WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - This Week In History - December: Christmas, Charlemagne, and Pearl Harbor

Episode Date: December 8, 2025

Join Ava and Alessia as they highlight some of December's most important events, from the birth of Christ to the attack on Pearl Harbor, and more.

Welcome to This Week in History with Ava and Alessia, your one-stop shop for all things history. To quote Charles Dickens, Merry Christmas, everyone. As Tiny Tim observed, God bless us. God bless us, everyone. This episode of This Week in History is really a month in history. We're going to be talking about events. all throughout December that changed the course of human history. Ava, let's start in American history.

On December 16th of 1620, the Mayflower anchored in Plymouth Harbor. We always associate the Mayflower and its landing with Thanksgiving, but fun fact, it's not. Well, it kind of is, but not really. And I'll explain. So the Mayflower first harbored in Provincetown Harbor on November 11th, which puts it in the Thanksgiving time period. And it was then that the Mayflower Compact was signed and I could yap about the significance of the Mayflower Compact for ages. But that's not what we're here to talk about today.

Anyways, the reason that they were prevented from fully landing at Provincetown was because of bad weather, poor wind, and really dangerous harboring conditions like the shore and whatnot. So they sent out a bunch of smaller scouting groups to find better areas to land. And these groups returned on December 10th. But yet again, bad weather prevented and delayed them from officially landing until December 18th, where they landed in Plymouth Harbor. And after landing, settlers took over an area to start their new life in a village that had been abandoned by Native Americans for a few years, which I actually didn't know that they took over an abandoned village. But it's super cool. Yeah. But as we know, the first winter on the actual land of North America was extremely rough.

Let go! Landau! Did not go well. Yeah, it was bad. But this is where the Charlie Brown First Thanksgiving story can take the rest of the lead. We made it, Charlie Brown.

We made it. Alessia, what do you have for American history? So I have Christmas Eve of 1776, and this is when George Washington crosses the Delaware. We love. basically every American knows this story, but it's a classic, so I figured I had to tell it. He has been losing battles. He's not doing well. The American, the Continental Army is just not doing well in general. Sad terms. Yeah, it's pretty sad. And George Washington is like,

well, we need to do something about this. We're desperate. And his troops are about to all go home. Their time is up. It's Christmas. They're just kind of done. Everybody's sick, cold, and just do they just want to leave and so he's like okay we're going to make a last ditch effort right before everyone goes home try to inspire some courage um build morale right before maybe people will stick around so he devises the strategy that they are going to cross the delaware river on christmas eve and they're going to sneak up on the british but it's really the hessians the hessians yes who are there They're mercenaries who are fighting for the British, so just as good to go and bother them. Bother is a really kind term for what happened.

It really is. The way that George Washington actually comes up with this plan is really cool. He has a spy, and you know how much I love talking about spies. I had no clue. And this spy basically finds out that they're there, they're kind of camped out for the winter, not really doing much, and they're probably going to all get drunk over. Christmas. And so George Washington is like, okay, we're going to take advantage of this. Let's go. And so they get on these boats and it doesn't go quite according to plan. The river is completely filled with ice. So the struggle is real to put this into modern terms. And they eventually

make it across, but it's hours later than they had planned just about daybreak. And by the time they actually make it to Trenton, the sun, it's morning. And they're not sure if it's going to work, if everyone's going to be ready for them. They have no idea what they're going to run into. And it ends up being that the Hessians had drank so much the night before. They're all still asleep. They're just chilling. And so when the Americans get there, they basically scare them out of their beds and win a complete victory. And then go over to Princeton and win another victory. The Hessians in this story are kind of giving the French in the Battle of Agincourt, TBH. Yeah. Also, I don't know if this has been your experience, but in every Red Robin restaurant I have ever stepped foot in there has been

a massive picture of the painting of George Washington Crossing the Delaware. You're probably right, but I have actually never been to a Red Robin. That's so sad. Sorry. But eating at Red Robin is how I learned the story of George Washington crossing the Delaware because I had my mom explain it to me. That's actually incredible. I love that.

Let's move to world history as we celebrate the season. What do you have, Ava? I say this every time I talk about the medieval period, but this is one of my favorite things. And it actually builds off of what I talked about in the last episode with Clovis I first. It's connected, but just a few hundred years later. So on December 4th of 800, Charlemagne, was crowned the first Holy Roman Emperor. Yes, let's go. We love Charlemagne. I love Charlemagne so much. I actually know who this is. Yes, elite. So Clovis I first, if you remember me talking about him last

episode, which you should totally check out if you don't. Shameless plug. Anyway, he was part of the Merovingian dynasty in Gaul, but Charlemagne's father, Pippin the Short, which is a really unfortunate name. That's really funny. Really unfortunate name. He was an official for the Merovingian king at the time. And with permission from the Pope, Pippin the short took over the kingdom. Dang. Yeah, just casually.

But after Pippin died, a long series of important things happened that led to Charlemagne, his son, having control of the whole Frankish kingdom. But you can read about that in a book called The Lives of Charlemagne, which I used to have a good chunk of memorized in middle and high school.

But anyway, Charlemagne's rule was characterized by really successful military campaigns, the promotion of Christianity, and fostering a completely new culture for the empire. But the main event of this story begins in 799. Pope Leo III is attacked by political rivals, but Charlemagne, being the cool guy that he is, gives the Pope sanctuary in his kingdom,

and even offers him protection in his journey back to Italy for his reinstallation as the Pope. What a guy. We love. But flash forward. forward. To Christmas Eve of 800, Charlemagne is attending mass in St. Peter's Basilica and kneeling down in prayer in front of the altar. But before Charlemagne gets up, Pope Leo III, the same pope who he gave sanctuary to, places a massive crown on his head and claims him as the new emperor of Rome, soon to be

known as the Holy Roman Empire. That's incredible. I love that story. Because if you remember me mentioning the fall of the Western Roman Empire in last week's episode, that makes sense, that the Holy Roman Empire is a thing. It was originally called the Roman Empire, but it moved to the Holy Roman Empire because of the history of Christianity in the current, or not current, current for Charlemagne Empire. That's so cool. Charlemagne is fabulous. Alessia, what do you have for world history? I think this goes without saying I have Christmas Day of, I guess it's between 3, 4 BC and 3 or 4 AD. I don't think we know exactly when. Debated time. Yeah. When baby Jesus is born?

Yeah, would it really be a Christmas episode if we didn't talk about this? Not at all. So we're just going to pick the story up when Caesar declares that they're going to have a census. When Caesar declares they're going to have a census. And so Mary and Joseph have to go to Bethlehem to be, a part of the census. And Mary is very pregnant. Very pregnant. So she's really hoping she's going to make it there. And then once they arrive, there's no place in the inn as the story goes. In any of the ends? Any of them. Yeah. And so they end up staying in a stable and baby Jesus is born in a stable

amongst animals. And I'm going to pass it on to Eva for the rest of the details on this because she has some lore to share with us. I do. I have a lot of fun facts. So, but first of all, in the Bible, it says that the heavens open up and the shepherds are told by a whole conglomeration of angels. What just happened, i.e. the savior of the world was just born in Bethlehem and they should go find him. And they do. But fun fact, Alessia mentioned that Jesus was born in a stable, which is true. However, stable doesn't necessarily mean what everyone thinks it does. It's not a barn.

It was actually a cave. Wait, really? Yeah. This changes my whole. vision. Yeah. My nativity is fake. Well, it's not fake. It's just in a slightly different setting. Wow. But there were still feeding troughs and all of the same things that you would find in a barn, except it's just not a structure made out of wood. Mind blown. Yeah. But so that's where Jesus would have been born, which to me is super interesting because some of the first scrolls found of the Bible, like years and years later, were found in caves. And I think that's just a really cool connection. anyways another fun tidbit about the christmas story is that everyone is told that the three wise men or the three kings or whatever you decide to call them visited jesus at his birth this is actually not true it took them either a year or slightly more to go see them so the star was present for a really really long time and if you've ever heard of the religious feast day of epiphany that's when the three wise men

officially come visit Jesus and that's celebrated I think on January 6th or 7th yeah we usually we celebrate that every year that's a very Italian holiday it's a big thing there and we even have this old lady type figure who's called the Bifana and that's such a cute name she's wonderful we used to go get gifts from her but basically her story is really cool because she also sees the star and I think she meets the wise men and then she decided she's going to go with her broom to find baby Jesus and it's just really cute that's adorable but i love the christmas story so much and linus and charlie brown christmas does it so much justice in such an understandable way and i love it so so much but yeah those are some two little tidbit facts about the first christmas story if you're just tuning in this is this week

in history with Ava and Alessia on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. I think we should move on to military history, our normal favorite part of the show. And I can't say that my date will be necessarily as happy as the birth of Christ. So Japanese aircrafts executed a bombing operation on the base in hopes of crippling America's ability to act in war. And Pearl Harbor was kind of a hub for a lot of America's naval activity with a variety of weaponized ships, as well as a really massive oil reserve. Luckily, American aircraft carriers were all out on duty and were unharmed, but eight battleships were damaged and two were destroyed. The USS Arizona was completely

obliterated and the USS Oklahoma capsized. Surprisingly, the oil reserve weren't targeted in the strike and were completely fine. But the total American casualties included around 2,300 killed and 1,100 wounded. And the United States formally declared war the next day and officially entered World War II. Alessie, have you ever been to Pearl Harbor? I haven't, but it is on my bucket list. I want to go so badly. I have. I went over fall break in second grade, but I don't remember much other than fulfilling the little like junior ranger scavenger hunt thing. Aw. And I remember waiting in line to go see the USS Arizona. I wish I had been a little bit older when we took that trip so I could remember more, but that just means I have

to go back. Yeah. Well, I swear parents just, they take little kids and say, well, we're not going to remember any of this. Couldn't we save the money and then go when we're older? And we'll actually appreciate it. But also, I get it. I still had a great time on the trip. I just wish I had recognized the historical significance of where we were visiting. Because I was like, oh, some boring military place. Why can't I just go swim? Yeah, you're at the beach. You just want to go to the water.

I remember being very sunburnt and very disgruntled, but now looking back on all those photos, I'm like, that's crazy that I was acting like that in such a place of historical significance that I would pretty much pay an arm and a leg to go back to see. Yeah, that's so real. It's like lecturing your little self in your head. Yeah. Like, why was I like this? Why? I was between the ages of 8 and 10, so it makes sense. But. Fair. Yeah. We were all like that. Yeah. Alessio, what do you have for Christmasy military history things? Mine isn't super Christmassy, but it does happen in December and that's what's important. So it began technically November 26th, but wasn't over until December 13th of 1950. And this is the Battle of chosen and this is the battle of the chosen reservoir i teased this in our last episode i promised that we would get to this and now we have this is this is so much this is so fascinating to talk about and it's honestly really sad and i kind of tear up every time though i talk about it so hopefully i don't do that right now but okay if you do there's a very good documentary about about this battle

and i was full on in tears watch this documentary part of that might have to do with the fact that my served in Korea. And so I've heard some of his stories. And so I've heard how bad it was from firsthand from his perspective. The winter was absolutely horrific. Temperatures were something like negative 20, 30, loss of snow. It was really bad. And they were up by this lake that was totally frozen over at this point. And then the Chinese and the Americans had been doing really well and they made it all the way up into North Korea past where the original boundary of the Koreas had been. Because of this, the Chinese decide that they're going to send millions of troops into North Korea to push the Americans back and get a communist victory. And this goes

horribly wrong for the Americans. And Douglas MacArthur, who was the commander of the American forces, World War II, Hero, all of that. He had decided to push too far, my opinion, into North Korea and so he stretched his supply lines and where the chosen reservoir is it's kind of difficult to get to so it's really easy for you to be cut off and that's exactly what happened these men got completely surrounded cut off and they had to go down this really narrow path to get down these mountains and all along the way they were being harassed and attacked by chinese and north korean troops and they just got decimated and they were freezing they didn't have enough food they were they were not really going to make it not that many people actually survived compared to the number that had gone in and the one of the really and they could have made it out they could have been okay if they had air support but they couldn't the american navy couldn't fly a lot of missions because of the weather the snow and altitude and just all of the things really came together and planes just couldn't really get over there a lot and so they

didn't have the air support to really flush out these Chinese troops who were hiding everywhere and they were just getting picked off. It was just, it's so sad. And one of my favorite stories to come out of this battle is the story of Jesse Brown and Tom Hudner. And this is portrayed in Adam Makos's book devotion. And it's also, it was made into a movie. The movie wasn't very accurate, but the book is incredible. I just bought it a little bit ago. And it's one of my hopeful Christmas break reads. You definitely should. And as soon as you read it, you should text me because I have a lot to say. I might honestly reread it. It's so good. I huge fan. But Jesse Brown was an African-American naval aviator. He was flying missions over Korea. And he became good friends with Tom Hudner,

who was another naval aviator. They were both very good pilots. And during one of the missions, Jesse's plane crashed behind enemy line. lines. It was not good to get captured. You couldn't. It was, they would definitely have killed him. And so in the hopes of trying to help his friend, Tom Hudner deliberately crashes his plane to go after him and try to get him out and try to make it out alive. But when Tom Hudner lands, Jesse is trapped in his airplane and he can't get him out. And so he's there with Jesse during his final moments. And it's just a really touching story of friendship that I just love. It's very inspiring it's very heartwarming just like christmas yeah it's a good it's a good christmas story

in the way that it's friendship and love for your fellow man despite adversity yeah if you're playing crash dava i would come to save you oh thank you i would save you too thank you so yeah a little bit of a downer there but military history always is i guess not always often is but let's try and lighten the mood Christmas and move to pop culture. Ava, what do you have? On December 21st of 1937, Walt Disney's Snow White is released. And a lot of people kind of know that Disney's film Snow White is important to the Disney canon, but really don't know a lot about the movie's historical significance.

So Snow White was actually the first full. length animated movie ever. And on top of that, it had sound that included speaking, singing, and sound effects, which was a new technology that had only been first used in the film industry less than 10 years prior. And on top of that, it was in color, which was also wild. The movie was given a special Academy Award two years later that was titled, quote, the award for significant screen innovation which has charmed millions and pioneered a great new entertainment field for the motion picture end quote we should listen to a clip yes the best song this movie was a key player in my childhood we had it on VHS it was great I love that just with the why you were and cheerfully together we can

I be of the play, so I'm a merry too. Alessia, what do you have for pop culture? So I have December 9th, 1965, and this is when Charlie Brown Christmas is released. Yes. This is an iconic movie. I love this so much. Me too. Every year, I have to watch it.

It's just so good. It's not Christmas if you don't watch Charlie Brown. Which is so true. And everyone, at least I would hope that everyone knows. Linus's speech. Yeah, let's listen to it. And there were in the same country shepherds, abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night, and lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them. And the glory of the Lord shone round about them. And they were sore afraid, and the angel said unto them, fear not. For behold, I bring you tidings of great joy, which will be to all people.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David, a savior, which is Christ the Lord. cinematic masterpiece 100% Christmas must watch and now it's time for everyone's favorite game where we may or may not embarrass ourselves about our knowledge of history or not guess that year and we're still five three because last episode neither of us got anything no we did awful do you want to go first alessia sure let's see what do I have in what year was Elvis Presley the famous singer drafted into the U.S. Army I know he was drafted into World War War II. So I, he wasn't. Was it Vietnam? Oh. Um, well, since he was drafted into Vietnam, uh, and since he was famous and later, I would probably say, 1967. You're 10 years off, 1957. So like pre-Vietnamish era.

Mm-hmm. Okay. That's really sad coming from me who is supposed to have a specialty in Vietnam. It's okay. Dates are hard. I have seen Elvis Presley's military uniform, his fatigues. I have touched them. That's really cool. It's very cool. What do you have for me, Eva? On, well, there's not a specific date for this one, but in December of what year did Queen Victoria and Prince Albert popularize the tradition of a Christmas tree in homes when a viral engraving was published all around of them putting a tree in their living room. my gosh um Victoria Victoria um Queen Victoria let's see and Prince Albert the namesakes of one of the top museums on my Museum to C list let me think I don't really know um I'm just

gonna guess 1902 is that even when she was around no wait when she was very dead then but can you give me like a time frame I don't you already guessed queen yeah but I don't okay it's 1848 Oh, man, I was way off. It's okay. I don't know my British monarchs. It's okay. In what year was St. Nicholas born? Like, St. Nicholas, as in the guy who punched Arias in the face?

I don't know, but the guy that Santa is based on. So, yes. Okay. I'm trying to remember when Aryanism was a thing in Christian heretical history. Uh, like, 396 AD. It looks like it's 270-80. So you were only about 100 years off. That's pretty good for this confusing time.

Cool. And this last date that I'm going to ask you doesn't have a specific time frame. So I'm just going to ask you to give me the century that this happened in because they also can only place the century. But when was the first usage of glass windows recorded in world history? I knew the time was going to come. I have wanted to ask this question the entire season. Oh, no. Yeah, I have absolutely no idea. So I'm going to say a completely random date. Go for it. Let's go with 1009. It was actually in 100 AD in the Roman Empire.

Man, I was way off. That's okay. It's super cool, though. Windows are fabulous. Windows are pretty great. I love windows. Well, thank you for joining us for this Christmas episode. This is also the final episode in season one of this week in history. So stay tuned on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. Time is here, happiness and cheer. Fun for all that children call their favorite time of me. Thank you.