The Skeptical Historian

At the time of recording, the most watched drama on Netflix in Australia was "Apple Cider Vinegar" which was inspired by the story of fraudster Belle Gibson, who built an empire pretending to have cured herself of cancer. But Gibson was not the first (nor will she be the last) to profit from selling fake cures. In colonial Australia, long before Gibson and "Apple Cider Vinegar," quack medicine was...

The horror of the Second Fleet is one of Australia's most shameful untold stories. Just two years after the First Fleet landed with barely any European causalities, six more ships arrived full of dead and dying convicts. But what had gone so wrong? This month, Juliana examines how perverse incentives, greed, poorly written contracts and human frailties all collided to create the catastrophe of the...

On 22 May 1936, Victoria's most famous detective John O'Connell Brophy, was shot four times in Royal Park, while sitting in an idling car with three civilians. After a bungled cover-up, a Royal Commission was established to sort fact from fiction, but there's still some gaping holes ninety years later. This month, Juliana turns her researcher's eye to this tale, peeling back the layers of cover-up...

On February 6 1851, the most extensive bushfire in Victoria’s history roared through the unprepared colony. At least twelve people, one million sheep, thousands of cattle and countless native animals died in the blaze, and over a quarter of the colony was burnt. But how did such a devastating fire occur, and why have we never had another one so extensive? Listen in to find out more.

On New Year's Day 1915, Gool Mohamed and "Mullah" Abdullah, two local cameleers from Broken Hill, New South Wales, opened fire on a train full of people setting off to enjoy a picnic in nearby Silverton. The men were shot dead later in the day by police. But what caused them to open fire? Was it Australia's first terrorist attack, as some have claimed? An attack on Australia by the forces of the O...

Captain Henry Wise, 40th Regiment, is the most famous of the soldiers who stormed the Eureka Stockade in 1854. His death rocked Ballarat to its core and, even today, debate rages about his character, his actions at the stockade, and who it was that fired the fatal shot. Join Juliana in the season finale of "The Skeptical Historian Writes A Thesis" as she examines the short life of this famous offi...

In 1885, the British parliament passed laws which made it illegal to rape a minor child, i.e. anyone under the age of sixteen. This came after more than a decade of campaigning by reformers and pushback from politicians. These 1885 laws were the first time the age of consent laws in Britain and the empire had been updated since the 1500s! But were these laws as benign on the surface as they appear...

We're talked about Melbourne after the gold rush... but what happened before the shiny metal was found, and what were the dreams of the early Europeans when they arrived on the Yarra River? In this special short episode, Juliana considers the two warring Johns who famously claimed to have founded Melbourne: John Batman and John Pascoe Fawkner. Warning: This podcast contains mentions of colonial er...

On the 8th of December 1941, Australia declared war on Japan. Just over two months later, Japanese planes appeared over Darwin and rained hell on our northernmost city. But was it a prelude to an invasion, or something else? Inspired by a recent conference paper, Juliana takes a break from Eureka to explore the popular belief that Australia narrowly escaped a Japanese invasion in 1941 and '42, and...

Back in Time: After twelve months of campaigning, the Adelaide city council recently announced that they WILL NOT be adding the name of infamous war criminal Harry Morant to the Boer War memorial in Adelaide. This is a good decision, but who was Morant and why was he such a controversial figure? Find out in this classic episode of the Skeptical Historian. In February 1902, Harry "The Breaker" Mora...

Out on the road near Ballarat, a party of 200 armed Americans lay in wait for a column of British infantry making haste to the restless goldfield. What would have happened if they'd crossed paths? The American contribution to Eureka has been buried, forgotten and (in some cases) deliberately written out of this famous story. In this episode, Juliana considers why the Americans have been forgotten,...

Juliana's away this fortnight, but listen in as she goes back in time and revisits an early episode from Season 1 of "The Skeptical Historian." 'Five Final Minutes' examines the mysterious crash of Trans Australian Airlines Flight 538, and the surprising safety legacy that followed. *** On the 10th of June 1960, Trans Australia Airlines Flight 538 was attempting to land at MacKay airport in Queens...

In the 170 years or so since Eureka, there have been two perspectives which have commanded attention: those of the stockaders, and that of the Victorian Government. The military, who played a major role in the event, have been side-lined from the historical re-telling. In this episode, Juliana explores the report written by Captain John Thomas, the commanding officer at Eureka, to see what it can...

In April 1855, while in hiding from the law after the Battle of the Eureka Stockade, Peter Lalor, the rebel Commander-in-Chief, wrote an open letter that has since become the Holy Gospel of Eureka. It is one of the most quoted and referenced documents regarding this event, and is indispensable to any serious study of the Eureka Stockade, or the Ballarat goldfields. But is it all we've been led to...

In April 1855, while in hiding from the law after the Battle of the Eureka Stockade, Peter Lalor, the rebel Commander-in-Chief, wrote an open letter that has since become the Holy Gospel of Eureka. It is one of the most quoted and referenced documents regarding this event, and is indispensable to any serious study of the Eureka Stockade, or the Ballarat goldfields. But is it all we've been led to...

On the 17th of October 1854, just six weeks before the famous Battle of the Eureka Stockade, a mob of furious diggers surrounded the opulent Eureka Hotel in Ballarat and burned it to the ground. The publican had recently got away with murder and the burning of the Eureka has been presented ever since as either a triumph of justice for the people, or the symptom of men pushed too far, too hard, who...

Just one year after trying to keep activist Egon Kisch out, the Australian government set their sights on excluding Mabel Freer, a British Indian woman who was coming to Australia to get married. She was white, she was a minor aristocrat, she was the very person Australia was trying to encourage to immigrate under the white Australia policy. So why were they excluding her? As it turned out, it had...

In 1934, Czechoslovakian activist Egon Kisch, an anti-war, anti-fascist campaigner who had escaped the horrors of Nazi Germany was invited to speak at an anti-fascist rally in Australia. He was stopped at the border by Australian immigration officials and prohibited from entering the country. Kisch was not the kind of man to go down without a fight, however, and through a series of legal maneuvers...

Australia Day. Invasion Day. An arbitrary date in January everyone likes to argue about. Whatever the 26th of January is for you, there's no other day in the Australian calendar that sparks so much passionate debate and fierce hatred, but what what is it about this day that gets people so hot under the collar? In this special bonus episode, we'll unpack some of the myths abut Australia Day and fac...

In 1851, the colony of Victoria was hovering on the verge of complete collapse as gold fever swept the inhabitants. Unable to cope, facing record high levels of inflation and with a famine threatening the colony, Governor La Trobe wrote in desperation to London to ask for a military force to restore order. They responded by sending one of the most famous regiments of their day: the 40th Regiment o...

On New Year's Eve in Sydney, 1908, things got so out of hands that the council came close to banning the celebration forever! Join Juliana in the very first episode of 2024 to discover what happened, why everything went wrong that year and the lasting legacy that began with a a gang of larrikins with explosive sticks... The Skeptical Historian Writes A Thesis is available every second Tuesday, whe...

SEASON FINAL! Sixty years ago, 35th President of the United States John Fitzgerald Kennedy, better known as JFK, was murdered in Dallas, Texas by Lee Harvey Oswald: a violent political extremist. But, despite multiple, investigations coming to the same conclusion, conspiracy theories about JFK's murder live-on into the present day, and none more so than 'Umbrella Man.' Was he signaling a gunman, a...

What do you get when you cross low wages with tumbledown barracks, overwork, corporate spies and the Melbourne Cup Carnival? You get the Victoria Police Strike of 1923! Following the first and only police strike in Australian history, Former Army Chief of Staff Thomas Blamey was appointed as Chief Commissioner of Victoria Police. Unfortunately, his penchant for controversy quickly infected the for...

Part 2 of 2. Edward "Ned" Kelly is perhaps one of the best konwn as most controversial figures in Australian history. Join me for Part II of his story, where we examine Ned's claim that the murder of three policeman at Stringybark Creek was nothing more than self-defense, and put to the test the idea that he robbed banks in Euroa and Jerilderie and handed his proceeds out like a regular Robin Hood...

Part 1 of 2. Edward "Ned" Kelly is perhaps one of the best known and most controversial figures in Australian history. Join me in this first two-part episode of the Skeptical Historian for a deep dive into Kelly's story, and examine the facts, the myths and the people who were involved. Listeners please note, this episode discusses gun violence, violent crime, police brutality and capital punishme...