Avsnitt
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Hi everyone, this week we’re doing things a bit different. I’ll be back from my mid year break with new episodes in two weeks’ time. In the meantime we’re running a pledge week for the Patreon channel.
Tuesday through Friday I’ll be dropping on old Patreon minisode per day - today we visit Milan, the year 1630. A comet blazing across the sky spooks the people. Augurers spoke, the comet portends death - in one form or another. Then people started dying. This reminded the folk of an ancient legend… That one day, The Devil himself would come to Milan.
Check out my Patreon! For just $2 a month* you get a minimum of one tale every month
(we’re committed to 20 a year there this year, and will start releasing two a month every month when we hit the first stretch target.)
As a patron you are helping to keep independent creators like me keep going. This includes occasionally putting down a month’s membership on some paywalled newspaper or other. This episode was penned a long time ago, and I’ve since lost the bibliography - but am pretty sure it grew out of something paywalled I found in the Washington Post.
Unsure if you want to join up yet? Try a 7 day free trial.
*Dollars quoted in USD…
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Hey all I’m on holiday, though I’ve got a few things programmed to drop while I’m away… including this; a re-upload of this episode from October 2021.
“On 9:14 pm, 22nd November 1987, Chicago’s WGN TV was ‘zipped’ by a mysterious attacker - a figure wearing a rubber Max Headroom mask. The attacker would strike again, upsetting Whovians in the Windy City.
In this short Tale we discuss the Max Headroom Incident.”
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Saknas det avsnitt?
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Hey all I’m on holiday, though I’ve got a few things programmed to drop while I’m away… including this, my short ode to the astronomer Tycho Brahe.
Sources include: Apologies all, this is from an old blog post where, now very much to my shame - I never noted my sources. If I’m recalling correctly I first heard the story of the moose/elk on a cracked.com video on YouTube (which I couldn’t find to link.) I think several of the posts I used have been taken down since, or paywalled?
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Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
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This week we conclude our mob Tale. With the bosses banged up, the Morello family must do their best to navigate a rapidly changing world - and several vicious wars. How will they deal with upstarts, Kings, The Camorra, prohibition - and the arrival of a Fifth Family?
Admin Note: Apologies for the messy scheduling of late. I’ve been a little worn out from everyday job stuff, a number of recent current events have been adding to the drain… and I’m well overdue a week of ‘me time’ away from the 9 to 5. I think I’m on the upswing, finally…
Also, I normally try to give myself a mid-season break after episode 10, where I’ll drop a couple of episodes I’ve prepared earlier. Cause this one ran to three parts I’m taking that break now, at episode 12. I’ll have a re-upload of 2021’s The Max Headroom Incident to drop in a little over a week’s time; a biographical piece on the Astronomer Tycho Brahe to drop two weeks after that, and a Patreon Pledge week (thanks to the Patrons for this one) where I’ll drop four minisodes from 2023 into the feed over four days… I’ll be back, all rested and good to go - two weeks after that.
Sources Include:
The First Family; Terror, Extortion and the Birth of the American Mafia by Mike DashFive Families by Selwyn RaabThe Black Hand by Stephan TaltyThe Gangs of New York by Herbert Asbury
Support the show on | Patreon | for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
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I haven’t yet made my X-it from X, but am very close to it… If Twitter was your thing come hand out with me on Threads.
Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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This week, (sorry all, please bear with me- day job’s running me a little ragged, but I should be on track again in August) we’re returning to our mobsters - Giuseppe ‘The Clutch Hand’ Morello and the 107th Street Gang. In part two of this three parter we discuss the rise of the professional hitman, the first Capo de Tutti Capi - and the ballad of an ambitious young man named Antonio Comito.
Sources Include:
The First Family; Terror, Extortion and the Birth of the American Mafia by Mike DashFive Families by Selwyn RaabThe Black Hand by Stephan TaltyThe Gangs of New York by Herbert Asbury
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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This week, (apologies for the delay all, I’ve been an absolute wreck the last couple of weeks) we’re returning to Little Italy; the year 1903. In part one of this two parter we discuss the early life of America’s first Capo di Tutti Capi, Giuseppe ‘The Clutch Hand’ Morello.
Sources Include:
The First Family; Terror, Extortion and the Birth of the American Mafia by Mike DashFive Families by Selwyn RaabThe Black Hand by Stephan Talty
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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This week, we take a magic carpet ride into the wilds of the Central Asian Steppe - timeframe? the mid 12th Century. Today we’re taking a (rather hagiographic) look at the early life of a young man named Temujin…
Sources Include:
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack WeatherfordEmpires of The Steppes by Kenneth HarlThe Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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This week - we travel to the British Seaside town of Hartlepool. The date?? Sometime around the Napoleonic Wars. A French ship has run aground, leaving bodies strewn across the beach. Legend tells one survivor was found - a small, hairy man - subsequently hung by the locals.
Did the people of Hartlepool really hang a monkey, mistaking the animal for a French sailor?
Sources Include: (I think these were the sources when I wrote this in 2020…)
The Hanging of the Hartlepool Monkey by Ben Johnson Was a Monkey Really Hanged in Hartlepool? By Duncan LeatherdaleThis article on Ned Corvan by Tony Henderson
And online articles containing the full text of the Monkey Barber, and an article on Simian impersonator Monsieur Goffe I could no longer find (thanks for the AI Google 🙄)
I’d intended to sing The Fisherman Hung the Monkey O myself on this episode, but - long story, short version - I all but lost my voice a few weeks back to a cold. I found this version online by a gentleman named Keith Gregson, and borrowed a few lines. Go check out his channel.
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly (with the exception of Keith Gregson’s The Fisherman Hung the Monkey O.).
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This week - Adrian Carton de Wiart was a lifelong soldier; acknowledged for his bravery across the 2nd Boer War, the Somaliland Campaign, Poland’s several wars for independence - and both World Wars. The man started out with a cavalry sabre, and was still writing reports back to high command in the Atomic Age - advising of the risk of a war in Vietnam. He also had the aura of invulnerability - having survived eleven life-threatening injuries, several plane crashes, and single-handedly tunnelling out of a Prisoner of War camp.
Today I just felt like telling his story.
Sources Include:
Happy Odyssey by Adrian Carton de WiartAnd The Life and Times of Lieutenant General Adrian Carton de Wiart… by Alan Ogden
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Quick Admin note: sorry for the lateness all, I’ve been a bit run off of my feet of late… and the episode following this one will more likely than not be three weeks’ from now. After that we should be back on track again…. Sorry all.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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This week we travel to the Germanic Duchy of Hannover, the year 1694. Under cover of darkness, a dashing, aristocratic young soldier named Philip Christoph von Konigsmarck makes his way to an illicit meeting with his lover; the deeply unhappily married Princess Sophia Dorothea of Celle. Before the night is done one of the lovers will disappear mysteriously.
Sources Include:
Great Mysteries of The Past - Readers Digest. Sex with the Queen: 900 Years of Vile Kings, Virile Lovers, and Passionate Politics by Eleanor HermanThis National Geographic article by Becky Little
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Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Trigger Warning: Death by misadventure, and an execution by guillotine. I make no concessions for calling Aotearoa… Aotearoa. I mention this as in Aotearoa (New Zealand) news sites are having to shut down comment sections on Maori language, Maori achievement and Maori culture over racist morons getting upset by this news. If the use of Te Reo names over those of colonizers upsets you, this show really isn’t for you…
This week is a bit of a departure from my regular plan. I’m still working on the episode planned for this spot, so put a triptych of shorter tales together.
First, we meet Harold Davidson - the Vicar of Stiffkey. A man well known in Britain’s newspapers in the 1930s, who, if he was remembered today would probably be known for something else entirely.
Then we briefly meet Polynesia’s great navigators.
And finally we discuss Father of modern Chemistry Antoine Lavoisier’s final experiment.
Sources Include:
Sorry all, I’m running late this week and will backfill this later. Harold Davidson’s tale came to me years ago via Mike Dash’s original blog site - and this is one of a number of pieces no longer up - but it is preserved on the Wayback Machine -so I’ll link to it.
Michael King’s The Penguin History of New Zealand, and several articles on NZ History’s site and Te Ara, the Encyclopaedia of New Zealand were used in The Navigators.
The Lavoisier piece is an old blog piece jumbled together from a bunch of sources, I don’t recall all of them, but will take a shot at finding them on the weekend.
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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Trigger Warning: Talk of executions, religious extremism and cannibalism. This week we return one last time to the city of Münster. With everything going to hell in Münster, Henry Gresbeck risks his life in a dash for freedom. The Prince Bishop has given orders to kill all men who show up at the wall - but Gresbeck has a secret that may just unravel the siege. How does this play out? Who will survive, and just what is a Wagenburg anyway?
Sources Include: There are very few book out there on this topic so I mostly worked from.The Tailor King by Anthony ArthurAnd Freaks of Fanaticism and Other Strange Events by Sabine Baring-Gould
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial. Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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This week we return to the city of Münster, in the Holy Roman Empire. Now we’ve got all the context out of the way - let’s discuss the war between the Prince Bishop, and the city’s new rogue Prophet - the Tailor, Jan of Leiden. This is Part Two of a Three Parter. Sources Include: There are very few book out there on this topic so I mostly worked from.The Tailor King by Anthony ArthurAnd Freaks of Fanaticism and Other Strange Events by Sabine Baring-GouldSupport the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on | Facebook | Twitter | TikTok | Threads | Instagram | YouTube |
Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly. Visit Simone’s | About Me | Twitter |
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This week we travel to the city of Münster, in the Holy Roman Empire. The year, 1534. Tensions have ratcheted up between the City’s Prince Bishop, the City Council and a rogue preacher to the point where the people have gone rogue - having rebelled, locked the gates and set up the cannons for war. Over the following two episodes we’ll break down what happened during the siege of Münster..
This is part one of a two parter.
Sources Include:
There are very few books out there on this topic so I mostly worked from.The Tailor King by Anthony ArthurAnd Freaks of Fanaticism and Other Strange Events by Sabine Baring-Gould
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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Hi all, I’m technically still on holiday (Tales will be back for Season 5 on 1st February.) - but I was on the mic on Sunday, and had a little downtime … and a spare script or two. This week we meet Charles Lightoller, a remarkable sailor, on what I believe must have been his worst day ever?
Sources Include:
I wrote this to the blog in early 2020… so …. pass, sorry. But articles probably included.
This History Channel article - Author not listed. This Encyclopaedia Titanica article looks very familiar… Author not listed… And this Dunkirk 1940 dot org article… Another anonymous piece.
AND I’m 100% certain I used an article from the Liverpool Museum website… But it appears they have taken that article down some time ago??
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Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
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Music, writing, narration, mixing normally yours truly. I probably unintentionally interpolated from Tom Lewis’ ‘The Last Shanty’ in the background music this week - so credit where credit is due.
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Happy Holidays all! This week we travel to Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day 1950. It’s four in the morning when a policeman comes across a young couple huddled together in their car. Like another young couple a few millennia before, they tell him they have come to town, only to find no room left at the inn. Little does the officer know, but he’d stumbled across a theft hundreds of years in the making.
Sources Include:
As I couldn’t find any books for this one, there were quite a few online articles - including.
A copy of a news report two days after the theft.
This ‘The National’ article on the Battle of Culloden, and the genocide that followed, by Hamish McPherson
This Smithsonian overview of the Scottish Independence movement by Meilan Solly
A Britannica entry on the Stone of Scone
A BBC Article (no author listed) on Alexander III of Scotland.
The Stone of Destiny (History UK) by Ben Johnson
A My Heritage page listing Tea Tephi
This ‘Tomorrow’s World’ article on the Prophet Jeremiah and his alleged arrival in Ireland.
This University of Glasgow article on Ian Hamilton and the Removal of the Stone of Scone
Another religious article (author not mentioned) about Jacob’s Ladder, his pillow, and his stupid claim God promised him Gaza.
This BBC article by Steven Brocklehurst about the Removal of the Stone of Scone
This Royal UK piece on James II
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Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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Hi all apologies for the delay. I’ve been unwell for a couple of weeks, and am only just bouncing back now. This week, on what was originally planned for Transgender Day of Remembrance (two weeks ago) we continue my annual Trans history episode. In 2022 I started this series replying to a foolish claim Trans people were a recent phenomenon. My take, there have always been people we’d now recognise as Trans.
My list of examples veered from groups, like the Galli, to individuals - like Eleanor Rykener.
Society once had places for Trans people - more often than not religious orders - but the church dismantled a lot of this at the Council of Nicaea.
Or at least they did so for Trans women. How did the church react to history’s Trans men? Today, with a little help from a couple of historical Trans cowboys and a few others, we take a look.
Sources Include:
The last six or seven minutes of this episode owes a huge debt to Nate Hale’s The Conspirators episode ‘The Secret Life of Pope Joan.’ Nate does this way better than I do, and in much greater detail. Go check his episode out.
Susan Stryker’s ‘Transgender History’ was invaluable. I used this English Heritage. Org article to fact check the Galli. This American Battlefields article on Albert Cashier This NY Times article on Charley ParkhurstAnd this National Women’s History Museum article on Deborah Sampson, written by Debra Michals.I’ll add a handful of other articles later. Much of this episode was put together from leftover notes from the TDOR 2022 episode.
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Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
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This week we meet two prophets, separated by half a world, and three centuries. One is the self appointed son of God, the other talks with Aliens. What happens to prophets, and more importantly - their followers, when prophesies fail?
(This episode is a re-do of 2021’s Dorothy Martin’s Flying Saucer.)
Trigger Warning: I hadn’t scheduled this with the current situation in Palestine/Israel in mind, but the episode discusses a claimant for the role of Jewish Messiah. I don’t know if this needs a trigger warning, but better safe than sorry?
Sources Include:
I wrote this a long time ago, and can only say on polishing the old script, I reopened When Prophesy Fails by Leon Festinger. and Madame Blavatsky by Marion Meade.
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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This week we travel to the Kingdom of Abkhazia, a Black Sea land nestled amongst the Caucasus. At a date lost to history, but believed to be around 1860 - hunters trap what they believe is a monster in their bear pit. The creature is shackled and brought to a nobleman named Edgi Genaba. This week is all about monsters - but the monster may not be who you are thinking of.
Trigger Warning: This Tale contains discussion of rape and dehumanisation.
Sources Include:
In The Footsteps of The Russian Snowman by Dmitri Bayanov.This DNA Explained article on Zana (author not listed.)This travelogue on Abkhazia.This Weird NJ article on Oliver the Humanzee by Mark Sceurman.I referred to Britannica to confirm several details that were already in my headAnd came around a dozen news articles from 2015 with much the same text one to the next…
Support the show on Patreon for $2 US a month and get access to exclusive content, or Try our 7 Day Free Trial.
Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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Music, writing, narration, mixing yours truly.
Visit Simone’s
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This week we travel to the Bagradas River, Tunisia in 256 BC. Rome are in the midst of the Punic wars against Carthage, and are in the process of launching an all out invasion on the Carthaginians. As 14,000 Legionnaires, led by Marcus Attilus Regulus make their way towards the capital, they encounter a foe they were not expecting. Just what was the Bagradas Dragon?
Apologies all, this week came out around ten minutes shorter than I planned in editing. I had no plans of dropping a minisode this week, but it needed the cuts to make it flow. Also my voice was the worse for wear when recording and does sound a little strained...
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Please leave Tales a like and a review wherever you listen. The best way you can support us is to share an episode with a friend - Creative works grow best by word of mouth. I post episodes fortnightly, Wednesdays.
Tales of History and Imagination is on
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- Visa fler
