Tales of History and Imagination

Hi all, welcome back (again) - sorry it’s a week later than planned… a few ongoing voice issues from the cold. This week we conclude the tale of Sidney Reilly and the ‘Red Terror.’  Sources Include: R.H. Bruce-Lockhart ‘ Memoirs of a British Agent ’ Sidney Reilly + Pepita Bobadilla ‘ Adventures of a British Master Spy ’ James Palmer ‘ The Bloody White Baron ’ Support Tales on Patreon for $2 US a m...

Hi all, welcome back - sorry it’s a week later than planned… I had a nasty cold. This week we’re in Russia just after the October Revolution. The Bolsheviks have taken over, plunging the nation even further into disarray. They’re determined to exit the First World War.  Britain, knowing this would be disastrous for their war with Germany need a hero to go in there and upset the apple cart - the ki...

Hi all, Happy Holidays! This year I’ve got a ghost story for you all. Today we travel to Greenbrier County, West Virginia in 1897.  Sources Include: Again this week I’ve gone from a handful of online articles, a few online genealogy pages - and a couple of podcast episodes.  Including… ‘ How The ‘Greenbrier Ghost’ Helped Convict a West Virginia Murderer in 1897’ by Joey Rather.  This website on gh...

This week we travel to Tana Island, Vanuatu (then the New Hebrides) in the midst of World War Two. God has returned - and not a moment too soon. Having abandoned them decades earlier, just as bad men with awful intentions arrived to steal their land - and send their people off to far away locales to be worked to death - he was back, as an American soldier named John Frum.   Sources Include: This w...

This week, how do I sum this up? I was freewheeling a little today, but have I got a tale of resistance, and a weird little man for you all. Anthony Comstock was a weird, joyless guy - and his ‘Comstockery’ ruined many ordinary lives - but hell hath no fury like Margaret Sanger and Katharine Dexter McCormick - our heroines this week.  Sources Include: I was free associating things I knew this week...

Hi there all, just dropping a quick note, before I return to the writing desk… USA I’m aghast… and worried, and saddened by recent turns of events.  And tonight I just wanted to send you all my love (well, obviously not all of you… some of you voted for a fascist) and just explain why I’m pulling an upcoming episode… hit play, spoken me explains it all better…  No ‘Sources Include’ tonight - unles...

This week, it’s Halloween! So, naturally I’ve got a tale of… well, historic hotel rooms in Kansas City, Missouri… And a notorious murder carried out in Room 1046 of the Hotel President..    Sources Include: This fantastic article by John Horner , which appears the font of a dozen or so other articles I read through. This post by the ‘Murder She Told’ podcast This article on Tom Pendegast by K.C. Y...

This week we return to Cuba to conclude our miniseries on the Cuban Missile Crisis. This week we discuss arctic explorers, nuclear test sites, saboteurs, spy planes gone awry, submarines and why I think having such power out there in an age where a ‘mad king’ could come to power is still very disconcerting.     Sources Include: One Minute to Midnight by Michael Dobbs Nuclear War by Annie Jacobsen...

On 16th October 1962, American President John F Kennedy was presented with three indistinct photos taken of several tubes laid out in a field in Cuba. Kennedy at first took the scene for a football field. His brother Robert, on viewing the scene, wondered if it depicted a farm house in mid construction.  It was, of course, a nuclear missile site in mid construction, and the following thirteen days...

Hi everyone, this week we’re doing things a bit different. I’ll be back from my mid year break with new episodes in two weeks’ time. In the meantime we’re running a pledge week for the Patreon channel.  Tuesday through Friday I’ll be dropping on old Patreon minisode per day - today, after visiting the set of the Donohue Show, we ask the question… Is a Nude Horse a Rude Horse?  Check out my Patreon...

Hi everyone, this week we’re doing things a bit different. I’ll be back from my mid year break with new episodes in two weeks’ time. In the meantime we’re running a pledge week for the Patreon channel.  Monday through Thursday I’ll be dropping on old Patreon minisode per day - today we’re going to meet a now obscure, but terrifying General named Uqba Ibn Nafi.  Check out my Patreon! For just $2 a...

Hi everyone, this week we’re doing things a bit different. I’ll be back from my mid year break with new episodes in two weeks’ time. In the meantime we’re running a pledge week for the Patreon channel.  Tuesday through Friday I’ll be dropping on old Patreon minisode per day - today we’re discussing one of history’s stranger What if’s. Thomas Johnson was a renowned smuggler, a talented escape artis...

Hi everyone, this week we’re doing things a bit different. I’ll be back from my mid year break with new episodes in two weeks’ time. In the meantime we’re running a pledge week for the Patreon channel. Tuesday through Friday I’ll be dropping on old Patreon minisode per day - today we visit Milan, the year 1630. A comet blazing across the sky spooks the people. Augurers spoke, the comet portends de...

Hey all I’m on holiday, though I’ve got a few things programmed to drop while I’m away… including this; a re-upload of this episode from October 2021.   “On 9:14 pm, 22nd November 1987, Chicago’s WGN TV was ‘zipped’ by a mysterious attacker - a figure wearing a rubber Max Headroom mask. The attacker would strike again, upsetting Whovians in the Windy City.  In this short Tale we discuss the Max He...

Hey all I’m on holiday, though I’ve got a few things programmed to drop while I’m away… including this, my short ode to the astronomer Tycho Brahe.   Sources include: Apologies all, this is from an old blog post where, now very much to my shame - I never noted my sources. If I’m recalling correctly I first heard the story of the moose/elk on a cracked.com video on YouTube (which I couldn’t find to...

This week we conclude our mob Tale. With the bosses banged up, the Morello family must do their best to navigate a rapidly changing world - and several vicious wars. How will they deal with upstarts, Kings, The Camorra, prohibition - and the arrival of a Fifth Family? Admin Note: Apologies for the messy scheduling of late. I’ve been a little worn out from everyday job stuff, a number of recent cur...

This week, (sorry all, please bear with me- day job’s running me a little ragged, but I should be on track again in August) we’re returning to our mobsters - Giuseppe ‘The Clutch Hand’ Morello and the 107th Street Gang. In part two of this three parter we discuss the rise of the professional hitman, the first Capo de Tutti Capi - and the ballad of an ambitious young man named Antonio Comito.      ...

This week, (apologies for the delay all, I’ve been an absolute wreck the last couple of weeks) we’re returning to Little Italy; the year 1903. In part one of this two parter we discuss the early life of America’s first Capo di Tutti Capi, Giuseppe ‘The Clutch Hand’ Morello.                     Sources Include:  The First Family; Terror, Extortion and the Birth of the American Mafia by Mike Dash Fi...

This week, we take a magic carpet ride into the wilds of the Central Asian Steppe - timeframe? the mid 12th Century. Today we’re taking a (rather hagiographic) look at the early life of a young man named Temujin…                  Sources Include:  Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford Empires of The Steppes by Kenneth Harl The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan     Support...

This week - we travel to the British Seaside town of Hartlepool. The date?? Sometime around the Napoleonic Wars. A French ship has run aground, leaving bodies strewn across the beach. Legend tells one survivor was found - a small, hairy man - subsequently hung by the locals. Did the people of Hartlepool really hang a monkey, mistaking the animal for a French sailor?                Sources Include:...

This week - Adrian Carton de Wiart was a lifelong soldier; acknowledged for his bravery across the 2nd Boer War, the Somaliland Campaign, Poland’s several wars for independence - and both World Wars. The man started out with a cavalry sabre, and was still writing reports back to high command in the Atomic Age - advising of the risk of a war in Vietnam. He also had the aura of invulnerability - hav...

This week we travel to the Germanic Duchy of Hannover, the year 1694. Under cover of darkness, a dashing, aristocratic young soldier named Philip Christoph von Konigsmarck makes his way to an illicit meeting with his lover; the deeply unhappily married Princess Sophia Dorothea of Celle. Before the night is done one of the lovers will disappear mysteriously.             Sources Include:  Great Myst...

Trigger Warning: Death by misadventure, and an execution by guillotine. I make no concessions for calling Aotearoa… Aotearoa. I mention this as in Aotearoa (New Zealand) news sites are having to shut down comment sections on Maori language, Maori achievement and Maori culture over racist morons getting upset by this news. If the use of Te Reo names over those of colonizers upsets you, this show re...

Trigger Warning: Talk of executions, religious extremism and cannibalism. This week we return one last time to the city of Münster. With everything going to hell in Münster, Henry Gresbeck risks his life in a dash for freedom. The Prince Bishop has given orders to kill all men who show up at the wall - but Gresbeck has a secret that may just unravel the siege. How does this play out? Who will surv...

This week we return to the city of Münster, in the Holy Roman Empire. Now we’ve got all the context out of the way - let’s discuss the war between the Prince Bishop, and the city’s new rogue Prophet - the Tailor, Jan of Leiden. This is Part Two of a Three Parter.        Sources Include:  There are very few book out there on this topic so I mostly worked from. The Tailor King by Anthony Arthur And...