Softcore History

Listen in as we breakdown the tale of drunken secret service agents, their night before the JFK assassination, and how no one thought it was that big of a deal except for one wet blanket. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Lord Byron was a rockstar poet considered to be the first modern celebrity. He gallivanted around the Mediterranean sleeping with any person that crossed his path, drank out of monk skulls, and owned his own zoo of animals. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Salem Witch Trials were pretty much entirely fueled by bored tweens pretending to be possessed by innocent old ladies and poor people. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In another grisly tale from Germany, we dive into the Hinterkaifeck murders, the circumstances surrounding the nightmare, and the possible suspects. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jessie Wiseman joins the boys to talk about serial killer Peter Kürten --better known as the Vampire of Dusseldorf -- who would drink and lubricated himself with the blood of his victims in 1920s Germany. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ghosts who aren’t invited to parties. Ghosts who like to watch ladies sleep. Impromptu amputation shows in basements. Gettysburg ghosts have it all. We run through the best ghost stories from America’s most famous battlefield. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From flavoring food to enlarging your balls, the guys dive into the wonderful history of spices. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Alexander "Superkiller" Solonik was a cold-blooded hitman who took out some of the biggest mob bosses in the Soviet Union and 1990s Russia. He was a blackbelt super soldier that escaped prison on several occasions, racked up millions of dollars in contracts, and dated Russian super models and bottle service girls. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Philly fans and SEC football lunatics have nothing on Eastern Roman Empire chariot racing supporters. Constantinople chariot racing factions regularly rioted and murdered each other by the thousands. Rooting for a certain chariot racing team was so important that emperors had to choose which team they supported in order to gain favor with the masses. Chariot racing insanity came to a head with the...

We cover the bizarre origins of medieval football, an American college team fleeing Cuba, and live animal mascots in this week’s episode featuring special guest former Texas A&M defensive lineman Jay Arnold. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Special guest Jack Mandaville joins us to cover the occult inspiration for the Third Reich’s racial purity policies and obsession with mythical artifacts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Journalist Nellie Bly checked herself into a 19th Century insane asylum to expose its horrors, discovered Helen Keller, was captured in World War 1, tried and succeeded at going around the world in less than 80 days, and became one of America’s GOAT investigative journalists ever along the way. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Elevator Operator Strike of 1945 was spurred by a desire for higher wages and better treatment after the end of World War 2. So, naturally, the building owners just switched to automatic elevators. But that wasn’t easy either, it turned out, because everyday people were terrified of operating an elevator without any training. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The domestication of cats and dogs, wacky Russian Silver Foxes that wag their tails, and a bunch of weird pets owned by people throughout history - learn all about our furry best friends on this week’s episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dan, Rob, and Cooper talk about the complicated Scot who is often regarded as the father of the US Navy -- John Paul Jones. From helping the U.S. win independence to fighting Turks in the Black Sea on behalf of Catherine the Great, JPJ lived an action-packed 45 years mostly on water or inside the warm embrace of a European woman. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The 1904 Olympic Games in St. Louis were the worst Olympics ever held. The Marathon involved a purposeful dehydration experiment and a runner who cheated by riding 11 miles in a car, the swimming events were all done in a pond, and people from various third world countries were forced to compete in what the media dubbed the “Savage Olympics”. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices....

Elmer McCurdy was perhaps the worst outlaw in the Wild West but his dead body became a show stopping attraction in everything from back road carnivals to Hollywood films over the course of a literal half century. Dan, Rob, and Jake talk about the extreme embodiment of success after death. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Trying to handle that dispute over the fence line with your neighbor? Learn how not to as Jake, Dan, and Rob dive into the wild and wonderful world of blood feuds in 1800s America. To work out how much life insurance coverage you need, and compare personalized quotes to find your best price, head to Policygenius.com and get your best quote in minutes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcas...

Rob Fox, Dan Regester, and Jake Goldman are joined by Rob’s pregnant wife Courtney to talk about the history of pregnancy, birth control, pain management, and childbirth in the Middle Ages and why if a woman was good at any of that she was a witch and deserved to be burned alive. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dan, Jake, and Rob are joined by Iconoblast's Matt Cooper to talk about Leo Major -- a Canadian scout and sniper who stormed the beaches of Normandy, took hundreds of POWs, and liberated a Dutch town of 50,000 by himself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Götz von Berlichingen was a mercenary knight during the end of one of the bloodiest eras in history. He had a metal hand, and also invented a common profanity all of us say every day. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Rob Fox, Jake Goldman, Dan Regester and special guest Veronica Ruckh go through the history of lesbians from ancient Egypt's reputation for being a girl on girl sin-fest to medieval Middle East believing that women were attracted to other women because they ate too much celery. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 1932 a New York bar owner and his connected friends took out an insurance policy on an alcoholic homeless man and did everything in their power to kill him. This is the story of how they failed over and over again. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jake, Dan, and Rob breakdown the life and trials of Topsy the elephant. Was she a serial killing beast? Or just a victim of circus circumstance? Find out the grizzly details of her death, and their consequences on this week’s episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Rob Fox, Dan Regester, and special guest Jack Mandaville discuss the most overrated civilizations in world history. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices