The NHL announced Monday that it will not participate in the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea, refusing for the first time in 20 years to halt its season for three weeks so its stars can chase gold for their home countries. From Alex Ovechkin and Jonathan Toews to Connor …

Exhibit at London’s Saatchi Gallery is showcasing the worldwide phenomenon. …

In early September 1930, the Blackfeet Nation of Montana hosted a historic Indian Sign Language Grand Council, gathering leaders of a dozen North American Nations and language groups. The three-day council held was organized by Hugh L. Scott, a 77-year-old U.S. Army General who had spent a good portion of …

While Justin Timberlake had a show-stopping moment alongside Chris Stapleton at the 2015 Country Music Association Awards, it was the Backstreet Boys who shined brightly at the 2017 Academy of Country Music Awards.   The boy band had the night’s liveliest moment Sunday in Las Vegas: the fivesome brought the …

Chicago blues musician Lonnie Brooks, whose relationship with his adopted hometown was cemented by his hit recording of Robert Johnson’s Sweet Home Chicago, has died at age 83. A prolific musician known for his intense guitar solos and raspy but strong voice, Brooks died Saturday night, his son Ronnie Baker …

A German software company has used drones and laser imaging to take people back in time to the ancient Italian city of Volterra. The goal of the project is to save historically significant places in cyberspace as time continues to slowly wear them down. …

The best women’s hockey players in the U.S. can now make a living playing the sport they love thanks to a landmark agreement with USA Hockey reached after a threat to boycott the world championship. The deal will likely help their counterparts north of the border make more money in …

To Doris Day’s many admirers, the pert and fresh-faced charmer who starred in “Pillow Talk” and “Move Over Darling” is ageless. But Day turns 95 on Monday – which is a birthday surprise to even the star herself, who has long pegged her age to a 1924 birthdate that would …

American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan accepted his Nobel Prize in literature Saturday in Stockholm, members of the Swedish Academy and local media reported. Dylan received his Nobel diploma and medal during a small ceremony at a hotel near where he performed later Saturday, Klas Ostergren, a member of the Swedish Academy, …

Acclaimed Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko, whose work focused on war atrocities and denounced anti-Semitism and tyrannical dictators, has died. He was 84. Ginny Hensley, a spokeswoman for Hillcrest Medical Center in Tulsa, confirmed Yevtushenko’s death. Roger Blais, provost at the University of Tulsa, where Yevtushenko was a longtime faculty member, …

Rodney Crowell’s tender lyrics about a woman with “hair two shades of foxtail red” in a song that features ex-wife Rosanne Cash makes it an easy leap to assume that he’s singing about her. It’s not like the thought didn’t cross her mind.   “If I’m totally honest,” she said. …

Already one of the biggest names in Latin music, Colombian pop star Maluma is hoping to cross over to a wider audience with an upcoming album of Spanish and English music. Maluma, the 23-year-old singer from Medellin, Colombia, has already collaborated with some of Latin music’s most successful cross over …

We’re lighting up the five most popular songs in the Billboard Hot 100 Pop Singles chart, for the week ending April 1, 2017. As has been the case, we welcome one new song this week…and it’s a big jumper. Number 5: The Weeknd & Daft Punk “I Feel It Coming” …

Rain-fed wildflowers have been sprouting from California’s desert sands after lying dormant for years — producing a spectacular display that has drawn record crowds and traffic jams to tiny towns like Borrego Springs.   An estimated 150,000 people in the past month have converged on this town of about 3,500, …

During World War II, the Warsaw Zoo in Poland’s capital became a hideout for Jews escaping Nazi persecution. Niki Caro’s film, The Zookeeper’s Wife, chronicles this true story, highlighting the courage and compassion of Jan and Antonina Zabinski, a couple who risked their lives and the life of their son …

During WWII, the Warsaw Zoo became a refuge for Jews hiding from Nazi persecution. Niki Caro’s film “The Zookeeper’s Wife,” chronicles this true story, highlighting the courage and compassion of zookeepers Jan and Antonina Zabinski, a couple who risked their lives and the life of their son to protect those …

In a custom-built arena in Kabul, crowds cheered as young Afghan men punched, kicked and wrestled in the country’s first professional mixed martial arts league, a welcome distraction to the violence besetting the country. While cricket and football more commonly grab public attention in Afghanistan, fighters and fans see martial …

On Tuesday, it will be “1984” again in movie theaters across the country. About 190 art-house theaters have banded together to show the 1984 big-screen adaptation of George Orwell’s dystopian masterpiece as a pointed comment on the presidency of Donald Trump, whose “alternative facts” administration has already sent “1984” back …

During their first-ever formal meeting, culture ministers representing Group of Seven industrialized nations on Thursday decried the looting and trafficking of cultural treasures by terror groups while experts acknowledged that objects believed looted by extremists are starting to surface in the marketplace. The topic was on the table both during …

Afghanistan’s first – and only – all-female symphony is trying to change attitudes in a deeply conservative country where many see music as immoral, especially for women.   The symphony’s two conductors show how difficult that can be, but also how satisfying success is.   One of them, Negin Khpolwak, …

A college in Susan B. Anthony’s western New York hometown has acquired a trove of 19th-century letters she wrote to a fellow leader in the women’s rights movement.   The University of Rochester says the collection originally owned by Isabella Beecher Hooker includes dozens of letters from fellow suffragists Susan …

In addition to visiting the hallowed battlesite grounds at Vicksburg National Military Park, national parks traveler Mikah Meyer also had the chance to visit several other national park sites in Mississippi, each with its own unique history. Natchez National Historical Park Natchez National Historical Park, in the southern part of …

The FBI has recovered a 1919 Norman Rockwell painting stolen more than 40 years ago from a New Jersey home. The painting, sometimes called “Lazybones” or “Boy Asleep with Hoe,” graced the cover of the Sept. 6, 1919, edition of the Saturday Evening Post. The oil-on-canvas piece was among several …

Part of music icon Bob Dylan’s once-secret 6,000-piece archive, including thousands of hours of studio sessions, film reels and caches of unpublished lyrics, has opened in Oklahoma. More than 1,000 pieces of the collection spanning Dylan’s six-decade career are available to scholars at the Gilcrease Museum’s Helmerich Center for American …

Universal Pictures is going back to its roots — monsters. The studio Wednesday debuted footage from its upcoming adventure film The Mummy, which opens a monster universe drawing on Universal’s vault of classic properties like Bride of Frankenstein, Invisible Man and Creature from the Black Lagoon. Tom Cruise stars in the Alex …