The Mask Slackers of 1918

As the influenza pandemic swept across the United States in 1918 and 1919, masks took a role in political and cultural wars.

People waiting for masks in San Francisco in 1918.Credit…Hamilton Henry Dobbin, via California State Library

By Christine Hauser

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China’s rat tribe: Over a million people still live in subterranean tunnels underneath Beijing 50 years after Chairman Mao told them to ‘dig deep’ to survive the Cold War

Over a million people are living in subterranean tunnels in China 50 years after they were built as a bomb shelter during the Cold War.

Low income workers known as the ‘Rat Tribe’ now occupy the tunnels, which cover an estimated area of 30 square miles. 

Construction of the underground city, dubbed ‘The Dungeon’, began in 1969 when the threat of nuclear war was at its peak. A man sits inside his apartment inside a Chinese air defense bunker in the outskirts of Beijing, China

A man sits inside his apartment inside a Chinese air defense bunker in the outskirts of Beijing, China

Continue reading “China’s rat tribe: Over a million people still live in subterranean tunnels underneath Beijing 50 years after Chairman Mao told them to ‘dig deep’ to survive the Cold War”