Loading descriptions...
Monday, August 11, 9-10 pm ET
An intact artillery shell that may have been part of an attack on the U.S. in WWI; etched glass that may depict the cruiser commanded by Commodore George Dewey; and a house that may have guarded against attacks during the French and Indian Wars.
Black Tom Shell - A woman in Whitehouse Station, New Jersey, has an
explosive artifact in her possession: a large, intact artillery
shell, along with a note in her mother's handwriting that reads
"Black Tom Explosion of 1914." The contributor's mother's
record-keeping is off: It was not 1914, but July 30, 1916, when a
German spy ring carried out a well-planned set of synchronized
explosions on Black Tom Island in New York's harbor, using the
United States' own cache of munitions produced to aid Britain and
France in World War I. Two million pounds of exploding ammunition
rocked the country as far away as Philadelphia and blew the windows
out of nearly every high rise in lower Manhattan, injuring
hundreds. HISTORY DETECTIVES host Gwendolyn Wright travels to
Maryland and New Jersey to determine whether this shell was
involved in one of the earliest foreign terrorist attacks on
American soil
USS Olympia Glass - The door of a farmhouse in eastern
Nebraska has an etched glass window with a depiction of a ship
cruising through open waters, smoke pouring from its stacks. The
home's owner believes the ship is the USS Olympia , the
cruiser commanded by Commodore George Dewey when he defeated
Admiral Montojo's Spanish squadron at Manila Bay in 1898, beginning
the Spanish-American War. The farm's been in the family for more
than half a century, and a 1977 letter from the USS Olympia
Association states that etched glass windows may have adorned
Admiral Dewey's own stateroom. HISTORY DETECTIVES host Wes Cowan
travels to Fremont, Nebraska, and Philadelphia to find our whether
the unique window can serve as a portal into a turning point in
American foreign policy.
Front Street Blockhouse - When a couple in Schenectady, New York,
purchased their dream house in the town's historic district, they
believed their home was built for a middle-class family in the late
19th century, like all other homes in their neighborhood. But four
mysterious stone walls visible in the attic have led them to
believe otherwise. Did this house once guard against enemy attacks
during the tense years of the French and Indian Wars - nearly 300
years ago? HISTORY DETECTIVES host Elyse Luray travels to Upstate
New York to determine whether this unassuming structure may have
helped ensure the survival of the town of Schenectady, a 17th- and
18th-century vanguard Dutch outpost, as it fought France and her
Indian allies for control of the lucrative fur trade.