August 1961

Flying the Soviet flag, the nuclear icebreaker Lenin plows north, trailed by the icebreaker Yermak. Borne by such vessels and by aircraft, the Soviets probed the Arctic Ocean for decades, seeking military advantage in the Cold War and amassing vast stores of environmental data. Information derived from this archive is now being made public, along with rare photographs of the Russian scientists at work, National Geographic, February 1997

“All empires from sunrise to sunset have been given to us, and we owe them.” -Guyuk, Third Great Khan of the Mongols, National Geographic, February 1997

A big one that got away, a meteorite of perhaps a thousand tons was deflected from its course on August 10, 1972, by earth's atmosphere. Seen here in a fortuitous amateur photograph at Jackson Lake, Wyoming, leaving a trail over the Tetons a fireball was visible from Utah to Alberta, Canada, National Geographic, September 1986

Battleship fortress of Christendom, the Peñafiel castle was launched in the tenth century when Christians challenged Moorish power along the Duero, National Geographic, October 1984

Children of sacrifice, the remains of youths near the great temple of Colula recall the countless victims who perished on Aztec altars, National Geographic, October 1984

"Nature . . . . is a friend you will never lose until death--and even when you die, you disappear into nature." The outdoors was a church to Tolstoy, and he often meditated while strolling down a cathedral walk of linden trees at Yasnaya Polyana, National Geographic, June 1986

On the prowl through the Himalayan night, a snow leopard steps on a hidden pressure pad and activates a concealed camera, creating one of the first three self-portraits ever made of this magnificent, endangered animal, National Geographic, June 1986

Bidding to better their stock, deer-farm owners last year paid around N.Z. $4,000 apiece for breeding hinds at an auction in Christchurch, New Zealand, National Geographic, October 1986

Weightless in water, cosmonauts rehearse extravehicular activity at Star City, their training center outside of Moscow, National Geographic, October 1986

Across the state, at South Haven, a house teeters on a storm-eroded bluff over Lake Michigan. Property owners reject blame for building near the shore and lobby for projects to lower lake levels, National Geographic, July 1987

Glorious testament to Moorish Spain, the Great Mosque of Córdoba rose in A.D. 786. During the Reconquest of Spain a cathedral was erected within the mosque. These hooded penitentes pass soaring Moorish arches during Holy Week, National Geographic, July 1988

Last bastion of the Moors, the remote Alpujarras region in the mountains of southeastern Spain proved a refuge for more than a century to Spanish Muslims freeing religious persecution after the recapture of Granada in 1492. Keeping to their isolated sanctuary, those Moors who had refused to accept Christianity endured until the early 1600s, when the long arm of the Spanish Inquisition finally drove them into exile, National Geographic, July 1988

Artful arabesques and vivid tile work adorn the king's palace in Fez, Morocco. The technique of carving plaster walls with intricate, geometric patterns was widely used by Moorish architects and is still practiced today by craftsmen restoring buildings in Toledo and Granada, National Geographic, July 1988

The quiet light of contemplation shines from a woman who has finished dressing  a Christ figure for an Easter celebration in a Roman Catholic church in Chíuchíu, National Geographic, July 1988

They were in their bedroom. The mother, a young woman of 19, still clutched her one-and-a-half-year-old baby to her breast. The child, its teeth still coming in, grasped the mother's elbow. Over them lay a man of about 28, presumably the father, who had tried to shield the pair from a deadly rain of limestone building blocks weighing as much as 300 pounds, National Geographic, July 1988