Episodes

  • 1959: The Dalai Lama Escapes
    Mar 16 2020
    The 23-year-old religious and spiritual leader of Tibet gets an invitation from the occupying Chinese to come to a dance performance. Without bodyguards. Sensing a trap, he flees on foot over the Himalayas to India, where he remains in exile. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    6 mins
  • 1922: Fatty Arbuckle's Third Trial
    Mar 13 2020
    He's a giant of silent comedies, in more ways than one. Hollywood's first million-dollar star is a baby-faced man-mountain with the grace of a dancer. But a sensational rape and manslaughter case has derailed his life and career. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    8 mins
  • 1918: The Flu Pandemic
    Mar 11 2020
    A century before the COVID-19 coronavirus, the United States, like all combatants in the Great War, wants to keep the exploding flu crisis quiet to protect morale and prevent the enemy from seeing weakness. Sound familiar? | (Correction: An earlier version of this episode contained an error. Some 675,000 AIDS deaths occurred in the United States.) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    7 mins
  • 1964: The Palace Hotel Protest Leader
    Mar 9 2020
    As an 18-year-old, Tracy Sims was the leader of civil rights protests that forced San Francisco hotels to end hiring discrimination. Now Tamam Tracy Moncur, the retired schoolteacher remembers a time when "the whole country was on fire for civil rights." | See also: 1964: Civil Rights at the Palace Hotel Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    18 mins
  • 1981: Walter Cronkite Signs Off
    Mar 6 2020
    "That's the way it is," says the Most Trusted Man in America — for the last time, as he retires from anchoring the CBS Evening News. It's like a presidential changeover. | Get unlimited Chronicle access. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    8 mins
  • 1946: Churchill's Iron Curtain Speech
    Mar 4 2020
    In a college gym in small-town Missouri, former Prime Minister Winston Churchill tries to shake Americans out of their postwar bliss by saying their old ally "Uncle Joe" Stalin has dropped an "Iron Curtain" across Europe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    6 mins
  • 1991: The Rodney King Beating
    Mar 2 2020
    When a commotion outside his apartment woke George Holliday up at 1 a.m., the plumber grabbed his new camcorder and went out to his balcony. He saw a police beating, and within a few days, everyone would see it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    7 mins
  • 1991: Murder in Porn's First Family
    Feb 28 2020
    The Mitchell Brothers, Jim and "Party Artie," revolutionized the adult entertainment business, first with their O'Farrell Theatre in San Francisco, then with movies like "Behind the Green Door." They were close. Then Jim killed Artie. Why?  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    7 mins