Chapter 19. Horatio Nelson, or: The Nava...

If you’re tracing the roots of America’s gun culture, you’ll surely stumble across Samuel Colt, inventor of the Colt Pistol, revolutionary in firearm manufacture and marketing, and total gun nut by anyone’s standards. Guests Rhys Waters and Jesse Harley (‘Canadian Politics is Bor ... Show More

Comedian Brandon Hackett is here for the story of Walter Raleigh, namesake of Raleigh, North Carolina: a great explorer, so we’re told, but really – did he get a single thing right? Or was he really famous because Queen Elizabeth I had the hots for him? Learn all about the man wh ... Show More

In a surprisingly horny episode, comedian Ashley Botting (Second City, Because News) is here for the story of Sir Henry Holland: physician to the wealthy, confidante to the elite, and – to spread a rumour we can in no way substantiate – hot lover to them all? Brought to you By: T ... Show More

In August of 1831, a 16-year-old from Connecticut named Sam Colt boarded a ship of missionaries bound for a round-trip voyage to Calcutta. Restless and rambunctious, with a particular fondness for blowing things up—he’d been expelled from Amherst Academy not long before for repea ... Show More

It sounds like something straight out of a Tarantino film -- a bloodthirsty, eccentric soldier welding a longbow and claymore against Nazis, then celebrating his exploits by wailing on some bagpipes. Oddly enough, this is a true story: John 'Mad Jack' Churchill was a real-life Wo ... Show More

“Come on, you Wolverines!”The story of the American Indian Wars of 1862-68 is an enthralling tale of hubris, politics, recklessness, and the merciless assault of industrialisation and modernity on an old world, nearly extinguished. An immense tragedy, it is also a story of great ... Show More

"What would you do if your home was attacked? You would stand up like a brave man and defend it. That is our story." Following the bloody Fetterman Fight, which saw the Lakota warlord Crazy Horse and his warriors ambush and massacre American troops, the American public was left s ... Show More

I confess I sometimes wonder where we got in the habit of proclaiming, usually with some sort of righteous indignation, that we have the “right” to this or that as citizens. I know that the political theorists of the eighteenth century wrote a lot about “rights,” and that “rights ... Show More

Produced by WBUR, Boston’s NPR, in partnership with The Trace, The Gun Machine looks into the past to bring you a story that most Americans never learned in history class: how early partnerships between mad scientist gunsmiths and a fledgling U.S. government created the gun indus ... Show More

A bad guy with a gun.At 09:30am on the 14th December 2012, the staff at Sandy Hook Elementary School locked the school's doors, a security precaution they took every day. At 09:35 a gunman shot his way through a glass panel and entered the school. By 09:40am twenty children and s ... Show More

Robert is joined by Miles Gray to discuss William Walker, the American who tried to conquer Central America.FOOTNOTES: Mercenary Hero William Walker Filibusters and Financiers: The Story of William Walker and His Associates [1916]  William Walker's Wars: How One Man's Private Ame ... Show More

With the American Civil War coming to a close in April 1865, George Custer, cavalry commander in the Union army, and a man of dubious political leanings for a unionist officer, was sent to Texas. Reckless, daring and bloodthirsty, the conclusion of the war came as a disappointmen ... Show More

In episode 88, Robert is joined by Jamie Loftus to discuss Ragnar Redbeard, the socialist turned Proto-Nazi who inspired a mass shooting.FOOTNOTES:1. Festival shooter Santino Legan wore tactical gear, sunglasses and a ballcap. He 'seemed confident in his use of the gun.'2. Desmon ... Show More