The Backstory: Tiny kidnap victims survive the Titanic disaster

The 113th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic is just weeks away, but the disaster still resonates. Two of the 710 survivors were tiny little boys, traveling with their father under an assumed name...after he kidnapped them from his ex-wife. They were the only children to survive without a pa…

The Backstory: How come there were no women’s running shoes until 1978?

The Boston Marathon is next month, but women weren’t officially allowed to run in it until 1972. Officials said it would shock a woman’s body to run more than one and a half miles at a time! In 1966 one woman began to change all that by sneaking into the race wearing her brother’s shorts and a new …

The Backstory: Charles, Camilla, and Diana: Proving your virginity

What’s the real story behind the love affair and long delayed marriage between King Charles and Queen Camilla? Their love affair predated his marriage to Princess Diana by almost 20 years. But British rules about virginity caused one of the biggest scandals in history. This is how it all came down.

The Backstory: Yasuke: The only black samurai

There is so much fascination and mystery in the history of feudal Japan. The true story of the only black samurai in Japanese history will be brought to life in the coming week with the release of Assassin’s Creed: Shadows. But who was he, how did he become a samurai and what happened to him?

The Backstory: Losing your head over royalty

The Boleyn sisters were red-hot English socialites in the early 1500s. Their rise and fall, one as the mistress of King Henry the Eighth and one as his queen, was shocking even by the standards of the time. Why did a bishop call one of them the “most infamous whore of all”? How did they catch the k…

The Backstory: Graffiti was Pompeii’s Instagram

The destruction of Pompeii in 79 AD by the volcanic eruption of Mt. Vesuvius was complete. But the people who lived there left behind personal stories. Graffiti was their social media.

The Backstory: The guy that connected us all

Imagine a world with no internet. Head back 30 years or so and you’ll see how the world wide web changed everything about how we communicate, learn, bank, socialize, and entertain ourselves. And we have one kind of geeky guy to thank.

The Backstory: Kate Chase: From the belle of Washington to egg lady

Kate Chase was the 20-year-old queen bee of Washington society at the onset of the Civil War. She had the ear of Abe Lincoln and the hatred of his jealous wife Mary Todd Lincoln. Kate married rich but then fell for another powerful man…until they were caught. And that changed everything. 

The Backstory: Stealing Frank Sinatra Jr.

It’s hard to imagine how a couple of 21-year-old kids could think up a scheme to snatch the son of one of the most famous entertainers in the world, much less carry it out. This is the crazy story of the kidnapping of Frank Sinatra Jr.

The Backstory: Lucky Luciano: From mob boss to war hero

How does a guy go from running with gangs on the Lower East Side to reinventing the mafia to going to prison as a convicted felon…to finally working with the U.S. government to protect NYC’s waterfront during World War II?