POLL: Pick the Next Extra History Series! "Weird and Wonderous"

Wait, I hear you ask, isn't it fairly late in February for a poll? And you are correct! We noticed that the polls and topic suggestions were beginning to outpace the production schedule, so this poll will run through February AND March. More time for you to agonize over these four very good topics. 

Olympics!: Passing the Torch

The Olympiad. Pride of the world. A circle of champions. And... actually a hot mess. In this series we'll look at the ancient Olympics—what they meant to Greece, their sacred nature, and the ideals of national competition without (too much) death. After all, there's always the wrestler who pulled his opponent's intestines out Mortal Kombat-style, or the guy who won even though he was dead. From there we'll jump to the Olympic revival in the modern period, and all the strange growing pains that entailed. This will include a whole episode on the 1904 Marathon in St. Louis, where only 14 out of 32 entrants finished the race, there were multiple near-fatalities, and entrants had to contend with dehydration, passing cars, doses of strychnine, packs of feral dogs, and one runner secretly completing part of the race in a car.

The Great Emu War

It's 1932, and thousands of demobilized Australian WWI soldiers have moved onto hardscrabble farmland in Western Australia. They're scratching a living from the soil, an act made harder by the Depression—AND THEN THE EMUS COME. Seriously. Twenty thousand native emu birds, each six feet tall, weighing over 100 pounds and able to run 30 miles an hour. They break fences and eat crops... and the farmers call in the Australian military. Enter Major Meredith of the Royal Australian Artillery, who brings two Lewis guns designed for butchering soldiers in the trenches. Things do not go well for him. Amid a media frenzy, arguments in congress, and a frankly embarrassing inability to kill emus, the cull becomes a political nightmare that lives in infamy to this day.

Gregor MacGregor: The Greatest Con

Would you like to buy some government bonds from the nation of Poyais? Don't worry if you've never heard of it. It's new. And in Central America. And led by General Gregor MacGregor, a highly prestigious veteran of the Peninsular War and Venezuelan War of Independence. For his heroism, he claims, a Honduran king has made him the leader of a new nation—and it's looking for immigrants. Those that return from the "colony," however, tell a different story. One of a harsh and undeveloped land where half the new "settlers" died. (Not because of their beloved General MacGregor, though—he is faultless.) Watch as one of the most brazen confidence tricks in history unfolds, and ask yourself... how much bigger can this go?

Grigori Rasputin: The Siberian Enigma

You've heard the story of Rasputin, or at least, you think you have. Because when you start to dig into his life, you start to find out that what we know about him often comes from rumor and attempts at character assassination. When we dive into his life, we find something unexpected: a man who's part of a larger spiritual movement of people turning away from traditional Christianity toward alternatives such as Spiritualism and the occult. Likewise his murder—so often sensationalized—comes of more as a drunken botch job than any kind of supernatural resiliance. Yet at its heart, we still have an enigma. Who was Grigori Rasputin, really? What did be believe, and was he guilty of the many crimes his enemies accused him of?

What series would you like us to air on Extra History? Cast your vote(s) below and let us know!

Friendly reminder: You can vote for as many choices as you want! This style of voting helps us see what people are most interested in without having to make tough decisions between a couple of close favorites. The poll will end at 11:59 PM PT on Sunday, March 7th.

Current Schedule: Jewish Pirates --> Thirty Years War --> Vlad the Impaler --> Your Vote!