HistoryPod
1,354 episodes - English - Latest episode: 3 days ago - ★★★★ - 234 ratingsThe 'on this day in history' podcast, with a new episode every single day. Featuring historical events that range from the Roman Empire to the World Wide Web, HistoryPod proves that there is always something to be remembered 'on this day'. Written and presented by Scott Allsop, creator of the award-winning www.mrallsophistory.com
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Episodes
28th April 1869: Ten miles of railway track are laid in a single day by the crews of the Central Pacific Railroad
April 28, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteEight Irish rail-layers of the Central Pacific Railroad were supported by hundreds of Chinese laborers to lay a record 10 miles 56 feet of ...
27th April 1953: The US launches Operation Moolah to obtain a Soviet MiG-15 jet fighter through defection
April 27, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteBy the time the armistice was signed on 27 July, the money for Operation Moolah was still untouched as no pilot had brought their MiG-15 to South ...
26th April 1933: The Gestapo secret police established by Hermann Göring in Nazi Germany
April 26, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe Gestapo operated with broad authority and virtually unlimited power, employing a network of informants and spies to monitor and report on suspected dissidents and political ...
25th April 1898: The United States declares war on Spain in the Spanish–American War
April 25, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteCongress didn’t formally declare war until 25 April, although the declaration recognized that a state of war had existed since Spain’s declaration four days ...
24th April 1800: The Library of Congress established when John Adams approves a budget of $5,000 for books
April 24, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe money allowed for the purchase of approximately 3,000 volumes from England that were housed in the north wing of the Capitol ...
23rd April 1348: Order of the Garter founded by King Edward III of England
April 23, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteMembership of the Order of the Garter is highly prestigious and is often reserved for members of the English nobility and royalty. Over the centuries, the Order of the Garter has evolved into a ceremonial institution, with its members participating in various official events and ...
22nd April 1889: Oklahoma Land Rush takes place with 2 million acres of Unassigned Lands opened to settlement
April 22, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteAn estimated 50,000 hopeful settlers gathered along the borders of the Oklahoma Territory prior to the gunshot that gave the signal for them to chaotically race into the territory on foot, horseback, and in wagons to stake their ...
21st April 1967: Svetlana Alliluyeva, the only daughter of Joseph Stalin, arrives in the USA after defecting from the Soviet Union
April 21, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe sensational defection of Stalin’s only surviving child made international news and four days later, at a press conference in the Plaza Hotel, she denounced the Soviet Communist regime and her father’s ...
20th April 1792: The French Revolutionary Wars begin when the Assembly vote for war against Austria
April 20, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe French declaration of war was part of a broader strategy by the revolutionary government to pre-empt foreign intervention and unite the French people behind the revolutionary ...
19th April 1987: The Simpsons make their first television appearance on The Tracey Ullman Show
April 19, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteAn overwhelmingly positive reaction in season one meant that Simpsons shorts were featured in every episode of the next two seasons before being spun off into a standalone half-hour series in ...
18th April 1775: Paul Revere rides from Charleston to Lexington with his message that “the Regulars are coming out!”
April 18, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteWhether Revere referred to the approaching army as ‘regulars’ or ‘Redcoats’ is unclear, but his cry had the intended consequence of signalling the march of troops towards the Massachusetts village of ...
17th April 1907: Ellis Island in New York Harbor has its busiest day, processing 11,747 immigrants
April 17, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThis surge in immigration was primarily driven by economic opportunities in the United States, which was at the height of the industrial revolution. This combined with a desire among some to escape growing political instability in Europe, while ethnic and religious violence led Jews from the Russian Empire in particular to seek a new life ...
16th April 1902: The first purpose-designed movie theater opens as Thomas Tally’s Electric Theatre
April 16, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteTally's Electric Theatre in Los Angeles proved incredibly popular with the public, and sparked a revolution in cinema history. Visit the excellent https://losangelestheatres.blogspot.com/2019/02/electric-theatre.html for more detailed ...
15th April 1989: 96 Liverpool fans killed in the Hillsborough Disaster
April 15, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteNinety-six Liverpool Football Club fans died and hundreds more were injured in a crush at Hillsborough Stadium in ...
14th April 1935: Black Sunday dust storm sweeps across the Great Plains during the Dust Bowl era
April 14, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe Black Sunday dust storm brought a massive wall of dust estimated to be over 2 miles high that engulfed entire communities in darkness and choking dust, reducing visibility to just a few ...
13th April 1970: Apollo 13 spacecraft rocked by an explosion from one of its oxygen tanks
April 13, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe resulting emergency led to the calm announcement by the crew of, ‘Houston we’ve had a ...
12th April 1861: American Civil War begins with the Battle of Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina
April 12, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteAfter suffering significant damage during the battle from more than 3,000 artillery rounds over 34 hours, at 2:30 p.m the following day Major Anderson and his men formally surrendered, and the Confederate forces took control of Fort ...
11th April 1968: The Fair Housing Act of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 signed into law by President Johnson
April 11, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe Act made it illegal to discriminate regarding the sale, rental, or financing of housing based on race, religion, or national ...
10th April 1815: The most powerful volcanic eruption in recorded human history occurred at Mount Tambora
April 10, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe explosion was estimated to be four times more powerful than the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa, making it the most powerful volcanic eruption in recorded ...
9th April 1865: Confederate States Army General Robert E. Lee surrenders to Union Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse
April 09, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteLee’s surrender to Grant encouraged other Confederate forces across the south to do the same and marked the beginning of the end of the American Civil ...
8th April 1838: SS Great Western begins her maiden voyage to New York as the first steamship specifically built for transatlantic travel
April 08, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteGreat Western’s maiden voyage crossed the Atlantic in a record time of 15 days and five ...
7th April 1954: President Eisenhower first described the ‘domino theory’ of the spread of communism during a news conference
April 07, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteEisenhower likened the spread of communism in Southeast Asia to a row of dominoes quickly collapsing after the first one ...
6th April 1793: Committee of Public Safety established by the National Convention of France
April 06, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe National Convention established the Committee of Public Safety with the primary objectives of maintaining public order, managing the war effort against foreign powers, and rooting out perceived enemies of the ...
5th April 1722: Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen becomes the first European to encounter Easter Island
April 05, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe first sighting coincided with Easter Sunday, so Roggeveen and his crew agreed to name the landmass Easter ...
4th April 1925: Adolf Hitler orders the establishment of the SS
April 04, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteThe Nazi Party founded a paramilitary organisation that became the Schutzstaffel, better known as the ...
3rd April 1721: Robert Walpole becomes the first de facto Prime Minister of Great Britain
April 03, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteWalpole was appointed First Lord of the Treasury, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Leader of the House of Commons. This made him the de facto Prime Minister and, while the title was not officially recognized at the time, Walpole wielded considerable power and ...
2nd April 1863: The Richmond Bread Riot saw hundreds of women in Virginia loot storehouses and shops
April 02, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteWith the cry of ‘bread or blood!’ the women marched to the city’s market district where they broke into government storehouses and nearby ...
1st April 1944: The USAAF accidentally bomb the neutral Swiss town of Schaffhausen instead of a German chemical factory
April 01, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteWhile flying over France, the formations experienced high winds that blew them dramatically off ...
31st March 1985: WrestleMania I takes place at Madison Square Garden in New York City
March 31, 2024 02:05 - 1 ByteWrestleMania grossed a reported $12 million and, although reviews of the first event were mixed, it marked the start of the longest-running professional wrestling competition in ...
30th March 1900: Archaeologists at the ancient site of Knossos discover the first clay tablet inscribed with Linear B
March 30, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteEvans’ excavation of the Linear B tablets at Knossos shed light on the complex and sophisticated nature of the Minoan ...
29th March 1806: Construction of the Cumberland Road, the first federally funded highway, authorised by U.S. Congress
March 29, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe Cumberland Road quickly became a vital artery for trade and transport, facilitating the movement of people, goods, and ideas between the eastern seaboard and the western ...
28th March 1979: Worst accident in U.S. nuclear power plant history at Three Mile Island Generating Station
March 28, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe incident at Three Mile Island heralded a dramatic shift in public attitudes towards nuclear power and the second reactor never returned to ...
27th March 1964: Most powerful earthquake ever recorded in North America struck Alaska
March 27, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe colossal earthquake, registering a magnitude of 9.2, struck Southcentral Alaska and is the most powerful on record in North America and the second-largest ...
26th March 1351: Combat of the Thirty fought between English and Breton soldiers during the Breton War of Succession
March 26, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteAlthough the event was of little military importance overall, the chivalric nature of the battle was celebrated by chroniclers, balladeers, and artists, while survivors of the Thirty were held in held ...
25th March 1965: The Selma to Montgomery March ends at the Alabama State Capitol
March 25, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe marchers arrived in Montgomery on 25 March, where King made his ‘How Long, Not Long’ speech to a crowd of more than 25,000 ...
24th March 1989: Start of the Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster in Alaska’s Prince William Sound
March 24, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteExxon Valdez had only recently departed the Valdez Marine Terminal when the captain, Joseph Hazelwood, left Third Mate Gregory Cousins in charge of steering the vessel while he retired to his ...
23rd March 1857: The world’s first successful passenger elevator installed in a five-storey New York City department store
March 23, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteElisha Otis was an American mechanic who invented the safety elevator, which featured a mechanism to prevent the platform from falling if the hoisting cable ...
22nd March 1622: Indian Massacre of 1622 occurred in the English colony of Jamestown, Virginia
March 22, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe surprise attack was launched against English settlers by the the Powhatan Confederacy, led by Chief ...
21st March 1952: Moondog Coronation Ball, the first rock and roll concert, takes place in Cleveland, Ohio
March 21, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteBy the time the concert began at 10pm on 21 March there were thousands of people outside the arena unable to get in who resorted to breaking through the ...
20th March 1854: U.S. Republican Party founded at a meeting in a schoolhouse in Wisconsin
March 20, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe party quickly built support and by 1856 it proved to be the dominant political force in the North when John C. Fremont, the first Republican presidential candidate, won 11 of the 16 Northern ...
19th March 1831: City Bank of New York robbed in the first widely-reported bank heist in U.S. history
March 19, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe heist was masterminded by James Honeyman and James Murray entered the bank late at night on 19 March where they raided the vault and safe deposit boxes. Together they left with approximately $245,000 in bank notes and coins, which is the equivalent of more than $50 million ...
18th March 1990: 13 works of art stolen from Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in the world’s largest ever art theft
March 18, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteDespite a reward of $10 million, and extensive investigations by the FBI, none of the works have ever been recovered and nobody has ever been arrested for the ...
17th March 1766: The first recorded Saint Patrick’s Day parade took place in the city of New York
March 17, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteIrish soldiers serving in the British Army led the first recorded Saint Patrick's Day parade which, due to the high number of Irish immigrants in New York, quickly became an annual ...
16th March 1660: England’s Long Parliament dissolved after twenty years in session
March 16, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe dissolution of the Long Parliament signalled the end of the republican experiment initiated by the Civil War and cleared the way for Charles II to return to England as king, marking the beginning of the Restoration ...
15th March 1916: U.S. General Pershing led the Punitive Expedition into Mexico to locate revolutionary leader Pancho Villa
March 15, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteBy January 1917 he was still no closer to being caught, and Pershing’s forces were ordered to withdraw and return to the United ...
14th March 1939: The First Slovak Republic proclaimed, as a client state of Nazi Germany
March 14, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe creation of the First Slovak Republic represented a long-standing aspiration for Slovak autonomy, but came under the shadow of Nazi influence and ...
13th March 1942: Julia Flikke, the commander of the Army Nurse Corps, became the first female Colonel in the United States
March 13, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteAlthough her rating was only temporary, it marked in important step towards the Army-Navy Nurse Act of 1947 that made such appointments ...
12th March 1947: Truman Doctrine established when the President asks for aid to Greece and Turkey
March 12, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteIn a program that won broad support, America committed to providing $400 million in assistance to Greece and ...
11th March 1941: Lend-Lease Act signed into law by United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt
March 11, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteBy providing substantial military assistance to Allied nations through the Lend-Lease Act, the United States played a crucial role in bolstering their ability to resist Axis aggression and played a major role in the Allied victory in the Second World ...
10th March 2000: The NASDAQ index peaks at the height of the dot-com bubble
March 10, 2024 03:05 - 1 ByteThe economic bubble that is also referred to as the ‘dot-com boom’ was the result of investors speculatively pouring money into the numerous internet companies that were founded in the mid- to ...