Copyright © 2026 OyList. All Rights Reserved.
Share
Items16
1
You're Dead to Me
Start with The Egyptian Pyramids (about 53 minutes). Greg Jenner, Egyptologist Sarah Parcak, and comedian Maria Shehata spend the full episode on what it took to build them and what that work tells us about the people who did it. The historian and comedian have different jobs here, so you can enjoy the joke and hear the evidence before the show moves on.
More about You're Dead to Me2
The Dollop
Give The Rube about an hour. Dave Anthony tells Gareth Reynolds the story of baseball pitcher Rube Waddell without warning him what the episode is about. Reynolds works with whatever detail has just arrived, so the punch lines can turn a brief detour into a whole scene. You can follow the oddball career without keeping a scorecard.
More about The Dollop3
Oh What A Time...
Surgery & Monkeys Eating Musical Instruments (Part 1) takes about 39 minutes and tells you a lot about how Elis James, Tom Craine, and Chris Scull work. They can make a wide subject feel approachable by finding the one detail you would never have thought to ask about. Try it when you like the sound of a historical topic being passed around a table.
More about Oh What A Time...4
Do Go On
Nancy Wake - Do Go On Mini runs about 28 minutes and offers a quick way into the Melbourne trio's report-to-the-class format. The other hosts can interrupt with the question you were about to ask, or take a remark somewhere the prepared report never expected. The short version gives the story of the wartime resistance figure enough room to hold its own.
More about Do Go On5
Half-Arsed History
You can fit The Dancing Plague of 1518, one of Riley Knight's shorter Quarter-Arsed History episodes, into about 17 minutes. The absurdity of the image is enough to draw you in, but the Strasbourg outbreak does not come with a tidy explanation. Try this if you like one host, a quick setup, and room for a little uncertainty.
More about Half-Arsed History6
Ridiculous History
Try the roughly 36-minute edition of Napoleon Bonaparte Was Attacked by Bunnies (and Lost). Ben Bowlin and Noel Brown spend a whole conversation making sense of a punch line that seems to give itself away in the title. Pick this when you want an odd incident to carry an episode, with enough back-and-forth for the story to keep surprising you.
More about Ridiculous History7
Sawbones (podcast)
Start with The Poison Squad, about 36 minutes. Sydnee McElroy supplies the history of experiments on food preservatives, and Justin gives the baffled listener a voice when the story gets strange. Go here if you like jokes that come from understanding why somebody once thought a terrible idea was worth trying.
More about Sawbones (podcast)8
An Old Timey Podcast
The Great Emu War! takes about 83 minutes. Give Kristin and Norman Caruso that time if you enjoy a long retelling where a military campaign against birds can interrupt itself to consider what counted as a success. This is a better pick for a trip than a quick walk if you want to hear the whole thing in one sitting.
More about An Old Timey Podcast9
Shite Talk: An Irish History Podcast
Kevin Larney and Jason Brennan are a good choice if you like local history with digressions. Start with Tayto (This is an episode about crisps), which gives an Irish snack about 89 minutes. A joke can run off the main road and make its way back when you least expect it.
More about Shite Talk: An Irish History Podcast10
The Constant: A History of Getting Things Wrong
Pick The Foolkiller Pt 1: Tears Falling From the Sky, at about 46 minutes, for a mysterious submarine pulled out of the Chicago River. Mark Chrisler keeps the humor in the narration and leaves the clues room to accumulate. It starts a five-part story, so this is the choice when you want an oddity to turn into a real investigation.
More about The Constant: A History of Getting Things Wrong11
The Alarmist
Try The Great Boston Molasses Flood: Who Is to Blame? at about 64 minutes. Rebecca Delgado Smith and guest Maggie Marion take the assignment of blame as seriously as a comic premise can bear. The pleasure is hearing how a candidate for blame sounds plausible until the conversation finds a better one. The disaster itself is sobering.
More about The Alarmist12
The Rest Is History (podcast)
Food Glorious Food, about 46 minutes, brings author Pen Vogler in to talk with Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook about British food. Try it for the kind of historical conversation in which a pig stitched to a chicken sounds ridiculous, then becomes a clue to what people valued at the table. You get the joke and enough context to understand its place.
More about The Rest Is History (podcast)13
Our Fake History
Start with Was There a Real King Arthur? (Part I), about 64 minutes. Sebastian Major lets the familiar legend draw you in before he starts asking what its most famous details tell you about the people who added them. Try it if you like dry humor and want to see the evidence behind the correction. There are two more chapters if you get hooked.
More about Our Fake History14
The Fantastic History of Food
Put on The German Coconut Cult for a roughly 16-minute story about August Engelhardt and his island experiment. Nick Charlie Key has time for the strange premise and the consequences before the novelty wears off. You can pick it when you want a tightly narrated story with very little time between the opening and the first thing you want to tell someone else.
More about The Fantastic History of Food15
Behind the Bastards
The Terrible Secret of Sea Monkeys is a live episode that takes roughly 110 minutes. Robert Evans uses the novelty pets as a way into a much darker story. Try it if you like black comedy and a live audience reacting as the material moves away from the reassuring picture on the packet.
More about Behind the Bastards16
The Year Is
The 1981 episode with Phil Ellis spends about an hour jumping from the first London Marathon to a supposed lost Mozart symphony and the comedian's own birth. Try it for the panel-show rhythm and the freedom to treat a calendar year as a good excuse to put unrelated things side by side.
More about The Year Is
