Historically High

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. Christopher Byers, Michael Moore, and Stevie Branch were found in a creek the next day, and one thing was on everyone's minds. Satanic Panic. Beliefs of the boys being sacrificed to Satan led investigators to accused Satanist, Damien Echols. The only problem was Damien wasn't a Satanist. That didn't stop the Arkansas justice system from sentencing him to death, Jason to Life imprisonment, and Jessie to Life+ for a crime they didn't commit. Join us as we get Historically High on The West Memphis Three.

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"Trouble in the Suez...." Billy Joel sang about it in We Didn't Start the Fire and until researching this episode I had no idea what trouble he was talking about. The Suez Canal is a man-made waterway connecting the Red Sea (that little stretch of sea nestled between Africa and the Middle East) and the Mediterranean Sea. Basically it connects the Indian Ocean to the Med eliminating that lengthy and dangerous trip around the south of Africa. Well I'm sure you can imagine the kind of money you could make charging ships for taking your shortcut. Located in Egypt, designed by a Frenchman, funded by the Ottomans, and coveted by the British. The construction of the canal was on another level. and if that wasn't enough it played a big role in both World Wars, and even an armed conflict most don't know about...we're looking at you Britiain and France and Israel. The Suez isn't a one trick pony either, it's grown with the times and is still an important aspect of world trade today. 

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Try putting together a guy's/girl's night when no on has a phone. Where do you meet, when, where? Imagine trying to move thousands of troops and resources around without constant communication. Well that whole thing had been figured out way before WW2. But what do you do when that life line of communication starts to work against you because your enemy is listening in and knows everything you're doing. The Pacific Theater was basically a series of islands being fought over at different times. Coded communication from ships to shore, and on the battlefield were being intercepted by the Japanese and decoded almost as fast as the codes could be created. One code went the entire war never being broken. The Navajo Code. The Navajo soldiers at the center to our episode were men that during childhood in white-run Indian schools were punished for using their native language. We pretty much did everything we could to kill their culture. Well once WW2 rolled around a man with knowledge of the Navajo Language recommended it to the U.S. Marine Corp due to its insane complexity, small number of people fluent, and the fact it didn't have written counterpart that made it indecipherable to the Japanese. Find out about the Navajo men who created the code and fought on the front lines providing the communications that helped win the war in the Pacific.  

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If you had to compare the ancient Silk Road to something we're all familiar with today, it would be the internet. The Silk Road was a network of travel routes that spanned across Asia through India, the Middle East, Africa, the Mediterranean and all the way to Europe. This route was the main mode of transportation not just for the all the goods (silk being just one of many) being traded 4,000 miles away, but for technology being sourced from different countries, not to mention the ideas and intellectual advancement that spread from those traveling the road. Kings, Khans, and Emperors came and went, countries fell and rose, but the road remained. It's not an exaggeration when we say the world would look much different if not for the Silk Road. 

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We finish off the Big 3 of Ancient Meso/South American civilizations with The Aztecs. Originally hailing from what is now the southern United States, the Mexica would enter the Valley the Mexico to find the place pretty crowded already. The only real spot left was a swampy marshy island in the middle of Lake Texcoco. Through innovation and engineering they created floating gardens to grow crops and sustain their growing population. 
The island that was once their disadvantage had now help them to grow and become valley's dominant peoples, ruling from their city of Tenochtitlan . Grand palaces, magnificent temples of sacrifice and enormous outdoor markets had the newly arrived Spanish Conquistadors in shock and awe. Well it wasn't long before Hernan Cortez and his Spanish troops started trying to take over the place. Find out what happened to the civilization that Mexico was literally built on. 

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The Berlin Wall is, for most, one of those historical topics you're aware of, but probably don't know a ton about. Well don't freak out because that's what we're here for. Post WW2 Germany was divided into zones with the U.S., U.K. and "France" taking stewardship of West Germany and the Soviet Union taking East Germany. Now this was right at the start of the Cold War,  East Berlin and West Berlin, which were also divided basically become a 24/7, 365 side by side comparison of Western Capitalism vs. Soviet Communism. Things got pretty bad in East Germany and East Berlin as their neighbors to the West thrived with the influx of western culture and that sweet sweet money. Well eventually J. Stalin got fed up with the embarrassment suffered due to the mass exodus of young talented people from East to West and decided to put a stop to that. How did he do it you ask, well he started building a wall. But it was what was happening on the East side of the wall that's really the story. 

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Jim Jones....Jim Jones....what can we say about Jim Jones? Early on young James found he had two things going for him, his newfound love of religion and his ability to memorize sermons and scripture. What started out as lil Jimmy preaching to the other kids in town, took a slight detour in dealing monkeys (not a euphemism) before he finally performed enough bullshit faith healing to start a church of his own. It didn't take long for Jim to find his own brand of religion which if we're being honest here, sounded pretty damn good in the beginning. But then the doomsday dreams started happening, combined with the power that came with being worshipped, and add in some drugs cause why not. Jim did what any sane person would do, he made himself the Messiah, kidnapped a kid, and took a bunch of his followers to the jungles of Guyana, normal shit. Well I wish I could say that was the end of it, but it gets tragic when Jones' god complex results in the death of over 900 people in a mass cult suicide. 

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Everyone take your seats because it is time for the sweet story of Milton Hershey and Hershey Chocolate. Milton grew up needing direction in life which he found in candy making. He started with caramel and failed more than once before eventually becoming the Caramel King of Pennsylvania. That wasn't enough for Milt because he had bigger dreams. From building a town to creating his own sugar distribution in Cuba, Milton Hershey was a fascinating man. Was he kind of a dick? Oh yeah. Did he change the world for quite a few people? You better listen to find out!

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April 19th 1995 was a pretty dark day for the United States and to the people of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in particular. Here in The States if you mention terrorism most people tend to think of the International variety, but domestic terrorism seems to be just as prevalent albeit with usually less of a bang, but not in this instance. Timothy McVeigh was a Gulf War Veteran who became disillusioned with the U.S. Government and decided he needed to send a message. Now he didn't just wake up one morning and decided to blow up a building, this was a slow burn that started in adolescence, slowly becoming radicalized over time. He didn't commit this heinous act on his own either, he had a few friends he would bounce ideas off of and also assist in building his bomb. What transpired left the country shocked and saddened. We've got you covered on the whole story. 

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Promo code: HistoricallyHigh for 15% off

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In 1492 this freakin guy Christopher Columbus took his ass across the ocean blue looking for a western sea route to the lands of Asia and India (which he actually thought were the same place and same people). What transpired saw the Nina, the Pinta, the Santa Maria (Boats and Hoes) sail across the Atlantic, which granted hadn't really been attempted too often, and hit landfall in the Caribbean. Now this clown never set foot on the land that would become the United States, yet we have a city in Ohio, and had a recently renamed National Holiday in his honor. The guy had no idea he wasn't in India which is why Indigenous Peoples got saddled with the Indian moniker for so damn long. So he basically stumbles onto landfall and like a good colonizer it didn't take him long to make the locals life hell... Welcome to the Columbus episode.
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