Steven Hansen
World's Happiest Place to Live 2023: Finland
Finland has been named the happiest country in the world for six years in a row – 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023. That honor was...
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Steven Hansen
- Mar 5
- 2 min
This Town Has the Best Water in the World in 2023
The finest tap water in the world comes from a place in Canada named – appropriately – Clearbrook. That neighborhood of Abbotsford,...
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Steven Hansen
- Jan 18
- 7 min
Best-of-the-Best Pizzerias in the U.S. 2023
Napoletano Gennaro Lombardi opened the first pizzeria in the U.S., on Spring Street in New York City’s Little Italy in 1905 -- and it's...
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Steven Hansen
- Dec 24, 2022
- 4 min
'Our Best Christmas ever...'
Our daughter was a 2-month-old baby and had recently come home from the hospital that Christmas. My husband and I had a lot of hospital...
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Steven Hansen
- Dec 8, 2022
- 4 min
Tucker Grant: Merchant of Joy
Before we’ve even finished clearing the table and packing up the Thanksgiving leftovers, the Christmas tree sellers are putting the final...
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Steven Hansen
- Nov 14, 2022
- 2 min
Ginkgo “The Living Fossil” Tree
City folks, especially in New York and Philadelphia are quite familiar with ginkgo trees, not only because of their exotic fan-shaped...
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Steven Hansen
- Oct 30, 2022
- 1 min
World’s Biggest Jack-O-Lantern Carved on Friday
Got 11 hours? Grab a Starbuck’s Trenta (their largest size at 31 oz.) Pumpkin Spice Frappuccino and sit back to enjoy watching the video...
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Steven Hansen
- Aug 4, 2022
- 3 min
The Remotest Island in the World
Next time you feel like really getting away from it all, why not sail on down to Tristan da Cunha? It’s the remotest inhabited island on...
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Steven Hansen
- May 29, 2022
- 8 min
“Recalculating… Enjoy Your Trip!”
Thank ye tech gods for inventing GPS, and the Google Maps lady whose calm and confident navigation gets us where we need to go!...
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Steven Hansen
- Apr 28, 2022
- 8 min
Great Passageways
We are always moving. Crossing passageways from point A to point B, beginning to end, winter to spring, border to border, good to bad,...
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Steven Hansen
- Mar 12, 2022
- 1 min
7 Minutes of Joy: Monarch Butterfly Sanctuary
One of the most amazing natural wonders of the world is the annual migration of the beautiful orange and black Monarch butterfly (Danaus...
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Steven Hansen
- Feb 23, 2022
- 2 min
World’s Booklovers Open 125,000 Miniature Libraries
Traverse City, MI Small town ideas sometimes turn into stunning worldwide movements. Long before the popular tiny house trend, were the...
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Steven Hansen
- Jan 19, 2022
- 2 min
Really Underground Book Reviews
Any book that can hold the attention of a New Yorker riding a jam-packed subway car that's screeching and lurching through the bowels of...
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HA Staff
- Dec 8, 2021
- 2 min
Heart to Heart Stories: A Real Secret Santa Delivers
Not enough years ago, I was sitting outside my second story apartment on the stairs outside my door. It was late on Christmas Eve. My son...
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Steven Hansen
- Dec 1, 2021
- 3 min
Gather Around the Storytelling Radio
One big lesson we learned early on in the pandemic was how much we missed being together with other humans in those everyday social...
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Steven Hansen
- Oct 25, 2021
- 2 min
Caution: Buying Art May Be Addictive
For less than the price of a pack of cig’s, you can own an original painting by a noted artist. Or a piece of handmade jewelry, a...
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Steven Hansen
- Sep 9, 2021
- 1 min
A New Ritual is Born in Denmark
The stunning new public library building in Aarhus, Denmark, seems to float above the shining sea of the city’s revitalized waterfront....
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Steven Hansen
- Sep 6, 2021
- 3 min
142 Days on the Appalachian Trail
In early spring of 2018, St. Louis-area business attorney Evan Schaeffer decided it was time to go outside and take a walk in the woods –...
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Steven Hansen
- Aug 16, 2021
- 1 min
Banksy’s Summer 'Spraycation'
Sure, he’s subversive, political, and anti-art-establishment, but England’s mysterious and often-maddening street artist Banksy can sure...
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Steven Hansen
- Aug 9, 2021
- 1 min
8 Minutes of Joy: Firefly Sanctuary
Follow adventure traveler Mike Corey into the Magic Forest near Nanacamilpa, Tlaxcala, Mexico, to see one of the most amazing sights of...
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Steven Hansen
- Jul 12, 2021
- 1 min
Concrete Zen Moments
When you see a fire hydrant or mailbox or trash can magically highlighted by waves of concentric painted ripples, you do take notice --...
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Steven Hansen
- Jun 30, 2021
- 3 min
Old School Cool
Maybe you think about it once a year – that first blistering day in June that catches you off guard, before you’ve put the AC units back...
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Deena Ebbert
- Jun 22, 2021
- 1 min
Heart to Heart Stories: Going Home
Home. You can go back home, no matter what the tropes say. You can have laughs and yummy food and good conversations and hugs. You can...
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Steven Hansen
- Jun 9, 2021
- 2 min
There are Nests in These Library Branches!
One thing we’ve learned to appreciate over the past year is the nurturing need to nest. Not just the act of staying safe and healthy at...
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Steven Hansen
- Jun 2, 2021
- 1 min
Heart to Heart Stories: A Father's Love
Nate, a high school student in Michigan at the time, sent this letter to FCKH8.com, an activist organization for gay youth, who posted it...
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Steven Hansen
- May 19, 2021
- 2 min
The Boy Who Can’t Stop Doodling
“My favorite things to doodle are monsters, aliens and food,” says 11-year-old Joe Whale, aka “The Doodle Boy,” the creative wunderkind...
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Steven Hansen
- May 13, 2021
- 1 min
55 Seconds of Joy
When Omarr K. Rambert, a recent UCLA School of Law graduate, found out on January 8 that he had passed the California Bar Exam, he was...
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Steven Hansen
- May 11, 2021
- 2 min
Uncorking Messages from the Past
Singer-songwriter Clint Buffington didn’t write Jim Croce’s 1973 hit “Time in a Bottle.” He wasn’t even born yet. But it could easily be...
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Happiness Archive Editor
- Apr 30, 2021
- 1 min
Sidewalk Splendor in a Flash
For the past six years, the floral design team of Lewis Miller has installed startlingly beautiful “flower flashes” on street corners,...
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HA Staff
- Apr 27, 2021
- 1 min
2:25 Minutes of Joy: Trumpet Giveaway
“To all the youth in New Orleans, Bring me a gun and I’ll give you a trumpet, no questions asked. I’m doing this until I run out of...
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Steven Hansen
- Apr 17, 2021
- 1 min
Tim Takes the Reins, Technically
If you don’t know about Tim Tiller, you’ve missed out on one of the few honest-to-goodness treats to come out of an otherwise dark...
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Steven Hansen
- Apr 12, 2021
- 1 min
Pink See-Saws at Border Wall Win Design Award
The “Teeter-Totter Wall,” which bridged across the border wall at El Paso, TX, and Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, for a brief 40 minutes, has won...
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Steven Hansen
- Apr 6, 2021
- 2 min
Heart to Heart Stories: A Moment of Comfort
I was on the 15L bus in Denver, Colorado, on my way home from work. The 15L was the East Colfax bus, meaning it didn't serve the fancy,...
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Steven Hansen
- Mar 21, 2021
- 1 min
3 Minutes of Joy: Barn Sanctuary
Dan McKernan quit his job at a tech company in Texas and moved back to the 140-year-old family farm in Michigan to start an animal...
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Steven Hansen
- Mar 18, 2021
- 1 min
The Purposeful Beauty of India’s ‘Saree Libraries’
Local libraries and nonprofits have been in the business of lending free things to the public forever – not just books, but also...
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Happiness Archive Editor
- Feb 26, 2021
- 1 min
Dear Diary #1
Sometimes diary entries – those private posts people wrote to themselves before the internet was invented – reveal that famous people are...
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HA Staff
- Feb 26, 2021
- 1 min
Love Letters: Road Dawg
We love finding and rescuing old letters and keepsake photos from inside books and boxes at second-hand stores. Love letters are...
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Steven Hansen
- Feb 23, 2021
- 1 min
Heart to Heart Stories: TIM
Can a story that makes you cry also make you happy? This true story of good humor, love and loss in 1990s New York City will bring you to...
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