In 1900, Greek sponge divers sheltering from a storm off the small island of Antikythera found the wreck of an ancient ship. Among the statues and treasures they brought up was a lump of corroded bronze that nobody paid much attention to. Inside it were gears.

More than two thousand years old, the Antikythera mechanism is a hand-cranked device that tracked the sun and moon, predicted eclipses, and even counted down to the Olympic Games. Nothing like it appears again for well over a thousand years. This episode follows its discovery, the century of detective work it took to read it, and what it tells us about ancient Greek science. We also sort the record from the legend, including what "ancient computer" really means and the wilder theories about who made it.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.

In January 1922, at Toronto General Hospital, a 14-year-old boy named Leonard Thompson was dying of diabetes. At the time, a diagnosis meant a starvation diet and, usually, death within months. Then doctors gave him an injection of a new extract made in a University of Toronto laboratory.

This episode follows the unlikely team behind it: Frederick Banting, a young surgeon with an idea, the student Charles Best, the professor J.J.R. Macleod, and the chemist James Collip, who made the extract pure enough to use. It follows the breakthrough, the bitter fights over credit, and the Nobel Prize that followed. We also sort the record from the legend, including the story of the patent sold for a single dollar.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.

In June 1813, during the War of 1812, Laura Secord learned that American troops were planning a surprise attack on a British outpost in the Niagara region. Her husband was still recovering from wounds, so she went herself, walking some 30 kilometres through woods, swamps and enemy territory to warn Lieutenant James FitzGibbon.

Days later, at the Battle of Beaver Dams, Indigenous warriors ambushed the American column, and the Americans surrendered. This episode follows Laura's walk, the battle, and the decades she waited to be recognised. We also sort the record from the legend, including the famous cow she supposedly brought along as cover, and how her name ended up on a box of chocolates.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.

On a cold, windy morning in December 1903, on the sand dunes near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville Wright lay flat on the wing of a homemade machine and flew for twelve seconds. It was the first powered, controlled flight of an aeroplane, and only a handful of people saw it.

Wilbur and Orville Wright were bicycle makers from Dayton, Ohio, with no university degrees and no government money. This episode follows how they solved the problem of flight with kites, gliders and a wind tunnel of their own, what happened on that windy beach, and why much of the world took years to believe them. We also sort the record from the legend, including the long feud that kept their aeroplane out of America's national museum.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.

In the hot summer of 1858, the River Thames was an open sewer, and London could no longer ignore the smell. Inside the new Houses of Parliament, members tried to keep working behind curtains soaked in chemicals, and some fled the building altogether.

Most people believed bad air itself spread disease. They were wrong about why, but the stench finally pushed Parliament to act. This episode follows the summer of the Great Stink and the engineer Joseph Bazalgette, whose vast network of sewers still serves the city today. We also sort the record from the legend, including what the smell did and did not do to Londoners' health.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.

On a Monday morning in August 1911, the Mona Lisa vanished from the Louvre. Nobody noticed for more than a day. The museum closed, the police questioned hundreds of people, the poet Guillaume Apollinaire was arrested, and even Pablo Picasso was brought in for questioning.

The thief was Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian handyman who had once worked at the museum. He walked out with the painting under his smock and kept it in his Paris room for more than two years. This episode follows the theft, the long search, and the clumsy sale attempt in Florence that finally gave him away. We also sort the record from the legend, including the tale of a mastermind who sold forged copies to collectors, and how the theft turned a well-known painting into the most famous one on Earth.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.

In 1914, Ernest Shackleton sailed south to cross Antarctica on foot. He never set foot on the continent. His ship, Endurance, was trapped in the ice of the Weddell Sea, crushed, and sank, leaving 28 men stranded on drifting ice with three small boats.

This episode follows what came next: months camped on the ice, a desperate boat journey to Elephant Island, and an open-boat crossing of some 1,300 kilometres of the Southern Ocean to reach help on South Georgia. Every member of the ship's crew survived. We also sort the record from the legend, including the famous "men wanted" newspaper advert that probably never ran.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.

On January 15, 1919, a giant storage tank in Boston's North End split open and released more than two million gallons of molasses into the streets. A wave of syrup swept through the neighbourhood, flattening buildings, overturning wagons and trapping people and horses. Twenty-one people were killed and around 150 injured.

The tank had leaked from the day it was filled. This episode follows the people who lived beside it, the company that built it in a hurry, and the long court case that changed how engineers in America prove their work is safe. We also sort the record from the legend, including the old story that the North End still smells of molasses on a hot day.

Created with the assistance of AI, using an AI model of the host's voice, and checked against the historical record.