History Shorts

Epizode

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  Nellie Bly Around the World 07.10.2026 11min

  In 1889, 25-year-old journalist Nellie Bly boarded a steamship in New York carrying one small bag, one dress, and a remarkable assignment: Travel around the world faster than Phileas Fogg. Inspired by Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days, Bly raced across oceans and continents by steamship and train. Along the way, she even stopped in France to meet Jules Verne himself. America followed her progress by telegraph. More than a million people entered a newspaper contest predicting exactly when she would return. On January 25, 1890, Bly arrived back in New York after 72 days, 6 hours, 11 minutes, and 14 seconds—smashing the fictional 80-day benchmark. But the journey was only one chapter in an extraordinary career.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Debunking the 1637 Tulip Mania 06.10.2026 15min

  In 1637, some Dutch tulip bulbs really did sell for extraordinary prices. But the famous story of Tulip Mania—families ruined, homes exchanged for flowers, and the Dutch economy devastated by history's first great speculative bubble—is far more complicated. The most prized tulips displayed spectacular flame-like patterns created by what we now know was a mosaic virus. As prices climbed, traders began buying and selling contracts for bulbs that were still underground. Then, in February 1637, buyers suddenly stopped appearing and prices collapsed. Yet when historian Anne Goldgar examined the surviving Dutch records, she found little evidence for the widespread financial devastation described in later accounts. So where did the legend come from?   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  The Lost Tomb of Genghis Khan 05.10.2026 14min

  Genghis Khan built an empire that stretched across much of Eurasia. Then, in 1227, he died—and his burial place vanished from history. According to later traditions, extraordinary measures were taken to keep the location secret. Stories tell of witnesses being killed, horses trampling the burial ground, and every trace of the grave being deliberately erased. Separating fact from legend after eight centuries is difficult, but one thing remains certain: Nobody knows where Genghis Khan is buried. For generations, attention has centered on Mongolia's sacred Burkhan Khaldun region, where cultural traditions and modern protections have severely limited archaeological excavation. Even satellite imagery and other modern technology have failed to settle the mystery.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Alexander the Great's Road to Tyre 04.10.2026 15min

  In 332 BCE, Alexander the Great stood on the Mediterranean coast staring at a seemingly impossible target. Tyre sat on an island roughly half a mile offshore, protected by massive walls rising directly from the sea. Previous conquerors had spent years trying to take the city. Alexander was 23 years old. His solution was extraordinary: build a road to it. For seven months, Alexander's army dumped stone, timber, and rubble into the Mediterranean, constructing a massive causeway toward Tyre. When defenders attacked it with fire ships, the Macedonians rebuilt. Alexander assembled a fleet, mounted siege engines aboard ships, and eventually breached the city's defenses. Tyre fell in July 332 BCE. But Alexander's greatest monument there may be the battlefield itself. His causeway altered currents, accumulated sediment, and eventually transformed the island into a permanent peninsula. More than 2,300 years later, modern Tyre still sits upon it.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  J. Colter - America's First Mountain Man 03.10.2026 14min

  In 1806, the Lewis and Clark Expedition was finally heading home when one member asked permission to turn around. His name was John Colter. Over the next several years, Colter became one of the earliest legendary mountain men, exploring and trapping across the northern Rockies. He traveled through a landscape of steaming springs, bubbling mud, and other geothermal features so strange that later stories associated his name with "Colter's Hell." But his most famous adventure was still to come. According to an account recorded years later, Blackfeet warriors captured Colter, stripped him, and forced him to run for his life. Colter escaped his pursuers, hid in a river, and eventually made his way back to safety after an extraordinary wilderness ordeal.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Reassessing the Hindenburg Disaster, w/ Catherine Katz 02.10.2026 34min

  On May 6, 1937, the German airship Hindenburg came in to land at Lakehurst, New Jersey. Crowds were waiting. Radio was already rolling. Thirty-four seconds later the greatest aircraft of its age was gone—and a reporter on the field was crying into a microphone words we still know: Oh, the humanity. We remember the fire. We are worse at remembering what the ship was for. Historian Catherine Grace Katz joins History Shorts for a full conversation about her new book, Shadow Before the Flame: The Hindenburg Disaster and the Prelude to War. This is not another "what sparked it" special. It is the Hindenburg put back where it belongs: on the collision course between a flying symbol of progress, a rising Nazi state, a failed helium deal with Washington, and the invention of breaking-news radio.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise  LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/   SPONSORED BY: www.thecollector.com 
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  Warsaw 1920 - The Battle that Saved Europe 01.10.2026 16min

  In August 1920, the Red Army approached Warsaw, and the newly independent Polish state appeared to be on the verge of collapse. The stakes stretched far beyond Poland. Bolshevik leaders hoped victory could help carry revolution westward, particularly toward a politically unstable Germany. Then the battlefield changed dramatically. Polish commander Józef Piłsudski launched a daring counteroffensive south of Warsaw, striking into a vulnerable section of the Soviet front and threatening its rear. Within days, the Soviet advance became a chaotic retreat. The Battle of Warsaw became one of the most consequential victories in Polish history. British diplomat Edgar Vincent D'Abernon later famously described it as the "eighteenth decisive battle of the world."   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  The Worst Military Decision in Ancient History 30.09.2026 13min

  In 415 BCE, Athens made an extraordinary decision: invade Sicily. The expedition was enormous. Confidence was high. And one of its chief architects was Alcibiades—a brilliant, charismatic, and notoriously unpredictable Athenian politician and general. Then everything began to unravel. Before the campaign was properly underway, Alcibiades was recalled to Athens to face charges of sacrilege. Instead of returning, he defected to Sparta—and began advising Athens' greatest enemy on how to defeat the expedition he had helped create. Over the next two years, strategic mistakes, political interference, disease, and Spartan intervention turned the campaign into catastrophe. The Athenian fleet was destroyed, its army surrendered, and thousands of survivors were imprisoned in the stone quarries of Syracuse. The disaster devastated Athenian power during the Peloponnesian War.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  The Rise of Catherine the Great 29.09.2026 13min

  In 1744, a 14-year-old German princess arrived in Russia to marry the heir to the Russian throne. She spoke little Russian, had few resources of her own, and barely knew the man who would become her husband. But Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst began reinventing herself. She learned Russian, converted to Orthodox Christianity, took the name Catherine, immersed herself in Enlightenment ideas, and spent years cultivating relationships within the Russian court. Then, in 1762, her husband became Emperor Peter III. His reign lasted just six months. With Peter increasingly isolated, Catherine secured the support of powerful allies and the Imperial Guard. In July, she rode to the Guard regiments, was proclaimed sovereign, and emerged from the coup as Empress Catherine II. Peter abdicated and died days later under mysterious circumstances.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  South Sea Company - The Original Economic Bubble 28.09.2026 15min

  In 1720, London was gripped by an investment frenzy. Companies appeared almost overnight, promising fortunes from everything imaginable—and sometimes from nothing at all. One notorious prospectus supposedly offered shares in "an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to know what it is." Investors bought in anyway. At the center of the mania stood the South Sea Company, whose shares skyrocketed during 1720 before spectacularly collapsing. Politicians were implicated, fortunes disappeared, and even Isaac Newton lost heavily after getting caught up in the boom. The scandal shook Britain's financial and political establishment. Its aftermath helped elevate Robert Walpole, traditionally regarded as Britain's first prime minister, as he worked to restore confidence in the government and financial system.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Two Days in Berlin 1961 - Cold War (Almost) Turns Hot 27.09.2026 17min

  On October 27, 1961, ten American tanks and ten Soviet tanks faced each other across Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin—loaded, ready, and separated by barely 100 meters. For sixteen hours, a single shot could have triggered a confrontation between two nuclear superpowers. But behind the scenes, John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev were communicating through a secret backchannel. Kennedy offered a way out: withdraw the Soviet tanks first, and the Americans would follow. Khrushchev did. The Soviets reversed. Thirty minutes later, the Americans followed. The crisis ended without a shot. In this episode of History Shorts, we explore one of the Cold War's most dangerous confrontations—and how leaders who understood how easily nations had stumbled into World War I chose, this time, to step back. Understanding history can be a form of protection against repeating it. It's also a central theme of my book, Eight Days in August, about the extraordinary final week of World War II—out now from Stackpole Books.   BUY THE BOOK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GGZ7R12D?lv=shuf&channelId=500&plpRedirect=mhFallback    SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Seven Days in Korea - To Fight or Not to Fight? 26.09.2026 16min

  At 4:00 a.m. on June 25, 1950, North Korean forces crossed the 38th parallel and invaded South Korea. Within days, President Harry Truman moved from supplying the South Koreans to ordering American air and naval support—and then committing U.S. ground troops. He did so without asking Congress for a declaration of war, presenting American intervention as action in support of the United Nations. At a press conference, the conflict was famously described as a "police action" rather than a war. The phrase captured something remarkable about how America had entered the conflict: not through one sweeping decision, but through a rapid succession of escalating choices. In this episode of History Shorts, we explore how seven extraordinary days transformed a distant invasion into an American war—and helped reshape the modern presidency's approach to military power. This week is about compressed time—moments when history does decades of work in days. It's also the idea behind my new book, Eight Days in August: The Final Week of World War II, out now from Stackpole Books.   BUY THE BOOK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GGZ7R12D?lv=shuf&channelId=500&plpRedirect=mhFallback    SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Morris - The Forsaken Founder w/ Scott Greenberger 25.09.2026 29min

  Gouverneur Morris wrote "We the People." He fought slavery on the floor of the Constitutional Convention. Washington turned to him when the army was starving. Hamilton's widow asked him to give the eulogy. He stayed in Paris through the Reign of Terror—wooden peg leg and all. Then history forgot him. Historian and journalist Scott S. Greenberger joins me to talk about his new book, The Forsaken Founder: Gouverneur Morris, the Unsung Patriot Who Wrote the Constitution, Stood Up to Slavery, and Survived the Reign of Terror. We get into who actually drafted the Constitution, why "We the People of the United States" matters, Morris's war on slavery inside the Convention, the Paris mob and the peg leg, his friendship with Hamilton, and why one of the most colorful founders was written out of the American story. If you think you know 1787, this conversation will rearrange the furniture.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise  LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/   SPONSORED BY: www.thecollector.com 
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  Eight Days in Manila - When the U.S. Became an Empire 24.09.2026 16min

  On May 1, 1898, Commodore George Dewey destroyed the Spanish fleet at Manila Bay. Then the cable went silent. For nearly a week, Americans had no reliable news from the Philippines. Newspapers speculated that Dewey had been defeated, captured, or perhaps had never fought at all. Meanwhile, events in Manila kept moving. Dewey worked with Filipino revolutionary Emilio Aguinaldo, whose forces soon resumed their campaign against Spanish rule. By the time news of Dewey's victory reached the United States, the Philippines had suddenly become central to a much larger question: Would America replace Spain as a colonial power in Asia? In this episode of History Shorts, we explore the extraordinary days when military victory, revolution, imperial ambition, and delayed communication helped transform America's role in the world. This week is about compressed time—moments when history does decades of work in days. It's also the idea behind my new book, Eight Days in August: The Final Week of World War II, out now from Stackpole Books.   BUY THE BOOK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GGZ7R12D?lv=shuf&channelId=500&plpRedirect=mhFallback    SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
• 
  Four Days in April - The Spark of the Civil War 23.09.2026 12min

  At 4:30 a.m. on April 12, 1861, Confederate artillery opened fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. For 34 hours, thousands of shells rained down on the fort. Remarkably, no one was killed during the bombardment. The first fatality came after the surrender. As the Union garrison fired a ceremonial salute to the American flag before evacuating, a cannon accidentally exploded, killing Private Daniel Hough. Three days later, Abraham Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers to suppress the rebellion. The proclamation accelerated the secession crisis, and Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina subsequently joined the Confederacy. In this episode of History Shorts, we explore how a battle with no combat deaths helped ignite a war that would kill hundreds of thousands. This week is about compressed time—moments when history does decades of work in days. It's also the idea behind my new book, Eight Days in August: The Final Week of World War II, out now from Stackpole Books.   BUY THE BOOK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GGZ7R12D?lv=shuf&channelId=500&plpRedirect=mhFallback    SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Six Days in March - The End of the Roman Republic 22.09.2026 15min

  On March 15, 44 BC, Julius Caesar was stabbed to death by a group of Roman senators who believed they were saving the Republic. Five days later, their plan was already unraveling. At Caesar's public funeral, Mark Antony displayed Caesar's bloodied and torn toga before an enraged Roman crowd. Violence erupted. Caesar's body was burned on an improvised pyre in the Forum, and the mob turned against his assassins. Brutus and Cassius fled Rome. Within two years, both were dead. Within thirteen, Augustus ruled the Roman world. The conspirators killed Caesar to preserve a political system that had endured for centuries. Instead, they helped accelerate its destruction. In this episode of History Shorts, we explore how a handful of extraordinary days transformed Rome forever. This week is about compressed time—moments when history does decades of work in days. It's also the idea behind my new book, Eight Days in August: The Final Week of World War II, out now from Stackpole Books.   BUY THE BOOK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GGZ7R12D?lv=shuf&channelId=500&plpRedirect=mhFallback    SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
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  Eight Days in August - The Collapse of Japan 21.09.2026 16min

  In the early hours of August 15, 1945, Japanese officers stormed the Imperial Palace. Their target wasn't the emperor. It was a phonograph record. Recorded on August 14, it contained Emperor Hirohito's announcement accepting surrender. The conspirators sealed the palace, cut communications, killed the commander of the Imperial Guard, and spent hours desperately searching for the recording. They never found it. Hidden among palace documents, the record survived. The coup collapsed at dawn, and at noon, millions of Japanese citizens heard their emperor's voice for the first time, announcing that the war was ending. In this episode of History Shorts, we tell the incredible story of the Kyūjō Incident—the last-minute attempt to prevent Japan's surrender and continue World War II. It's one of the eight remarkable days told in my new book, Eight Days in August: The Final Week of World War II, out now from Stackpole Books.   BUY THE BOOK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GGZ7R12D?lv=shuf&channelId=500&plpRedirect=mhFallback    SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
• 
  The Osage Reign of Terror 20.09.2026 15min

  In the 1920s, members of the Osage Nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world, thanks to oil discovered beneath their Oklahoma reservation. Then they began dying. Osage men and women were poisoned, shot, and killed in mysterious circumstances. Behind many of the deaths was a calculated conspiracy: murder Osage people, inherit their valuable oil headrights, and steal their fortunes. Local authorities repeatedly failed to stop it. Eventually, federal investigators arrived, and the case became one of the most important early investigations of what would become the FBI. But the murders uncovered were only part of the story.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
• 
  The 1927 Bath School Disaster 19.09.2026 14min

  On May 18, 1927, the small farming community of Bath, Michigan, suffered the deadliest school attack in American history. Explosives secretly planted beneath the local school detonated shortly after classes began, collapsing an entire section of the building. As parents, teachers, and neighbors desperately searched the rubble for survivors, another explosion struck nearby. By the end of the day, 38 children and six adults had been killed, with dozens more injured. The attack shocked the nation, yet the Bath School disaster has largely faded from American memory.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise   LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/ SPONSORED BY: https://www.podcastrepublic.net/get-it-now 
• 
  Inside the National WWI Museum, w/ Christopher Warren 18.09.2026 35min

  Dr. Christopher Warren, Vice President of Curatorial Affairs and Chief Curator at the National WWI Museum and Memorial, joins History Shorts for a full conversation about the Great War, memory, and why World War I still matters. The National WWI Museum and Memorial in Kansas City is America's official museum and memorial dedicated to the First World War. Visitors enter across a glass bridge over 9,000 poppies—each representing 1,000 combatant deaths—before encountering one of the world's most important collections of objects, documents, and personal stories from 1914 to 1918 and beyond. In this interview, Warren discusses the American experience in World War I, the global nature of the conflict, how Kansas City came to build the Liberty Memorial so quickly after the Armistice, and why the war is still too often forgotten in the United States. We also talk about commemoration, the work of a curator, and what a first-time visitor should take away from the museum.   SUPPORT THE SHOW: https://www.patreon.com/c/HistoryShortsPodcast ADVERTISE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/advertise  LEARN MORE: https://www.historyshortspodcast.com/   SPONSORED BY: www.thecollector.com