In The News: Department of History

Sputnik

Today, February 14 Valentine's Day, which is celebrated with gifts such as red roses, heart chocolates and teddy bears, dates back to a festival celebrated in Ancient Rome in the 6th century BC.The unchanging symbol of February 14, which has passed through various stages and loaded different meanings over time, is love and love.

New York Times

The league has partnerships with several companies and casinos and a record number of bets are expected to be placed on the Super Bowl. That would have been unlikely years ago given its stance.

CNET

On Valentine's Day, millions present flowers, chocolates and cards to their sweethearts. While the holiday's traditions really became cemented in the 1800s, historians link its roots to wild pagan revelries from before the birth of Saint Valentine himself.

Teen Vogue

The origins of Valentine’s Day are pretty obscure. While scholars generally agree that the holiday was popularized in the 1840s in the U.K. and U.S., the specific historical roots of the celebration remain ambiguous. Some say it began with the Roman pagan festival Lupercalia, a fertility festival from February 13-15 involving animal sacrifice, ritualized sex play, and general debauchery. Others point to Roman emperor Claudius II’s execution of several men named Valentine on February 14, one of whom later became a martyr in the Christian faith. Fast forward several centuries and the holiday shows up again in the Middle Ages, with Chaucer’s poem “Parliament of Fowls” (referring to the mating pattern of birds in early spring), and later in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, which alludes to lucky lovers meeting on St. Valentine’s Day. But how do a pagan fertility festival, a Christian martyr, and English poetry connect with this now ubiquitous, commercialized celebration of love?

WRAL

Jolene Sliwka was searching through a thrift store for vintage t-shirts and used records 35 years ago when she picked up a “scratch off and sniff” Valentine’s Day card and added it to her haul.

The Michigan Daily

What is love? Scientists explain it in terms of the body’s release of adrenaline, dopamine and serotonin; cynics refute its existence by citing ancient philosophy. The Greeks had six words to describe it, whereas Merriam Webster offers a simple definition. More recently, a Hallmark card asserted that love is when you find “the sprinkled donut in a sea of glazed.”

Republika Network

The month of February comes again, and the crowds come again about whether Indonesians should celebrate the so-called "Valentine's Day". Regardless of the choice of dear readers, let's look at a number of facts about this world-wide Western tradition.

KSNV-TV: News 3

When it comes to the Golden Age of Hollywood, Clara Bow and Rex Bell were at the very top.

KTNV-TV: ABC 13

Nevada hit ten straight billion-dollar months—a streak that continues to grow.

KTNV-TV: ABC 13

Nevada hit ten straight billion-dollar months—a streak that continues to grow.

Zinn Education Project

As the nation faces ongoing threats of white supremacist violence and voter suppression legislation, more than 200 scholars of U.S. history have signed an open letter urging school districts to devote more time and resources to teaching the Reconstruction era in upper elementary, middle, and high school U.S. history and civics courses.

El Tiempo

It wasn't the first hotel to be built in Las Vegas as some claim, but the Golden Gate is a hotel full of firsts.