Flashback: History's Unintended Consequences

Our first season connects the dots on 10 incredible tales of unintended consequences that changed history, from Henry Ford’s role in the Oklahoma City bombing to the home appliance that changed the landscape of American politics.

Why the story of human flight begins on a frozen pond in Dayton, Ohio…and why there was only one Wright Brother with the Right Stuff.

Flashback listeners send us examples of the unexpected results of some historical events -- from two World Wars to an unfortunate landscaping trend.

When a newspaper mistakenly proclaimed Alfred Nobel dead in 1888, the inventor of dynamite set out to reinvent his legacy.

If not for the fateful inaction of a single Washington, DC police officer, Watergate might never have happened.

Ludwig Bemelmans rode his bike down the wrong side of the road and into literary history when he dreamed up the beloved children’s book Madeline.

The tragic death of Cleveland Indians shortstop Ray Chapman in 1920 would help shape the future of baseball.

In 1955, actress Grace Kelly journeyed to the Cannes Film Festival, setting in action a chain of events that would find her trading her Hollywood throne for a real one.

After a 23-year-old Elvis Presley submitted to an Army barber in March 1958, rock and roll, and American life, were never quite the same.

The worst incident of election violence in American history happened a century ago on Election Day, 1920 in the town of Ocoee, Florida. The victims were hundreds of Black residents. The perpetrators were their white neighbors. And the reason was that Black citizens had gone to the polls and tried to vote.

Before the presidential election of 1920, the Klan marched through Florida to warn Black citizens not to vote. Newspapers across the state issued the same warning. When a prominent Black resident, Mose Norman, tried to cast his vote in the town of Ocoee, a mob of white vigilantes descended on the community. They exacted a terrible vengeance, starting with the family of a local Black leader, July Perry. Photo credit: Orange County Regional History Center

After the horrific violence of Election Day, 1920, in Ocoee, Florida, hundreds of Black families fled the town, never to return. White farmers took ownership of their lands. And the crimes of the mobs of white vigilantes - lynching, murders, arson, theft - were covered up for almost a century. Until now.