Mary Toft Giving Birth to Rabbits - She stuffed a rabbit WHERE? - Bad Ideas
Mary Toft was a British woman with the magical ability to give birth to rabbits. Or rather rabbit parts. And cat parts. And chunks of other...
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Bad Ideas Podcast
A podcast about the worst ideas in history. Albert Berg and Tony Southcotte take on some of the biggest historical flops, mistakes, and blunders. From Cop Rock to the Yugo.
Episodes
20 of 100 episodesPayday Loans - Predatory Loans Meant to Create a Cycle of Debt with 1000% interest - Bad Ideas
Payday loans are a loan you can get when you leverage your next paycheck for cash today. Usually there is a small fee but they can quicky tu...
The Great Salad Oil Swindle - Bad Ideas
Soy Bean oil doesn't SEEM like the kind of thing that could crash the entire American Economy, but in 1963 that's almost what happened. Tino...
The Fistula Fad - King Louis the XIV's Fistula Fashion - Bad Ideas Podcast
King Louis the 14th found himself in dire need of surgery to fix a fistula. A fistula is an alternative canal from the rectal cavity usually...
Ouya: What Happened to the Kickstarter Console?
The Ouya was one of the biggest Kickstarter success stories, so what happened? This one actually shipped and everything! Julie Urhman Ouya's...
The Story Behind The Charge of the Light Brigade - Bad Ideas
There's a store behind the poem, The Charge of the Light Brigade, a story you may not have heard before. The charge itself was a very small...
Martensville Satanic Panic - When Satan Comes to Town - Bad Ideas
Martensville is a small Canadian town with a huge problem. The Satanic Panic of the 90s is hitting them in full force and making everyone co...
Spanish Flu and Morale Laws - How to Hide a Deadly Pandemic - Spanish Flu vs Coronavirus
While we are currently dealing with Coronavirus, we take a deep look into the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918. Most specifically we look at how...
Aqua Dots: The Toy that was Recalled for Containing a Date Rape Drug - Bad Ideas Minisode
Aqua Dots (also known as Bindeez) was a toy bead that was accidentally coated with a chemical that synthesizes into something called GHB, a...
WeWork Collapse - How Andy Neumann Destroyed WeWork - Bad Ideas
Why did WeWork collapse? Well Andy Neumann's company would end up crashing and giving him the biggest golden parachute of all time. WeWork b...
"Mad" Mike Hughes: The Life and Death of the Flat Earth Rocket Man
"Mad" Mike Hughes was a stunt man who built a rocket out of scraps and tried to launch himself as high and fast as possible. Was he really t...
Xu Xiaodong Exposes Fake Martial Arts and Loses Everything - Bad Ideas
Xu Xiaodong is a Chinese Mixed Martial Artist who has made it his goal in life to expose fake martial arts and kung fu practitioners. Especi...
Understanding the Sand Creek Massacre | Bad Ideas
The Sand Creek Massacre was an atrocity, an attack on Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians who had surrendered to the United States military in a de...
The AAirpass - American Airlines Offered a Lifetime of First Class Tickets and it Backfired
The AAirpass was a lifetime pass that allowed its members to fly free for the rest of their lives. While this was amazing for them, it would...
Thomas Midgely Jr. and the Deadly Invention of Leaded Gas - Bad Ideas
Leaded Gasoline was developed by GM to solve the problem of engine knock in the early 20th century. There were other ways to solve engine kn...
Albania's Ponzi Rebellion and Civil War - When Ponzi Schemes Destroy an Economy
Tony takes a deeper look at the 1997 Albanian Civil War that started because a huge swath of their entire GDP was caught up in ponzi schemes...
How Hype Ruined the Segway - Bad Ideas
The Segway was a revolutionary invention, and on top of that it was fun to ride. So why did it become the punchline of every joke about mall...
Fordlandia - Ford's Failed Company Town in Brazil - Bad Ideas Podcast
Fordlandia was an experiment from Henry Ford to take away the British monopoly on rubber. He decided to set up an entire city in the depths...
William Walker's One Man Invasion of Nicaragua | Bad Ideas
In his time William Walker was known as the Grey Eyed Man of Destiny, probably because the Grey Eyed Man of SUPER Racism wasn't as catchy. H...
The Vasa - Sweden's Massive Gunboat, and Even Bigger Mistake
The Vasa was a massive 64 gun 200 foot long ship in the 1600s. The massively expensive project was supposed to propel Sweden into the future...