Subjects
154 subjects are ready to play. Every one is four suits of nine stories, and every story lists its sources.
Sports
Baseball
Thirty-six true stories from the ballpark: a catcher who spied on the atom bomb, a roof that killed the grass, and the mud on every ball.
Basketball
Thirty-six true stories from the court: a janitor's peach baskets, a game played behind locked doors, and a hundred points nobody filmed.
Billiards and Pool
Thirty-six true stories from the green cloth: a cue tip cut from a saddle, a break of 153, and the chalk that is not chalk.
Surfing and Skateboarding
Thirty-six true stories from surf and sidewalk: Mark Twain's wipeout, Norway's skateboard ban and the physicist behind the wetsuit.
Bowling
Thirty-six true stories from the lanes: Congressman Lincoln the awkward bowler, a pin too tough to sell, and a perfect series that never counted.
Boxing
Thirty-six true stories from the prize ring: rules named for the wrong man, a fight that ran 110 rounds, and gloves that began as swimwear.
Chess
Thirty-six true stories from the board: a champion who reshaped algebra, a priest who won by promoting to a rook, and a machine with a man inside.
College Football
Thirty-six true stories from the college game: a mascot named before the brand, a tie the paper called a win, and a Heisman used as a doorstop.
Cricket
Thirty-six true stories from cricket: turf carried between grounds, a ball bowled clean through the stumps, and a final settled on boundaries.
Cycling
A Tour invented to sell newspapers, a champion who never wore yellow, and a mile ridden behind a train: true stories of bikes and their riders.
Figure Skating
Thirty-six true stories from the rink: a gold medal won on shop-bought skates, a backflip banned for 48 years, and the bench called the kiss and cry.
Fishing
Thirty-six true stories from the water: a hook carved 23,000 years ago, a record marlin the sharks ruined, and a reel built by a bomb company.
Football
Thirty-six true stories: a league founded in a car showroom, a championship played on an 80-yard indoor field, and a team owned by its own fans.
Formula One
Grand Prix racing since 1950: a first race on a wartime airfield, a fan car that was never banned, and a wall that collects champions.
Golf
Thirty-six true stories from the links: a hole sized by a blacksmith's cutter, a champion changing in a parked Daimler, and a six-iron on the Moon.
Hockey
Thirty-six true stories from the rink: a Stanley Cup that began as a flower bowl, a coach in goal at 44, and a pioneer with one good eye.
Horse Racing
Thirty-six true stories from Thoroughbred racing: a colt born during an eclipse, a boxer who started Saratoga, and a racetrack under a reservoir.
Lacrosse
True stories of lacrosse: a medicine game, a fort taken during a match, a stolen gold trophy and a team that travels on its own passports.
Martial Arts
True stories from the dojo and beyond: a judo school born in a temple, Sherlock Holmes's misspelled fighting style, and a hit song cut as a B-side.
Rodeo
Thirty-six true stories from the arena: the bell that is not for noise, the hat that was cut up and sold, and the horse nobody could ride.
Rugby
Thirty-six true stories from rugby union and league: a tournament to save a club, a cup melted down from rupees, and a Test on a polo field.
Sailing and Rowing
Thirty-six true stories from the water: a race for a comic actor's coat, a keel hidden under skirts, and a sculler who stopped for ducks.
Skiing and Snowboarding
True stories from the snow: ancient skis, unlikely champions, famous mountains and the inventions that made skiing and snowboarding.
Soccer
The world's game, from an 1863 London tavern to the World Cup: legends, famous clubs and stadiums, great tournaments and the rules' odd history.
Stock Car Racing
Thirty-six true stories from stock car racing: a minnow pond that bent a speedway, a monkey in the passenger seat, and a win with no trophy.
Summer Olympics
Thirty-six true stories from the Summer Games: a marathon finished 54 years late, and two vaulters who cut their medals in half to share them.
Swimming and Diving
True stories from pool and sea: an Olympic course marked with pumpkins, and a champion who borrowed his brother's birthplace.
Tennis
Thirty-six true stories from the lawn: a 15-year-old champion, a major named for a fighter pilot, and a tiebreak announced by red flags.
Track and Field
Thirty-six true stories from the track: hurdles made of telephone poles, a final run alone, and a coach who ruined his waffle iron.
Volleyball
Thirty-six true stories from the net: a game for tired businessmen, a ball made to order, and a beach set that ran to 42-40.
Winter Olympics
A century on snow and ice: a flame lit in a fireplace, a bolt lent to a rival, and a medal that arrived fifty years late.
Women in Sports
A golf champion who never knew it, a scoreboard that could not show a 10, and a 240-mile race won outright: true stories of women in sports.
Wrestling
Thirty-six true stories from the mat and the ring: an 11-hour Olympic match, a luchador buried in his mask, and a prize bull.
History
African Kingdoms
Kush, Aksum, Mali, Great Zimbabwe and Benin: the gold and salt that paid for them, the rulers who spent it, and the stories Europe got wrong.
Age of Exploration
Ocean voyages from the 1400s to the 1600s: the instruments, the ships, the people who sailed and the people already there.
American Revolution
From the Stamp Act to the Constitution: the spies, engineers and penmen behind the famous names, and the myths the country kept anyway.
Ancient China
Oracle bones sold as medicine, a sealed tomb still leaking mercury, and the mortar with rice in it: imperial China from the sources up.
Ancient Egypt
Pharaohs, pyramids, bread and beer, and the archaeology behind them, with the famous stories checked against what the sources actually say.
Ancient Greece
From the Minoan palaces to Alexander: the votes, the ships, the statues and the arguments, told from the sources that survive.
Ancient India
Brick sewers, a dot that became zero, a king who carved his own regret in stone, and a script nobody can read.
Ancient Mesopotamia
Sumer, Akkad, Babylon and Assyria: the cities between the rivers, the clay they wrote on, and the diggers who learned to read it again.
Aztec, Maya and Inca
Cities on lakes and mountaintops, kings and queens, a shell that meant zero, and a famous doomsday that was only a page turning.
Kings and Queens of England
Nine centuries of English and British monarchs: the palaces they built, the jewels they remade, and the coronations that did not go to plan.
Civil Rights Movement
The people, protests, places and rulings that brought down legal segregation in America, including the stories the famous versions leave out.
The Cold War
The Cold War in true stories: the leaders, the crises, the spies and secrets, and the culture that grew up in the shadow of the bomb.
Samurai Japan
Shoguns, castles and tea rooms across nine centuries, including the famous samurai code that turns out to be a book written in English.
French Revolution and Napoleon
The Revolution and the empire that followed: seven prisoners in the Bastille, a queen who never said it, and a short emperor who was not short.
Industrial Revolution
Steam, cotton and iron from 1760 to 1900: the barber who became a cotton king, a telegraph with no letter Q, and the day work met the clock.
Islamic Golden Age
A cloud in Andromeda written down in 964, a famous book its author never wrote, and a mosque raised on secondhand Roman columns.
Medieval Europe
Castles that fell, knights smaller than the movies allow, monks who ran an ironworks, and the medieval myths worth correcting.
Pirates
Real pirates, real ships, and the famous details that turn out to be invented, from a smoking beard to the flag nobody flew until the end.
Polar Exploration
True stories from both ends of the Earth: a stowaway in a locker, a fruitcake that lasted a century, and a North Pole claim nobody has proved.
The Renaissance
Europe reinvents itself: painters who missed deadlines, printers who cut corners, bankers who paid for it, and a rhinoceros nobody had seen.
The Roaring Twenties
America in the 1920s in true stories: jazz and flappers, speakeasies and radio, the Harlem Renaissance, new inventions and the crash of 1929.
Roman History
Rome from the she-wolf to the last emperor: roads and water, games and street food, and a few famous stories that turn out to be wrong.
The Space Race
Sputnik to Apollo-Soyuz in true stories: the cosmonauts and astronauts, the spacecraft, the missions and the engineers who made them fly.
U.S. Civil War
Four years that decided whether the United States would keep slavery: the people, the battles, the machines and the home front.
U.S. Presidents
The patent Lincoln held, the pony in the White House elevator, the desk built from a lost Arctic ship, and the holiday that does not legally exist.
Vikings
Longships and wool sails, runes and riddles, filed teeth, and a silver hoard found after the camera crew went home.
The Old West
Real marshals and outlaws, trails and boomtowns, the gear that made the work possible, and the Hollywood West corrected.
Women Who Changed History
Pharaohs and physicists, poets and pilots: women who changed history, and the surprising details most accounts leave out.
World War I
The First World War in true stories: the people, the battles, the machines that were new, and the world that waited at home.
World War II
World War II in true stories: the people, the battles, the codebreakers and machines, and life on the home front.
Cars and Machines
Aviation
From a sheep in a balloon basket to a jetliner rolling over a boat race: the people, machines and record flights that got us off the ground.
Cars of the 1900s
Steam, electric or gasoline? In the brass era nobody agreed, and motoring was a dusty, noisy argument on wheels.
Cars of the 1910s
Moving assembly lines, electric starters, the first Indy 500s and trucks at war: true stories from motoring in the 1910s.
Cars of the 1920s
Closed cars, credit buying, brake wars and a new 24-hour race: the decade that made the automobile part of everyday life.
Cars of the 1930s
Streamliners, sixteen-cylinder engines and a hot dog on wheels: how the automobile grew up while the Depression squeezed everyone building one.
Cars of the 1940s
Jeeps, a wartime halt and the first all-new postwar designs: the decade the automobile went to war and came home changed.
Cars of the 1950s
Tailfins and V8s, the Corvette and the Interstates, bubble cars and the first Toyotas in America: the decade cars grew big and small at once.
Cars of the 1960s
Mustangs and muscle cars, turbine cars and dune buggies, Le Mans glory and a new federal safety law: the 1960s on four wheels.
Cars of the 1970s
Gas lines and the 55 limit, catalytic converters and Japanese imports, the Countach and the Pacer: the 1970s on four wheels.
Cars of the 1980s
Minivans and supercars, turbos and touchscreens, early car navigators and a van that drove itself: the 1980s on four wheels.
Cars of the 1990s
Supercars and SUVs, the first hybrids, dual airbags and a car that broke the sound barrier: the 1990s on four wheels.
Cars of the 2000s
Hybrids went mainstream, robots raced the desert and Detroit nearly went broke: the 2000s on four wheels.
Great Ships
Clippers, liners, warships and wrecks: thirty-six true stories from the age of sail to the day a lost ship was found three miles down.
Harley-Davidson Motorcycles
Engines named by their riders, a company bought back by its own managers, world titles nobody expects, and the badge whose designer is unknown.
Motorcycles
From a wooden test bed with outrigger wheels to a hundred million Super Cubs: the makers, machines, riders and races that built the motorcycle.
Railroads
Steam engines, golden spikes and the workers who kept the trains moving: true stories from two centuries of railroad history.
Trucks and Tractors
From a brick-factory test drive in 1896 to a mining truck that hauls 450 metric tons: the working machines, and the people who built them.
Food and Drink
American Food Classics
Thirty-six true stories from the American table: a dentist's candy machine, chili trucks with live wolves, and a potato chip legend that falls apart.
Barbecue and Smoking
How smoke turns tough meat tender, the cooks who built American barbecue, and why every region argues about the sauce.
Bread and Baking
Breads from Ethiopia to Iceland, famous pastries and their real origins, the science of the rise, and 14,000 years of baking history.
Cheese
Famous cheeses and their surprising backstories, the odd science of cheesemaking, legendary cheese towns and caves, and 7,000 years of cheese history.
Chocolate and Candy
Chocolate from ancient Amazon pottery to modern bars, plus the surprising people, machines and myths behind famous candy.
Coffee and Tea
Goats, popes, smugglers and a webcam: true stories of how coffee and tea were found, fought over, brewed and carried around the world.
Culinary History
Sushi aged for three years, a stove built by a blind Nobel laureate, and a sandwich story nobody can prove: true tales of how we cook and eat.
Desserts
Cakes, pies, cookies and ice cream, and the real people, lawsuits and legends behind them, from Vienna's cake war to a fruitcake in Antarctica.
Fruits and Vegetables
Where the produce aisle came from: wild ancestors, stubborn breeders, a tariff case, and the botany hiding inside a banana.
Pizza, Pasta and Italian Food
Thirty-six true stories from the Italian table: a noodle made of gold, a Roman hill of olive oil jars, and the magazine behind the Marco Polo myth.
Soda and Soft Drinks
Pharmacists' tonics, a bottle modeled on the wrong plant, and the soda that flew on the space shuttle.
Spices and the Spice Trade
Pepper in a frontier fort, a nutmeg on a national flag, and the twelve-year-old who solved vanilla: how a handful of plants moved the world.
Street Food Around the World
Thirty-six true stories from the world's sidewalks: the carts, the cooks, the markets, and the dishes that outgrew them.
Science and Nature
Birds
A falcon clocked diving at a reported 242 mph, a crow that bent a wire into a hook, a war-hero pigeon, and why ostriches never bury their heads.
Cats
Breeds named for the wrong places, famous cats from a medieval poem to outer space, wild cats making comebacks, and the science of the purr.
Computers and the Internet
The people and machines that built computing, from Babbage's unbuilt engine to the web's first photograph and the moth in the logbook.
Dinosaurs
Dinosaurs in true stories: giants and hunters, the finds that changed science, and the fossil hunters and feuds behind the famous names.
Dogs
Breeds with surprising pasts, famous dogs from ancient Egypt to the 1966 World Cup, dogs that work for a living, and the science of how dogs think.
The Chemical Elements
How the elements were found and named, the people who found them, the jobs they do around the house and the oddities they hide.
Rocks, Gems and Minerals
A diamond mailed for $2.44, a gem that comes from one hill on Earth, the crown ruby that is not a ruby, and a billion years of missing rock.
Great Scientists
The people who changed how we understand the world, from Newton's apple to Kevlar, with overlooked pioneers and famous myths set straight.
The Human Body
How the body really works, in true stories: surprising organs and senses, human records with a twist, and popular body myths set straight.
Insects and Spiders
A ladybug that rescued California's oranges, a spider that lived to forty-three, ants that count their steps, and the fly said to outrun a bullet.
Inventions and Inventors
The tailor behind riveted jeans, a sweetener found on an unwashed hand, and the plumber who never invented the toilet.
Mathematics
Thirty-six true stories from mathematics: a woman who signed a dropout's name, a taxi ride worth a century of study, and a legend invented in 1883.
History of Medicine
Pioneers, discoveries, instruments and old remedies from the history of medicine, with a few popular myths set straight.
Oceans and Sea Life
Strange sea creatures, the deep-sea frontier, the explorers who charted it, and natural wonders from glowing bays to bottomless trenches.
Space and Astronomy
Thirty-six true stories from the sky: a planet named by an 11-year-old, a famous nose made of brass and a galactic crash that may never happen.
Trees and Plants
Famous trees, the histories behind flowers, record-setting plants, and the species that changed how people eat, heal and build.
Volcanoes and Earthquakes
Eruptions, earthquakes and the people who learned to read them, from a dragon-studded detector to a volcano that soaked the stratosphere.
Weather
Hurricanes and tornadoes, official world weather records, the people who learned to forecast them, and the strangest things the sky can do.
Wild Animals
Thirty-six true stories about wild animals: what they can do, where they live, and the ones that came back from almost gone.
Arts and Entertainment
Animation
Cartoon factories, a lost first feature, a mouse someone else drew, and the patents and gadgets that taught still drawings to move.
Architecture
True stories of great buildings and the people who made them, from a pyramid builder worshiped as a god to a skyscraper saved by a question.
Broadway Musicals
Broadway musicals in true stories: landmark shows, stars, songwriters and theaters, from a five-hour 1866 spectacle to Hamilton.
Circus and Carnival
Showmen and big tops, trapeze and tigers, the Ferris wheel and the fairy floss stand: how the circus and the carnival were built.
Classic Literature
Thirty-six true stories from the shelf of classics: the writers, the books, the characters, and the accidents that shaped them.
Classic Television
True stories from TV's first decades: a dummy that was television's first face, a clown who never spoke, and a Moon walk that came via Australia.
Classical Music
Composers, masterpieces, instruments and great halls: the true stories behind classical music, with a few famous myths set straight.
Comic Books
A lie detector pioneer created Wonder Woman, a Black cowboy headlined a 1965 comic, and an attic find sold for $9.12 million.
Country Music
From the Bristol sessions to the Opry circle: true stories of country music's stars, songs and landmarks, and the surprises behind them.
Fairy Tales and Folklore
Where the tales really came from, who wrote them down, and what the folk creatures were doing before the storybooks got hold of them.
Golden Age of Hollywood
True stories from Hollywood's studio era: overlooked stars, classic films, studio moguls, and the censors and myths behind the camera.
Greek Mythology
Gods, heroes and monsters as the ancient poets actually told them, plus the words and ideas we still borrow from Greek myth.
Hip-Hop
From a Bronx back-to-school party to the Olympics: true stories of hip-hop's pioneers, artists, elements and landmark moments.
Jazz
Jazz from New Orleans to Tokyo in true stories: the musicians, clubs, styles and records that shaped it, with a few legends labeled as legends.
Magic and Illusion
Stage magic with the receipts: borrowed secrets, invented traditions, patents that backfired, and escapes that nearly went wrong.
Norse Mythology
Gods, giants, monsters and nine worlds, told from the medieval Icelandic books that preserved them, with Marvel and Tolkien sorted out.
Great Paintings
Masterpieces with surprising back stories, painters who beat the odds, museums with strange pasts, and heists and forgeries that shook the art world.
Photography
From a sealed room with a hole in the wall to a phone in your pocket: the people, machines, pictures and tricks that taught light to hold still.
Rock and Roll
The pioneers, bands, songs and wild nights that built rock and roll, in true stories with the myths corrected.
Shakespeare
Thirty-six plays rescued by two friends, a playhouse that burned in an hour, and the phrases you use without knowing whose they are.
World and Places
The Fifty States
Fifty states: the firsts nobody remembers, the symbols written into law, the landmarks with the wrong story attached, and the odd borders.
Castles and Palaces
True stories of castles and palaces worldwide: forged surrenders, fairy-tale kings, working moats, and the myths tour guides love to repeat.
Flags of the World
True stories about the flags of the world: their symbols, the people who designed them and the arguments they started.
Great Rivers
True stories of the world's great rivers: the explorers who traced them, the bridges and dams that span them, and the life along their banks.
Holidays Around the World
The true stories behind holidays, traditions, and foods from cultures around the world.
Islands
Volcanoes that made new land, birds that forgot how to fly, castaways, and borders that run through bare rock.
Mountains and Mountaineering
True stories from the high places: a king's ladder climb in 1492, a coat made of balloon cloth, and a climber's sock found after 100 years.
U.S. National Parks
True stories from America's national parks: cavalry on skis in Yellowstone, a floating log tracked since 1896, and a fox saved from golden eagles.
Wonders of the World
True stories of the world's wonders: a pyramid builder's logbook, a Colossus that never straddled a harbor, and a volcano born in a cornfield.
Word Origins
Where everyday words and phrases really come from: a mouse in every muscle, a Persian king in checkmate, and famous origin myths debunked.
World Capitals
How the world's capitals were chosen, moved, renamed and rebuilt, and the landmarks and records hiding inside them.
Everyday Life
Board and Card Games
Escape maps hidden in Monopoly sets, a Babylonian rulebook on clay, and a king of hearts who only looks like he is stabbing himself.
Brand Origins
A mine that found the wrong rock, a tractor called Carioca, a logo billed at $35, and the gum that is not in the Smithsonian.
Clocks and Timekeeping
Sundials, water clocks and atomic clocks, calendars that lost days, the people who tamed time, and the oddest quirks of time zones.
Fashion History
The true stories behind everyday clothes, famous designers, handy accessories and the fashions that swept the world.
Mail and Postage
Stamps worth millions, children sent by parcel post, a dog who rode the mail trains, and the missile that delivered 3,000 letters to Florida.
Money and Coins
Money through the ages: lion-stamped coins, mulberry-bark notes, playing-card cash, a bank vault full of cheese, and money myths set straight.
Golden Age of Radio
For thirty years the family radio was the main attraction in the living room. Here are the shows, the voices, the machinery and the nights.
Telegraph and Telephone
Dots, dashes, switchboards and sea cables: how the world learned to talk at a distance, and who really deserves the credit.
Theme Parks and Roller Coasters
Famous amusement parks, record-setting roller coasters, classic rides and the showmen, engineers and artists who invented the fun.
Toys
A felt elephant pincushion, a wallpaper cleaner that became Play-Doh, and the Furby banned as a spy: true stories from the toy box.
Video Games
Thirty-six true stories of video games, from arcade quarters to a landlord's accidental namesake and a solo hobby that outsold everything.
Stories you find are saved for each subject, and the history page keeps count. Playing a subject again deals the stories you have not seen first.