THIS ARTICLE IS ADAPTED FROM THE MAY 18, 2024, EDITION OF GASTRO OBSCURA’S FAVORITE THINGS NEWSLETTER. YOU CAN SIGN UP HERE. Music is all about context. The same high-energy track that keeps you moving at a concert might feel disruptive and annoying if blasted at a restaurant. A 2018 study published in the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Sciences...

"You don’t choose art, art chooses you," artist Herb Mignery told Nebraska Stories in 2020. “You may try to redirect it… but it’s just something that has to be done. It’s just an itch that you have to scratch.” Growing up in the small town of Barlett, Nebraska, Mignery’s connection was to the land and those who worked it. His bronze sculptures, fluid...

We’ve all heard the bumps in the night. Strange sounds that have us questioning our senses. Was that the wind? A creaky floorboard? An animal outside? Usually, a quick flick of a light switch reveals that those shadows in the dark were just everyday objects. But sometimes those strange sounds, eerie, happenings, or creepy sense of not being alone,...

When the Strategic Air Command & Aerospace Museum hosted an opening day ceremony on a windy March day in 1967, no one expected that the event would be just as full of aviation excitement as the museum’s exhibits. To celebrate the opening of the museum, which at the time touted displays of vintage aircraft like World War II bombers and an X-15,...

The late 1800s brought a lot of change to central Nebraska’s North Loup Valley. This was the era that the first non-Indigenous residents began making their way to the region, trying to make new lives in an unfamiliar land, and in 1872, a group from Wisconsin established their first settlement. They may have been confused, a little lost, a little overwhelmed...

There is a quiet wonder that happens when you see a dark sky—a really dark sky. Free from the light sources that are a regular part of modern life, the sky reveals itself. Stars seem to be layered, a shining blanket of light. Planets come into view. Galaxies leave a stardust streak across the sky. Moments like these, places like these are worth preserving....