Offbeat History: Lisztomania
In 2015, we talked about Franz Liszt, who was a pianist, a composer and a conductor, and basically the first rock star who drove fans into fits of swooning and screaming. Some fans even stole the detr...
19 Mar 202026min
Offbeat History: The Great Moon Hoax of 1835, Part 2
The second part of this offbeat revisit! As the New York Sun's series of astonishing moon discoveries concluded, most people recognized that it was a hoax. But what made people buy into the tall tale ...
19 Mar 202024min
Offbeat History: The Great Moon Hoax of 1835, Part 1
This offbeat 2015 episode covers a series of 1835 news articles about some utterly mind-blowing discoveries made by Sir John Herschel about the lunar surface. The serial had everything: moon poppies, ...
19 Mar 202024min
Offbeat History: Hennig Brand and the Discovery of Phosphorus
It's a 2019 show about urine! Spoiler alert: Hennig Brand discovered phosphorous by boiling pee. But he was trying to do something else: He thought the secret to the philosopher’s stone might be found...
19 Mar 202029min
Offbeat History: A Culinary History of Spam
Back in 2014, we tackled SPAM's story. This famous Hormel Foods product was invented in the 1930s to make use of a surplus of shoulder meat from pigs. It played a huge role in WWII, and shaped the cui...
19 Mar 202027min
Offbeat History: The Mystery of the Devil’s Footprints
In October 2017, we talked about mysterious prints that looked like hoof marks appeared all over the English seaside county of Devon in February 1855. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www....
19 Mar 202029min
Offbeat History: The American Hippo Ranch Plan, Part 2
We continue out offbeat 2015 story. Once the effort to import hippos to the U.S. got the backing of a politician, two men with intertwined histories, Frederick Russel Burnham and Fritz Duquesne, were ...
19 Mar 202024min
Offbeat History: The American Hippo Ranch Plan, Part 1
An offbeat episode from 2015: In 1910, the U.S. a meat shortage, and a water hyacinth overgrowth problem. The obvious solution to the dilemma: Import hippos from Africa. Learn more about your ad-choi...
19 Mar 202020min
