‘Monkey Biz-ness’: Pop culture helped fan the flames of the Scopes ‘monkey trial’ 100 years ago − and ever since

The Scopes Monkey Trial at 100: Who really won?

If anyone remembers the Scopes Monkey Trial today, it’s most likely because of its fictionalized retelling in the classic 1960 movie “Inherit the Wind.” Itself an adaptation of a popular play, “Inherit the Wind” stars Spencer Tracy as the Clarence Darrow stand-in, an idealistic lawyer defending a man accused of teaching the theory of evolution to schoolchildren — a crime according to (recently passed) Tennessee state law.It was not evolutionists…

‘Monkey Biz-ness’: Pop culture helped fan the flames of the Scopes ‘monkey trial’ 100 years ago − and ever since

The star attorneys of the Scopes trial: Clarence Darrow, left, for the defense and William Jennings Bryan for the prosecution. Historica Graphica Collection/Heritage Images/Getty ImagesAsk Americans about the Scopes trial, and they might have heard of it as the “trial of the century,” a showdown over teaching human evolution. Less well known are its origins. As historian Edward J. Larson observed in “Summer for the Gods,” his Pulitzer Prize-winn…

Inherit the Fight: How the Scopes Trial's Legacy Lives on in Today's Classroom Wars

As the Scopes Trial marks its 100th anniversary, states are again testing the boundaries of religion in public schools, reigniting century-old constitutional questions.