Historically High

For 48 years, from 1924 to 1972, J. Edgar Hoover served, as first the head of the Bureau of Investigation and then the head of its successor, the FBI. For almost 50 years one man was in control of the nations domestic intelligence gathering and surveillance apparatus. 50 years is a long time to get up to some real shady shit and get up to it J. Edgar did. The nation's "top cop" used his department...

This week Professor Adam is bringing out a true crime hall of fame story. The death of Brian Wells/the Pizza Bomber/the Collar Bomber, is one of the most puzzling crimes ever committed. It has everything a true crime story could ever want. A serial killer, a bank robbery, a scavenger hunt, a creepy love story, a conspiracy, and a healthy dose of mental illness. Brian Wells delivered a pizza to a T...

The year was 1985, Freddy Mercury was bringing down the house at Wembley, Rocky Balboa won the Cold War by defeating Ivan Drago, and the Nintendo Entertainment System was release in the United States. It took the country by storm on the overall clad back of an Italian plumber named Mario. Nintendo ruled the home video game market until 1989 when a new player joined the game. The Sega Genesis' step...

During the 4 1/2 months it was fought, the Battle of the Somme took the crown as the deadliest battle of World War 1. This battle had it all, trench warfare, so many artillery pieces it created mountains of spent casings, fighter aircraft, and the introduction of the tank to the world as a weapon. The battle was the meeting of old world tactics and new world technology, never a good thing. The fir...

The history of Basketball begins in the unassuming town of Springfield, Massachusetts. Canadian born James Naismith is trying to keep his group of students at the YMCA busy during a cold New England winter. It took 2 peach baskets, a soccer ball, and a few simple rules to create the game of basketball... sort of. The first thing Naismith created was chaos. Eventually, out of the chaos came basketb...

The United States was brought into WW2 with the Japanese surprise attack at Pearl Harbor on Dec 7 1941. The U.S. was shook, fear of an invasion of the west coast was at an all time high with nothing standing between us and Japan. The moral of the nation wasn't good and in the weeks after Pearl Harbor more Japanese victories did nothing to reassure the country we could win this war. The U.S. needed...

Leonardo Da Vinci started his artistic journey at the age of 14, beginning as a studio boy to Andrea del Verrocchio. Verrocchio taught Leo the ropes in sculpting, painting, casting, leather work, amongst other things, until Da Vinci stepped in to paint a couple angels in a mostly complete "The Last Baptism". Verrocchio looked at his work, looked at Da Vinci's and legend has it he set down his brus...

The Black Plague or Black Death as its also known really put it to Europe, Asia and Africa from 1346 through 1353. In just 7 years it killed off up to 60% of Europe's population. 20-50 million dead due to a little bacteria called Yersinia Pestis, the cause of the Plague. It wasn't just effective in the way it hitched a ride on fleas, which then hitched on rats, which hitched a ride on everything e...

What good would a history podcast be without some sports history? Babe Ruth feels like he should be on the Mount Rushmore of sports history. Born in the Pigtown part of Baltimore, he defied the odds to become the most well-known baseball player of all time. He dazzled fans on the field, on the silver screen, and on every sports page in the country. His trade from the Red Sox also cursed the organi...

Who doesn't love a good Heist? Now throw in the most valuable diamond in the world at the time, the Millennium Star. Still not convinced? Well let's put this thing right in the middle of London at the Millennium Dome's De Beers exhibit. In November of the year 2000, a crew of career criminals attempted one of the ballsiest, most brazen robberies in history. And they would've probably gotten away w...

As far as American Icons go it probably doesn't get much bigger and recognizable than Henry Ford and Ford Motors. Not the inventor of the automobile, that credit goes to Carl Benz (go back and listen to that episode) but Henry developed what would become the modern automotive industry as we know it. Assembly lines were a thing, just not with cars until Henry decided to use them to mass produce the...

The line between cult and religion is sometimes blurred by the leader of the movement. Bonnie Nettles and Marshall Applewhite blurred the lines of new age religion and a cult by introducing aliens and UFOs. Nettles and Applewhite set out to bring their message of leaving the worldly distractions behind to ascend to the next level. The next level became more complicated when Nettles passed away. It...

Russian history is pretty wild. Tsarist Russia was in a league by itself. There were two main dynasties, The Rurikids and The Romanovs. Today we'll be discussing the "patriarch" of the Romanov Dynasty and the guy who brought Russia into the modern age. Peter Alekseyevich Romanov had decided he was going to drag Russia into the future whether they wanted to or not. Now Peter wasn't the kinda of dud...

The 761st Tank Battalion, known as the Black Panthers, was a segregated unit created during World War 2. Regardless of the fact that African Americans had participated in every major conflict dating back to before the United States even existed, a report from the War College labeled African Americans as "not fit for service" in World War 2. The 761st was created and kept stateside until the need f...

At a certain point in human history, mundane spices like pepper, cinnamon, nutmeg, the stuff you have shoved in the back of your cabinet right now, made one company so much money it is still considered one of the valuable to ever exist. Not only were they extremely successful at running spice, they almost served as a country unto themselves. The Dutch government had granted the VOC (the acronym fo...

The 1848 discovery of gold in California didn't just change the lives of those that rushed across the country to strike it rich. It also shaped the development of the early United States in a big way. California being the 31st state in the union may seen kinda odd being that's its about as far west as you can get and there's a lotta area in between. Well that's all thanks to the thousands and thou...

When you think of World War 2, France is usually not one of the first countries you think about. That's partly because they spent a good majority of the war under occupation. Moreso the newly formed Vichy Government agreed to an armistice with the Germans putting them under occupation. There was one man who didn't surrender. That man became Free France, Charles De Gaulle. The veteran of World Wars...

In the course of human history wars have been waged primarily over two things, land and religion. Sometimes for both of those reasons at the same time. Sometimes you do it 8 times. The Crusades are the best example of using the "will of god" as an excuse to do what the Europeans did best, conquer and kill. The Church (you know the one) decreed the man up stairs wanted Jerusalem and the Holy Land b...

A major if not the most important key to victory in World War 2 Europe was the Allied Bombing Campaign against Nazi Germany. World War 2 wasn't just a collections of campaigns fought in different theaters but also campaigns specific to the land, sea, and air. After WW1 introduced the concept of air power, the end of the conflict saw every country invest into this new frontier of war to varying deg...

In 1961, at the height of the Cold War, the fight against communism was in full swing. The CIA was deep into the politics of Central America, having already assisted some dictator-ish guys staying in power. The U.S. felt like it couldn't lose when it decided to "intervene". America was friendly with the current regime of Cuba, and it probably had nothing to do with all of the American corporations...

When you're considered the world's oldest fraternal order and one of the oldest continuous organizations in history, you're probably gonna develop some secrets or at the very least the suspicion that you're hiding something. Enter the Freemasons. The Freemason origin is kind of like a choose your own adventure book where there's an option for all, depending on what you're into. You can go the bibl...

Mussolini has a general reputation as the bumbling idiot of the axis powers. While he does appear to be at a glance, history should not sleep on Mussolini. The man actually founded Facism. That word that seems to still be prevalent in our world today, yeah he created the Facist Party. The Father of Facism started from humble beginnings and through a combination of radical ideas, his trademark orat...

Vatican City is the smallest country in the world. At only 109 acres, it packs a ton of history in a small space. The Catholic Church is headquartered within their own nation. Vatican City proper was created through a Treaty signed by Benito Mussolini and Pope Pius XI establishing the sovereign nation in 1929. Some of the world's most beautiful buildings reside inside the walls of the tiny nation....

In December 1944 World War 2 in Europe was at a tipping point. It just so happened the way it was leaning was for the Allies. The Eastern front saw the Russians forcing the Nazis out of Poland and advancing toward the Fatherland itself. In the west the combined Anglo-American forces of the USA, Great Britain, Canada and others had broken out from Normandy, liberated Paris and a good chunk of north...

Is anybody really safe? You see the storyline in every form of entertainment, "Arrested for a crime they didn't commit", but what if it wasn't just a storyline? For Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley it's the story of their lives. The West Memphis Three, as they have come to be known, were convicted of the murders of three 8-year-old boys who were killed on May 5th, 1993. Christop...