Daniel Lewis, the Dibner Senior Curator of the History of Science at The Huntington, discusses his new book about the birds of Hawaii. Belonging on an Island: Birds, Extinction, and Evolution in Hawai'i takes readers on a thousand-year journey as it explores the state's magnificent birds, touching on topics ranging from the concept of belonging to the work of pioneering bird conservationists.

When German brewing magnate Adolphus Busch purchased a mansion on Pasadena's "Millionaires' Row" in 1904, he quickly bought up some 60 additional acres stretching down to the bottom of Arroyo Seco and developed it into a lushly landscaped parl. Busch Gardens, which opened to the public in 1906, featured terraced hillsides, waterfalls and ponds, and "fairy scenes" drawn from tales of the Brothers Grimm. Local historian Ann Scheid gives a fascinating lecture about this once-famous theme park, remnants of which can still be glimpsed around the neighborhood where it once stood.

Alexandra Walsham, professor of modern history at the University of Cambridge, explores how the English Reformation was remembered, forgotten, contested, and reinvented between 1530 and 1700 and discusses the enduring legacies that these processes have left in more recent cultural memory.

Author Susan Whitfield (Silk, Slaves and Stupas: Material Culture of the Silk Road) is joined by renowned theater director Peter Sellars for a fascinating conversation about the diversity of peoples and cultures that traveled the ancient trade routes of Afro-Eurasia.

Best-selling author Simon Winchester (The Professor and the Madman; The Men Who United the States) explores the origins of "precision" and the invisible role it plays, for good or for ill, in the way we live our lives. The lecture is drawn from his new book, The Perfectionists: How Precision Engineers Created the Modern World.