History Detectives Season 7, Episode 7: Hindenburg Artifact; John Adams Book; Birthplace of Hip-Hop

Slave Songbook; Josh White Guitar; Birthplace of Hip Hop

60 min

Psychophone; War Dog Letter; Pancho Villa Watch Fob

Season 7 begins with a closer look at the "Psycho-Phone," a device presumed to have been built by Thomas Edison and was designed to communicate with the dead. Then, a WWII letter between two soldiers which talks about a third man's qualifications to become a dog trainer. Lastly, a watch fob which commemorates Pancho Villa's infamous raid on Columbus, New Mexico in 1916.

60 min

Manhattan Project Patent; Galleon Shipwreck; Creole Poems

Manhattan Project Patent - Could this drawing have been part of America's secret plans to fuel the atomic bomb? Galleon Shipwreck - Is this a piece of treasure from a Spanish galleon washed up on an Oregon beach? Creole Poems - Does this manuscript contain words of love or illegal acts of rebellion?

60 min

St. Valentine's Day Massacre; Booth Letter; Cemetery Alarm

Items include a shotgun believed to have been used by a member of Al Capone's gang during the St. Valentine's Day Massacre; a threatening letter to President Andrew Jackson believed to have been written by John Wilkes Boothe's father; and an alarm which is thought to have been an alarm against grave robbers in a cemetery.

60 min

Sideshow Babies; Lubin Photos; Navajo Rug

A woman wonders whether her mother was used as an infant as part of the incubator expedition at the 1933 World's Fair in Chicago. Also, a look at the Siegmund Lubin Studios, which made silent films in Philadelphia. And lastly, a closer look at a Navajo rug which may have a taboo symbol on it of a man in a feathered headdress holding lightening bolts.

60 min

Tokyo Rose; Crazy Horse; World War II Diary

Items explored include a recording believed to be from the trial of Iva Toguri, better known Tokyo Rose, the Japanese American woman who made propaganda broadcasts for the Japanese during WWII; a possible photograph of the legendary Crazy Horse, the Lakota warrior. Also, a diary written by a pilot during WWII who perished in action is returned to his family.

60 min

Amelia Earhart Plane; Fillmore Pardon; Boxcar Home

A Honolulu flight mechanic's grandson believes he possesses a piece of Amelia Earhart's airplane but needs help identifying it. Next, the 1851 presidential commutation of a death sentence to life in prison in the case of See See Sah Mah, a Native American who was charged with murdering a a St. Louis trader. Lastly, a home in Colorado which is believed to have been built solely from railroad boxcars.

60 min

Mussolini Dagger; Liberia Letter; N.E.A.R. Device

A man from Nevada believes he holds a dagger which was owned by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, including a letter which indicates it was retrieved from Mussolini's apartment following his death. Also, a stack of letters from post-Civil War from a freed slave emigrating from the US to Liberia; and a Cold War era, hand size device that has "National Emergency Alarm Repeater, Civilian Warning Device" printed across them.

60 min

WPA Mural Studies; George Washington Miniature; Japanese Balloon Bomb

Items look at include six paintings by Thelma Johnson Streat, which may have been mural studies commissioned by the WPA in the 1930s or '40s; a 1790 miniature color portrait of a "G. Washington" which was found stored above a Manhattan tavern in a box of documents; and a scrap of material believed to have come from a Japanese balloon bomb used during WWII.

60 min

Stalag 17 Portrait; Seadrome; Black Tom Shell

A woman from Arizona wants to find out the fate of the man who sketched a picture of her father while in a WWII P.O.W. camp in Krems, Austria. Next, the Seadrome was a floating airport which would enable transatlantic flights was proposed in the 1920s, is investigated for a man in New York who inherited photos of Seadrome from his grandfather. Also, a woman in New Jersey has possession o an unusual artifact: a live artillery shell believed to date to the 1916 sabotage attack of Black TomIsland , N.Y., munitions depot by a German spy ring.

60 min

Duke Ellington Plates; Scottsboror Boys Stamp; Civil War Bridge

Duke Ellington Plates - Are these plates the first edition of Duke Ellington’s “Take the A Train”? "Scottsboro Boys" Stamp - Did a penny stamp help save the Scottsboro Boys from the electric chair? Civil War Bridge - Has a new discovery rewritten Civil War history?

60 min

Shipwreck Cannons; Connecticut Farmhouse; Kahlil Gibran Painting

Shipwreck Cannons - Are these the last remains of a navy schooner that fought in a border dispute with the mighty British Empire? Connecticut Farmhouse - How is this Connecticut farmhouse connected to the assassination of a Russian tsar? Kahlil Gibran Painting - Is this painting an unknown work by an immigrant poet whose words inspired an American generation?

60 min