Introducing a new feature

Truth be told, I haven’t come up with a story for today (slow news over the long weekend), and I didn’t want to let a day go by without saying something, so I’m drumming up an entry out of a little idea I had.

Specifically, I’ve become completely obsessed with a PBS show called History Detectives. I’ve watched a half dozen episodes by now, and I inevitably sobbed at least once per hour. It features 3 different segments about an artifact its owner would like investigated.

Sometimes the stories are deeply personal, like the pencil portrait of an American pilot who sat for it while imprisoned in Stalag 17 whose granddaughter wanted to find the artist, a fellow American POW. That’s the kind of stuff that leaves me in a hopeless puddle.

Other times it’s a neat artifact with less emotional impact, but holding just as much fascination, like the house built on an old trolley car bought for a hundred bucks in the 30’s when the rail system was dissolved.

Anyway, I’ve decided I’m going to blog a review the day after each episode. They air on Monday at 10:00 pm in my market, so that means expect your weekly Watching the History Detectives missives on Tuesdays.

I’m hoping it’ll encourage people who haven’t seen it yet to seek it out (you can watch episodes online), and most importantly, it’ll give me a chance to chatter about each amazing story with a target audience of people who might actually give a rat’s ass. :boogie:

6 thoughts on “Introducing a new feature

  1. I always have the same response from Who Do You Think You Are. Of course it amazes me that very intelligent people can know so little about their own grandparents.

    Zoe Wannamaker found her great grandmother’s grave in Chicago, put up by a charitable trust because the poor woman died only a fortnight after getting off the ship from Russia, via Belgium and Canada. I was sitting in the tv room saying “come on Zoe, find it, find it, find it… OHHHHH THAT’S IT!!!” Then I dissolved in tears.

    And another thing she didn’t know. Her father’s FBI records, albeit with censorship, were amazing historical and cultural documents.

  2. Welp, that sounds pretty durn cool to me. I’ll check it out after work for sure. I don’t watch television very much, so haven’t seen/heard of it, but if the show is available online then I’m on it!

    Thanks for the heads up. :hattip:

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.