This episode looks at one of the strangest episodes in the whole history of the Crusades when, in 1212, groups of children in France and Germany followed child preachers on a wildly unrealistic expedition to liberate Jerusalem. It provides a fascinating insight into the medieval mind, dominated by a belief in miracles and a yearning to seek a better life.
Please take a look at my website nickholmesauthor.com where you can download a free copy of The Byzantine World War, my book that describes the origins of the First Crusade.
One of Google’s long points of pride was its open, collaborative, and transparent company culture. But many Googlers feel like that's slipping away. Over our next two episodes, we’ll tell the story of a breakdown of trust inside Google — between management and employees. Starting with a covert contract Google made with the Department of Defense.
How did the Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade rule their new city of Constantinople and their lands in Greece? And how did the break-away Byzantine states oppose them? Find out in this episode.
Please take a look at my website nickholmesauthor.com where you can download a free copy of The Byzantine World War, my book that describes the origins of the First Crusade.
In 1988, a high school football team in Odessa, Texas, was so good that it became the inspiration for a book, movie and, eventually, the television series “Friday Night Lights.” And in the decades since, as West Texas has weathered the unsettling undulations of the oil industry, football has remained steady.
So after the pandemic hit, the town did what it could to make sure the season wasn’t disrupted. And at Odessa High School, where the football team struggles to compete against local rivals, the members of their award winning marching band were relieved they could keep playing.
In Part 2 of Odessa, we follow what happened when the season opened — and how the school weighed the decision to start against the possible risks to students’ physical and mental health.
With flood risk increasing and flood insurance rates likely following suit, it seems like there's got to be a better way to tackle the challenge.
For example: could we make our homes float when the water comes?
This week we talk to an architect who has devoted her professional life to that question, and we visit a Louisiana community where some people have decided that it makes more sense to temporarily float a house than to elevate it on stilts.
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Since they were Stanford grad students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin have had big ideas for technologies that could change the world. Only now, they have Google's nearly limitless resources to turn those ideas into reality. Some of Google's projects seem like a vision from the future. Others have crashed and burned. This is the story of two moonshots, and the world we might live in someday.
The Fourth Crusade was initiated as a plan to attack Egypt. But with the Crusaders short of money, and the emergence of a Byzantine pretender, claiming that he would help the Crusaders if they helped him, things started to develop somewhat differently. With the scheming Venetians in the background, the Crusaders looked east not to the Holy Land but to the glittering city of Constantinople.
Please take a look at my website nickholmesauthor.com where you can download a free copy of The Byzantine World War, my book that describes the origins of the First Crusade.
When Google bought YouTube, it went from being a company that helps users search the Internet, to a company that shapes the Internet itself. With 2 billion users, YouTube generates its own gravitational pull on society and culture worldwide. And as an open platform that allows anyone to upload videos, it's a force that even Google can't quite control.
Internet memes may have invaded our brains but they brought back the Aviation too.
It was the early 2000s and cocktail bars were taking off along with a crazy little idea called the internet. People from all over the world were making funny gifs, pictures and sayings while in the east village Sasha Petraske opened a tiny little bar with no sign called Milk & Honey. As one grew it fed off the other one to spread ideas, methods, fads, crazes and all sorts of notions until the cocktail bar as we know it today took shape. Special guests this week are Tom Richter of Tomr’s Tonic, Greg Boehm of Cocktail Kingdom and Eileen Fisher of Hotaling & Co.
Please SUBSCRIBE and RATE the show if you can. Join us every two weeks as we talk about history's favorite drinks and how what we drink shapes history. To see what's coming next follow Greg on instagram @100ProofGreg. #drinkinghistory
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The First Crusade had saved Byzantium. Now the Fourth Crusade would be directed against it. How and why did this happen? Find out in this episode.
Please take a look at my website nickholmesauthor.com where you can download a free copy of The Byzantine World War, my book that describes the origins of the First Crusade.