The Most Important Lost Fossils in Histo...

Exactly a century ago, teacher John Scopes was charged with the “crime” of teaching evolution. But Scopes was hardly a defiant Galileo, nobly standing up for truth. In fact, he never even taught evolution. (Really.) But despite the unseemly origins of the Monkey Trial, Scopes pro ... Show More

Astronomer Jules Janssen was desperate to escape the siege of Paris in 1870 and observe an eclipse in Africa—work that he hoped would confirm his discovery of a brand new element in the Sun, helium. So he devised a plan to escape the city in a hot-air balloon, despite promises by ... Show More

In the 1970s, paramedic units were illegal in the United States. One (very bad) television show, Emergency!, set out to change that—and saved tens of thousands of lives in the process. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collect ... Show More

<p>China’s written history goes back more than 3,000 years, stretching deep into the Bronze Age. But just how far back does it go, and how reliable are those first legendary texts when discussing a world that had already been lost for centuries? They speak of powerful kings and c ... Show More

How did prehistoric people in Britain view and understand the world around them? What did they smell, hear and see? Francis Pryor, one of Britain’s leading archaeologists and the author of Scenes from Prehistoric Life, delves into the sensory world of our prehistoric ancestors.   ... Show More

On today’s Saturday Matinee, we learn the history of Skeleton Lake, as told by the podcast Ancient History Fangirl. Link to Ancient History Fangirl: https://www.ancienthistoryfangirl.com/See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art1 ... Show More

<p>Roughly 40,000 years ago, Ice Age Britain was undergoing a transformation.&nbsp;</p><br><p>The first modern humans, <em>Homo sapiens, </em>were arriving and beginning to settle in the British Isles. Their evolutionary predecessors, the Neanderthals, were on their way to extinc ... Show More

<p>What can we learn about the deep human past by studying present-day hunter-gatherers? I asked that question to Professor Robert Kelly of the University of Wyoming, who's both one of the world's experts on hunter-gatherers and an accomplished archaeologist. Today's hunter-gathe ... Show More

From each stone’s incredible size, to its impressive age of 5000 years, Stonehenge has puzzled people throughout history. How was this immense, prehistoric monument built? And why? We dig deep to find answers, and explore how many theories shifted after a surprising discovery at ... Show More

<p>Mary Anning started hunting for fossils in Lyme Regis in the early 1800s. Around 1811, she uncovered the complete skeleton of an ichthyosaurus. She made several significant contributions to paleontology, so why didn't she always get credit for her work?</p><p> </p> Learn more ... Show More

<p>Uncovered a decade ago in the Rising Star Cave system in South Africa, Homo Naledi's discovery has impacted paleoanthropology in ways nobody could expect. Upon first discovery, it was assumed this small brained hominid lived millions of years ago - yet when dating of the fossi ... Show More

Between 1927 and 1937, paleontologists excavated fossils from about 40 members of the species that today we call Homo erectus from a site in China known as Dragon Bone Hill. And then World War II broke out and the fossils were lost. In this episode, we trace their path as far as ... Show More