Cultures News

Behind today's Google doodle: Get the facts on Halloween 2009 and Halloween history, this year's most popular costumes, record-breaking pumpkins, and more in National Geographic News's Halloween roundup.

October 31, 2009
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Forty years after the first simple network message crossed California and crashed the Internet's precursor, the system's current ubiquity leaves at least one of its creators "surprised and totally pleased."

Updated 4:15 p.m. ET, October 29, 2009
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In time for Halloween, archaeologists have unearthed a witch bottle—a stone jug that may have contained toenails, hair, and other bodily bits to deter witches and other evildoers.

October 29, 2009
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Forty years after the first simple network message crossed California, the Internet has transformed our lives—and experts argue it should be a right, rather than a privilege.

October 29, 2009
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A far cry from the Twilight vampires, naughty nurses, and Spider-Men of 2009, the first Halloween costumes included animal skins and heads, drag getups, and even mechanical horse heads, historians say.

Updated October 29, 2009
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Get the facts on Halloween history, today's most popular costumes, record-breaking pumpkins, and more in National Geographic News's 2009 Halloween roundup.

Updated October 28, 2009
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Wild dromedary camels, brought to Australia in the mid-19th century to help explore and develop the outback, were left to breed and survive on their own. Now they number a million in the wild and have become pests, officials say. Video.

October 26, 2009
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When is the big daylight saving time (often called daylight savings time) switchover in autumn 2009? Why do we fall back in the first place?

Updated October 26, 2009
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Australia's iconic, island-like Uluru, or Ayers Rock, may soon be off limits to climbers, mainly because Aborigines see the desert sandstone formation as sacred. Video.

October 16, 2009
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Highway bridges, an 80s public library, and a concrete powerboat arena are just some of the U.S. structures named on the World Monument Fund's 2010 Watch List of landmarks worth preserving.

October 13, 2009
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Today's announcement that U.S. swine flu deaths among children are "shooting up" is generating headlines. Meanwhile swine flu is infecting another group up to five times more often than the general public, advocates say.

October 9, 2009
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The inescapable bar code celebrates its 57th anniversary Wednesday, with a little help from Google. Find out how it came to be, why it's still with us, and what's next.

October 7, 2009
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See Bluestonehenge, the newly discovered site that archaeologists say was likely a key stop on the journey to the afterworld—and to Stonehenge itself—for many Stone Age Britons.

October 5, 2009
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The newfound "Bluestonehenge" stone circle may have been a ritual pit stop on the road to Stonehenge—and the afterlife.

October 5, 2009
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People around the world are celebrating Mohandas K. Gandhi's 140th birthday, including children who dressed as him (mustache and all), U.S. President Barack Obama—even Google.

October 2, 2009

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