Examples of mathematical work that gained recognition after it was outlined by journalists Having a background in both mathematics and journalism, I'm interested in examples of previously barely recognized mathematical achievements that received recognition after having been given attention by journalists through expository articles.
A good example is given by Victor Protsak's answer to the MO question "Major mathematical advancements past age fifty", where he mentions the work of Thomas Royen. His proof of the Gaussian Correlation Inequality received little attention upon its publication in 2014. It was only after Natalie Wolchover published a Quanta article in 2017 that he was given wide public and academic acclaim - as stated on his wiki page.
Question: are there other examples of mathematical work that were long forgotten or barely recognized, only to be revived by journalists who wrote up a story on the theorem(s) and the history behind them?
 A: To elaborate on Somos's comment, David Gale wrote about The Strange and Surprising Saga of the Somos Sequences in the December 1991 "Mathematical Entertainments" column of the Mathematical Intelligencer.  First studied by Michael Somos in the course of his investigations of elliptic theta functions, these amazing sequences continue to inspire new research to this day; see for example the OEIS entry A006720 for Somos-4.
This example is a little unusual, though, because I don't think that Somos (or anyone else) formally published any research papers on Somos sequences before Gale's expository article.  In a footnote, Gale wrote:

Somos actually discovered his sequences eight years ago but did
not succeed in capturing the attention of the mathematical community until the summer of 1989.

A: There are several examples featuring Martin Gardner.  R. B. Kershner's work on tiling the plane with convex pentagons would probably have been largely ignored (with his mistake remaining undiscovered for who knows how long) had Gardner not chosen to write about it.  Conway's Game of Life was also unknown to all but a few people close to Conway until Gardner wrote about it.  I'm sure there are many other Martin Gardner examples.
