Episodes
Jan. 28, 2026
The Origin Of Weird: Atomic Bombs Fall on North Carolina, 1961 Goldsboro Incident
A midnight breakup over rural North Carolina. Two hydrogen bombs sheared from a disintegrating B-52. And one small switch that kept the East Coast from waking to a mushroom cloud. We dive into the Goldsboro incident of 1961, ...
Jan. 26, 2026
Tutankhamun’s Money: Howard Carter
A nervous hello, a lime beer, and then a sand-choked staircase that changed history. We pull back the curtain on Howard Carter’s last-chance bet with Lord Carnarvon and the painstaking, high-stakes work that turned a flicker ...
Jan. 19, 2026
Encephal-in-Silence: Dr. Oliver Sacks
A forgotten epidemic turned people into “living statues,” and one composite patient—Leonard—shows what it means to be awake, alive, and trapped. We trace encephalitis lethargica from its eerie rise to its unexplained disappea...
Jan. 14, 2026
The Origin of Weird: Corporal Wojtek the Bear
A starving cub on a mountain trail becomes a brother in arms on one of World War II’s toughest fronts. We tell the full, rarely believed story of Wojtek—the Polish bear who learned to salute, drank beer with the unit, and car...
Jan. 12, 2026
Son of a Wealthy Aristocat: James Smithson
A British scientist born in France, dead in Italy, and never once a visitor to America quietly set the stage for the world’s largest museum complex. James Smithson’s curious will, his wayward heir, and a windfall that shocked...
Jan. 5, 2026
Irena's List: Irena Sendler
A forged ID, a nurse’s armband, and a will that never broke. We share the astonishing real story of Irena Sendler, the Polish social worker who smuggled 2,500 Jewish children out of the Warsaw Ghetto and buried their true nam...
Dec. 31, 2025
The Origin of Weird: 1904 Olympic Marathon
What happens when a world-stage marathon is staged like a dare? We head back to the 1904 Olympics in St. Louis and trace a course lined with heat, dust, and a shocking lack of common sense. With temperatures near 90 degrees, ...
Dec. 29, 2025
Buffoons Reminisce
What do a goat mayor, a corpse on trial, and a coconut SOS have in common? They all made our year of storytelling outrageous, insightful, and way more fun than history class ever was. We mark the end of the year by quizzing e...
Dec. 22, 2025
In This Our Life: Hattie McDaniel
A nightclub mic no one expected to be open. A maid’s uniform worn to an audition. An ovation that shook the room while the system kept her at the far wall. Hattie McDaniel’s life reads like a ledger of impossible choices—yet ...
Dec. 17, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Timothy Dexter
A fortune built on bed warmers, coal, stray cats, and whale bones shouldn’t exist, yet Timothy Dexter kept cashing in. We jump into the outrageous life of a leather apprentice turned millionaire who wagered on “worthless” Con...
Dec. 15, 2025
Quaker Beard Man: James VI and I
A baby crowned in a cradle. A teenage king kidnapped by his own nobles. A husband sailing into lethal storms to bring home his bride—and returning convinced that enemies could conjure weather. Our latest deep dive follows Jam...
Dec. 8, 2025
1-800-TYPHOID: The Oregon Trail Part Two
Hope can fit inside a covered wagon, but so can heartbreak. We trace the Sager family’s 1844 push toward Oregon—from a baby born on the prairie and a nine-year-old’s leg crushed under a wagon wheel to typhoid, orphanhood, and...
Dec. 3, 2025
The Origin of Weird: The Anti Pope Schism
Power doesn’t just shape history—it picks the chair. We dive into the Western Schism, when Europe faced not one but multiple popes, and legitimacy became a battlefield of theology, politics, and personality. From Rome to Avig...
Dec. 1, 2025
Chimney Cricket: Oregon Trail Part One
A 2,000-mile promise of “free land” sounds irresistible—until you’re walking beside a creaking wagon at two miles per hour, guarding flour from river water and praying cholera spares your camp. We’re pulling the curtain back ...
Nov. 24, 2025
Hold My Fosters: Dave Kunst Walk Around The World
A wild idea in a Minnesota movie theater turns into a four-year odyssey across continents, palaces, deserts, and a war-torn frontier—only to be shattered and reshaped by a midnight ambush in the Afghan mountains. We follow Da...
Nov. 19, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Uther Pendragon and Lady Igraine
A dragon-tailed comet blazes across the sky, a king takes it as a sign, and a wizard decides the future is worth a dangerous bargain. We dive into the charged origin of King Arthur—not at the anvil, but at Tintagel—where Uthe...
Nov. 17, 2025
The Tudor Wizard: Cardinal Wolsey
Power doesn’t just sit on a throne—it lives in the hands that organize, negotiate, and quietly make things happen. We dive into the life of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the butcher’s son who became England’s most formidable power ...
Nov. 10, 2025
Holy Hitman Roofie: Thuggee Cult of India
A friendly smile by the fire, a shared meal on a dusty road, and a scarf that turns into a weapon in a heartbeat. We dive into the shadowed world of the Thuggee—bands of highway killers who claimed divine orders from the godd...
Nov. 5, 2025
The Origin of Weird: L. Ron Hubbard and His Lackluster Naval Career
A man drops depth charges on a rock formation, shells the wrong country for target practice, and later rebrands himself as a decorated hero and spiritual “Commodore.” We follow L. Ron Hubbard from pulp fiction pages to a chao...
Nov. 3, 2025
PerSwede Them: Black Sox Scandal
A powerhouse roster, a miserly owner, and a storm of quiet resentment set the stage for baseball’s most infamous fall. We trace how the 1919 Chicago White Sox—frustrated by low pay and trapped by the reserve clause—slipped fr...
Oct. 27, 2025
Feared and Revered: The Wendigo and Other Cryptids
A classic cocktail opens a door to stranger places. We start with the crisp snap of a gin and tonic and its unexpected past as a colonial malaria remedy, then step into the woods, deserts, and fog banks where four legends sti...
Oct. 22, 2025
The Origin of Weird: Will West and William West
Two men. Same name. Same face. Same measurements. Different fingerprints. The Leavenworth intake room went silent in 1903 when Will West’s file appeared to match a prisoner already serving time: William West. That uncanny col...
Oct. 20, 2025
I Don't Do Nautical Things: Submarine R-14
Stuck 100-plus miles off Hawaii with dead engines and a silent radio, a 1919 submarine shouldn’t have had a chance. Ours did. We walk through the improbable rescue of USS R-14—how a small crew turned hammocks into sails, bunk...
Oct. 13, 2025
The Audacity of that Kid: William Patrick Hitler
Ever wondered what it takes to outrun a last name that shaped world history? We dive into the strange, complicated life of William Patrick Hitler—born in Liverpool, raised by an Irish mother, and briefly swept into the social...