Gregor MacGregor and the Biggest Scam in History
One of the most audacious scams in history took place in the early 19th century in Britain. A man sold thousands of people a dream of land in the New World. His claims attracted large investments, en...
27 Jun 202416min
The Discovery and Burial of the Remains of Richard III (Encore)
The death of a British monarch is a very big event. Thousands of people may take part in the funeral and procession, with millions more lining up to pay their respects and billions more watching on te...
26 Jun 202412min
Air Conditioning
One of the biggest problems that humanity has faced for thousands of years is heat. Excessive heat made it difficult to work in the middle of the day. Heat was especially problematic in the tropics, ...
25 Jun 202414min
The Formation of the United Nations
In the midst of the Second World War, the Allied powers began planning ahead for what the post-war world was going to look like. The Legion of Nations had failed to prevent World War II. If they were...
24 Jun 202415min
The Marginal Revolution (Encore)
In most academic disciplines, there is often a single idea or discovery which makes everything fall into place. All of the things which didn’t make sense before suddenly do when looked through this n...
23 Jun 202412min
The French Foreign Legion
A popular topic of films has been the French Foreign Legion. The French Foreign Legion was supposed to be an organization where someone could get a new identity and a new start on life, even if they ...
22 Jun 202414min
The Domestication of Cats (Encore)
Dogs and cats are both domesticated, four-legged, fur-bearing mammals. Beyond that, they really don’t have much in common. One of the things that they don’t have in common is how they wound up in the...
21 Jun 202413min
The History of Skyscrapers
If you were to pick a single visible icon to represent the 20th century, it would probably be the skyscraper. Skyscrapers didn’t really even exist before the 20th century, but by the end of the centu...
20 Jun 202414min
