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Throughline

NPR

Throughline is a time machine. Each episode, we travel beyond the headlines to answer the question, "How did we get here?" We use sound and stories to bring history to life and put you into the middle of it. From ancient civilizations to forgotten figures, we take you directly to the moments that shaped our world. Throughline is hosted by Peabody Award-winning journalists Rund Abdelfatah and Ramtin Arablouei.

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Beschikbare afleveringen

  • The First Department of Education

    Whose job is it to educate Americans? Congress created the first Department of Education just after the Civil War as a way to help reunify a broken country. A year later, it was basically shut down. But the story of that first...

  • The Woman Behind The New Deal

    From Social Security and the minimum wage to exit signs and fire escapes, Frances Perkins transformed how people in the U.S. lived and worked. Today on the show: how a middle class do-gooder became one of the savviest and most powerful...

  • We the People: Search and Seizure

    The Fourth Amendment is the part of the Bill of Rights that prohibits "unreasonable searches and seizures." But — what's unreasonable? That question has fueled a century's worth of court rulings that have dramatically expanded the power...

  • War Crimes

    On today's episode, we travel from the battlefields of the U.S. Civil War, through the rubble of two world wars, to the hallways of the Hague, to see how the modern world has tried to define — and prosecute — war crimes. This episode...

  • The Tax Collector

    Gangsters, banksters, and politicians. Today on the show, how the hunt for Al Capone helped turn the IRS into one of the U.S. government's most powerful tools — and most effective weapons. To access bonus episodes and listen to...

  • California's 'Bum Blockade'

    The story of the Los Angeles police chief who, faced with one of the largest internal migrations in American history, tried to close California's borders to stop it. To access bonus episodes and listen to Throughline sponsor-free,...

  • Motherhood

    Baby bonuses, childless cat ladies: the rhetoric around motherhood is politically charged right now. And the fantasy of an ideal mother remains powerful, even as real-life parents struggle to reconcile its demands. Today on the show,...

  • The Deadly Story of the U.S. Civil Service

    When James Garfield won the Presidency in 1880, Charles Guiteau got ready to accept his new government job. No one had actually offered him a job – but he'd campaigned for Garfield, so he assumed he'd be rewarded. That was the spoils...

  • The Alien Enemies Act

    In March 2025, President Trump issued an executive order invoking a centuries-old law: the Alien Enemies Act. The Act allows a president to detain or deport citizens of foreign adversaries to the United States, but only in the case of a...

  • When Things Fall Apart

    Climate disaster, political unrest, random violence: Western society can often feel like what the filmmaker Werner Herzog calls "a thin layer of ice on top of an ocean of chaos and darkness." But is that actually true — or the way it...

  • Get Rich Quick: The American Lottery

    Want to get rich quick? You're not alone. Right now, Americans spend over $100 billion, yes billion, every year on lottery tickets. Today on the show, in collaboration with Scratch and Win from WGBH, how the mafia, Sputnik, medical...

  • We the People: The Right to Remain Silent

    The Fifth Amendment. You have the right to remain silent when you're being questioned in police custody, thanks to the Fifth's protection against self-incrimination. But most people end up talking to police anyway. Why? Today on...