353: Miracle with Lou Vairo
BASED ON A TRUE STORY (BOATS EP. 353) — During the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York, the United States sent shockwaves around the world as they upset the four-time defending gold medalist Soviet Union team in a game that would go on to be called the “Miracle on Ice.” That story is […]
352: This Week: Napoleon, Thirteen Days, The Patriot, The Last Duel
BOATS THIS WEEK (OCT 14-20, 2024) — This Wednesday is the anniversary of Marie Antoinette’s execution in 1793 that we saw inn the opening sequence of Ridley Scott’s Napoleon (2023). After that, we’ll travel exactly 169 years from 1793 to 1962, because Wednesday is also depicted in Thirteen Days (2000) as it’s showing the start […]
351: This Week: Che!, Eight Men Out, 1492, Captain Phillips
BOATS THIS WEEK (OCT 7-13, 2024) — 57 years ago tomorrow, Che Guevara was captured in Bolivia. Then, two years later, Omar Sharif portrayed him in the movie version of Che’s story that we’ll compare to the true story of this week’s event. Then, we’ll shift to Eight Men Out because as baseball season comes […]
350: This Week: Alexander, 61*, Black Hawk Down, The Social Network
BOATS THIS WEEK (SEP 30-OCT 6, 2024) — Thousands of years ago this week, Alexander the Great fought his final decisive battle against Darius III so we’ll start our journey by comparing the true story of Gaugamela with the battle in 2004’s Colin Farrell movie. Then we’ll hop onto the baseball field because tomorrow, October […]
348: This Week: Frida, Chaplin, Tolkien, Goodfellas
BOATS THIS WEEK (SEP 16-22, 2024) — Tuesday is the 99th anniversary of the bus accident that changed Frido Kahlo’s life, and we’ll learn more about the way the movie Frida shows it happening. After that we’ll jump to the movie with Robert Downey Jr. as Charlie Chaplin for his being kicked out of the […]
343: This Week: Rome, Geronimo: An American Legend, The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid
BOATS THIS WEEK (SEPT 2-8, 2024) — On this day almost two thousand years ago, the Battle of Actium decided power in Rome. Not coincidentally, we’ll learn about that today from a TV show called Rome. The second event from this week in history according to the movies comes from the 1993 film called Geronimo: […]
341: This Week: The Crucible, Sweet Dreams, Pompeii
BOATS THIS WEEK (AUG 19-25,2024) — Historical events from the movies start with The Crucible and how it depicts the Salem witch trials from this week in 1692. Then, we’ll learn a bit about Patsy Cline’s hit song “Crazy” because it was this week in 1961 that she started recording it in the studio, and […]
338: This Week: Braveheart, Hatfields & McCoys, The Walk, Frost/Nixon
BOATS THIS WEEK (AUG 5-11,2024) — This week’s events from historical movies starts with Monday’s 719th anniversary (August 5th, 1305) of William Wallace’s (Mel Gibson) capture shown in the movie ‘Braveheart.’ In the History Channel’s dramatic miniseries “Hatfields & McCoys”, we’ll see how it portrays the feud between their two families turning to bloodshed for […]
337: This Week: USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage, Rush, Patton
BOATS THIS WEEK (JUL 29-AUG 4,2024) — There were two major disaster this week in history. The first we’ll learn about is an event many consider the worst shark attack in history, which began on July 30th, 1945, and is shown in the movie USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage. Our next historical disaster marks its […]
335: Vice with William Cooper
Today we’ll delve into Dick Cheney’s political rise in the Nixon and Ford administrations and his role in post-9/11 policies as they were shown in the 2018 political satire comedy-drama “Vice” from director Adam McKay. William’s Historical Grade: C What’s your historical grade? Learn about the true story Get William’s book Listen to the audio […]
334: This Week: Dahmer, First Man, At Eternity’s Gate
BOATS THIS WEEK (JULY 22-28,2024) — Events from this week in history include Jeffrey Dahmer’s confession on July 22nd, 1991. We’ll learn how well Netflix’s 2022 smash hit series Monster shows that happening. This week also marks the end of the Apollo 11 mission on July 24th, 1969, but we’ll have a special minisode coming […]