Top History Podcasts

Enjoy calming sleep stories about history to help you relax at bedtime. Narratted by a real person (not A.I.) and without any loud obnoxious ads. Topics include The Titanic, Henry Ford, Gold Rush, Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, Pirates, True Crime, UFOs, Bigfoot, Loch Ness Monster, Jesse Owens, Jackie Robinson, Marco Polo, Rum, Salt, Coal, Oil, Pearls, and much more. These calm history sleep stories will distract and relax your bedtime brain squirrels. Access over 600 relaxing and AD-FREE episodes at www.calmhistory.com.

Reconstruction begins where, for most Americans, the story of the Civil War ends: The North is victorious and slavery is abolished. But what happened next was one of the most important decades in American history, a moment when our country grappled with its original sin and imagined — and briefly enacted — a more perfect union. 

Drawing from archives, letters, diaries, court records, eyewitness testimonies and some of America’s most accomplished scholars and storytellers, Reconstruction: The Unfinished Promise explores this unprecedented historical moment in rich, kaleidoscopic detail. The series unpacks a time when a determined band of reformers attempted to radically reimagine American society — from the Constitution to the roots of its economy to the very nature of citizenship itself.

Reconstruction was a time when Americans struggled over fundamental questions about our country. Who gets to be a citizen? Who has the right to vote? Who can own property? In short, who belongs? Reconstruction: The Unfinished Promise explores what America might have looked like if Reconstruction had truly succeeded, and how the ultimate backlash to Reconstruction prevented our country from becoming a truly multiracial democracy. 

Guiding us through this extraordinary moment in American history is best-selling author and host of Revisionist History Malcolm Gladwell. He’ll have help from luminaries, historians, and storytellers such as President Barack Obama, Jelani Cobb, Wyatt Cenac, David Blight, Kai Wright, Kellie Carter Jackson, Ashley C. Ford, Manisha Sinha, Kidada Williams, and Eric Foner. This is a series about why America has yet to make good on the promise of Reconstruction, and how it still might.

An Audible Original in partnership with History Channel. Produced by Higher Ground and Pushkin Industries.

Native people have been written out of the American story, but without us you don’t know what happened. This summer the United States will celebrate the 250-year anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. When you read the Declaration, you realize it is a list of complaints. The last entry, the climax in our founders’ reasons for rebellion against the Crown, is this: “He has excited… the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.”

We have been told the Revolution was fought over taxation and representation. But what the founders were most angry about in our country’s most famous document was Indian affairs. How did generations of Americans miss this?

The first armed rebellion against the Crown was an attack on British forts that traded with tribes. When colonists threw tea into the Boston harbor, they dressed up like members of the Mohawk tribe—not for disguise, but because pretending to be Indian symbolized freedom and rebellion. The founding fathers’ first government failed because Indigenous nations were too powerful; war and diplomacy with Native people is why we have a central federal government.

Hosted and reported by Rebecca Nagle and  featuring leading Native historians,  First America unveils  how the founders’ treatment of Indigenous nations—and their resistance—shaped US democracy. The show  does not simply add another blemish to the image of the founding fathers, it reveals the real story of why the colonists rebelled, what kind of government they created, and, crucially, how our current political moment was 250 years in the making.

Slow Burn illuminates America’s most consequential moments, making sense of the past to better understand the present. Through archival tape and first-person interviews, the series uncovers the surprising events and little-known characters lurking within the biggest stories of our time.

Join Slate Plus to unlock full, ad-free access to Slow Burn and your other favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe from the Slow Burn show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or visit slate.com/slowburnplus to get access wherever you listen.

Season 11: Becoming Justice Gorsuch

How Neil Gorsuch laid the foundation for a SCOTUS supermajority and then became its most unexpected wild card.

Season 10: The Rise of Fox News

How a cable news channel became a cultural and political force—and how a whole bunch of people rose up to try and stop it.

Season 9: Gays Against Briggs

A nationwide moral panic, a California legislator who rode the anti-gay wave, and the LGBTQ+ people who stepped up and came out to try and stop him.

Season 8: Becoming Justice Thomas

Where Clarence Thomas came from, how he rose to power, and how he’s brought the rest of us along with him, whether we like it or not. Winner of the Podcast of the Year at the 2024 Ambies Awards.

Season 7: Roe v. Wade

The women who fought for legal abortion, the activists who pushed back, and the justices who thought they could solve the issue for good. Winner of Apple Podcasts Show of the Year in 2022.

Season 6: The L.A. Riots

How decades of police brutality, a broken justice system, and a video tape set off six days of unrest in Los Angeles.

Season 5: The Road to the Iraq War

Eighteen months after 9/11, the United States invaded a country that had nothing to do with the attacks. Who’s to blame? And was there any way to stop it?

Season 4: David Duke

America’s most famous white supremacist came within a runoff of controlling Louisiana. How did David Duke rise to power? And what did it take to stop him?

Season 3: Biggie and Tupac

How is it that two of the most famous performers in the world were murdered within a year of each other—and their killings were never solved?

Season 2: The Clinton Impeachment

A reexamination of the scandals that nearly destroyed the 42nd president and forever changed the life of a former White House intern.

Season 1: Watergate

What did it feel like to live through the scandal that brought down President Nixon?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As long as there’s been oppression, there’ve been people fighting it. This weekly podcast dives into history to drag up the wildest rebels, the most beautiful revolts, and all the people who long to be—and fight to be—free. It explores complex stories of resistance that offer lessons and inspiration for us today, focusing on the ensemble casts that make up each act of history. That is to say, this podcast focuses on Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff.

The Vikings terrified the medieval world. Yet they beguile us today. Who were they really?

The WallBuilders Show is a daily journey to examine today's issues from a Biblical, Historical and Constitutional perspective. Featured guests include elected officials, experts, activists, authors, and commentators.

“This is a town where there are three pastimes: politics, sports and revenge.” The town is Boston.

Seemingly dry topics become gripping political dramas in this Peabody Award winning show from creator Ian Coss and GBH News. Each season of “The Big Dig” uncovers a different facet of society – infrastructure, gambling, food, healthcare – together the pieces connect to tell the story of modern America. 

Season 1: "The Big Dig" 

The highway project known as “The Big Dig” is infamous – a shorthand for government failure – but it all started as one engineer’s dream to correct the wrongs of the past, and its legacy is far from simple.

Season 2: "Scratch & Win" 

America’s most successful state lottery – and its greatest innovation, the scratch ticket – all starts with mafia bookmakers and state bureaucrats going toe to toe in a battle to own the future of gambling. 

Season 3: "Catching The Codfather"

A fishing tycoon is arrested in an elaborate sting operation, but claims he’s the real hero fighting back against the state.

Coming Soon - Season 4: "Mitt & Ted, a healthcare story" 

Mitt Romney and Ted Kennedy began their political journeys on opposite sides of the healthcare issue, and they ended once again on opposite sides, but for a brief period in the middle they worked together to pass a groundbreaking law – one that promised to finally transform the politics of American healthcare – the law known as Romneycare. So what brought this odd couple together, and what ultimately pulled Mitt and Ted apart?

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CREDITS:

Host & Creator: Ian Coss

Executive Producer: Devin Maverick Robins

Producer: Isabel Hibbard

Story Editor: Lacy Roberts 

Contact us as thebigdig@wgbh.org