January 15, 1919. Boston PD receives a call: “Send all available rescue personnel...there's a wave of molasses coming down Commercial Street." The bizarre flood decimated Boston's North End. How did it happen? And why does it still affect us all today?

Special thanks to our guest, Stephen Puleo, author of Dark Tide: The Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919.

** This episode originally aired Jan 13, 2020.

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Editor’s note: This episode originally aired January 9, 2023. Lt. Col. Harry Stewart Jr. passed away in February 2025 at the age of 100. Lt. Col. James Harvey III still resides in New Jersey, now 102 years old.

--

January 11, 2022. Lt. Col. James Harvey arrives at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada for the first time in 73 years. He’s there to accept a plaque celebrating the last time he was there, for the Air Force’s first-ever weapons competition. Back then, Harvey and the other Tuskegee Airmen on his team had squared off against the best military pilots around. They tackled high-skill tests of simulated aerial warfare… and they won. But over the decades, the official record of their victory was lost or neglected. Who were these exceptional Black pilots? And what did it take to rescue their accomplishments from obscurity and bring them into the light?

Special thanks to our guests: Lt. Col. James Harvey III; and Lt. Col. Harry Stewart Jr., who passed away in February 2025 at the age of 100. Lt. Col. Stewart was the co-author of Soaring to Glory. Thanks also to Zellie Rainey Orr, author of Heroes in War, Heroes at Home, and to Daniel Haulman, retired historian at the Air Force Historical Research Agency and author of Misconceptions About the Tuskegee Airmen.

--

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

January 3, 1924. Archeologists crowd into an ancient Egyptian tomb to uncover what awaits them in the unopened burial chamber. The world is waiting to find out. That’s because two years before, the discovery of the tomb of the pharaoh Tutankhamun revealed antiquities so dazzling that a media frenzy ensued – newspapers, newsreels, and Hollywood movies vied to show audiences these wonders of ancient Egypt. Now, lead archaeologist Howard Carter pushes open the door to find a majestic stone sarcophagus. Inside lies Tutankhamun, whose regal face of gold and azure blue has lain in darkness for millennia. He’s about to meet the new century … and dazzle the world anew. How did an unknown pharaoh become a sensation? And how did a modern revolution change the fate of Egypt's most precious artifacts?

Special thanks to our guests, Professor Christina Riggs, author of Treasured: How Tutankhamun Shaped a Century; and Heba Abd el Gawad, Heritage Specialist and Museum Researcher at the Institute of Archaeology, University College of London, and researcher with Egypt’s Dispersed Heritage project.

** This episode originally aired January 2, 2023.

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Rockefeller Center Christmas tree has brought joy and sparkle to Midtown Manhattan since the early 1930s. The annual festivities may seem steady and timeless but this holiday icon actually has a surprisingly dramatic history.

Millions tune in each year to watch the tree lighting in a music-filled ceremony on NBC, and tens of thousands more will crowd around the tree’s massive branches during the holiday season, adjusting their phones for that perfect holiday selfie.

But the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree is more than just decor. The tree has reflected the mood of the United States itself — through good times and bad.

The first tree at this site in 1931 became a symbol of hope during the Great Depression. With the dedication of the first official Christmas tree two years later, the lighting ceremony was considered a stroke of marketing genius for the grand new “city within a city” funded by JD Rockefeller Jr.

The tree has also been an enduring television star — from the early years in the 1950s with Howdy Doody to its upgrade to prime time in the 1990s.

Join Greg Young for this festive holiday history featuring kaleidoscopic lighting displays, painted branches, whirling snowflakes, reindeer and a very tiny owl.

** This episode originally aired in December 2021.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

December 27, 1853. On a freezing, snowy night in Birmingham, England, 2,000 people have lined up outside the town hall. They’ve braved the temperatures for a landmark performance, Charles Dickens’ first reading of A Christmas Carol. The tale will become an international sensation and beloved Christmas tradition. In this special episode of HISTORY This Week, we bring you a classic 1949 rendition of the story starring Vincent Price, so you can decide for yourself: What is it about A Christmas Carol that’s endured for over 150 years? 

** This episode originally aired December 21, 2020.

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

December 16, 1773. Samuel Adams sits in a crowded meeting of American colonists at Boston’s Old South Meeting House. He’s watching small groups of men slip quietly out the door. Once outside, the men don disguises and make their way toward three ships moored in the harbor – each weighted down with chests of valuable British East India tea. The men climb aboard, tear open the chests and dump the tea in the water. Cheers fill the winter night. Back at the meeting, Samuel Adams waits. There’s nothing directly tying him to this radical act of rebellion … but few doubt he’s behind it.

How did a chronic underachiever help light the fuse of the American Revolution? And why has this important Founding Father largely been forgotten? 

Special thanks to our guest, Stacy Schiff, author of The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams.

** This episode originally aired December 12, 2022.

--

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

December 18, 1970. Decades after the end of WWII, a Nazi doctor is on trial. Today is judgment day in a long, difficult legal battle, but this case isn’t about war crimes. The German pharmaceutical company Grunenthal is charged with the worst medical disaster in history: the Thalidomide scandal. The shoddily tested and hastily approved drug made its way into medicine cabinets around the world, and a decade after its release, the reality is becoming clear: Thalidomide is killing babies. Who are the heroes who brought down Thalidomide? And how did this disaster change pharmaceutical regulations forever?

Special thanks to our guest, Michael Magazanik, author of Silent Shock.

** This episode originally aired December 14, 2020.

--

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

December 1, 1564. Spanish vessels left a secret port in Mexico about two weeks ago. Their goal: to sail across the Pacific and back, charting a new route for international trade, and giving Spain an edge against its chief colonial rival, Portugal. But today, when a storm hits, the smallest ship is separated from the rest of the fleet. Now, that ship, the San Lucas, is on its own. The following year, when the San Lucas makes it back to Mexico, against all odds, its pilot—a Black mariner—is accused of treason. How did the San Lucas—the smallest ship in the fleet—complete a near-impossible journey that would connect the world? And how did the trailblazing mariner Lope Martín get erased from the story?

Special thanks to our guest, Andrés Reséndez, author of Conquering the Pacific: An Unknown Mariner and the Final Great Voyage of the Age of Discovery.

** This episode originally aired November 29, 2021.

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

November 30, 1954. At about 12:45 in the afternoon, a space rock comes plummeting through the roof of a house in Sylacauga, Alabama. It bounces off a stand-up radio, ricochets around the living room, and collides with the thigh of Mrs. Ann Hodges, who’s been napping on the couch. Newspapers declare: “experts agreed unanimously that Mrs. Hodges was the first person known to have been struck by a meteorite.” What happened to this space rock after it crashed to Earth and thrust itself into volatile human affairs? And what happened to the human beings whose lives were upended by this rarest of rare events?

Thanks to our guests: Dr. Julia Cartwright, planetary scientist at the University of Alabama; Billy Field, professor at the University of Alabama and screenwriter; and Julie Love Templeton, attorney in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Dr. Cartwright is involved in a number of art/science collaborations to engage and educate the public about meteorites and planetary science. You can find out more on her website, https://le.ac.uk/people/julia-cartwright. Keep an eye out for Billy Field’s latest project, TheStoryAcorn.com, which launches in January 2023. The website will feature history from the Civil Rights movement, told by those who lived it. The website teaches students to gather stories from their own communities and share them with the world. Thanks also to Mary Beth Prondzinski, former collections manager at the Alabama Museum of Natural History, and to the Alabama Museum of Natural History.

** This episode originally aired November 28, 2022.

--

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

November 16, 1776. George Washington rows toward Manhattan to inspect the fort that bears his name, only to meet a full-scale British assault already underway. By afternoon, Fort Washington has fallen, and General Washington is forced to abandon New York City. 

The Continental Army is sick, outnumbered, and demoralized. For a moment, the Revolution seems lost. Facing his worst defeat of the war, Washington himself is questioning their odds.

In their new PBS documentary, The American Revolution, Ken Burns and Sarah Botstein set out to tell this version of the Founding Fathers, showing fear, chaos, and uncertainty. They also highlight oft-overlooked characters: the women and children following the army in supporting roles, the Native nations whose decisions shaped the continent, or the enslaved people listening closely to talk of liberty.

This week, we talk with Ken Burns and Sarah Botstein about the revelations behind their decade-long project. How did they revisit a story that’s been told so many times, it almost feels like a myth? And how does that myth fit into the world today?

The American Revolution is a six-part, 12-hour documentary now premiering on PBS. The series is directed by Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein, and David P. Schmidt. It's also narrated by a guest from one of our recent episodes, Peter Coyote.

--

Get in touch: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram: @historythisweek

Follow on Facebook: ⁠HISTORY This Week Podcast⁠

To stay updated: http://historythisweekpodcast.com

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices