Strange Tales Podcast

Harold Adrian Russell "Kim" Philby (1 January 1912 – 11 May 1988) was a British intelligence officer and a double agent for the Soviet Union. In 1963 he was revealed to be a member of the Cambridge Five, a spy ring which passed information to the Soviet Union during World War II and in the early stages of the Cold War. Of the five, Philby is believed to have been most successful in providing secre...

The 1990 Strangeways Prison riot was a 25-day prison riot and rooftop protest at Strangeways Prison in Manchester, England. The riot began on 1 April 1990 when prisoners took control of the prison chapel, and the riot quickly spread throughout most of the prison. The riot and rooftop protest ended on 25 April when the final five prisoners were removed from the rooftop, making it the longest prison...

Project Stargate which was a secret U.S. Army unit established in 1978 at Fort Meade, Maryland, by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). Work primarily involved remote viewing, the purported ability to psychically "see" events, sites, or information from a great distance. The project was overseen until 1987 by Lt. Frederick Holmes "Skip" Atwater, an aide and "psychic headhunter" to Maj. Gen. Albe...

The trials of the Pendle witches in 1612 are among the most famous witch trials in English history, and some of the best recorded of the 17th century. The twelve accused lived in the area surrounding Pendle Hill in Lancashire, and were charged with the murders of ten people by the use of witchcraft. The official publication of the proceedings by the clerk to the court, Thomas Potts, in his The Won...

Fleetwood Mac are a British-American rock band, formed in London in 1967. They were founded by guitarist Peter Green, drummer Mick Fleetwood and guitarist Jeremy Spencer, before bassist John McVie joined the lineup for their self-titled debut album. Originally primarily a British blues band, Fleetwood Mac scored a UK number one with "Albatross", and had other hits such as the singles "Oh Well" and...

Fleetwood Mac are a British-American rock band, formed in London in 1967. They were founded by guitarist Peter Green, drummer Mick Fleetwood and guitarist Jeremy Spencer, before bassist John McVie joined the lineup for their self-titled debut album. Originally primarily a British blues band, Fleetwood Mac scored a UK number one with "Albatross", and had other hits such as the singles "Oh Well" and...

James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger Jr. (September 3, 1929 – October 30, 2018) was an American organized crime boss and FBI informant who led the Winter Hill Gang in the Winter Hill neighborhood of Somerville, Massachusetts, a city directly northwest of Boston. On December 23, 1994, Bulger fled the Boston area and went into hiding after his former FBI handler, John Connolly, tipped him off about a pendin...

James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger Jr. (September 3, 1929 – October 30, 2018) was an American organized crime boss and FBI informant who led the Winter Hill Gang in the Winter Hill neighborhood of Somerville, Massachusetts, a city directly northwest of Boston. On December 23, 1994, Bulger fled the Boston area and went into hiding after his former FBI handler, John Connolly, tipped him off abou...

Margaretha Geertruida MacLeod, she was a Dutch exotic Asian inspired dancer that toured Europe. Mata Hari, meaning “eye of the day” in Malay, in reality she was born in a small town in northern Holland in 1876. She became a famous courtesan, and with the outbreak of World War I her catalog of lovers began to include high-ranking military officers of various nationalities. In February 1917, French...

Project Blue Book was the code name for the systematic study of unidentified flying objects by the United States Air Force from March 1952 to its termination on December 17, 1969. The project, headquartered at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, was initially directed by Captain Edward J. Ruppelt and followed projects of a similar nature such as Project Sign established in 1947, and Project Gru...

The Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by United States Army and United States Marine Corps forces against the Imperial Japanese Army. The initial invasion of Okinawa on 1 April 1945, was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific Theater of World War II. The 98-day battle lasted from 26 March until 2 July 1945....

The North Hollywood shootout was a confrontation between two heavily armed and armored bank robbers, Larry Phillips Jr. and Emil Mătăsăreanu, and members of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) in the North Hollywood district of Los Angeles, California, United States on February 28, 1997. Both robbers were killed, 12 police officers and eight other civilians were injured, and numerous vehicles...

Marilyn Monroe born Norma Jeane Mortenson June 1, 1926 – August 4, 1962 was an American actress, model, and singer. Born and raised in Los Angeles, Monroe spent most of her childhood in foster homes and an orphanage and married at age 16. She was working in a factory during World War II when she met a photographer from the First Motion Picture Unit and began a successful pin-up modeling career, wh...

The surrender of Havana led to substantial rewards for the British naval and military leaders and smaller amounts of prize money for other officers and men. The Spanish governor, Admiral and other military and civil office holders were court-martialed upon their return to Spain and punished for their failures to conduct a better defense and allowing the Spanish fleet present to fall intact into th...

Lawrence Sigmund Bittaker and Roy Lewis Norris, also known as the Tool Box Killers, were two American who kidnapped, raped, tortured, and killed five teenage girls in Southern California over a period of five months in 1979. Bittaker and Norris became known as the "Tool Box Killers" because the majority of instruments used to torture and murder their victims, such as pliers, ice picks, and sledgeh...

The Bay of Pigs Invasion was a failed landing operation on the southwestern coast of Cuba in 1961 by Cuban exiles who opposed Fidel Castro's Cuban Revolution, covertly financed and directed by the U.S. government Over 1,400 paramilitaries, divided into five infantry battalions and one paratrooper battalion, assembled and launched from Guatemala and Nicaragua by boat on 17 April 1961. Two days earl...

D. B. Cooper is a media epithet (actual pseudonym: Dan Cooper) used to describe an unidentified man who hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in United States airspace between Portland and Seattle on the afternoon of November 24, 1971. After a stop at Seattle-Tacoma airport to collect $200,000 in ransom (equivalent to $1.28 million today and four parachutes, he leapt to an uncertain fate over southwester...

D. B. Cooper is a media epithet (actual pseudonym: Dan Cooper) used to describe an unidentified man who hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in United States airspace between Portland and Seattle on the afternoon of November 24, 1971. After a stop at Seattle-Tacoma airport to collect $200,000 in ransom (equivalent to $1.28 million today and four parachutes, he leapt to an uncertain fate over southwester...

Robert Philip Hanssen (born April 18, 1944) is an American former FBI double agent who spied for Soviet and Russian intelligence services against the United States from 1976 to 2001. His espionage was described by the Department of Justice as "possibly the worst intelligence disaster in U.S. history." Hanssen is currently serving 15 consecutive life sentences without parole at ADX Florence, a fede...

Charles Ponzi born Carlo Pietro Giovanni Guglielmo Tebaldo Ponzi; March 3, 1882 – January 15, 1949 was an Italian swindler and con artist in the U.S. and Canada. His aliases include Charles Ponci, Carlo, and Charles P. Bianchi. Born and raised in Italy, he became known in the early 1920s as a swindler in North America for his money-making scheme. He promised clients a 50% profit within 45 days or...

Nuestra Señora de Atocha Spanish for Our Lady of Atocha was a Spanish treasure galleon and the most widely known vessel of a fleet of ships that sank in a hurricane off the Florida Keys in 1622. At the time of her sinking, Nuestra Señora de Atocha was heavily laden with copper, silver, gold, tobacco, gems, and indigo from Spanish ports at Cartagena and Porto Bello in New Granada present-day Colomb...

COINTELPRO was a series of covert and illegal projects conducted by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation aimed at surveilling, infiltrating, discrediting, and disrupting domestic American political organizations. FBI records show COINTELPRO resources targeted groups and individuals the FBI deemed subversive, including feminist organizations, the Communist Party USA, anti–Vietnam War o...

Lazarus Group also known by other names such as Guardians of Peace or  Whois Team is a cybercrime group made up of an unknown number of  individuals. While not much is known about the Lazarus Group,  researchers have attributed many cyberattacks to them over the last  decade. Names given by cybersecurity firms include HIDDEN COBRA by the  United States Intelligence Communi...

Lazarus Group also known by other names such as Guardians of Peace or Whois Team is a cybercrime group made up of an unknown number of individuals. While not much is known about the Lazarus Group, researchers have attributed many cyberattacks to them over the last decade. Names given by cybersecurity firms include HIDDEN COBRA by the United States Intelligence Community and Zinc by Microsoft. The...

Banksy is a pseudonymous England-based street artist, political activist, and film director whose real name and identity remain unconfirmed and the subject of speculation. Active since the 1990s, his satirical street art and subversive epigrams combine dark humour with graffiti executed in a distinctive stenciling technique. His works of political and social commentary have appeared on streets, wa...