Episodes

Jumbo, one of the largest elephants ever seen, departed London Zoo for Barnum & Bailey’s Circus in New York on March 9th, 1882. Nationally beloved as the ‘pet’ to Queen Victoria’s children, for 16 years he’d given thousands of rides around Regent’s Park, but was sold off for $10,000 once he started exhibiting trauma – […]

Medieval power couple King Louis VII of France and Eleanor of Aquitaine, seemingly unable to produce a male heir, had a messy breakup. Their annulment on 21st March 1152 was granted by the Pope on the grounds of consanguinity – meaning they were too closely related by blood. And yet both parties went on to

The Jules Rimet, trophy of the FIFA World Cup, was stolen from a stamp exhibition in Westminster Central Hall on March 20th, 1966 – the year England was hosting (and went on to win) the tournament. The theft sparked a massive Police investigation and multiple offers of rewards for its recovery. Astonishingly, the trophy had

The first ever St. Patrick’s Day parade took place not in Ireland, as many people might expect, but in Spanish Florida, on March 17, 1601. It wasn’t until about 100 years later that the world famous parades got going in Boston and New York City. Historian J. Michael Francis made the discovery of this unexpectedly

The world’s first blood bank opened on March 15, 1937 at Cook County Hospital in Chicago, revolutionising the way blood transfusions were performed. Dr. Bernard Fantus, the man behind the blood bank, had originally wanted to call his innovation the Blood Preservation Laboratory – but then his daughter came up with a rather less ghoulish

The Mikado opened on March 14, 1885 to immediate acclaim, and went on to become W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan’s most famous and best-loved operetta, despite its tortured genesis.  Due to growing creative tensions and their previous show flopping, Gilbert and Sullivan’s partnership was on the rocks, so The Mikado’s success took both completely

Margaretha Geertruida MacLeod, better known to the world as Mata Hari, set the Paris stage ablaze on March 13, 1905, with a scandalous dance routine that turned her into an overnight success.  Sporting a gold jeweled breastplate and bracelets, Mata Hari’s performance was a striptease that left little to the imagination. But even the wildest

The infamous French Foreign Legion was formed by King Louis Philippe on March 10, 1831, to help the French control Algeria using mercenaries who were more expendable than native young Frenchmen. To this day a magnet for men who want a clean break from their past, the Legion famously did not ask many questions about

Copycat murderer Heriberto Seda began his spree of violence in New York City on March 8, 1990, when he attempted to kill a middle-aged man with a homemade gun. He claimed he was the famous ‘Zodiac’ killer, who had terrorized the West Coast in the 1960s.   The NYPD began to take his crimes seriously

Kidnapped from her prestigious Liverpool boarding school on March 7, 1827, 15-year-old Ellen Turner was led to believe her family would be financially ruined if she didn’t marry her 30 year-old abductor, Edward Gibbon Wakefield. Before she was able to deduce that his story was a sham, Turner was whisked off to Gretna Green and