Episodes
July 30, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Humphry Davy
Ever wonder how laughing gas went from Victorian party entertainment to dental offices? Our journey through the life of Humphrey Davy reveals the surprisingly wild origin story behind one of medicine's most unusual discoverie...
July 28, 2025
The Whole Thing’s a Latrine: Henry Gunther
What drives a soldier to charge toward enemy lines one minute before a ceasefire? Henry Gunther's tragic story serves as a haunting reminder of war's senseless waste. Born to German-American parents and growing up in a predominantly German neighborhood in Baltimore, Gunther was drafted into WWI in …
July 21, 2025
See Something? Don't Say Something: The Shelton Brothers Gang
The forgotten criminal dynasty that ruled Illinois before Capone even knew their names. Meet the Shelton brothers – Carl, Earl, and Bernie – three farm boys who transformed themselves into the most powerful bootleggers in sou...
July 16, 2025
The Origin Of Weird: Lawn Chair Larry
Ever wondered what would happen if you tied 45 giant weather balloons to a lawn chair? In 1982, truck driver Larry Walters answered this question with an adventure that transformed him from an ordinary man with a dream into a...
July 14, 2025
Slabalanche: Dyatlov Pass Incident Part 3
The mystery of Dyatlov Pass has haunted us for over 60 years, presenting one of history's most perplexing unsolved cases. Nine experienced hikers from the Ural Polytechnic Institute ventured into Russia's Ural Mountains in 1959, only to be found dead under circumstances so bizarre they've spawned 7…
July 7, 2025
A Tale of 9 Yuri's: Dyatlov Pass Incident Part 2
The mystery of Dyatlov Pass has haunted us for over six decades. What could drive nine experienced hikers to slice through their tent from the inside and walk barefoot into certain death on a freezing mountain slope? When the...
July 2, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Prince of Poyais - Gregor MacGregor
Have you ever wondered what happens when charisma, opportunity, and audacity collide? The result might look something like Gregor MacGregor's breathtaking 19th-century fraud that cost hundreds of lives yet went largely unpuni...
June 30, 2025
Textbook Labaz: Dyatlov Pass Incident Part 1
The Ural Mountains of Siberia, 1959. Nine experienced Russian hikers vanish, leaving behind a mystery that still haunts us today. Their tent, slashed from the inside. Their bodies, scattered across the snow. Their final momen...
June 23, 2025
Slipped on a Pair of Trousers: Sarah Rosetta Wakeman
History's attics hide remarkable stories, and few are as compelling as Sarah Rosetta Wakeman's. At just 19, this strong-minded woman from rural New York made a decision that defied every convention of her time—she cut her hair, put on men's clothing, and became Lyons Wakeman. The eldest of nine chi…
June 18, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Mary Toft and Her Rabbit Babies
How far would someone go to escape poverty? In 1726, Mary Toft, a destitute servant and mother of three who had recently suffered a miscarriage, concocted an outrageous scheme that would captivate England and eventually reach...
June 16, 2025
The Father, the Son and the Distilled Spirits: Uncle Nearest
"Who taught Jack Daniel how to make whiskey?" seems like a simple question with an obvious answer – until you discover the truth that was hidden for more than 150 years. When young orphan Jasper Newton "Jack" Daniel arrived at Reverend Dan Call's farm in 1850s Tennessee, he became fascinated with t…
June 9, 2025
Bubbles After All: The Wizard of Oz
Ever wonder what really happened behind the scenes of The Wizard of Oz? The yellow brick road was paved with dangerous stunts, toxic makeup, and shocking studio practices that would never be allowed today. From the moment we ...
June 4, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Louie Louie and the FBI Investigation
A simple rock recording session in 1963 snowballed into one of the FBI's most bizarre investigations when The Kingsmen recorded "Louie Louie" in a single take with just $50 and one hour of studio time. The perfect storm of fa...
June 2, 2025
Soap Opera Plot: Zlata Filipović
When 11-year-old Zlata Filipović received a blank diary in September 1991, she couldn't have known it would become a powerful testament to one of Europe's most devastating modern conflicts. As Yugoslavia fractured along ethni...
May 26, 2025
Buffoonery Chit-Chat
Ever wondered what happens when the history books close and the microphones stay on? In this special episode, Kate and Bradley pull back the curtain on the History Buffoons podcast, sharing the triumphs, challenges, and occas...
May 21, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Anti Comet Pill
Fear and opportunism collide in this fascinating dive into one of history's strangest mass panics. When scientists discovered cyanogen gas in Halley's Comet's tail before its 1910 arrival, what should have been a minor scient...
May 19, 2025
Two Polite Porcupines: Marie Antoinette
History often reduces Marie Antoinette to a single misattributed quote about cake and a guillotine blade, but the real woman behind the myth was far more complex and tragic. Born an Austrian archduchess and sent to France at ...
May 12, 2025
Tropical Text Message: PT-109 and JFK
The story of how a future president became an unlikely war hero starts with a wooden boat cut in half by a Japanese destroyer in the pitch-black waters of the South Pacific. Despite having a bad back that should have kept him...
May 7, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Weird Origins of Idioms
Words can be strange little time capsules. Take idioms - those peculiar phrases we use without questioning how bizarre they actually sound. "Jump the shark"? "Close to the chest"? "More than one way to skin a cat"? Who came up with these, and why do we still use them? In this linguistic adventure, …
May 5, 2025
Smack Dabble: Charles Lightoller
Charles Lightoller wasn't merely present for some of the 20th century's most significant maritime events – he survived them all with an almost supernatural resilience. Born into humble beginnings in Lancashire, England in 1874, Lightoller's life story reads like an adventure novel too extraordinary…
April 28, 2025
Run for the Roses: History of the Kentucky Derby
Fascinators, mint juleps, and a centuries-old tradition that nearly collapsed—the Kentucky Derby's rich history goes far beyond the track. How did a 24-year-old architect's twin spires design become an American icon? What cat...
April 23, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Theft of Einstein's Brain/Chess = Genius
What happens when a pathologist steals the brain of one of history's greatest geniuses? In one of the most bizarre tales from scientific history, we dive into the unauthorized removal of Albert Einstein's brain during his 195...
April 21, 2025
Unreasonably Warm: The Children's Blizzard of 1888
A warm January day suddenly plunged into lethal chaos across the American prairie. One moment, children were enjoying their first day back at school after weeks of bitter cold; the next, they were fighting for their lives in ...
April 14, 2025
You're Lucky You're A Person: Lizzie Cyr/Famous 5 Part 2
"You're not a qualified person." With these dismissive words, the Canadian government repeatedly denied women access to the Senate based on a narrow interpretation of constitutional language. But in 1927, five determined wome...