Offbeat History: The Crash at Crush and Other Train Wreck Spectacles

Though John James Audubon was the son of a French planter, he cultivated the image of an American frontiersman. In this episode, New York Public Library curator Michael Inman joins us for a discussion...

18 Kesä 201220min

In 1849, Edgar Allan Poe disappeared for five days before he was found semi-conscious outside of a saloon. He died four days later, presumably from alcohol abuse. Over the years, many alternate cause-...

13 Kesä 201231min

William Kidd had settled down by 1695, but privateering was still in his blood. He struck up a plan to attack pirates plaguing English ships and enlisted investors to back his efforts. Eventually he w...

11 Kesä 201223min

By 1887, Nikola Tesla secured seven patents for components of his alternating current system. In 1888, George Westinghouse offered to hire Tesla to develop the AC system, and that's when the Current W...

6 Kesä 201227min

Laura Bridgman was the first deafblind person to be educated -- a feat accomplished by Samuel Gridley Howe in the 1830s. People from around the world came to see her, including Charles Dickens, who wr...

4 Kesä 201226min

In 1857 Nikola Tesla began work on direct current motor issues. In 1884, he approached Thomas Edison with ideas about alternating current, but Edison championed direct current. Their disagreement led ...

30 Touko 201216min

P.T. Barnum worked with many performers. Perhaps the most famous was the diminutive General Tom Thumb. Barnum also promoted Swedish singer Jenny Lind, but his biggest act was Jumbo the Elephant, an Af...

28 Touko 201226min

Operation Mincemeat aimed to relay false information to the Nazis by dropping a corpse where they would find it, along with fake documents. The British agents gave their corpse a backstory to make it ...

23 Touko 201228min