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

This 2013 episode delves into a maritime history mystery. The Flannan Islands have been rumored for centuries to be haunted or have some supernatural darkness. In 1900, three men vanished from the lig...

26 Jan 201923min

Sushruta’s Compendium is one of the foundational texts of Ayurveda, India’s traditional system of medicine. He’s also known as the father of plastic surgery, and was writing about medicine and surgery...

23 Jan 201926min

Not only was Teresa Carreño the most famous pianist of her day, she is considered to be Venezuela’s first international super star. And her personal life was just as compelling as her public persona. ...

21 Jan 201927min

This 2015 episode is all about pianist, composer and conductor Franz Liszt. He was basically the first rock star who drove fans into fits of swooning and screaming. Some fans even stole the detritus o...

19 Jan 201927min

Last time, we talked about Sojourner Truth's enslavement and how a religious vision after she was free led her to moving to New York City. Today, we’re picking up with another vision, which marked a h...

16 Jan 201937min

Sojourner Truth was an abolitionist and women’s rights activist in the 19th century. But because a speech most famously associated with Truth is a version rewritten by someone else, she’s commonly ima...

14 Jan 201930min

Today we're revising a 2013 episode about the Suquamish chief who is best remembered for a speech he gave upon discovering that Governor Stevens wanted land to build a railroad. However, the speech's ...

12 Jan 201939min

In the first part of this two-parter, we covered ballet’s origins and early evolution. We left off with the founding of the Academie Royale de Musique, and the ways Jean-Baptiste Lully worked to ensur...

9 Jan 201931min