Best HistoryPod Podcasts (2025)

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31st December 1853: New Year’s Eve dinner takes place inside a model of an Iguanodon at the Crystal Palace Park in south London

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The dinner was widely reported and helped generate public interest in the Crystal Palace Park's life-sized models of extinct animals, which opened to visitors the following ...By Scott Allsop

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30th December 1922: Foundation of the USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics)

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In 1922 the USSR consisted of just four Soviet republics – the Russian SFSR, Ukrainian SSR, Byelorussian SSR and Transcaucasian ...By Scott Allsop

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29th December 1890: Lakota Sioux massacred at Wounded Knee

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More than 150 Native Americans from the Lakota tribe were killed by U.S. soldiers in the Wounded Knee ...By Scott Allsop

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28th December 1537: Francis I of France establishes the first legal deposit for books under the Ordonnance de Montpellier

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The Ordonnance de Montpellier required printers and booksellers to deposit a copy of every book published in the kingdom with the royal ...By Scott Allsop

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27th December 1929: Stalin calls for the ‘liquidation of the kulaks as a class’

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The Soviet dekulakisation campaign began when Joseph Stalin announced the ‘liquidation of the kulaks as a ...By Scott Allsop

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26th December 1991: Soviet Union dissolved in the final meeting of the Supreme Soviet

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As it became obvious that the USSR was falling apart, on 25 December Gorbachev resigned as President and the Soviet Union was formally dissolved the next ...By Scott Allsop

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25th December 800: Charlemagne crowned emperor by Pope Leo III during Christmas Mass at St Peter’s Basilica

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The coronation of Charlemagne established the precedent for what later became known as the Holy Roman Empire and reinforced the idea of a Christian emperor as protector of the ...By Scott Allsop

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24th December 1955: Colorado Springs Continental Air Defense Command first gives children the location Santa as he delivers presents

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CONAD was replaced by NORAD (the North American Aerospace Defense Command) in 1958, and NORAD Tracks Santa has reported Santa’s location ever ...By Scott Allsop

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23rd December 1750: Ben Franklin accidentally shocks himself while trying to electrocute a turkey

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Benjamin Franklin, the American polymath, accidentally electrocuted himself while attempting to kill a ...By Scott Allsop

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22nd December 1964: Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird strategic reconnaissance aircraft makes its first flight

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The SR-71 was used to conduct reconnaissance missions over hostile territory, providing high-quality photographic and electronic intelligence until its retirement in ...By Scott Allsop

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21st December 1913: First modern crossword puzzle printed in the New York World newspaper, created by Arthur Wynne

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Wynne’s first ‘word-cross puzzle’ was shaped as a symmetrical diamond with a hollow centre, and was developed by Wynne for the 21 December issue of the New York World’s ‘Fun’ ...By Scott Allsop

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20th December 1917: Establishment of the Cheka, the Russian Bolshevik secret police

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Established following a decree by Lenin on 19 December, the Cheka’s focus was on defending the revolution by removing internal threats to the communist ...By Scott Allsop

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19th December 1777: George Washington leads the Continental Army into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania

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By the time the Continental Army left Valley Forge in June 1778 it was smaller in number but stronger in organisation and confidence, establishing the foundations of its eventual success against British ...By Scott Allsop

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18th December 1892: Tchaikovsky’s ballet The Nutcracker receives its première performance at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg

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Composed in the Romantic style, the score received good reviews although responses to the ballet itself were mostly negative. The fortunes of the ballet only turned around with a new staging in New York in ...By Scott Allsop

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17th December 497 BCE: The first Saturnalia festival celebrated in ancient Rome

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The Saturnalia festival was dedicated to Roman god, ...By Scott Allsop

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16th December 1431: Henry VI became the only English monarch to be crowned King of France

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Henry was crowned by the Bishop of Paris, as the Archbishop of Reims was aligned with the French crown. Attendance was limited, and the event failed to generate significant support among the French ...By Scott Allsop

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15th December 1851: The Forest Creek Monster Meeting of Australian gold miners protests taxes

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Over 14,000 Australian gold miners gathered at Forest Creek in Victoria for a protest known as the Monster ...By Scott Allsop

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14th December 1911: Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen becomes the first to reach the South Pole

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Amundsen’s team arrived five weeks ahead of British explorer Robert Falcon Scott’s Terra Nova ...By Scott Allsop

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13th December 1577: Francis Drake departs Plymouth on his circumnavigation of the globe

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Drake’s fleet consisted of five ships, with the flagship Pelican later renamed Golden Hind, and it departed Plymouth on 13 ...By Scott Allsop

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12th December 1935: The Lebensborn registered association established in Nazi Germany by the SS

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Literally translated as ‘Fount of Life’, Lebensborn was designed to harness apparent racial purity through the birth of children conceived between Aryan women and members of the SS, often as a result of extramarital ...By Scott Allsop

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11th December 1936: King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom announces his abdication in a worldwide radio broadcast

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King Edward VIII Edward abdicated in order to marry American divorcee Wallis Simpson, and became known as the Duke of ...By Scott Allsop

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10th December 1948: Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris

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Drafted in the aftermath of the Second World War and the revelations of mass atrocities committed by totalitarian regimes, the declaration aimed to provide a shared framework for human dignity applicable to all ...By Scott Allsop

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9th December 1921: Lead identified as a fuel additive to reduce engine knocking in automobiles

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Thomas Midgeley Jr. discovered that adding tetraethyl lead to gasoline reduced knocking in automobile ...By Scott Allsop

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8th December 1980: John Lennon murdered outside his New York apartment block by Mark David Chapman

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As Lennon walked from his limousine to the Dakota building’s front entrance, Mark David Chapman fired five rounds at his back, of which four hit ...By Scott Allsop

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7th December 1995: NASA’s Galileo spacecraft becomes the first to enter orbit around Jupiter

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Galileo’s arrival at Jupiter on 7 December 1995 demonstrated the feasibility of long-duration operations in the outer Solar System and produced findings that shaped subsequent missions, including Juno and the planned Europa ...By Scott Allsop

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6th December 1956: The ‘Blood in the Water’ Olympic water polo match between the USSR and Hungary

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The match was a semi-final at the 1956 Melbourne Summer Olympic Games and became famous as a result of the violence that ran throughout the ...By Scott Allsop

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5th December 1934: The Walwal Incident lays the foundations for the Abyssinia Crisis

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Over 150 soldiers from both sides died in a two-day skirmish that began on 5 December, and whose origins continue to be ...By Scott Allsop

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4th December 1676: Battle of Lund fought between Denmark–Norway and Sweden, one of the bloodiest battles in Scandinavia

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Casualty estimates indicate that nearly half of all soldiers engaged were killed or wounded, making the Battle of Lund one of the bloodiest engagements ever fought on Scandinavian ...By Scott Allsop

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3rd December 1910: The world’s first neon light was turned on for the public at the Paris Motor Show

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Frenchman Georges Claude’s neon lighting at the Paris Motor Show was used to light the front of the large exhibition space at the Grand Palais with red ...By Scott Allsop

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2nd December 1804: Napoleon Bonaparte crowns himself Emperor of the French at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris

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Napoleon’s coronation as Emperor of the French was a lavish affair that referenced various elements of Carolingian tradition, the ancien régime, and the French ...By Scott Allsop

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1st December 1934: Assassination of Sergei Kirov, one of the most prominent figures in the Soviet Communist Party

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The authorities claimed that the murder was part of a broader conspiracy involving former oppositionists,, and used it as a catalyst for the purges that began in 1935 and escalated into mass arrests, show trials, and ...By Scott Allsop

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30th November 1982: Michael Jackson releases Thriller, the best-selling album of all time

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Thriller was released just three weeks after mixing was finished and proved so popular that it was selling a million copies a week at its ...By Scott Allsop

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29th November 1850: The Declaration of Olmütz signed by Prussia and Austria

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The Declaration of Olmütz was signed between Prussia and Austria, in which Prussia submitted to Austrian ...By Scott Allsop

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28th November 1660: The Royal Society founded at Gresham College in London by a group of notable natural philosophers

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By providing an organised setting for experiment, publication, and debate, the Royal Society helped anchor the emerging scientific method and created a model that continues to influence scientific culture in Britain and ...By Scott Allsop

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27th November 1809: The Berners Street hoax causes chaos in central London

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Englishman Theodore Hook orchestrated a practical joke known as the Berners Street hoax in the heart of ...By Scott Allsop

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26th November 1922: Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon enter the tomb of Tutankhamun in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings

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Although Tutankhamun was one of the minor Pharaohs, the discovery of his tomb is significant for it being the most complete example of a royal tomb ever ...By Scott Allsop

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25th November 1940: Nikolai Yezhov, former head of the Soviet secret police, executed in Moscow

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Under Yezhov's leadership the NKVD launched a campaign of arrests targeting party members, military officers, and civilians that saw widespread purges, forced confessions, and executions. Estimates of those killed range into the hundreds of ...By Scott Allsop

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24th November 1859: Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species, considered by many to be the foundation of evolutionary biology

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Darwin’s book presented evidence for the process of natural selection, and its publication sparked a seismic shift in the study of ...By Scott Allsop

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23rd November 1450: Ottoman forces abandon the First Siege of Krujë, after being unable to defeat Skanderbeg’s forces

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The Ottomans had suffered up to 20,000 casualties compared to Skanderbeg’s 1,000 during the ...By Scott Allsop

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22nd November 1987: Max Headroom signal hijacking takes control of two Chicago television stations

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The hijackings showed a figure dressed as Max Headroom, a fictional artificial-intelligence television personality created in the mid-1980s and presented as “the world’s first computer-generated TV host”, in front of a sheet of corrugated ...By Scott Allsop

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21st November 1974: The Birmingham pub bombings kill 21 people and injure 182

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21 people were killed and 182 were injured in the Birmingham pub ...By Scott Allsop

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20th November 1945: The first of the Nuremberg Trials begin in the aftermath of the Second World War

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Organised by the Allies to bring senior Nazis to justice for their part in the war crimes committed by the regime, t first Nuremberg Trial lasted for almost a ...By Scott Allsop

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19th November 2006: Nintendo release the Wii console that includes motion-sensing technology

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The Wii's defining feature was the Wii Remote, a wireless controller that could be swung, pointed, or tilted that enabled physical actions to correspond directly with on-screen ...By Scott Allsop

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18th November 1916: Battle of the Somme ends with a German withdrawal

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By the end of the Battle of the Somme, the Allies had advanced more than six miles into German-held ...By Scott Allsop

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17th November 1903: The Bolshevik-Menshevik split within the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party

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The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party split into the Bolshevik and Menshevik ...By Scott Allsop

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16th November 1938: Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann synthesizes lysergic acid diethylamide, later known as LSD

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Lysergic acid diethylamide was modified from one of the principal active components of ergot, a fungus found on rye that had long been known for its medicinal and toxic ...By Scott Allsop

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15th November 1969: 500,000 people march on Washington in the Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam

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Over 500,000 protesters marched on Washington D.C. as part of the national Moratorium to End the War in ...By Scott Allsop

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14th November 1990: Margaret Thatcher’s fifteen year leadership of the British Conservative Party challenged by Michael Heseltine

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Thatcher became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom following the General Election of 1979 but by the late 1980s her popularity, along with that of her party, was ...By Scott Allsop

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13th November 1833: Great Meteor Storm brings tens of thousands of meteors per hour to the North America sky

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Contemporary estimates suggest that up to 100,000 meteors per hour may have been visible at the Great Storm's peak shortly before dawn on 13 ...By Scott Allsop

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12th November 1990: The World Wide Web formally proposed by British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee

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Within five years the World Wide Web began to be adopted by people and companies that weren’t connected with science or academia, and it has seemingly been dominated by photographs of cats ever ...By Scott Allsop