It’s History

It’s History

By Ryan SocashHistory
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It’s History episodes

  • A forgotten Christmas miracle in the middle of the desert
    For over 50 years, a Christmas-themed town stood in the scorching Arizona desert, complete with Santa’s workshop, a post office, and a famous inn. Once a beloved roadside attraction known nationwide, Santa Claus, Arizona, drew families, celebrities, and curious travelers year-round. But how did such a strange idea succeed, and why was it ultimately abandoned?

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    17 min
  • Boston’s Forgotten Streetcar Tunnels | The Secret Subway Beneath the City

    Beneath Boston’s City Hall Plaza lies a forgotten 1898 streetcar tunnel — a sealed remnant of America’s first subway. What began as a desperate solution to 19th-century gridlock eventually evolved into a hidden web of corridors, platforms, and portals stretching beneath the city. From the Pleasant Street Portal to the long-lost tracks of Scollay Square and Adams Square, these underground passages once powered one of the largest streetcar systems in the United States.

    In this episode, we trace Boston’s evolution from a crooked colonial peninsula to a booming streetcar metropolis, uncovering how the rise of electrified rail led to the nation’s earliest subway infrastructure. We explore how modernization, automobiles, and shifting political priorities ultimately sealed off entire sections of the network — leaving behind abandoned chambers, hidden platforms, and tunnels that still sit below modern streets.

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    22 min
  • Why California Abandoned the Bullet Train

    What began as America’s most ambitious infrastructure project — a sleek, 220-mile-per-hour bullet train linking San Francisco to Los Angeles — now stands as a cautionary monument to over-promising and political gridlock. Billions of dollars later, California’s high-speed rail system remains unfinished. Concrete viaducts stretch across farmland like modern ruins — silent reminders of a dream that was meant to change American transportation forever.

    In this episode, we trace the rise and stall of the California Bullet Train: from its optimistic beginnings in the 1990s, through the voter-approved 2008 bond, to the lawsuits, budget overruns, and federal withdrawals that left it stranded in the Central Valley. How did this state-of-the-art vision become the ultimate “train to nowhere”?

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    18 min

About It’s History

From the publisher's feed

IT’S HISTORY is a ride through history – join us in discovering the world’s most important eras, the minds that changed everything, and the most important inventions of our time through weekly tales of Urban Decay.