In 1928, a strange phenomenon was sweeping the state of Idaho. A Boise resident might wake up on a typical Monday morning, drag themself out of bed, and they would hop in their car to drive to work, only to realize that their license plate had been stolen right off of their car. … | Continue reading
We’re used to disposing of hazardous sharps in specialized ways, from labeled bins at hospitals to slotted container covers in airports. So on some level, a variant of tile that accepts slim and dangerous razor blades seems familiar, except one has wonder: where does it lead? Rem … | Continue reading
Victorian nurse Florence Nightingale (played by her distant cousin Helena Bonham Carter) is a hero of modern medicine – but her greatest contribution to combating disease and death resulted from the vivid graphs she made to back her public health campaigns. Florence Nightingale l … | Continue reading
Mark Bloschock is an engineer from Texas, and in the late 1970s, he got a job with the Texas Department of Transportation renovating the Congress Avenue Bridge. The bridge was a simple concrete arch bridge that spans Lady Bird Lake in downtown Austin. It needed to be rebuilt wit … | Continue reading
Mark Bloschock is an engineer from Texas, and in the late 1970s, he got a job with the Texas Department of Transportation renovating the Congress Avenue Bridge. The bridge was a simple concrete arch bridge that spans Lady Bird Lake in downtown Austin. It needed to be rebuilt wit … | Continue reading
Everyone has seen renderings of icebergs with small hills on top and vast spikes protruding into the depths, appearing to embody common knowledge that 90% of an iceberg sits underwater. But as interested scientists are quick to point out: these iconic configurations don’t reflect … | Continue reading
It is a design technique familiar to anyone who has watched Star Wars, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, or essentially any space-centric science fiction film or series — a trick to imply scale through complexity. Despite seeing it many times over, though, you might not even know … | Continue reading
In early 2009, Christie’s International in Paris held a much-anticipated three-day auction from the private art collection of the late fashion designer, Yves Saint Laurent. The items up for sale were 733 pieces that Saint Laurent and his partner, Pierre Bergé had amassed over fiv … | Continue reading
When a sacred Xingu cave was systematically desecrated by unidentified vandals, historical etchings on the stone walls were physically lost, but not forgotten — thankfully, they had at least been well-documented, opening up options for their re-creation. The Factum Foundation, wh … | Continue reading
There are lots of reasons to build underground. In Singapore, there are skyscrapers being constructed under the earth because the country has run out of space on the surface. In Toronto, Canada, there’s a network of tunnels called The Path that connects the whole downtown, so peo … | Continue reading
Santa Fe is famous in part for a particular architectural style, an adobe look that’s known as Pueblo Revival. This aesthetic combines elements of indigenous pueblo architecture and New Mexico’s old Spanish missions, resulting in mostly low, brown buildings with smooth edges. Bui … | Continue reading
Snaps, crackles, pops and other unwanted sounds can be a bane to media producers but a boon for clever designers who create a wide range of quiet props for use in films and TV shows. Some solutions are relatively ad hoc while others are quite sophisticated. Above, Scott Reeder sh … | Continue reading
They will concede they are both older women, but beyond that, the vandals who changed the name of (what is now) Douglass Park by a single letter wish to remain anonymous. Their persistent crime? Adding a second “s” to “Douglas Park” signs in the Chicago Park District. “It had sta … | Continue reading
Cities around the world have distinctive modes of transportation — the canals of Venice, the double-decker busses of London, and the Twin Cities (of Minneapolis and St. Paul) have skyways. In both downtowns, there are vast networks of climate-controlled pedestrian bridges that re … | Continue reading
They will concede they are both older women, but beyond that, the vandals who changed the name of what is now Douglass Park by a single letter wish to remain anonymous. Their persistent crime? Adding a second “s” to “Douglas Park” signs in the Chicago Park District. “It had start … | Continue reading
Here in Oakland, homelessness is never out of sight, out of mind. In less than five years (between 2015 and 2019) the rate of homelessness doubled. Reporter and Oakland resident Katie Mingle has a simple question with a complex answer: “What are we doing about all of it?” The way … | Continue reading
Most years, we release two sets of mini-stories, but this year our team is larger than ever and, well, we simply have more stories to tell! For our third installment, 99% Invisible producers talked with host Roman Mars about the health-related origins of radiators, one of the rem … | Continue reading
In this set of short stories, 99% Invisible producers talked with host Roman Mars about everything from climate-changing sheep to the persistent urban legend behind the invention of a space pen. Sea Sheep by Emmett FitzGerald Off the shore of Scotland lies an array of islands cal … | Continue reading
It is extremely challenging to design something both to be sturdy and durable enough to survive a rocket launch but also able to be detonated on demand. But as a vessel travels up out of our planet’s atmosphere and heads into space, that is just what is needed — a lot of moving p … | Continue reading
To celebrate the 10th anniversary of 99% Invisible, we’ve been publishing a series of roundups, in part for new listeners and readers. In this end-of-the-year guide to end all guides, you might find something novel, or: new ways to get your friends and family into 99pi! Article 9 … | Continue reading
The use of checkered patterns by police forces has roots in Scottish heraldry, traditional tartans, and one particularly progressive police chief in northern Britain. Per the Glasgow Police Museum, it started like this: “Around the time of the First World War and shortly thereaft … | Continue reading
Each year, 99% Invisible producers select short design stories to talk about with host Roman Mars. Some of these were just too brief to make into full 99pi episodes, but many also reveal aspects of how we find ideas for (and ultimately make) the show. In this collection, we’ll ta … | Continue reading
In an era of social distancing, safely performing music with other people can be challenging — but one group has figured out a way to make it work using a set of four-by-four-foot greenhouses. Author Mary Robinette Kowal originally procured these miniature buildings to enable sum … | Continue reading
Roman Mars joins Jesse Thorne on Bullseye this week to talk about life before podcasting, and what decades in radio has taught him. Roman has worked in podcasts and radio for decades at this point, but his career didn’t start out in audio. He was originally getting a PhD in genet … | Continue reading
Buried in a 1971 edition of the New York Times lies a letter to the editor in which the author recounts catching, cooking, and eating a three-pound carp in the basement of a Manhattan building. “We had a lantern to pierce the cellar darkness,” he wrote, “and fifteen feet below I … | Continue reading
If homelessness is the problem, housing is the solution. But it’s not always that simple. Kate Cody has been living in her encampment community for a long time. And there’s no guarantee she’ll be able to make the transition inside, even with the golden ticket. “I didn’t think any … | Continue reading
Launched in February, the Slow Ways project was established to map out paths across Great Britain, aiming to locate and confirm walking routes across the island. But then the pandemic struck. Plans to meet in person across England, Wales and Scotland were cancelled, and a call wa … | Continue reading
When Tulicia Lee tried to get help with housing, she was essentially put on a big long list with a bunch of other homeless people. If you live in the U.S., your community probably has a list like this too. Where one ends up on the list can have huge implications, but how one rise … | Continue reading
The remains of Carnuntum, an ancient Roman city and military fort complex, sprawl out along the edge of the Danube River in Austria near Vienna. Visitors travel from around the world to explore this large, open-air museum and learn from pieces of the past. [Note: This short story … | Continue reading
In the 1980’s, a psychologist named Sam Tsemberis was working with mentally ill homeless people on the streets of New York. Sometimes, when he thought it was necessary to keep someone safe, Sam would have people committed to a psychiatric hospital. But a few months later, he’d no … | Continue reading
Asked about the genesis of her new album of 99pi music, Sean Real says it started with the very first episode she worked on: “I had the idea to put out the music from the beginning” Working on Miss Manhattan in 2016, Sean already wondered: “How am I going to release this?” Episod … | Continue reading
Katie heard a lot about 211 doing this reporting. Not just from Tulicia Lee who called a bunch of times, but from everyone—from homeless people and service providers and advocates. In her mind, it was the 911 of homelessness. Only, more often than not, it seemed like when people … | Continue reading
In the early days of the automobile, the United States government didn’t see much point in involving itself in a national system of roads. Horses, buggies and streetcars served local transit purposes in cities, while railroads provided comfortable intercity transportation. This l … | Continue reading
In the trailer for Ready Player One, a science-fiction film set in a packed dystopia, we zoom in on our protagonist living in a dilapidated landscape of stacked “mobile homes” known aptly as “the Stacks.” The Stacks symbolize anything but mobility, either physical or economic — i … | Continue reading
When we think about homelessness, we often have a certain image in our mind—people pushing shopping carts, or big sprawling tent encampments. But for the vast majority of homeless people, the experience is less visible. Many people who are unable to afford a place to live end up … | Continue reading
On January 3, 1979, two officers from the Los Angeles Police Department went to the home of Eulia May Love, a 39-year-old African-American mother. The police were there because of a dispute over an unpaid gas bill. The officers approached her, and Love allegedly threatened them w … | Continue reading
Last year, Katie and her girlfriend moved into a new apartment near Berkeley in the north part of Oakland. She was thrilled to find it because it had two bedrooms with a nice big kitchen and a washer and dryer in the unit. All this, and the place was still under $3,000 a month, … | Continue reading
There are spots like this in many cities, places where tourists are shuttled by tour buses to take silly photographs. Consider Pisa, where people use perspective to pretend they’re holding up the leaning tower. In this case, the city is Prague, the icon is the “Dancing House” by … | Continue reading
It’s a classic city scene: kids playing outside in the spray of fire hydrants, wrenched open and spilling water out onto the sizzling streets of the Big Apple. While removing caps still technically illegal in many cities, it’s common to find firefighters lending a hand and helpin … | Continue reading
Get all of your holiday shopping done in one place with a range of nifty new things in our shop, available separately or bundled into gift packs, including signed books, challenge coins and our new album. For the beautiful nerds in your life, look no further than the 99pi store! … | Continue reading
Chances are you’ve been spending a lot of time at home since March, and it’s starting to feel a little claustrophobic. But if you think about it … were you actually going outside all that much before the pandemic? Emily Anthes is the author of The Great Indoors: The Surprising Sc … | Continue reading
If you’ve never heard the podcast Song Exploder, then you are missing out, because it’s the perfect concept for a podcast. Hrishikesh Hirway interviews musical artists and gets them to break down a song into its component parts and talk about how it all came together. Here at 99p … | Continue reading
It’s hard to imagine a world in which most cities had their own local times, but back in the 19th century, that was the norm. The subjectivity of local times varying between adjacent towns caused all kinds of headaches, especially for railroad companies shuttling people between t … | Continue reading
Retail spaces are designed for impulse shopping. When you go to a store looking for socks and come out with a new shirt, it’s only partly your fault. Shops are trying to look so beautiful, so welcoming, the items so enticingly displayed and in such vast quantity, that the consum … | Continue reading
Do you remember… airplane travel? Packing into a tin can with 200 other people all breathing each other’s air? These days most of us are still avoiding plane travel. But, in the Before Times, when we boarded a flight, we all received the same familiar set of instructions. If you’ … | Continue reading
The Earth is regularly bombarded with ancient material from outer space, but most of it has historically be searched for and found in remote areas where it is easy to pick out from its surroundings. Scientists long dismissed urban landscapes as ideal hunting grounds because of th … | Continue reading
Ten years ago, 99% Invisible launched as a radio show and podcast. Five years later, we began to publish articles and videos as well. Some cover subjects that seemed too succinct to warrant entire episodes. Others make use of visuals to tell stories that would be challenging to d … | Continue reading
With the spread of American train networks in the late 1800s, more and more hobos (individuals without permanent jobs or homes) tried their luck on the rails, riding illegally across the country to find work and leaving their marks along the way, including visual symbols scrawled … | Continue reading