Retropod

The history of subpoenas, and the fiery congressional hearings that have captivated Americans for centuries began with a Founding Father raising his hand to say, “Investigate me!”

Sexual harassment has been existed in showbiz as long as there have been bright lights.

In the 19th century, publications both reputable and scandalous routinely blackmailed society figures caught in compromising circumstances.

Some 50 million people are projected to fill out a March Madness bracket this year. As you finish filling out yours, you might want to tip your pencil and say thanks to the late and loud Staten Island bar owner Jody Haggerty.

Harper Lee's classic novel has been causing controversy for as long as its been in print. Here's a look at the history of banning "To Kill a Mockingbird."

North Korea has long been a superpower when it comes verbal attacks.

There’s one thing that you can’t have delivered anymore that was totally normal to send by mail in the early 1900s.

Thurgood Marshall, the first African American member of the Supreme Court, took the constitutional oath of office from Hugo Black, a white associate justice who had once been a member of the Ku Klux Klan.

In 1978, Marilyn Loden gave new meaning to an image women have fought for decades.

Edythe Eyde, also known by her pen name Lisa Ben, was a visionary who fought to make lesbians visible in pop culture decades before most others had the guts to do the same.

The deadliest wildfire in U.S. history wasn’t in California.

President Abraham Lincoln had to worry about the first lady being a leaker, and it was quite a scandal.

If the order for a nuclear attack is issued, the soldiers operating the launch machine have no choice but to fire. Or do they?

In 1926, the United States received a birthday card signed by 5.5 million Polish people.

Buildings that stand as symbols of American democracy - the White House, Mount Vernon and Monticello, to name a few - were erected with the labor of those who were not free.

A dog and a cadaver deserve credit for their contributions to the invention of the telephone.

Jesse James, the most famous outlaw in history, was eventually foiled by a picture hanging crooked on a wall.

President Trump made history when he nominated a woman to become director of the Central Intelligence Agency. But while a woman leading the CIA was once unthinkable, female spies have made enormous, overlooked contributions in espionage.

Oscars night is probably the one moment around the world when people become really interested in envelopes.

The history of social media began in 1844, when Samuel F.B. Morse sent a message from Washington to Baltimore. It said, "What hath God wrought?"

Sonja Henie won three Olympic gold medals and 10 world championships, and turned her star power into as career as one of Hollywood's biggest movie stars. Meet figure skating's first megastar.

To understand the gruesome history of the death penalty, it is essential to comprehend how badly Thomas Edison wanted to zap George Westinghouse.

Whether you believe in this stuff or not, the many accounts that have spilled out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue over two centuries give ghosts an undeniable place in the country’s history.

Historians and national security analysts have been re-examining one particular forgotten moment in the history of U.S. and North Korea conflict.

The Kinneys married in Washington, D.C., in 1874. Then, they were arrested back home in Virginia for violating the state’s laws. They fought the ruling in higher and higher courts but never won the right to stay married in their home state.

Dr. Spock - not the guy from Star Trek - was at one time America's most beloved pediatrician. A whole generation of children was raised on his medical advice. But not even his popularity could save him from being indicted by the federal government.

During World War I, the Marines Corps needed help on the home front while men were fighting overseas. Opha May Johnson was the first woman in line.

In 1812, Philadelphia was outfitted with the latest in plumbing technology - a network of wooden pipes to carry water throughout the city.

Back in the 1830s, Jim Crow wasn't yet a symbol of inequality. He was a fictional character in minstrel shows who, to entertain his audiences, performed in blackface.

A full year after the King James Bible was printed in 1631, people discovered an error.

The president's State of the Union started as a simple report on the condition on the nation; overtime, the address became a moment to rally Congress and the public.

The woman who first introduced equal pay legislation in Congress had to fight to be taken seriously — and often failed.

In 1983, Stanislav Petrov, a lieutenant colonel in the Soviet Union’s Air Defense Forces, trusted his gut and averted a global nuclear catastrophe.

A few days before his team took the field as huge underdogs in Super Bowl III, New York Jets quarterback Joe Namath made what was seen as an insane prediction at the time: "The Jets will win Sunday," he said. "I guarantee it."

If you work in an office without offices, with just about everyone working in a large spare space full of stylish desks, straight lines and papers stored in a credenza, then you have met Florence Knoll Bassett.

After the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln, John Surratt traveled across three continents, wore disguises and used fake names for nearly two years to escape authorities.

If you’re like most Americans, you probably visit a grocery store once or twice a week. But you probably don’t know that one single grocery item is responsible for the rise of supermarkets as we know them.

Over the past seven decades, the Doomsday Clock has served as a metaphorical measure of humankind’s proximity to global catastrophe. Every year, scientists and nuclear experts set the clock's time after grappling over the state of geopolitical affairs.

Pinball was once so vilified that it was banned in cities across the United States.

In the 1950s, Lester Wunderman became the king of direct mail advertising — the ancestor of today’s online targeted ads.

In the early days of the House, some congresspeople thought hats had no place atop the heads of representatives debating the great issues of the day. Hats, they argued, weren’t dignified.

When Eugene Cernan walked on the moon, he didn’t know he’d be the last astronaut to make the journey.

The name on Martin Luther King Jr.'s birth certificate was not Martin. Nor did the document include the middle name Luther.

When Alexander Hamilton argued in favor of lifetime tenures for Supreme Court justices, he probably didn’t foresee them living past their prime.

More than a century ago, Carry Amelia Nation — hatchet in hand — chopped the country toward temperance.

Once upon a time, people walked between the U.S. and Canada over a frozen Niagara Falls. But one day, that all changed forever.

Adolf Hitler's mother may be the only person he genuinely cared for.

For decades, the boundary between Mexico and the United States was little more than an imaginary line in the sand.

When a steel industry strike threatened military production during the Korean War, and Congress couldn’t come to an agreement, President Truman had a solution — declare a national emergency.

Lego started as a company that made wooden toys, and grew into an empire of plastic building blocks.