American History Hit

Mon, 14 Apr 2025

How did a US Army mission in Vietnam end with the massacre of up to 500 people?In this episode, Don ...

Thu, 10 Apr 2025

Born in poverty in Texas Hill Country, President Johnson delivered an unsurpassed series of legislat...

Mon, 07 Apr 2025

The Vietnam War is a defining chapter in American military history. But how did the US get so involv...

Thu, 03 Apr 2025

Almost a year into the American Civil War, Union forces laid siege to Fort Donelson. In this episode...

Mon, 31 Mar 2025

Bobby Kennedy's 1968 presidential campaign had an aura around it. Its urgency, idealism and raw emot...

Thu, 27 Mar 2025

80 years ago, the battle of Iwo Jima came to an end on 26 March 1945. After 36 days of fighting, nea...

Mon, 24 Mar 2025

How do you justify a war you lost, and that destroyed countless homes, businesses, towns and familie...

Thu, 20 Mar 2025

The biggest counterfactual that hangs on the assassination of JFK is this: Would JFK have launched a...

Mon, 17 Mar 2025

Did the Confederates predict that secession would lead to war? How ready were they to fight? And wha...

Thu, 13 Mar 2025

Dwight D. Eisenhower is a fixture in the lists of America's favourite Presidents. How did Eisenhower...

Mon, 10 Mar 2025

The Civil War consumed the Confederacy for its entire existence, draining it of supplies, food and p...

Thu, 06 Mar 2025

What do Thomas Jefferson and Beyonce have in common? They have both been thought to be members of th...

Mon, 03 Mar 2025

Only one person has ever held the title of President of the Confederate States of America. In this e...

Thu, 27 Feb 2025

The end of the Second World War. The start of the Cold War. The dropping of the Atomic Bomb and the ...

Mon, 24 Feb 2025

In 1699, Virginia’s government and capital moved from Jamestown to Middle Plantation, renaming it ...

Thu, 20 Feb 2025

What was it like to live in the fort at Jamestown? Who was in charge? What provisions were there? An...

Mon, 17 Feb 2025

What is a Viking? Did they really make it to the United States? And if so, how far did they get?Don ...

Thu, 13 Feb 2025

How did Frederick Douglass, born into enslavement, rise to become one of the most influential orator...

Mon, 10 Feb 2025

From suspicion, to siege, to collaboration, to all out war - in this episode we uncover the complex ...

Thu, 06 Feb 2025

Born enslaved in 1818, by the time of the Civil War Frederick Douglass was famous around the United ...

Mon, 03 Feb 2025

In May 1607, over 100 English settlers arrived at Chesapeake Bay on the East Coast of North America....

Thu, 30 Jan 2025

FDR and Winston Churchill spent 113 days in each others' company during WWII. FDR even saw Churchill...

Mon, 27 Jan 2025

In the 19th Century, a war on the boundary between Europe and Asia had an unexpected effect. It caus...

Thu, 23 Jan 2025

They say that the enemy of your enemy is your friend, but did that apply to President Franklin D. Ro...

Mon, 20 Jan 2025

Why was there once a fashion for styling your hair like Brutus, the most famous of Julius Caesar's a...

Thu, 16 Jan 2025

The leaders of the two most powerful nations fighting in the Second World War, President Franklin D....

Mon, 13 Jan 2025

Sitting Bull, Jumping Badger, Slow - what do we know about the man who went by each of these names? ...

Thu, 09 Jan 2025

In 1932, amidst the Great Depression, Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected the 32nd President of the Un...

Mon, 06 Jan 2025

In April 1861, Union forces having lost the first battle of the Civil War, attention turned to the C...

Thu, 02 Jan 2025

President Herbert Hoover is synonymous with failure. As the Great Depression hit, shanty town across...

Mon, 30 Dec 2024

In this special episode, Don Wildman is joined by experts Jonathan Alter and Jefferson Cowie to delv...

Mon, 30 Dec 2024

When the US turned to Japan for workers in the late 19th Century, they probably never foresaw that o...

Thu, 26 Dec 2024

The shot heard ‘round the world'; the start of the American Revolution. An event that would have p...

Mon, 23 Dec 2024

When fossils were discovered in the US during the 19th Century, it altered American understandings o...

Thu, 19 Dec 2024

What makes the ideal gangster hunter? In the 1930s, outlaws like John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson an...

Mon, 16 Dec 2024

How did a couple's holiday save Kyoto from certain ruin? How did a landslide contribute to the Revol...

Thu, 12 Dec 2024

Sworn in after the death of President Harding by the light of a kerosene lamp, the 30th President of...

Mon, 09 Dec 2024

76 people died on 19th April 1993 when the compound of a religious sect, the Branch Davidians, went ...

Thu, 05 Dec 2024

On 7th December, 1941, the Japanese Imperial Navy struck the United States. In an action which kille...

Mon, 02 Dec 2024

Alien spacecraft, phenomena from another dimension, ghosts, demons of satan, a trick of light - what...

Thu, 28 Nov 2024

A cargo hold, just 5 feet tall and divided up with canvas - this is what served as the living quarte...

Mon, 25 Nov 2024

More than 30 million people can trace their ancestry to the 102 passengers and 30 crew aboard the Ma...

Thu, 21 Nov 2024

Despite dying as one of the most popular presidents in history, the 29th Commander-in-Chief has been...

Mon, 18 Nov 2024

In April 1898 the United States declared war on Spain. By the end of the war that December, the Span...

Thu, 14 Nov 2024

This is the story of America's longest held prisoner of war. John 'Jack' Downey, an American CIA ope...

Mon, 11 Nov 2024

In 1933, The Pittsburgh Courier published an editorial entitled 'Hitler Learns from America'. S...

Thu, 07 Nov 2024

With the US election happening, we wanted to take a look back at the presidents from the past what w...

Mon, 04 Nov 2024

Invisible ink, delayed flights and political meddling - elections are a symbol of democracy, so how ...

Thu, 31 Oct 2024

The unclaimed dead of New York City's streets and rivers were brought to the New York Morgue in the ...

Mon, 28 Oct 2024

What causes a person to lose the Presidential election?Henry Clay ran for the Presidency 3 times, an...

Thu, 24 Oct 2024

If somebody asked you to go on a dangerous mission, no other details, would you volunteer?Well, in 1...

Mon, 21 Oct 2024

4,322 days. That's how long Franklin Delano Roosevelt was in office. Whilst no other US president ha...

Thu, 17 Oct 2024

On July 21, 1861, Confederate and Union forces met for the first time in full-scale battle at Bull R...

Mon, 14 Oct 2024

We have a constitutional right to vote in the United States ... don't we? Find out in this first epi...

Thu, 10 Oct 2024

What does it take to be the first person named as 'Public Enemy No.1' by the US Bureau of Investigat...

Mon, 07 Oct 2024

Did Columbus really think the Earth was flat? Where did he come from? Where did he get to? To untang...

Thu, 03 Oct 2024

Just how murderous were Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow? Where did those famous photos come from? And...

Mon, 30 Sep 2024

When it comes to US foreign policy in the early 20th Century, isolationism tends to come to mind. Wh...

Thu, 26 Sep 2024

Jesse James. Perhaps the most notorious American outlaw?He’s become legendary figure of the Wild W...

Mon, 23 Sep 2024

Very few people know what it is like to be in the infamous US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, ...

Thu, 19 Sep 2024

When was the first bank robbery? What does it take to be successful in organized crime? Is it possib...

Mon, 16 Sep 2024

How did Egypt and Israel come to an agreement at Camp David in 1979? How did the USSR come to allow ...

Thu, 12 Sep 2024

Who was Joe McCarthy? How did this Republican Senator come to lead a nationwide campaign against com...

Sun, 08 Sep 2024

When the US turned to Japan looking for workers in the late 19th Century, they probably never foresa...

Thu, 05 Sep 2024

The 20th Century is up and running and the next President in our series, Woodrow Wilson, is in for a...

Mon, 02 Sep 2024

In 1621 the Virginia Company of London put out a call for young, handsome and honestly educated wome...

Thu, 29 Aug 2024

Which President was best with their money? Which was worst? And are Presidents responsible for payin...

Mon, 26 Aug 2024

In June 1944, the joint forces of the Allies began the liberation of continental Europe on D-Day. Bu...

Thu, 22 Aug 2024

Sandwiched between Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson is our 26th President of the United States,...

Mon, 19 Aug 2024

Why did an aristocratic French man fight for American freedom? How influential was Lafayette? And wh...

Thu, 15 Aug 2024

Cleopatra, Catherine the Great, Boudicca, Margaret Thatcher, Angela Merkel: what do these women have...

Thu, 15 Aug 2024

Host Don Wildman has a message for listeners old and new, marking 200 episodes of American History H...

Mon, 12 Aug 2024

What kind of a nickname is Bull Moose? How progressive was Theodore Roosevelt's presidency? And how ...

Thu, 08 Aug 2024

"Speak softly and carry a big stick."The youngest President ever, Lieutenant Colonel of the Rough Ri...

Mon, 05 Aug 2024

How do our politicians use the media? Throughout the 2024 election we have seen a boom in the use of...

Thu, 01 Aug 2024

When the First World War ended at 11am on 11 November, 1918, how did army command relay the ceasefir...

Mon, 29 Jul 2024

On 6th September, 1901, President William McKinley attended a public reception at the Pan American E...

Thu, 25 Jul 2024

Why does the Secret Service protect the President of the United States? And what can we learn from M...

Wed, 24 Jul 2024

President Joe Biden will address the nation from the Oval Office on Wednesday night, after announcin...

Mon, 22 Jul 2024

How did a party in the White House end in mayhem? When did the West Wing become a hive of government...

Fri, 19 Jul 2024

Lincoln, FDR, Reagan, Clinton, Bush and now Trump. All have been targets of assassination attempts w...

Thu, 18 Jul 2024

This podcast contains adult language.What was the ‘Indian Citizenship Act’ of 1924? Why was it n...

Mon, 15 Jul 2024

Right from independence, a question has hovered over the government of the United States. How much p...

Thu, 11 Jul 2024

What caused the economic panic of 1893? In this episode we are delving into the event that made Grov...

Mon, 08 Jul 2024

What do you know about Galveston, Texas? Perhaps you've heard about the disastrous hurricane of 1900...

Thu, 04 Jul 2024

In the long unanswered question of whether the established elite truly support the concerns of ordin...

Mon, 01 Jul 2024

What took the US from the Boston Tea Party to Lexington and Concord? Where was the turning point for...

Thu, 27 Jun 2024

Why is the 23rd President of the United States, Benjamin Harrison, remembered as a 'Human Iceberg'? ...

Mon, 24 Jun 2024

A 34-hour bombardment, one (accidental) death, and the start of the bloodiest war the United States ...

Thu, 20 Jun 2024

This episode was first released on November 14 2022.The Whiskey Tax, imposed in 1791, was the first ...

Mon, 17 Jun 2024

In the US Constitution, the President of the United States is granted the right to pardon those conv...

Thu, 13 Jun 2024

They say that honesty is the best policy, but was this the case for Grover Cleveland? He may be the ...

Sun, 09 Jun 2024

How did the United States go from a country defined by its lawlessness in the 1920s and early 1930s,...

Thu, 06 Jun 2024

On June 6, 1944, the Allied forces combined their land, air and sea forces into the largest amphibio...

Sun, 02 Jun 2024

The history of the United States' relationship with communism is one littered with fear and persecut...

Wed, 29 May 2024

Where did baseball come from? Why is every stadium unique? And how do you make it to the Hall of Fam...

Mon, 27 May 2024

Please note, this episode contains discussion of suicide.On 1 April 1945, as the Second World War in...

Thu, 23 May 2024

Vice President to a narrow election winner, Chester Arthur was a very unlikely President. But on Sep...

Sun, 19 May 2024

11 Tonys, a Grammy, a Pulitzer Prize and broken box office records - there's no denying the impact o...

Thu, 16 May 2024

Today we dive into the little-known true story of American castaways abandoned on the Falkland Islan...

Mon, 13 May 2024

When Alexander Hamilton took a bullet to the abdomen on the morning of the 11th July 1804, he joined...

Wed, 08 May 2024

This may have been the second shortest Presidency in the history of the United States, but the term ...

Mon, 06 May 2024

Founding Father, first Secretary of the Treasury and focus of one of the world's first political sex...

Thu, 02 May 2024

Theodore Roosevelt is arguably the most masculine president in American history. So how was he influ...

Sun, 28 Apr 2024

Who really was Alexander Hamilton, and what do we actually know about his life?A Founding Father, he...

Thu, 25 Apr 2024

Emerging victorious from an electoral quagmire in 1876, Rutherford B. Hayes became the 19th Presiden...

Mon, 22 Apr 2024

An iconic signature on the Declaration of Independence - that is what John Hancock is best known for...

Thu, 18 Apr 2024

During the spring of 1921, eleven bodies were found in in rural Georgia. These men were victims of h...

Mon, 15 Apr 2024

How does a heroic general of the Civil War become one of the lowest rated Presidents (at least until...

Thu, 11 Apr 2024

Strategic brilliance? Relentless determination? Unbeatable leadership and cooperation with Lincoln? ...

Mon, 08 Apr 2024

Al Capone is one of the most notorious gangsters in US history. His story of rags to riches, set aga...

Thu, 04 Apr 2024

It comprises more than half of the world's defence spending, but what is the North Atlantic Treaty O...

Mon, 01 Apr 2024

A wealthy man in his early 30s. An army man. A German immigrant. A bootlegger. A lover. Who was Jay ...

Thu, 28 Mar 2024

Three quarters of a million people dead in the Civil War. A country separated in to two. How do you ...

Sun, 24 Mar 2024

More than 200 accused, 20 executed and a village plagued with hysteria. Were the Salem Witch Trials ...

Thu, 21 Mar 2024

Would the Cold War have happened if the nuclear bomb was never created? How did Gorbachev, Reagan an...

Mon, 18 Mar 2024

At least 23 of the Presidents of the United States can have their ancestry traced back to Ireland.So...

Thu, 14 Mar 2024

President and Commander-in-Chief at a major turning point in American History? Victim of a violent a...

Mon, 11 Mar 2024

A far-right hate group known the world over, the Ku Klux Klan emerged in the aftermath of the Civil ...

Thu, 07 Mar 2024

Inaugurated into the thick of secession and assassinated just weeks after Confederate surrender, the...

Sun, 03 Mar 2024

In July 1860, half a century after the importation of captive slaves was banned under federal law, a...

Thu, 29 Feb 2024

When it comes to US Presidents, it’s not easy to agree on much these days. But one thing that has ...

Tue, 27 Feb 2024

The Cold War, Prohibition, the Gold Rush, the Space Race. Every part of your life - the words you sp...

Sun, 25 Feb 2024

On February 18th, 1965, the University of Cambridge hosted one of the most legendary debates in hist...

Thu, 22 Feb 2024

On 23 June 1972, a man boarded American Airlines Flight 119 in St Louis. He sat most of the way to T...

Mon, 19 Feb 2024

The city of Tulsa is perhaps best known in history books for the events of 1921. In 36 hours, hundre...

Thu, 15 Feb 2024

From 1857 to 1861, James Buchanan held the office of President of the United States. It was a pivota...

Sun, 11 Feb 2024

From financial to conspiratorial to sexual, the words 'Clinton' and 'scandal' are regularly found in...

Wed, 07 Feb 2024

Where did the idea for Facebook come from? How has the site evolved? And how has it changed the worl...

Mon, 05 Feb 2024

The war between the Union and the Confederacy is a major turning point in the history of the United ...

Thu, 01 Feb 2024

We're creeping closer and closer to the Civil War in our chronology of presidents, and this episode'...

Mon, 29 Jan 2024

What were the Apache Wars? How did they begin? And how did the end of the Mexican-American War impac...

Thu, 25 Jan 2024

How did the 100th bomber group get a reputation for being unlucky? Who were they? And what was their...

Sun, 21 Jan 2024

Wiretapping, White House tapes and the possibility of impeachment. On June 17, 1972, a break-in at t...

Thu, 18 Jan 2024

How did a president lose his entire cabinet so soon after taking office? What was his role in the We...

Mon, 15 Jan 2024

Who introduced Martin Luther King Jr. to activism? Why is the influence of mothers so often understa...

Thu, 11 Jan 2024

Chaos, collusion and the Chennault Affair. What made the election of 1968 so unusual?Luke Nichter jo...

Mon, 08 Jan 2024

Once the most popular man in America, hero of the Mexican-American war Zachary Taylor is our twelfth...

Thu, 04 Jan 2024

January, 1968. Fighting in Vietnam has been ongoing since the 1950s. Ho Chi Minh and the leaders of ...

Mon, 01 Jan 2024

In the summer of 1579, Francis Drake had to land in a ‘fair and good bay’ on the western coast o...

Thu, 28 Dec 2023

On 17 January 1920, the 18th Amendment came into effect in the United States. It made the manufactur...

Mon, 25 Dec 2023

What was it about the Kennedys that attracted so much tragedy, that many believed them to be cursed?...

Wed, 20 Dec 2023

Is this the only president to have achieved all of their campaign promises? James K. Polk, the 11th ...

Mon, 18 Dec 2023

Simple living, plain dress and pacifism. This is not a lifestyle typical of the United States. So ho...

Thu, 14 Dec 2023

Why did the Boston Tea Party happen? Why Boston? And how did the events of December 1773 fit in to t...

Mon, 11 Dec 2023

On December 16th 1773, Bostonian colonists took a stand against the British Crown in the Boston Tea ...

Wed, 06 Dec 2023

He may have been the tenth President, but John Tyler - 'His Accidency' - was a pioneer in many ways....

Mon, 04 Dec 2023

The two party division of the US political system is as evident as ever as we warm up to the 2024 el...

Thu, 30 Nov 2023

How would the Allied forces have forced the surrender of Japan had they not dropped the bombs on Hir...

Mon, 27 Nov 2023

The ninth President of the United States holds two unique records. William Henry Harrison delivered ...

Thu, 23 Nov 2023

Napoleon Bonaparte. From military leader to revolutionary to Emperor of the French, his conquests an...

Mon, 20 Nov 2023

On November 22nd 1963, President John F. Kennedy was shot dead. The ensuing years have been filled w...

Thu, 16 Nov 2023

Who was JFK? How popular was he in his lifetime? And how did his untimely death impact the world's m...

Mon, 13 Nov 2023

What makes the Gettysburg Address one of the most famous speeches in history? Did Lincoln reall...

Thu, 09 Nov 2023

The 'Little Magician', the 'Sly Fox' or - to our expert guest - a 6.5/10 president. We're onto Presi...

Sun, 05 Nov 2023

What is a Viking? Did they really make it to the United States? And if so, how far did they get?Don ...

Thu, 02 Nov 2023

During the first half of the 20th century, dozens of murders plagued the oil-rich Osage Nation. The ...

Mon, 30 Oct 2023

If you've ever watched a Voodoo scene in a horror movie, you might be forgiven for envisioning zombi...

Thu, 26 Oct 2023

The seventh person to hold the position of President is arguably one of the most divisive.A strong-w...

Mon, 23 Oct 2023

Clint Eastwood, Robert Redford, John Wayne. We've seen them roping and wrangling and defeating their...

Thu, 19 Oct 2023

From 800 to 1300 CE, a great religious movement swept Mesoamerica, the Southwest, and the Mississipp...

Mon, 16 Oct 2023

A 13 day siege. 90 minutes of fighting. An almost 200 year legacy and the most popular tourist site ...

Thu, 12 Oct 2023

John Quincy Adams didn't just share a name with his father. He also followed in his footsteps to tak...

Mon, 09 Oct 2023

What if the Civil War had ended differently, with the South seceding from the Union? Would slavery h...

Thu, 05 Oct 2023

In 1969, at the height of US presence, there were over half a million Americans in Vietnam.But why w...

Mon, 02 Oct 2023

'It's one of those threads you pull on and immediately you're connected to the whole fabric of Ameri...

Thu, 28 Sep 2023

Serving from 1817 to 1825, James Monroe's presidency was only the fifth presidency of the United Sta...

Sun, 24 Sep 2023

Not one of the US forces led by General George Custer into the attack on 25 June 1876 survived. But ...

Thu, 21 Sep 2023

What is a bat bomb? Why would you cover a fox in radioactive paint? And who are the masterminds behi...

Mon, 18 Sep 2023

It's the worst accident in US commercial nuclear power history. In March 1979, the Unit 2 reactor at...

Thu, 14 Sep 2023

His life is one of firsts for the United States. Having contributed to the Federalist Papers, the Co...

Mon, 11 Sep 2023

New York was a city of 8 million people in 2001. A city that would be changed forever by the events ...

Thu, 07 Sep 2023

In 1848, after almost two years of fighting, the US annexation of former Mexican territory was signe...

Mon, 04 Sep 2023

The new Oppenheimer movie has everyone asking questions about the atomic bombs dropped on Japan in 1...

Thu, 31 Aug 2023

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence, so how did it work out...

Mon, 28 Aug 2023

45 seconds. An estimated 7.9 on today's Richter scale. The deadliest earthquake in US history.In thi...

Thu, 24 Aug 2023

What could the prehistoric artists of North America have in common with the graffiti artists of toda...

Mon, 21 Aug 2023

Despite her's being a household name, how much do we really know about Pocahontas? Where did she com...

Thu, 17 Aug 2023

Sequels are always hit and miss. So what must it have been like to be the second President of the Un...

Mon, 14 Aug 2023

When it closed in 1973, the Texas Chicken Ranch was the oldest continually operating brothel in the ...

Thu, 10 Aug 2023

On August 10 1680, the Pueblo people began the most successful uprising against colonial power in No...

Mon, 07 Aug 2023

What does a document written in 1215 in England have to do with the United States? The Magna Carta h...

Thu, 03 Aug 2023

He was the victorious Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary W...

Mon, 31 Jul 2023

He is undoubtedly the most famous member of the Confederate forces. But it wasn't always set to be t...

Thu, 27 Jul 2023

Beginning with the enduring words, 'We the People of the United States', the US Constitution is the ...

Mon, 24 Jul 2023

She's an icon, a polymath, a fashionista, and she's absolutely everywhere right now.Where did Barbie...

Thu, 20 Jul 2023

The Church of the Latter Day Saints is one shrouded in mystery, whispers of polygamy and is often sy...

Mon, 17 Jul 2023

School, play and much less work: the idealised childhood is a very separate part of life. But how di...

Thu, 13 Jul 2023

Richard Nixon and Nikita Khrushchev. Leading figures of the United States and the Soviet Union respe...

Mon, 10 Jul 2023

Why should we associate LSD and its psychedelic effects with New York as much as we associate it wit...

Thu, 06 Jul 2023

Gettysburg is synonymous with the bloodiest battle in the history of the United States. But before i...

Mon, 03 Jul 2023

The first three days of July 1863 saw the bloodiest single battle of the American Civil War. This cl...

Thu, 29 Jun 2023

What made June 28 1969 a landmark occasion for LGBTQ+ rights?How was Stonewall different from the up...

Mon, 26 Jun 2023

On July 2 1937, Amelia Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, took off on what was supposed to be t...

Thu, 22 Jun 2023

Behind the handshakes of leading politicians, beyond the trade deals and beneath mutually beneficial...

Mon, 19 Jun 2023

We celebrate abolition - in the United States during the Civil War and on Juneteenth, in Haiti af...

Thu, 15 Jun 2023

There are no other historic sites like this one on the planet. The concentric semi circles and mound...

Mon, 12 Jun 2023

Why were gay federal employees seen as a national security threat during the 20th century? How might...

Thu, 08 Jun 2023

Approximately 100 thousand flights take off and land each and every day. A months long journey on a ...

Mon, 05 Jun 2023

Of all of the people enslaved in the southern United States over time, 40% of them were owned by wom...

Thu, 01 Jun 2023

From the rings on our fingers, to coins in our pockets and, for a select few, the medals hanging aro...

Mon, 29 May 2023

He's the best president that the United States has ever had ... at least according to one 2021 C-spa...

Thu, 25 May 2023

13 equal horizontal stripes in red and white, with a navy blue square in the top left bearing 50 sma...

Mon, 22 May 2023

Was the USA already a superpower when it joined the Second World War? How did it turn from an isolat...

Thu, 18 May 2023

Between 1871 and 1872, Labette County, Kansas became a source of mystery. Several people have gone m...

Mon, 15 May 2023

The Vietnam War or the Great Society? Which event looms larger in the history of the United States?&...

Thu, 11 May 2023

He was the most famous man in the world at the turn of the 20th century, bringing the American front...

Mon, 08 May 2023

When it was founded in 1585, Roanoke was intended to be the first permanent English outpost in Ameri...

Thu, 04 May 2023

In 1939, on the invitation of Franklin D. Roosevelt, King George VI became the first reigning Britis...

Mon, 01 May 2023

In August 1918, the battle of Amiens brought the German army's 'black day' and the beginning of the ...

Thu, 27 Apr 2023

Nearly a thousand years ago, America's first city appeared in the Mississippi flood plain. Don finds...

Mon, 24 Apr 2023

Horses have been a bulwark of American culture and society for centuries. Think of cowboys in the Mi...

Thu, 20 Apr 2023

Benjamin Franklin is considered by many to be one of the first to live the American Dream. He came f...

Mon, 17 Apr 2023

Much of American history has been redacted. Since the World War 2, the number of secrets the US gove...

Thu, 13 Apr 2023

July 20th, 1969. Neil Armstrong descends from Lunar Module Eagle to the Moon's surface. A momen...

Mon, 10 Apr 2023

Under segregation, African Americans' lives were severely limited. Restricted entry to public places...

Thu, 06 Apr 2023

English-born artist Thomas Cole emigrated to the United States in 1818. Six years later he began wha...

Mon, 03 Apr 2023

Claire Bellerjeau tells Don the the story of Liss, an enslaved Black woman in 18th century New York,...

Thu, 30 Mar 2023

The story of the American Revolution is one of the best known in American history. But it could have...

Mon, 27 Mar 2023

While the President of the United States is often seen as the most powerful person in the world, the...

Thu, 23 Mar 2023

You are what you eat - and so is America. Various foods have played their part in the country’s hi...

Mon, 20 Mar 2023

At its height the Iroquois Confederacy (or Haudenosaunee) - a union of the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga,...

Thu, 16 Mar 2023

When it was completed in 1931, the Empire State Building became the tallest building in the world. W...

Mon, 13 Mar 2023

Completed in 1825, the Erie Canal was the first navigable waterway connecting the Atlantic Ocean to ...

Thu, 09 Mar 2023

Don talks to former White House reporter Kate Andersen Brower about how the role of First Lady has c...

Mon, 06 Mar 2023

Before New York was New York, it was New Amsterdam. Dutch colonists arrived on the East Coast in the...

Thu, 02 Mar 2023

George III is forever known as the king who lost the 13 American colonies. In the US he is thought o...

Mon, 27 Feb 2023

On a cold winter morning in February 1908, six cars lined up in Times Square, attempting to be the f...

Thu, 23 Feb 2023

The revolution in Haiti freed the country from French control and created the first Black republic a...

Mon, 20 Feb 2023

One of the Founding Fathers of the United States, Samuel Adams was a political force of nature. Stac...

Thu, 16 Feb 2023

Harriet Tubman is perhaps the most famous African American woman in the world, but she’s usually r...

Mon, 13 Feb 2023

The Waldorf-Astoria, the Plaza and the Algonquin all tell their own stories of New York City. Don ta...

Thu, 09 Feb 2023

The first naval engagement of the American War of Independence took place on Lake Champlain, which s...

Mon, 06 Feb 2023

In late April 1607, three ships carrying a hundred men and boys arrived in Chesapeake Bay, having se...

Thu, 02 Feb 2023

In Spring 1961, the Space Race between the US and Soviet Union was well underway. Russian cosmonaut ...

Mon, 30 Jan 2023

For thousands of years, nomadic Native American peoples crossed the Yellowstone River basin, in awe ...

Thu, 26 Jan 2023

From 1956 to 1971, J. Edgar Hoover ran COINTELPRO (Counterintelligence Program). A series of covert ...

Mon, 23 Jan 2023

J. Edgar Hoover was the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation for 48 years. He grew the FB...

Thu, 19 Jan 2023

From the 1880s to the 1920s the United States experienced a huge wave of immigration. People fleeing...

Mon, 16 Jan 2023

Dr Martin Luther King Jr was one of the figureheads of the civil rights movement in America. On 28th...

Thu, 12 Jan 2023

One of the most famous writers ever to have lived, Charles Dickens travelled twice to the US, in 184...

Mon, 09 Jan 2023

Join Don as he visits Benjamin Franklin's home of nearly 16 years: 36 Craven Street, London. Now a m...

Thu, 05 Jan 2023

Gone with the Wind, released in 1939, is the highest-grossing film of all time. Based on Margaret Mi...

Thu, 29 Dec 2022

It’s December 1912 and we’re joining in with the festivities at Highclere Castle, in London Engl...

Thu, 22 Dec 2022

Modern humans thrived in the Americas for thousands of years before the first European colonists arr...

Mon, 19 Dec 2022

As the British and French colonies in North America expanded in the middle of the 18th century, they...

Thu, 15 Dec 2022

In the early 19th century, amidst the Napoleonic wars, the British began restricting the United Stat...

Mon, 12 Dec 2022

On 5th September, 1901, President William McKinley attended a public reception at the Pan American E...

Thu, 08 Dec 2022

On the morning of 7th December 1941, hundreds of Japanese planes took off from aircraft carriers and...

Mon, 05 Dec 2022

Space historian Jay Gallentine tells Don how World War 2 weapons paved the way for space rockets, ig...

Thu, 01 Dec 2022

On shooting President Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth fled Ford’s Theatre in Washington, DC on ...

Mon, 28 Nov 2022

On the evening of 14th April, 1865, the Union was celebrating victory in the civil war, won 5 days e...

Thu, 24 Nov 2022

In the fall of 1621, a year after the pilgrim ship the Mayflower landed on the coast of New England,...

Mon, 21 Nov 2022

When Ronald Reagan became President in 1981, he was initially written off by many as a reckless B mo...

Thu, 17 Nov 2022

While Thomas Edison is widely credited as the inventor of the electric lightbulb in 1879, it had exi...

Mon, 14 Nov 2022

The Whiskey Tax, imposed in 1791, was the first federal tax on a domestic product by a United States...

Thu, 10 Nov 2022

The experience of African Americans in World War 2 was, to say the least, a gross double standard. W...

Mon, 07 Nov 2022

On April 6th 1909, deep inside the Artic Circle after months on the ice, Robert Peary, Matthew Henso...

Thu, 03 Nov 2022

In August 1921, when Franklin D. Roosevelt was 39 years old, he contracted Polio, paralysing him fro...

Mon, 31 Oct 2022

On Halloween, Elizabeth Bradley tells Don about Washington Irving's famous story, The Legend of Slee...

Thu, 27 Oct 2022

In 1963, a Gilded Age estate in Millbrook, New York, became a venue for academic research into thera...

Mon, 24 Oct 2022

From the 1830s until the arrival of the transcontinental railroad, hundreds of thousands of people p...

Thu, 20 Oct 2022

When the Central Intelligence Agency was created by President Truman in 1947, it was the latest inca...

Mon, 17 Oct 2022

When US Marines landed on the island of Guadalcanal in the Pacific, in August 1942, they were taking...

Thu, 13 Oct 2022

Edward Rulloff was described as “a monster imbued by the spirit of the devil”. In 1844, he murde...

Mon, 10 Oct 2022

In October 1962, the United States confirmed that Soviet missiles were being deployed in Cuba. Presi...

Thu, 06 Oct 2022

Central Park is an oasis of nature in New York City, amidst the countless skyscrapers and gridded st...

Mon, 03 Oct 2022

In 1763, Native American tribes in the Great Lakes region began fighting British expansion and rule ...

Thu, 29 Sep 2022

The Battle of Midway took place between the US and Japan in June 1942. The US victory, after 4 days ...

Mon, 26 Sep 2022

After World War 2 ended, the Nazis defeated, America feared communist infiltration of its institutio...

Thu, 22 Sep 2022

While the Revolutionary War was being fought in July 1776, the 13 British colonies in America came t...

Thu, 22 Sep 2022

In 1939 Franklin D Roosevelt received a letter from Albert Einstein, warning him that the ...

Mon, 12 Sep 2022

We had plans today to release the first two episodes of American History Hit but due to the news of ...

Tue, 23 Aug 2022

Join Don Wildman twice a week for your hit of American history, as he explores the past to help us u...