Since 1651, Boston has had a legal responsibility to mark and measure its boundaries every few years. Despite advances in technology, the practice of “perambulating the bounds” means that someone has to go out and walk the town lines. This law is one of the oldest still on the books, but when was the last time Boston perambulated its bounds? Listen now!
Author: jake
Blooper: Oxford Comma
This is why the “Oxford” or “Harvard” comma is important in a list of three or more items…
Otherwise, you end up with this: Continue reading Blooper: Oxford Comma
Episode 43: The Case of the Somnambulist
When young Albert Tirrell killed his lover Maria Bickford on Beacon Hill, it sparked a scandal that rocked Victorian Boston in the 1840s. It was a tale of seduction, murder, and the unlikeliest of defenses. In the end, he would be found not guilty, in the first successful use of sleepwalking as a defense against murder.
We apologize for Nikki’s head cold, some rough cuts that resulted from editing out her sniffles, and the couple of sniffles that made it into the final cut.
Quock Walker blooper
In which co-host Jake just has to say the name “Quock Walker,” and completely loses it.
Episode 42: Total Eclipse of the Podcast
Your humble hosts are traveling this week, trying to see the first total eclipse of our lifetimes. While we’re gone, listen to the story of the 1806 eclipse, the first total eclipse seen in Boston after European colonization.
Episode 41: Canoes and Canoodling on the Charles River
During a late nineteenth century canoe craze, recreational canoeing became Boston’s hottest leisure time activity. Young lovers took advantage of the privacy and intimacy of a canoe to engage in a little bit of illicit romance, leading a humorless state police agency to ban kissing in canoes on the Charles River.
Continue reading Episode 41: Canoes and Canoodling on the Charles River
Episode 40: Banned in Boston
Despite our liberal reputation today, for years Boston was a bastion of official censorship. Authors and playwrights whose works were considered obscene had to create a watered-down “Boston version.” The Watch and Ward Society decided what art, theater, and literature was permissible, and what would be Banned in Boston!
Blooper: Live Rewrite
Sometimes, the scripts we write for ourselves don’t sound as good when spoken out loud as they did in our heads. When that happens, we have to rewrite the show in real time. This is what that sounds like.
Blooper: words are hard
In which I have to say the words tomaszewski and ostracization in the same sentence. (mildly NSFW)
Blooper: Math is hard
How do you know that the hosts of a history podcast were humanities majors, not hard science? Listen to us try to subtract 1942 from 1993.