Words by Robert Neff Photos from the collection of Robert Neff One of the earliest modernizations to Seoul was the...
Modern Seoul is filled with hotels and getting a room is generally not much of a problem, but it wasn’t...
History isn’t without its foibles and quirks. If it’s not lack a of information about Shakespeare, then it’s the real truths behind Lincoln’s press for abolishing slavery. Korean history, however, benefits from a stringent documentation of history and an unforgivingly detailed account of many historical figures. So here we are...
Words by Robert Neff, Photos courtesy of the Robert Neff collection As the primary way of accessing Seoul during the early...
The children of Joseon period Korea may not have had a holiday dedicated to them, but they still had to shoulder heavy domestic and scholastic responsibilities like their counterparts today.
As we welcome in another New Year with copious amounts of food and alcohol in homes or at local pubs and clubs, let us pause for a moment and reflect on how the New Year was celebrated by Koreans a century ago. Although the solar New Year – December 31/January...
Modern transportation has made travel to most places in Korea, no matter how distant from Seoul, easy and comfortable. However,...
Life at the Western gold mines in northern Korea was dangerous both inside and out in the 19th and early...
We all know that students have it rough in Korea. They go to school early in the morning and then after school spend several additional hours in private learning institutes studying math and English. These institutes are everywhere now, but they haven’t always been. In 1882—just prior to Korea opening...
From unwieldy pipes to black-market cigarettes, tobacco has been an important part of Korean society for over four hundred years....