Touring History 8-2-25

TOURING HISTORY - AUGUST 2ND SCRIPT

COLD OPEN

LANE: Welcome back to Touring History, where we make the past more entertaining than your doom-scrolling habits. I'm Lane.

DAVE: And I'm Dave, still processing that people used to have to memorize actual phone numbers. Like, you had to store ten digits in your brain just to call your friend about weekend plans.

LANE: Today we're exploring August 2nd, a date that's brought us postal innovations, atomic discoveries, and some truly spectacular examples of how presidential affairs can literally change the course of American politics.

DAVE: Yes, let’s see who’s jumping out of the birthday cake today!

CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS

LANE: Let's celebrate some August 2nd birthdays! We've got Peter O'Toole, who made playing Lawrence of Arabia look effortless while actually suffering through one of the most brutal film shoots in history.

DAVE: Also born today: James Baldwin, whose writing about race, sexuality, and identity in America was decades ahead of its time and remains painfully relevant. And Myrna Loy, who basically defined sophisticated comedy in Hollywood's golden age.

LANE: Can't forget Freddy Mercury, born August 2nd... wait, no, that's wrong. Let me check my notes... Actually, it's Sam Worthington, who somehow became a leading man despite having the charisma of unsalted crackers.

DAVE: Harsh but fair. Though he did manage to get cast in both Avatar and Terminator, so maybe bland is the new black in Hollywood.

SALACIOUS DAVE SEGMENT

DAVE: Scandal time! August 2nd, 1923, President Warren G. Harding died suddenly in San Francisco, but the real scandal was the explosive revelation of his affair with Nan Britton that rocked American politics for decades.

LANE: Oh boy, another presidential sex scandal. What makes this one special?

DAVE: Harding had a secret affair with Nan Britton, who was 31 years younger than him and the daughter of his friend. But here's the kicker - she claimed he fathered her daughter, Elizabeth, and they conducted their affair in a White House coat closet!

LANE: A coat closet? That's both scandalous and incredibly uncomfortable.

DAVE: Nan wrote a tell-all book in 1927 called "The President's Daughter," which was the first book to explicitly detail a presidential affair. It was banned in many cities, but became a massive bestseller because America loves political sex scandals.

LANE: So this was like the original political tell-all book?

DAVE: Exactly! But the scandal got even juicier - Harding also had a 15-year affair with his best friend's wife, Carrie Phillips. The Republican Party actually paid Phillips hush money and sent her on an all-expenses-paid trip to Japan during the 1920 election to keep her quiet.

LANE: So the Republican Party was literally paying to cover up presidential affairs a century ago?

DAVE: The Nan Britton scandal destroyed Harding's historical reputation and led to DNA testing decades later that proved he was indeed the father of her daughter. One affair in a coat closet literally rewrote how we view presidential privacy and changed political campaign vetting forever.

INNOVATION LANE SEGMENT

LANE: Innovation time! August 2nd, 1939, Albert Einstein signed a letter to President Roosevelt urging the development of atomic weapons, basically launching the Manhattan Project with his signature.

DAVE: That's a pretty heavy kind of innovation, Lane.

LANE: Einstein later called it "the one great mistake" of his life, but his letter led to the development of nuclear technology that changed everything - weapons, power generation, medicine, and space exploration.

DAVE: So one scientist's letter accidentally created both the atomic bomb and nuclear medicine? That's the ultimate "be careful what you wish for" moment.

LANE: Also August 2nd, 1858, the Government of India Act transferred power from the East India Company to the British Crown, basically innovating how empires could rebrand their colonialism as "official government policy."

DAVE: That's less innovation and more "corporate colonialism gets a government makeover." Though I guess making exploitation more official counts as process improvement?

LANE: The innovation was creating modern colonial administration that influenced how empires managed territories for the next century. Not good innovation, but definitely influential.

AD BREAK

LANE: Let's talk about The Cheese Store of Beverly Hills, where they've been perfecting the art of deliciousness since 1967.

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