Stuff You Missed in History Class

This 2012 episode covers the 1936 Berlin Olympics and African-American sprinter Jesse Owens, as well as the games as Nazi propaganda. More nations than ever participated, and the Olympic torch was used for the first time.

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Tracy and Holly talk about how young everyone had been during the Mississippi Freedom Summer, voter suppression, and Holly's trick to stop crying when recording. There's also talk of how topics get added to phone lists. and Cobb's violin playing.

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W. Montague Cobb was the first Black person in the U.S. to earn a PhD in physical anthropology, worked to debunk racist theories in the field, was an activist for desegregation and Medicare, and was an anatomy professor at Howard University. 

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The Mississippi Summer project of 1964, now known as Freedom Summer, was a in part a voter registration project that was met with an extremely violent and deadly backlash.

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This 2018 episode covers Gertrude Stein, an icon in the world of modernist literature. Alice B. Toklas is often described as her partner and assistant, but she was also a published writer, and "assistant"really doesn't cover how important she was to Stein's life and work.

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Tracy and Holly talk about Spain's effort to spread the smallpox vaccine, and how Balmis handled things. They also discuss fear about vaccines, bodily autonomy, and what does and doesn't gross them out.

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With the smallpox vaccine established, Spain’s wanted to deliver it to its colonies in the Americas and the Caribbean. Francisco Xavier de Balmis carried the vaccine from Spain to the Americas using a chain of young boys who acted as living vaccine hosts.

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Once Edward Jenner developed the smallpox vaccine, it spread from England, where he lived, to other parts of the world. Meanwhile, events were unfolding that led the Spanish Empire to launch a huge expedition to take the vaccine to its colonies. 

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This 2013 episode covered the Nazca lines in the desert about 200 miles southeast of Lima, Peru, between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. The glyphs have remained intact for centuries, and have been avidly studied since their discovery in the late 1920s.

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Holly and Tracy talk about how many things don't make it into episodes, sometimes due to cutting for narrative structure, and sometimes due to translation of sources. They also discuss Emilie Du Châtelet and the various ways her story is told.

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