Indy Neidell's World War II

September 2, 2018 1:40 AM

Indy Neidell, one of the people behind the very ambitious Great War Youtube Channel, has launched his even more ambitious World War II channel (first video covers September 1 1939 - The Polish German War). As usual the war will be documented week-by week in real time (for the next six years!) and there will be tons of specials on a myriad of WW2 topics. This time, however, Indy and friends will team up with other historians on Youtube to better cover history's largest and most complicated war.
posted by Foci for Analysis (8 comments total)

The excellent @RealTimeWWII has been doing this on a daily basis for years now. I found it really interesting first time around to note just how much stuff happened in between the big stuff that makes it into the major history books. Historians will (necessarily) summarise things like ‘several weeks of bombing’ but real time histories like this give you a tiny insight into the day to day movements of large historical events.
posted by Happy Dave at 2:16 AM on September 2, 2018 [4 favorites]

WWII Today has been a favorite of mine, as well. It's very good at telling some of the smaller stories of the people caught-up in the conflict.
posted by Thorzdad at 5:07 AM on September 2, 2018

No spoilers, please. I didn't get to watch WWII as it happened and I'm curious as to how it ends.
posted by delfin at 8:12 AM on September 2, 2018 [6 favorites]

Thank you - this is fantastic
posted by growabrain at 8:40 AM on September 2, 2018

Oh good. His WWI is very good.
posted by doctornemo at 9:44 AM on September 2, 2018

for the next six years

This kicks!
posted by filtergik at 1:27 PM on September 2, 2018

Lincoln P. Bloomfield of MIT had a series in the early 90s on Christian Science Television called "Fifty Years Ago Today" based on issues of the Christian Science Monitor which covered the early years of the war. It was actually a terrific program but seems to have not left an archive behind.
posted by interglossa at 4:07 PM on September 2, 2018

Thanks for posting this. I was unaware of The Great War series, but will watch this one with interest.

I didn't get to watch WWII as it happened and I'm curious as to how it ends.

You're joking, but in seriousness I think the jury's still out on that one.

Indeed, it's said that Zhou Enlai was asked in 1972 about the impact of the French Revolution and answered that it was too soon to tell. (This was probably a misunderstanding, but it certainly feels true in these uncertain times. Sometimes I wonder what the ultimate outcome of the Enlightenment era will be.)
posted by ragtag at 3:30 PM on September 3, 2018 [1 favorite]