History Goon

History Goon Ep. 25 - Battle of Mogadishu Pt. 1 - Irene This episode is part 1 of one of the most harrowing 24 hours in US Special Forces history. It all started as a UN Peacekeeping operation to try and feed the starving people of Somalia. Warlords had taken control of the country and started weaponizing hunger and food against their own people. After months of UN forces getting attacked and ambu...

Back to WWII we go! Back to a familiar place (Operation Market Garden) with some people we’re familiar with (the British Paratroopers) but since we’re talking about the Brits during WWII YOU KNOW we’re in for a treat of just… Bonkers stories… Pat Glover is no exception to this rule. He may have been just a Quartermaster for his unit but, he was a badass also. Jumping into Holland for Market Garden...

This guy may be the most badass offering from Poland of all time. Jan Sobieski was born to a Noble family, he travelled Europe with his brother and learned like 75 languages then went home to fight. Not on foot, he’s a cavalry guy… He builds his own unit of Winged Hussars. Giant, metal, winged death machines. This was at a time where the Ottoman Empire was spreading through Europe, a very few woul...

Baseball is my favorite sport. The Yankees are my LEAST favorite team. Billy Martin is my FAVORITE Yankee. It may be strange to have a favorite person on your least favorite team but, stick with me and you’ll see why I love this guy. He is an All American success story: He grew up poor, worked hard and earned an opportunity to fight other professional athletes in a non-combat sport. He played with...

Have you ever wanted to know what would happen to you in history if you did something silly like: say something about royalty, be a witch, be gay, have a miscarriage? Most of the time it’s horrible. Sometimes it's funny. It’s ALWAYS painful. Wanna hear about people getting tossed out windows? Skin peeled off? Squashed to death by the largest land mammal around? How bout mutilated limbs and eaten a...

History Goon Ep. 20: Fred Burnaby This week we are headed to a couple places we've visited before: England and Africa... Fred Burnaby was born into a family of note. His father was buddies with Dukes and Nobles and higher up in the local Church. Fred was lined up to follow in his fathers footsteps but decided he wanted to live a life of adventure. He would attend college, beat up the locals an...

To piggyback off last week’s episode, on his death, Chief Cornstalk supposedly cursed the land he died on. That land was the spot of Point Pleasant, WV. 190 years later the steel beams of the Silver Bridge that connected Point Pleasant, WV and Gallipolis, OH would twist and break, sending cars plummeting into the icy water below. What’s strange is the events that lead up to this starting in 1967 w...

This week we are headed back to pre-Revolutionary War America for a lesser known war. Chief Cornstalk of the Shawnee was a man of peace. Until he was pushed to violence. The British Government in control of the Colonies had been signing treaties with tribes all over the area of what today is New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia and Kentucky. The problem began when a treaty was sig...

This week we take to the skies to follow the life of a boy fascinated by planes that just so happened to become the most lethal pilot in US history. Dick Bong was born in a small Wisconsin town but would join the Army Air Corp right out of college and take the fight to the Imperial Japanese Army behind the sticks of one of the most interesting planes of WWII, the P-38 Lighting. This quiet, shy, re...

This week we are headed to London. The culture. The history. The scenery. The Iranian Embassy being stormed by a bunch of poorly trained Iranian separatists. These guys have the perfect plan; take hostages and hold them until a bunch of political prisoners are released. Let's start taking some bets. Who would win? 6 poorly armed guys trying to make a political stand or a dozen of the most high...

Danny Greene was born into misfortune. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio. Mom died right after he was born due to complications of his delivery, Dad was a raging drunk. He would end up bouncing around from living with Dad and Grandpa, to an Orphanage, back to Dad and Step-mom and then back to Grandpa’s. Believe it or not, he was getting into trouble THE ENTIRE TIME this was going on. He did a short s...

This should be a refreshing change from the last couple episodes. We’re off the the Peghamagabow was nobody, well less than nobody to the Canadian Government. He was a First Nations member of the Ojibwe Tribe that decided to volunteer to fight for a country that didn’t like him. He fought through the trenches, survived gas attacks and pulled some real life Metal Gear Solid stuff in No-Mans-Land. H...

This time, we finish up the incredible, horrible tale of the goings on in Leopold’s Congo from last time. We start off with someone calling him out for the terrible things going on, and it is completely ignored. Then other people come forward with news of people being mutilated, and it being completely ignored. Then, some Irish guy creates tires out of rubber, and things get even worse for the Con...

Boy oh boy… If you don’t know who this guy is, first off, lucky you. Second, I’m sorry that I’m about to change that. He was a simple man; all he really wanted was to take over the throne of Belgium from his father and own a colony somewhere that would help his country build its economy. After trying and failing for years to talk Parliament into building a colony somewhere he decided “F**k it. I’l...

This episode holds a special place in my heart for a couple of different reasons. First, it happened in my home state of Vermont, and secondly, I got to spend a couple of hours hanging out with my little brother. We talk about fun trips we took in our childhood, hospital trips with Dad for an axe wound, the beauty of childbirth and even about this one time that a bunch of Confederate soldiers came...

It’s hard to cover the entire history of a military unit. It’s much easier to cover a handful of individuals who were part of it. It’s even better when those handful of guys are completely God damn feral in battle. When you think of Nepal you probably think of sherpas and Mount Everest, you don’t think of a bunch of badasses with giant knives fighting for the English Crown in basically every confl...

This one is a bit different. It’s IMPOSSIBLE to tell either of these men’s stories without talking about the other. Fate and hatred pulled these two towards each other in a way that is like something out of a movie. Talaat Pasha was a Turkish politician and military leader who was, bare minimum, one of the most evil people who has ever been, but most people have never heard his name. Soghomon Tehl...

Born into a well-off family, he was left fatherless at a young age after his father died from the horrific long-term effects of being gassed in the trenches of WWI. He wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps and be a fighting man, and so did his brother and sister. Well, she wasn’t a fighting man. She was a badass combat ambulance driver. He spent his early career in Her Majesty's Army over...

Our first toe dip into the world of the underworld. This is the kind of True Crime topic you can expect to see more of in the future of History Goon. Joe Barboza had a f**ked up childhood. His dad left because he was cheating on his mom; she sent little Joe to talk to him, and he kicked him out. After he bought him a pigeon. He bounced around youth and adult prisons (he spent time in a bunch of pl...

The “War on Drugs” started back in 1971 under Richard Nixon with the intent of eliminating illegal drug use by making the fines and penalties so stiff that people would stop using them. It’s hard to say, but guys, I think drugs won. That being said, people have been doing drugs for a LONG TIME. People have also been going to war for a LONG TIME. Sometimes, the streams get crossed, and guys stuff h...

This one is wild. Very interesting childhood, moving all over the world with his father doing missionary work until he accidentally joined the Chinese Army. Then his dad go pissed and got him removed, then he went to fight in Spain for a bit before WWII (yes, that was a thing) and then finally joining up with the US Army and getting treated like garbage because he just so happened to be Black. Eve...

One man’s freedom fighter is another man’s terrorist. This man was a freedom fighter. No questions asked. He grew up in a rural part of Afghanistan and got a good education before following in his father’s footsteps of joining the military. Then Communism entered the “Graveyard of Empires,” and they faced off with the Mujahideen and learned why Afghanistan earned that nickname. When your choice is...

If there were a Mount Rushmore for the Marine Corp., Dan Daly is on that bad boy. As a young man, he dreamed about becoming a Marine so that he could go and fight side by side with his hero, Teddy Roosevelt. Unfortunately for Daly (but good for anyone dumb enough to want Marines to show up on the beaches), that fighting ended before Daly could join up with Teddy. He DID, however, get to fight in t...

Born the half-brother of the King of Norway, Harald wanted more. By that, I mean he wanted to politely ask his brother to let him be King (he built an army and took the fight to him), and was exiled from his homeland. Which may have been the best thing for him in the long run. He traveled the world, killing people for money as a mercenary and eventually becoming the leader of the legendary Varangi...

One of the most interesting humans that the British Empire has ever produced. A star rugby player, a Queen’s University Belfast law graduate, a lawyer, an alcohol enthusiast, and an early member of the legendary Special Air Service (SAS) and part of the notorious Desert Rats. He and his boys cruised around North Africa, making it miserable to be German and in the sand. There’s no way I can even be...