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Can't Make This Up
Can't Make This Up
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The Greatest Beer Run Ever with Chick Donohue
Can't Make This Up
11/13/20 • 54 min
At the height of the Vietnam War in 1967, former marine John "Chick" Donohue decided to take on the most extraordinary mission. Chick and other members of his New York neighborhood had watched months of antiwar protests sweep the country and decided to do something about it. Someone at the local bar said, "Our boys over there deserve a beer to let them know we care about them." Chick agreed and within a week he was on a ship bound for Vietnam.
Chick, now a 79 year-old veteran, joins me to discuss his new book "The Greatest Beer Run Ever: A Memoir of Friendship, Loyalty, and War" about his epic journey through war torn Vietnam to track down the guys from his neighborhood and hand them a beer. Not only was Chick's mission nearly an impossible one from the outset, getting out of the country as the Vietcong launched the infamous Tet Offense would prove to be even harder. This is history you really can't make up!
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Hidden Habits of Genius with Craig Wright, PhD
Can't Make This Up
10/07/20 • 56 min
What makes a genius? Perhaps someone who can memorize endless facts or sees the world in an entirely original way. Who are some people you would consider to be a genius? Perhaps Leonardo DaVinci, Mary Shelley, or Albert Einstein. Are geniuses born or are they made?
These are all questions my guest today has given considerable thought to. Craig Wright is Professor Emeritus of Music at Yale University, and during his professorship he developed a course called Exploring the Nature of Genius that has become quite popular among Yale's undergraduates. He has distilled his research for that course into his new book, "The Hidden Habits of Genius: Beyond Talent, IQ, and Grit - Unlocking the Secrets of Greatness." In this episode, Craig and I discuss exactly what a genius even is, explore some common misconceptions of genius, and talk about some notable geniuses throughout history.
Want to listen to new episodes a week earlier and get exclusive bonus content? Consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon!
Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok
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A Furious Sky with Eric Jay Dolin
Can't Make This Up
08/13/20 • 63 min
With the end of summer comes the arrival of hurricane season for the southern United States and East Coast. Today, we await their arrival through radar and satellite imagery, watch their ferocity on television, and expect the government to assist with their clean up. All of these things are relatively new in the long history of hurricanes.
Today, I am joined by historian Eric Jay Dolin to discuss the history behind hurricanes and our ever-changing efforts to understand them. Eric is the bestselling author of numerous books and a returning guest on the podcast, and in this episode he is going to talk to us about his newest book "A Furious Sky: The Five-Hundred Year History of America's Hurricanes." He and I will discuss some of the earliest encounters with hurricanes in the New World, the early scientists who studied them, and some of the most notable hurricanes to strike the United States.
Want to listen to new episodes a week earlier and get exclusive bonus content? Consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon!
Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok
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Hunting Whitey with Casey Sherman and Dave Wedge
Can't Make This Up
07/21/20 • 29 min
James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger Jr. is one of the most infamous organized crime leaders in modern American history. As leader of Boston's Winter Hill Gang, Bulger would eventually earn a place at #1 on the FBI's Most Wanted List. Bulger went on the run in 1994 and became a ghost for the law enforcement agencies tasked with finding him.
Today, I am joined by bestselling authors Casey Sherman and Dave Wedge to talk about their new book, Hunting Whitey: The Inside Story of the Capture and Killing of America's Most Wanted Crime Boss. Casey and Dave both have backgrounds in journalism and have developed a dynamic partnership writing about topics related to the Boston area. In today's true crime episode, the three of us discuss Whitey Bulger's criminal career, his 16 years spent as a fugitive, and the breaks in the case that ultimately led to Bulger's arrest in 2011.
Want to listen to new episodes a week earlier and get exclusive bonus content? Consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon!
Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok
--- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cmtuhistory/support
Bonus Episode - Alternate Histories #5: Fast Girls
Can't Make This Up
07/08/20 • 16 min
Today on Alternate Histories, I am joined by Elise Hooper. "A New Englander by birth (and at heart), Elise lives with her husband and two young daughters in Seattle, where she teaches history and literature. The Other Alcott was her first novel." Elise and I discuss her new novel, Fast Girls.
"In the 1928 Olympics, Chicago’s Betty Robinson competes as a member of the first-ever women’s delegation in track and field. Destined for further glory, she returns home feted as America’s Golden Girl until a nearly-fatal airplane crash threatens to end everything.
Outside of Boston, Louise Stokes, one of the few black girls in her town, sees competing as an opportunity to overcome the limitations placed on her. Eager to prove that she has what it takes to be a champion, she risks everything to join the Olympic team.
From Missouri, Helen Stephens, awkward, tomboyish, and poor, is considered an outcast by her schoolmates, but she dreams of escaping the hardships of her farm life through athletic success. Her aspirations appear impossible until a chance encounter changes her life.
These three athletes will join with others to defy society’s expectations of what women can achieve. As tensions bring the United States and Europe closer and closer to the brink of war, Betty, Louise, and Helen must fight for the chance to compete as the fastest women in the world amidst the pomp and pageantry of the Nazi-sponsored 1936 Olympics in Berlin."
Learn more about Elise Hooper and her work at https://www.elisehooper.com
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Radium Girls with Kate Moore
Can't Make This Up
07/02/20 • 39 min
Radium is an element that appears in 88th spot on the periodic table. It is radioactive with a half-life of 1600 years and the radiation in produces as it decays produces a low level light through a process known as radioluminescence. Today, radium is considered the most hazardous of the radioelements and is handled only in controlled and contained environments.
My guest today is Kate Moore. Kate is a book editor, actress, theater director, and bestselling author. She joins me on the podcast today from her home in the U.K. to discuss her book, Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women. In Radium Girls, Kate dives into America's early fascination with radium and profiles the tragic lives of several 1920s women whose job painting with luminescent radium paint led to horrific medical problems and an uphill legal battle to seek justice from the factories that knowingly exposed them to hazardous materials.
Want to listen to new episodes a week earlier and get exclusive bonus content? Consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon!
Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok
--- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cmtuhistory/support
Today on Alternate Histories, I am joined by UK writer and novelist Annabel Abbs. "Annabel has a degree in English Literature from the University of East Anglia and a Masters in Marketing from the University of Kingston After fifteen years running a consultancy, she took a career break to bring up her four children, before returning to her first love, literature. Her debut novel, The Joyce Girl, won the 2015 Impress Prize for New Writing and the 2015 Spotlight First Novel Award, and was longlisted for the 2015 Caledonia Novel Award and the 2015 Bath Novel Award." She joins my from her home in London via Zoom to discuss The Joyce Girl: A Novel of Jazz Age Paris.
"The review in the Paris Times in November 1928 is rapturous in its praise of Lucia Joyce’s skill and artistry as a dancer. The family has made their home in Paris—where the latest ideas in art, music, and literature converge. Acolytes regularly visit the Joyce apartment to pay homage to Ireland’s exiled literary genius. Among them is a tall, thin young man named Samuel Beckett—a fellow Irish expat who idolizes Joyce and with whom Lucia becomes romantically involved.
Lucia is both gifted and motivated, training tirelessly with some of the finest teachers in the world. Though her father delights in his daughter’s talent, she clashes with her mother, Nora. And as her relationship with Beckett sours, Lucia’s dreams unravel, as does her hope of a life beyond her father’s shadow.
With Lucia’s behavior growing increasingly erratic, James Joyce sends her to pioneering psychoanalyst Carl Jung. Here, at last, she will tell her own story—a fascinating, heartbreaking account of thwarted ambition, passionate creativity, and the power of love to both inspire and destroy.
The Joyce Girl creates a compelling and moving account of the real-life Joyce Girl, of unrealized dreams and rejection, and of the destructive love of a father."
Learn more about Annabel Abbs at www.annabelabbs.com
This podcast is part of Straight Up Strange Productions. Check out www.straightupstrange.com for more shows like this one.
--- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cmtuhistory/support
The Contact Paradox with Keith Cooper
Can't Make This Up
05/25/20 • 58 min
Are we alone in the universe?
Since humans first gazed up into the cosmos, we have tried to answer to this question, sometimes using theology and sometimes philosophy. In our literature, particularly in the science fiction genre, we have speculated what contact with otherworldly beings could look like. In recent centuries, we have used science and our ever-increasing advances in technology to look out into the heavens and search for tell-tale signs that someone else is out there.
Studying the stars for alien life has a long and interesting history, most notably with the founding of SETI (The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) nearly sixty years ago. My guest today is Keith Cooper, author of The Contact Paradox: Challenging Our Assumptions in the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, who joins me to discuss the history surrounding academic efforts of "seeking out new life and new civilizations." Keith has a background in astronomy and astrophysics and has served as the Editor of Astronomy Now since 2006. His articles on cosmology, planetary science, astrobiology, and related disciplines have appeared in Sky & Telescope, Physics World, and the Journal of the British Interplanetary Society. In our conversation, Keith and I discuss early searches for ET intelligence and the origins of the SETI program, what SETI has done to listen for signals from other worlds, and the controversy surrounding the idea of whether or not we should respond if we do indeed intercept an alien signal. Keith and I then dive into our own evolutionary history to speculate on how life might have evolved elsewhere, and we explore examples from Earth's history of first contact between cultures to see what lessons we might be able to apply to first contact with an extraterrestrial civilization.
Check out the massive selection of sci-fi comics, books, toys, and games available at Things from Another World!
Want to listen to new episodes a week earlier and get exclusive bonus content? Consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon!
Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok
--- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cmtuhistory/support
Lady from the Black Lagoon with Mallory O’Meara
Can't Make This Up
05/14/20 • 28 min
The Creature from the Black Lagoon was always my favorite classic monster movie growing up. The "creature" is certainly one of the most original and iconic monsters to ever grace the silver screen. But did you know that it was designed by a woman? Millicent Patrick was a makeup artist, animator, special effect designer, and an actress, but unfortunately her contributions to the horror film genre have largely been forgotten. My guest today is Mallory O'Meara and she has written the first biography of Millicent's life and career in Hollywood, The Lady from the Black Lagoon: Hollywood Monsters and the Lost Legacy of Millicent Patrick. Mallory is an award-winning author, co-host of the literary podcast Reading Glasses, and she works in the horror movie industry as a screenwriter and producer. Today, Mallory and I discuss Millicent's unique childhood, how she entered Hollywood, and how the film industry failed to recognize her achievements.
If you've never experienced this classic film or want to revisit it, you can rent or buy The Creature from the Black Lagoon from Amazon Prime Video.
Want to listen to new episodes a week earlier and get exclusive bonus content? Consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon!
Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok
--- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cmtuhistory/support
Daring, Devious & Deadly with Dean Jobb
Can't Make This Up
11/19/20 • 45 min
One of the easternmost provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia is a pleasant and scenic place to visit today. But it has a colorful and sometimes checkered history. From bank robbers who used P.T. Barnum's circus as a diversion to voters who went to the polls brandishing clubs and pistols to the world's largest manmade explosion until the testing of the atomic bomb, Nova Scotia's history is filled with unbelievable yet true tales.
In this episode, I am joined by a returning friend of the podcast, Dean Jobb. Dean is a professor of journalism and a member of the faculty of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Nonfiction Program at the University of King's College in Halifax. He has an enduring interest in true crime and has written several books on the subject. Dean joins me again to discuss his latest book, "Daring, Devious & Deadly: True Tales of Crime and Justice from Nova Scotia's Past," which is a collection of 15 remarkable true crime stories.
Want to listen to Dean Jobb's first appearance on the podcast? Check out "Empire of Deception with Dean Jobb" from February 2019.
Want to listen to new episodes a week earlier and get exclusive bonus content? Consider becoming a supporter of the podcast on Patreon!
Like the podcast? Please subscribe and leave a review! Follow @CMTUHistory on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & TikTok
--- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cmtuhistory/support