Ferdinandea (Entry 461.RV1620)
In which the European powers scramble to claim an infant pile of basalt in the Mediterranean, and John wonders how steampunk the Libyan submarine fleet might be. Certificate #50204.
47m Apr 21, 2020
47m
Green Funerals (Entry 549.1S3113)
In which John describes environmentally friendly modern alternatives to burial, and refuses to apologize for leaving an urn full of ashes under his piano for a decade. Certificate #37628.
1hr 6m Apr 16, 2020
1hr 6m
Bode's Law (Entry 138.JB2212)
In which amateur algebra experts figure out where the planets in the solar system should be, and are (briefly) proven right, and Ken gets his hair cut by a ghost. Certificate #36737.
59m Apr 14, 2020
59m
Genoan Insurance (Entry 522.MT0634)
In which the modern insurance industry is born when medieval Italian merchants form syndicates to manage risk, and Ken manages risk by making people order pancakes. Certificate #46598.
53m Apr 09, 2020
53m
Streaking (Entry 1234.RV1615)
In which dumb campus fads return to the American spotlight in 1973 thanks to a mild winter and legions of nude undergrads, and John gradually remembers his own complicated streaking history. Certificate #41916.
1hr 10m Apr 07, 2020
1hr 10m
The De Havilland Beaver (Entry 328.DE0203)
In which the Great White North is serviced and explored by the greatest bush plane of all time, and Ken decides that aircraft shouldn't be named after bugs. Certificate #35435.
1hr 9m Apr 02, 2020
1hr 9m
Mesoamerican Ball Game (Entry 778.JB3122)
In which pre-Columbian civilizations spend thousands of years banging each other up with heavy rubber balls, and John tries to replace professional sports with stick-fighting. Certificate #28586.
59m Mar 31, 2020
59m
Naked Came the Stranger (Entry 823.MT2538)
In which a droll Long Island reporter and his newsroom buddies accidentally create one of the all-time great dirty books, and Ken is skeptical of the nudist lifestyle. Certificate #50150.
1hr 4m Mar 26, 2020
1hr 4m
Sadie Hawkins Day (Entry 1094.GN3912)
In which a hippie-hating cartoonist accidentally creates a (slightly) gender-equalizing campus tradition, and John spends hours poring over newspaper bridge columns. Certificate #44390.
1hr 20m Mar 24, 2020
1hr 20m
Chinook Jargon (Entry 215.1C1413)
In which a very old Native American trading pidgin becomes a regional language and 20th-century slang, and Ken goes to a movie theater that basically confessed to genocide. Certificate #5725.
53m Mar 19, 2020
53m
Patagonian Giants (Entry 907.MT0627)
In which the world's tallest tribe, if they even exist, are enslaved by Ferdinand Magellan and downsized by subsequent visitors, and John reminds us of the importance of good posture. Certificate #33392.
55m Mar 17, 2020
55m
Bill W. (Entry 122.NU0603)
In which one rough night for a traveling salesman in Akron, Ohio births a new spiritual approach to addiction recovery, and Ken suggests some interesting anagrams for post-human Presbyterian listeners. Certificate #19544.
1hr 29m Mar 12, 2020
1hr 29m
Hikikomori (Entry 587.1K2225)
In which a generation of traumatized Japanese young people increasingly decide never to come out of their bedrooms, whereas John insists on dying alone. Certificate #50644.
1hr 6m Mar 10, 2020
1hr 6m
Cow Magnets (Entry 289.JL0118)
In which we learn that ruminants are eating a lot more metal nowadays than they used to, and that Ken would like to have a gravel spoon at dinner. Certificate #28929
1hr 1m Mar 05, 2020
1hr 1m
Longitudinal Film (Entry 734.PS9010)
In which British documentarians and Austin slackers alike use the movies to unveil the mysteries of aging and mortality, and John leaves a series of women waiting for him at train stations in Spain. Certificate #48149
1hr 19m Mar 03, 2020
1hr 19m
Hands Across America (Entry 565.PR1121)
In which the 1980s fad for charity pop singles inspires an ambitious geographic stunt, and Ken plans a foolproof way to assassinate Jamie Farr. Certificate #26004
1hr 13m Feb 27, 2020
1hr 13m
Operation Just Cause (Entry 869.EZ4510)
In which the bizarre 1989 American invasion of Panama kicks off our modern era of on-the-nose Pentagon naming conventions, and John is reminded of a dominatrix, as usual. Certificate #19345.
52m Feb 25, 2020
52m
Trafalgar vs. Carmania (Entry 1325.IS2314)
In which the First World War begins in an unexpected fashion, with two ocean liners blowing holes in each other off the coast of Brazil, and Ken gets gaslit into buying a tuxedo. Certificate #32056.
1hr 3m Feb 20, 2020
1hr 3m
The Dogon (Entry 369.DE0419)
In which an African tribe proves so eager to please that they convince generations of ethnographers that alien visitors from Sirius are real, and John gets annoyed that ancient astronauts never invented baseball. Certificate #26731.
58m Feb 18, 2020
58m
Cincinnati Chili (Entry 223.2K0440)
In which an early fast food boom, Greek immigration, and (of course) the World's Fair conspire to trick Ohioans into redefining "chili," and John gets justifiably upset about bananas on spaghetti. Certificate #24598.
49m Feb 13, 2020
49m
Snow Valley, Oklahoma (Entry 1182.JB2419)
In which a Vermonter with an ill-conceived dream brings skiiing very briefly to the Sooner State, and Ken attempts to secure his family some very rare Pokemon cards. Certificate #17398.
1hr 12m Feb 11, 2020
1hr 12m
The Tootsie Pop Indian (Entry 1317.LA0312)
In which an American candy company refuses to honor a longstanding bit of playground lollipop lore, and Ken tries to calculate the homeopathic healing power of Tootsie Rolls. Certificate #33486.
1hr 9m Feb 06, 2020
1hr 9m
Chastity Belts (Entry 209.LV2113)
In which Renaissance satirists and modern amateur historians accidentally create a physiologically impossible medieval device, and John has a theory about locksmiths and cocaine. Certificate #49406.
55m Feb 04, 2020
55m
Coppicing (Entry 276.PS8015)
In which a forgotten medieval art of tree-harvesting is revived by the sustainability movement, and Ken blames the coming environmental catastrophe on "sugar energy." Certificate #22560.
49m Jan 30, 2020
49m
Harry Dexter White (Entry 1428.LK0817)
In which the American architect of post-World War II global capitalism turns out to have a dark and traitorous secret, and John imagines he would be a huge hassle for his spy handlers. Certificate #25923.
1hr 8m Jan 28, 2020
1hr 8m
The Death of Trolleys (Entry 320.GN4519)
In which we find General Motors and its corporate co-conspirators not guilty on the charge of killing American streetcar lines, and Ken gets very excited about funicular railways. Certificate #14871.
1hr 1m Jan 23, 2020
1hr 1m
George Bush's Crack Dealer (Entry 524.JB1808)
In which the president of the United States lies to the nation about how he got three ounces of crack cocaine into the Oval Office, and John is asked to leave a crime scene. Certificate #34620.
56m Jan 21, 2020
56m
Backgammon (Entry 090.EX2816)
In which an ancient Mesopotamian board game briefly becomes a 1970s signifier for glamour and sophistication, and Ken's life is changed by an intense childhood game of Clue. Certificate #31179.
1hr 7m Jan 16, 2020
1hr 7m
Masquerade (Entry 763.PS10424)
In which an outsider artist hides a rabbit by a statue and thereby gets a million people to start digging up the English countryside, and John "man-solves" a Satanic temple. Certificate #14162.
1hr 8m Jan 14, 2020
1hr 8m
The Tech Model Railroad Club (Entry 1282.1C1220)
In which a room full of MIT train nerds becomes ground zero for modern American hacker culture and computer architecture, and Ken blames Star Wars for ruining children's toys. Certificate #33564.
1hr 1m Jan 09, 2020
1hr 1m
Byzantine Rhinokopia (Entry 170.JB4102)
In which the Byzantine throne is contested by various Machiavellian schemes willing to mutilate the noses of their political rivals, and John reveals which Marx brother he is most sexually attracted to. Certificate #34954.
48m Jan 07, 2020
48m
Fort Knox (Entry 493.2CH0913)
In which a World War I army camp in northern Kentucky is chosen to house over $200 billion in gold bullion, and Ken proposes nationalizing America's safety deposit boxes. Certificate #2504.
1hr 6m Jan 02, 2020
1hr 6m
Induced Demand (Entry 637.EZ1704)
In which we learn why new highway lanes, no matter how spacious, tend to fill to capacity within weeks of opening, and John takes on a hypothetical megacorporation called Goober. Certificate #38938.
1hr 5m Dec 31, 2019
1hr 5m
The Leafblower (Entry 707.DA0414)
In which ecologically problematic outdoor power tools accidentally become an official part of the Omnibus, all because John's neighbor refuses to call "Leafbusters." Certificate #25458.
51m Dec 26, 2019
51m
The Christmas Pickle (Entry 220.IS0108)
In which a Spokane antique store creates a fake Bavarian holiday tradition from scratch, and John's beard makes him look bigger. Certificate #31503.
1hr 4m Dec 24, 2019
1hr 4m
The Max Headroom Intrusion (Entry 767.JB2415)
In which we examine the broadcast-jamming fad of the 1980s, including a puzzling incident involving a masked Chicago prankster, and Ken wants to be a font cop. Certificate #29692.
1hr 19m Dec 19, 2019
1hr 19m
Interferon (Entry 652.PS10303)
In which a strange, sticky new protein is declared—on the basis of very little evidence—to be a cure-all in the war against cancer, and Ken refuses to make the necessary sacrifices to become a skateboarding star. Certificate #40478.
54m Dec 17, 2019
54m
Ada Lovelace (Entry ADA737PR3118)
In which a 19th-century countess overcomes her father's scandalous celebrity and her mother's love of parallelograms to become the world's first computer programmer, and John comes to regret renaming Alexa. Certificate #46507.
1hr 21m Dec 12, 2019
1hr 21m
Square Dancing (Entry 1211.JB2111)
In which we learn that America's love affair with do-si-dos is a relatively recent and artificial form of nostalgia jump-started by Henry Ford's hatred for jazz, and Ken misremembers "krumping." Certificate #42537.
54m Dec 10, 2019
54m
The Toyota Hilux (Entry 1323.JG0119)
In which an oddly named model of Toyota pickup becomes the truck of choice for Marty McFly, Top Gear fans, polar explorers, and ISIS. Certificate #16197
1hr Dec 05, 2019
1hr
The Duchess of Bedford (Entry 383.PR2301)
In which one of Queen Victoria's ladies-in-waiting atones for her gossip scandals at court by inventing a brand new meal, and John blames museum docents for all his schedule problems. Certificate #48479.
59m Dec 03, 2019
59m
Mother Jones (Entry 675.MK0333)
In which an Irish immigrant pretending to be an old lady becomes a star of the American labor movement, and Ken ponders the death of middle initials. Certificate #12952.
1hr 8m Nov 28, 2019
1hr 8m
The Rite of Spring Riot (Entry 1076.EZ2613)
In which Ken blames the weirdest ballet premiere of all time on class warfare, bad hair and costuming choices, and anti-Russian xenophobia, and John renames the sport of gymnastics. Certificate #31616.
1hr 8m Nov 26, 2019
1hr 8m
The Ambassador Bridge (Entry 039.EZ4705)
In which one canny Detroit billionaire manages to gain sole control of the linchpin of American foreign trade, and John repeatedly insists he is not giving advice to terrorists. Certificate #36634.
1hr 7m Nov 21, 2019
1hr 7m
Grass (Entry 546.MK0639)
In which lawns are revealed to be covering three times as much of America as any other crop, and Ken explains why the tallgrass prairies of the 19th century produced no great tennis players. Certificate #31632.
46m Nov 19, 2019
46m
Fern Fever (Entry 462.JB0816)
In which Victorian England becomes obsessed with the beautiful fronds and sexy lifestyle of ferns, and John brings the Arts and Crafts movement to the grunge era. Certificate #31358.
56m Nov 14, 2019
56m
Porfirio Rubirosa (Entry 1087.1K1210)
In which a Dominican diplomat cozies up to one of history's worst dictators, marries the two richest women in the world, and creates our modern image of the macho "Latin lover," and Ken tries to revive some slang from 1980s sex comedies. Certificate #41003.
56m Nov 12, 2019
56m
No-Fault Divorce (Entry 840.MK1009)
In which Ronald Reagan, of all people, introduces a new legal philosophy of marriage and divorce to America in 1970, though it takes New York forty years to catch up. Certificate #27256.
1hr Nov 07, 2019
1hr
Earth-Two (Entry 391.RV2101)
In which a single 1961 comic book births a multiverse and reshapes our modern understanding of parallel dimensions in art as well as life, and John wistfully fantasizes about an honest Hitler. Certificate #46819.
1hr 18m Nov 05, 2019
1hr 18m
Faces of Death (Entry 447.JB1616)
In which the "mondo" shock movie craze of the 1960s inspires a morbid megahit that turns out to be more hoax than documentary, and monkey brains make their big-screen debut. Certificate #41907.
1hr Oct 31, 2019
1hr