Stuff You Missed in History Class

All over the world, for all of human history – and probably going back to our earliest hominid ancestors – people have found ways to try to keep themselves clean. But how did soap come about?  Resear...

This 2021 episode covers John Dalton, famous for his work in atomic theory. But he wrote one of the first thorough descriptions of what he called “anomalous vision” – he realized he wasn’t perceiving ...

Holly talks about nebulous passages in the writing of Jane Croly and her brother. Tracy and Holly talk about watching TV as children.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The initial time period where a TV remote control was developed was pretty short. And it shows how two different people perceive their work, and how that work is perceived differently over time by the...

Jane Cunningham Croly, who wrote under the pen name Jennie June, was a journalist who advocated for equality for women. She is most well known for founding one of the earliest clubs for women in the U...

This 2022 episode discusses how modern rabies prophylaxis is almost 100% effective at preventing human death from the bite of a rabid animal. How did people come to understand rabies, and then develop...

Holly talks about the arguments she found online about whether graffiti is art. Tracy talks about how the Dickin Medal impacted veterinary medicine.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy informatio...

Maria Dickin wanted to raise the status of animals in society and bring more awareness to the work they were doing during World War II. The Dickin Medal was created to honor military working animals. ...

The possible contenders for the title of inventor of spray paint were actually working across decades. And really, all those people contributed pieces of the story. Research: Abplanalp, R.H. “Valve...

This 2021 episode covers Eunice Newton Foote, who became the first person to make a connection between the Earth’s temperature and the concentration of carbon dioxide gas in the atmosphere in 1856.  ...