The profile that led to the Massey Energy CEO’s resignation.

Jeremy Wilson spent years crisscrossing the country and inventing new identities as a war hero, an MIT grad, a Hollywood journalist, and more.

Ashima Shiraishi is the most talented rock climber in the world. She’s also 14.

The urban legend about the guy who hooked a rocket up to the back of his car and drove/flew it into a mountain? The anonymous author claims the story is about him and some of his small town high school buddies.

About 100 miles from Galveston, Flower Garden Banks is home to some of the healthiest coral communities in the world. Some unlikely allies came together to help expand protections, but will it be enough?

How the illegitimate son of Liberian ex-President (and accused cannibal) Charles Taylor went from being a small time Florida hoodlum to one of Africa’s most notorious killers.

Interviews with modern travelling salesmen. The article inspired Kirn’s novel Up in the Air.

What makes this a truly military culture, besides its overwhelming maleness, its air of emotional deprivation and the lousy rations, is its obsession with rank and hierarchy. Like jungle gorillas, business travelers always know where they stand versus the rest of the group. In this parallel universe of upgrade vouchers and priority-boarding privileges, everyone has a number and a position, and who gets that open aisle seat in first class means even more on the road then who earns what.

An oral history of the Pacers/Pistons melee in 2004.

How a longtime gambling addict and a small band of his cronies manipulated both the game and betting exchanges from a tiny Berlin cafe, going as far as buying ownerships of teams in order to insure their failure.

During his nearly six years in the Air Force, Airman First Class Brandon Bryant flew hundreds of missions and logged almost 6,000 hours of flight time. He killed or helped kill 1,626 people. And he never left Nevada.

“We must be grateful for the smallest of blessings. Last week I saw and heard some things that provided a measure of hope and nuance in these grim and hysterical times.”

Unpacking the empty promises of the minimalism craze.

On returning to Lagos after years abroad.

It is always understood when you leave Nigeria as a Nigerian that you will return at some point.

Revealing the murder of 109 Vietnamese civilians during a 1968 search-and-destroy mission on a rumored Viet Gong stronghold, often referred to in military circles as Pinkville, actually the village of My Lai.

The woman that the mixed martial arts star beat nearly to death tells her side of the story.

How an Iraqi expat conned the United States, without ever once being interviewed by an American official, into making the case that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. “Believe me, there was no other way to bring about freedom to Iraq.”

Journalist Kim Wall was murdered aboard a homemade submarine while reporting on the designer of the vessel. Her friend and fellow journalist wanted to know what really happened to her.

How we became suckers for the hard labor of self-optimization.

The enigmatic leader of the U.A.E. may soon emerge as the region’s most powerful figure. What does he really want?

Gavin McInnes used to be known as a Vice magazine co-founder with controversial political leanings and an affinity for darkly unfunny jokes. Now, he’s also known as the founder of the far-right group the Proud Boys.

On riding China’s Qinghai-Tibet Railway just before it opened:

Staring out at the shimmering tracks and concrete-reinforced embankment extending to the horizon, I can’t help but think of the senior Chinese scientist who confessed to me that the rail line he helped build might not be safe for long.

“I had inherited a Rolodex full of useful phone numbers (the College Board, a helpful counselor in the UCLA admissions office), but the number I kept handing out was that of a family therapist.”

On the structural underpinnings of the revolts currently shaking the Arab world.

The organization’s leadership is focused on external threats, but the real crisis is of its own making.

The importance of the sports metaphor in the American consciousness and why Lewis Lapham didn’t join the C.I.A.