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World War II with Tom Hanks reexamines history’s most devastating conflict for a new century. Across twenty hours, the series traces the war’s full arc–from the rise of fascism to Hiroshima–uncovering the decisions, hidden networks, and lasting consequences that continue to shape our world.

Episode 1 – The Beginning

In September 1939, enabled by a secret pact between Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin, Germany invades Poland with its lightning style of tank warfare, plunging Europe back into war. Adolf Hitler can now pursue his longed-for racial war, as the world watches in horror, and the stage is set for global conflict.

This episode features interviews with (in order of appearance):

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May 30, 1945. In Washington, Secretary of War Henry Stimson calls General Leslie Groves to his office and demands answers: which Japanese cities are about to become targets for the atomic bomb? What follows will pull Stimson—a deeply religious statesman who believed in restraint, but also in overwhelming force—into a profound crisis over morality, destruction, and what modern war is becoming. 

How did Henry Stimson grapple with the bomb? And after helping usher in the atomic age, how did he reckon with what he’d done?

Special thanks to Evan Thomas, journalist and New York Times bestselling author of Road to Surrender: Three Men and the Countdown to the End of World War II.

You can find the rest of the books we used to research this episode at historythisweekpodcast.com.

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May 23, 1934. On a muggy Louisiana morning, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow speed toward the Texas border. They’ve been on the run for over a year—wanted for robbery and murder—and the lurid news accounts of their exploits have made them famous. But today, Bonnie and Clyde’s legendary crime spree comes to an end … in a hail of bullets.

Why did some come to view these Depression Era outlaws as agents of chaos the country needed? And what was the real motivation behind their crimes?

Special thanks to our guest, John Neal Phillips, author of Running With Bonnie and Clyde: The Ten Fast Years of Ralph Fults.

** This episode originally aired May 22, 2023.

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May 12, 1949. After eleven months under Soviet blockade, the people of West Berlin flood into the streets to celebrate. The lights are back on. The autobahn is open. The siege is over.

But just months earlier, West Berlin seemed doomed.

Surrounded deep inside Soviet-controlled territory, more than two million Berliners are suddenly cut off from food, fuel, electricity, and supplies after Joseph Stalin seals the city’s borders. Many fear the Western Allies will abandon Berlin altogether. Instead, American and British leaders gamble on something unprecedented: supplying an entire city by air.

In this episode, how the Berlin Airlift became the largest sustained airlift in history—and the first major showdown of the Cold War. Along the way: the flamboyant American commander known as “Howlin’ Mad” Howley, Soviet attempts to break the city’s spirit, pilots landing in near-zero visibility every few minutes, and the high-stakes crisis that helped create NATO and reshape the postwar world.

Special thanks to Giles Milton, author of  Checkmate in Berlin: The Cold War Showdown That Shaped the Modern World. 

You can find the rest of the books we used to research this episode at historythisweekpodcast.com.

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Family Lore is a weekly narrative podcast that celebrates and investigates ancestral mystique. Each episode begins with a guest sharing a fascinating family legend, followed by a historical deep-dive to uncover the truth and meaning behind the tale. Available now: link.pscrb.fm/f0281/FLFD

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May 9th, 1942. In the Lustgarten, a sprawling park in the center of Berlin, a strange new attraction opens to the public. It’s a maze of tents, glowing under red lightbulbs. Inside: a staged vision of the Soviet Union. Filthy streets, starving children, torture chambers. A horror show.

The man behind it all is Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s minister of propaganda, and the most powerful figure in Berlin. Posters, radio broadcasts, films, classrooms… his message is everywhere. The enemy is at the gates. The war must be won. No matter the cost.

And Berliners are watching. Some believe it. Some look away. Some quietly resist.

Because beyond the spectacle, the war is beginning to close in. Bombs fall on the city. Neighbors disappear. Truth itself becomes something the regime can manufacture.

This is life inside Nazi Berlin at the center of World War II.

How do ordinary people live under a system built on propaganda and fear? And when the story begins to crack… what happens next?

Special thanks to Ian Buruma, professor of human rights and journalism at Bard College, and author of Stay Alive: Berlin, 1939-1945.

For more on this story, search for “Inside the Nazis’ Supernatural Obsession” on Apple, Spotify, or wherever else you listen to HISTORY This Week (aired Jun 2, 2025).

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April 25, 1859. About 150 people have gathered on the shores of Lake Manzala in Egypt. And one of them, a mustachioed, retired French diplomat, steps forward. He raises his pickaxe and strikes a ceremonial blow.

The audacious goal is to cut through the desert to connect the Mediterranean Sea with the Red Sea, creating a new trade route between the East and the West. Changing global trade and geopolitics forever. Today: the Suez Canal. Why did the tremendous efforts of a Frenchman end up enriching the British Empire? And how, decades later, did the canal play an unexpected role in the birth of modern Egypt?

​​Thank you to our guests, Ibrahim El-Houdaiby and Professor Aaron Jakes, for speaking with us for this episode. Thank you also to Dr. Bella Galil for talking with us. If you want to read more about the Suez Canal, Zachary Karabell's Parting the Desert: The Creation of the Suez Canal is a great resource. 

** This episode originally aired April 25, 2022.

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April 20th, 2004. A quiet suburban development outside Seattle. Brand-new homes. Fresh lawns not yet grown in.

Then, in the middle of the night—sirens. Flames ripping through two houses.

Investigators quickly find the cause: homemade incendiary devices. And a message, left behind at another site: “urban sprawl has become a central issue in the struggle to protect the earth.” Signed, the Earth Liberation Front.

The ELF is already known to authorities: a shadowy network of environmental activists who operate in secret, striking targets they see as destroying the planet. But this attack feels different. Closer to home.

Today: one man’s journey into the Earth Liberation Front. From suburban childhood to underground cells…from protest to arson.

What draws someone into a movement like this? How does activism turn into sabotage? And when it comes to defending the Earth…how far is too far?

Special thanks to Matthew Wolfe, author of Fires in the Night: The Earth Liberation Front, the FBI, and a Secret History of Eco-Sabotage.

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April 18, 1806. In his study, President Thomas Jefferson signs a law that doesn’t look like an act of war. It bans imports. Leather. Silk. Glass. Playing cards. A strange list. A quiet move. But Jefferson is trying to confront one of the most powerful empires in the world, without firing a shot.

Britain is stopping American ships at sea. Boarding them. Taking sailors by force. The country is furious. War feels close.

Jefferson has another idea.

How did Jefferson—an avatar of individual liberty—become the president who suspended due process, militarized the coastline, and nearly tore his country apart? And what can his legacy teach us about the prevailing winds of global trade?

Special thanks to Harvey Strum, professor of History and Political Science at Russell Sage College in Albany and Troy, New York; and Lawrence Hatter,  associate professor of Early American History at Washington State University.

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This episode comes from Points North, a podcast about the land, water, and inhabitants of the Great Lakes. You can listen to Points North wherever you get your podcasts.

Lake Champlain is more than 16 times smaller than Lake Ontario, the smallest Great Lake. But in 1998, Congress designated Lake Champlain as the sixth Great Lake, teeing off a historical and cultural fight over which lakes can really call themselves Great.

Radio excerpts in this episode were originally broadcast on NPR’s “All Things Considered” and “Weekend Edition”. TV excerpts from “NBC Nightly News”.

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