History for Kids / History's Not Boring: The Kids History Podcast

Imagine being handed the keys to an entire empire when you're only nine years old! That's exactly what happened to King Tutankhamun in Ancient Egypt. In this exciting episode of History's Not Boring, Mira and Finn travel back over 3,000 years to uncover the incredible true story of the famous Boy King!

Join the adventure as we explore the blazing hot deserts of Egypt and follow British archaeologist Howard Carter on his desperate, years-long hunt for a lost tomb. When he finally uncovers a hidden stone step in the sand in 1922, what lies beneath will shock the world! Discover a secret burial chamber packed with over 5,000 priceless treasures, including a solid gold coffin that weighed as much as a baby elephant and a dazzling golden death mask.

But that's not all! You won't believe what King Tut packed for the afterlife. From 145 pairs of ancient Egyptian underwear to a super cool dagger made from an actual outer space meteorite, this is one historical mystery you do not want to miss. Grab your explorer hat and let's go!

Have you ever wondered how humans first learned to ride horses? Grab your lasso and get ready for a wild ride back in time to the freezing, windy grasslands of ancient Kazakhstan! In this episode of History's Not Boring, Mira and Finn uncover the amazing secrets of the Botai people, who lived on the Eurasian Steppe over 5,500 years ago. To survive winters that dropped to minus forty degrees, the Botai built clever underground pit houses and survived by hunting giant, wild horses. But eventually, they decided to try something completely wild—taming them!

Discover how these brave prehistoric people built massive wooden corrals, crafted heavy leather lassos, and became the very first humans to hop on a galloping horse's back! We'll explore clues left behind in ancient dirt, from bridle bit marks on horse teeth to 5,500-year-old traces of mare's milk. Plus, find out about a massive, mind-blowing DNA twist that changed everything scientists thought they knew about the ancestors of modern horses! Put on your riding boots and join us for an incredible prehistoric adventure!

Imagine a warrior so fearsome that the mighty Roman Empire paid him 2,100 pounds of solid gold—the weight of a great white shark—every single year just to leave them alone! Meet Attila the Hun, the leader nicknamed the "Scourge of God." In this exciting episode of History's Not Boring, Mira and Finn uncover the wild and dramatic story of the ancient world's most terrifying conqueror!

Did you know the Huns were nomadic warriors who practically lived on their horses? They even ate and slept while in the saddle! Join us as we learn how Attila claimed to wield the mythical Sword of Mars, demanded half of the Roman Empire as a wedding gift, and clashed with a brilliant general who knew all his secrets. Plus, find out how Attila's army accidentally helped build the famous floating city of Venice, and discover the surprisingly un-scary way he finally met his end (spoiler alert: it involves a massive nosebleed!). Saddle up for an epic journey back to the crumbling days of the Roman Empire!

Get ready to sparkle and shine, because we are diving into the wild and amazing history of precious gems! Have you ever wondered where diamonds and pearls actually come from? In this glittering episode, Mira and Finn uncover the incredible secrets behind the world's most famous jewels! Journey back 8,000 years to find a tiny pink pearl smaller than a grain of rice, and travel to Ancient India where warriors thought magical lightning bolts created indestructible diamonds! You won't believe the true story of the giant Cullinan Diamond—a gem the size of a loaf of bread that literally broke a heavy steel knife in half when an expert tried to cut it! We'll also track down the legendary La Peregrina pearl, a jewel so heavy it kept falling off queens and even got chewed on by a famous Hollywood star's puppy! Plus, find out how a 15-year-old boy discovered a massive diamond just by picking up a shiny pebble in the dirt. It's an action-packed adventure that will have you looking at backyard rocks in a whole new way!

Did you know that the oldest recorded joke in human history was written on a clay tablet almost 4,000 years ago? And guess what... it was a toot joke! Get ready to laugh out loud as Mira and Finn travel back in time to uncover the hilarious history of jokes and the world's very first comedians!

Discover how Ancient Greeks read from a massive joke book called The Laughter Lover, and learn about the incredible "licensed fools" of the Middle Ages. These court jesters wore colorful patchwork clothes, carried silly wands, and were the only people brave enough to make fun of powerful kings! You won't believe the true story of Roland the Farter, a medieval entertainer who was rewarded with a giant mansion and thirty acres of land just for doing one jump, one whistle, and one toot on Christmas Day!

Plus, meet a royal jester who told jokes with a pet monkey on his shoulder, and an actor who danced for 100 miles straight just to make people smile. Join us on this giggly adventure to find out why laughter is literally contagious!

Can you imagine a scorching hot summer day with no cold drinks or frozen ice cream? It sounds like a total nightmare! But before refrigerators were invented, keeping things cold was an incredible, globe-trotting adventure! Join Mira and Finn as they uncover the wild history of how humans learned to freeze things. Did you know President George Washington loved ice cream so much that he spent the equivalent of five thousand dollars on it in just one summer?! You'll find out how people used to dig massive holes in the ground called ice houses and saw giant blocks of ice out of frozen winter lakes just to save it for July! Meet Frederic Tudor, the stubborn "Ice King" who shipped massive blocks of ice halfway across the world packed in thick sawdust! Plus, discover the amazing Florida doctor, John Gorrie, who invented a giant, clunky ice-making machine to help cure sick people, creating a brilliant invisible cold waterfall! From running behind horse-drawn ice wagons to the loud, shaky motors of the very first kitchen fridges, this chilling episode is guaranteed to blow your mind. Stay cool and tune in!

Have you ever wondered about the history of your favorite sandwich? Join Mira and Finn on an incredible time-traveling adventure to discover the epic history of bread! You won't believe how an ordinary loaf shaped human history. Did you know the world's oldest bread is over 14,400 years old, baked by ancient hunter-gatherers even before farming was invented?!

Get ready for some truly wild, and sometimes gross, historical facts! We'll explore Ancient Egypt, where people actually ate bread filled with sand and tiny rocks that gave pharaohs terrible toothaches! We'll even uncover the amazing secret of eighty-one perfectly burnt loaves of bread left behind during the explosive volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Pompeii!

Plus, find out why medieval kings and queens used giant slabs of stale bread as dinner plates instead of real dishes, and why they fed their dirty bread plates to the castle dogs! We will also meet the unstoppable inventor who spent sixteen years trying to build the world's first bread slicer. From loaves used as money to pay pyramid builders to the invention of the perfect slice, history has never tasted so fascinating!

Imagine looking down your street and seeing a massive, 40-foot-tall wave crashing toward you... but instead of water, it's made of brown, sticky, super-sweet syrup! In this unbelievably sticky episode of History's Not Boring, Mira and Finn travel back to Boston in 1919 to uncover the wild true story of the Great Molasses Flood!

How did 2.3 million gallons of thick molasses end up flooding a city street? You'll find out why a giant, leaky metal tank was secretly painted brown to hide a huge problem, and what happened when it finally burst open! Picture a 160-foot-wide tidal wave of syrup racing through the neighborhood at a shocking 35 miles per hour—faster than you can run!

Learn about the incredible heroes who jumped into the freezing, gooey mess to save people, including a brave railway worker who stopped a passenger train just in time. Plus, discover the bizarre secret to cleaning up a city covered in sticky syrup (hint: you can't just use a mop!). Grab your time travel goggles and get ready to learn about the strangest, stickiest disaster in American history!

Have you ever wondered what the very first pair of shoes looked like? Spoiler alert: they weren't sneakers! Join Mira and Finn on an amazing journey through the history of shoes, starting with 10,000-year-old sandals made completely out of woven tree bark! We'll discover how ancient people survived freezing weather with boots stuffed full of grass, and how the Roman army basically invented the very first soccer cleats! Did you know that in the Middle Ages, some people wore shoes with toes so long—up to 24 inches!—that they had to tie them to their knees with gold chains just to walk? Or that high heels were actually invented for soldiers riding horses? From the smelly, poop-covered secret that preserved the world's oldest leather shoe to the invention of bouncy rubber sneakers, footwear history is full of wild surprises! We even blast off into space to find out why there are human shoes sitting on the moon right now! Tie up your laces and jump into this super fun, fact-filled episode!

Did you know that the invention of the bicycle actually started with a massive, earth-shaking volcano? It’s true! When a giant eruption in 1815 blocked out the sun and made it too cold to grow food for horses, people desperately needed a brand new way to travel! Join Mira and Finn on an amazing journey to discover the wild and wacky history of bicycles. You won't believe what the very first bikes looked like!

Imagine trying to ride a fifty-pound wooden balance bike with absolutely no pedals, or taking a ride on a heavy iron-wheeled contraption nicknamed "The Boneshaker" that literally rattled riders' teeth! We’ll also learn how brave cyclists managed to climb onto giant five-foot-tall Penny Farthing bicycles without falling off, and discover how a dad invented squishy, air-filled rubber tires just to cure his son’s headaches! Plus, find out how kids in California invented BMX by racing their bikes on dirt motorcycle tracks, and hear the mind-blowing story of a woman who rode a custom bicycle at a whopping 183 miles per hour! Hop on and let’s pedal through history!