Everything Totally Explained


Ask & we'll explain, totally!
The History Channel
Totally Explained

  NEW! All the latest news in the worlds of computer gaming, entertainment, the environment,  
finance, health, politics, science, stocks & shares, technology and much, much, more.  

View this entry using RSS

Everything about History Channel totally explained

The History Channel is a cable television channel, devoted mainly to historical events and persons—often with observations and explanations by noted historians as well as reenactors and interviews with witnesses. Some of the original programming is also shown on History Television in Canada.
   On February 16, 2008, a new logo was launched on the flagship American network. While keeping their trademark "H", the triangle shape on the left acts as a play button for animation and fly-outs during commercials and shows. The former logo form remains in place for the rest of the world.

Programming and ownership


   Programs cover a wide array of periods and topics, while similar topics are often organized into themed weeks or daily marathons. Subjects include military history, medieval history, the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, modern engineering, and historical biographies. Many programs compare contemporary culture and technology with the past, while some programs have a more esoteric focus such as conspiracy theory, religious interpretation, UFO speculation, or reality television. The History Channel maintains a corporate initiative called Save Our History, dedicated to the preservation of history and historical sites and artifacts, similar in spirit but not to be confused with the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In 2007 The History Channel launched "Take a Veteran to School Day," designed to foster relationships between U.S. military veterans and students; R. Lee Ermey is the spokesman for the initiative.
   Launched on January 1, 1995, the channel is owned by A&E joint venture (Hearst, Disney, NBC) and Sky News Corp. and operates, in various forms, in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain, Italy and Latin America. The network is also currently available in South Asia under a deal between STAR TV and AETN International. Interestingly, the channel has consistently produced prime time ratings in the U.S. comparable to or higher than the A&E Network itself. The channel isn't to be confused with a similar, independently-owned, Canadian service, History Television. Indeed, the phrase "Not available in Canada" became a de facto slogan for the channel in its early years, as a result of its use in promotional ads, at least those aired on A&E (which is available in Canada).
   A British version of the History Channel is a joint venture between A&E and British Sky Broadcasting; a high-definition version was launched at 8pm BST on Thursday October 26 2006, on the Sky HD platform in the United Kingdom. An HD version of the network launched in the United States in September 2007 on Dish Network. It also launched on DirecTV in September.
   A Scandinavian version was launched in September 1997, broadcasting for three hours per day on the analogue Viasat platform. Initially time-sharing with TV1000 Cinema, it was later moved to the Swedish TV8 channel and continued broadcasting there until November 2004 when Viasat launched their own history channel, Viasat History, in the Nordic region and closed down the History Channel. On February 1, 2007 the History Channel returned to Denmark, Norway, Finland and Sweden when the UK version was launched as a stand-alone channel on the Canal Digital satellite platform.
   The History Channel started its operations in India in late 2003, with News Corp's STAR as its sales partner. A joint venture of A&E and Astro All Asia Networks plc is launching the History Channel in Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam and Brunei in the second and third quarters of 2007, and in Taiwan and China by the end of the year. Some other Asian countries such as Japan and South Korea currently have their own versions of the network.

Criticism and evaluation

The History Channel received the nickname "the Hitler Channel" for its extensive coverage of World War II, though much military-themed programming has now been shifted to its sister network, the Military History Channel, and the network's programming now covers a diverse range of topics on history. The U.S.-based network has also been criticized for devoting most of its coverage to US and Western history. Programs have been faulted for bias especially in treatment of non-Western societies and customs. The network has also received criticism for emphasizing the history of relatively recent times, as opposed to ancient or medieval eras.
   There have been complaints of misleading information in some programs; a special on the history of torture may have provided a misleading account of Perillos of Athens and his torture device, the Brazen Bull. Fact-checking has also been faulted; in American Vesuvius incorrect information may have been given on temperature scales. In addition, the History Channel has been reproved for giving too much attention to arguably non-historical subjects, such as UFOs. However, the network's Ice Road Truckers series garnered record ratings despite its debatably non-historical nature.
   The network has won praise from professional historians such as Stanley Kutner for its willingness to examine the biases of its own programming – in particular, a series on the John F. Kennedy assassination. Programs such as Modern Marvels have been praised for their presentation of detailed information in an entertaining format.
   The History Channel is sometimes humorously and critically referred to as "The Armageddon Channel" for its seeming focus on the apocalypse (In the series "Decoding The Past" alone, there are four episodes about it.). "The Lost Book Of Nostradamus" is the most recent special focusing on such material.

List of shows

Program Type Year Series Premiere Series Finale Hosted or Narrated by Notes
American Eats Series 2006 Thursday, June 29, 2006 Thursday, November 23, 2006 Mason Adams & Jeremy Schwartz
Ancient Discoveries Series 2003 Sunday, December 21, 2003 Present
Ancient Mysteries Series 1996 1996 ??? 1996 ??? Leonard Nimoy Originally aired on the A&E Network
Ax Men Series 2008 Sunday, March 9, 2008 unknown Thom Beers
Back to the Blueprint Series 2005 2005 ??? unknown
Band of Bloggers
Battle 360° Series 2008 Friday, February 29, 2008 Present Eric Amdahl
Battlefield Detectives Series 2003 Saturday, October 4, 2003 Thursday, February 9, 2006
Boneyard Series unknown unknown unknown
Boys' Toys Series unknown unknown unknown
Breaking Vegas Series 2004 2004 ??? unknown
Cities of the Underworld Series 2006 Thursday, March 02, 2006 Present Eric Geller & Don Wildman
Civil War Combat Series 2005 2005 ??? unknown
Civil War Journal Series unknown unknown unknown
Color of War Series unknown unknown unknown Peter Coyote
Command Decisions Series 2004 2004 ??? unknown
Conflict Series 1956 Tuesday, September 18, 1956 Tuesday, September 3, 1957 Originally aired on ABC
Conquerors, The Series 2005 2005 ??? unknown
Conquest Series 2002 2002 ??? 2003 ??? Peter Woodward
Cole Conspiracy, The Special 2005 2005 ??? Not Applicable
Conspiracy? Series 2004 2004 ??? unknown Tom Kane
Declassified Series 2004 Tuesday, November 9, 2004 Thursday, March 30, 2006 John J. Flynn
Decisive Battles Series 2004 2004 ??? 2004 ??? Matthew Settle
Decoding the Past Series 2003 2003 ??? unknown
Deep Sea Detectives Series 2003 2003 ??? 2006 ??? John Chatterton & Richie Kohler
Digging for the Truth Series 2005 Monday, January 24, 2005 Present Josh Bernstein (S 1-3) & Hunter Ellis (S 4)
Disasters of the Century Series unknown unknown unknown
Dogfights Series 2005 Friday, September 16, 2005 Present Phil Crowley
Double 'F' Series 2006 Friday, May 12, 2006 Present unknown airs in India
Engineering an Empire Series 2005 Monday, September 5, 2005 Monday, January 8, 2007 Peter Weller
Shockwave (TV Series) Series 2007 Tuesday, November 13, 2007 Present
UFO Hunters (The History Channel) Series 2008 Wednesday, January 30, 2008 Present Bill Birnes, Pat Uskert, Ted Acworth, Jeff Tomlinson

Regular series

  • Extreme History with Roger Daltry (2003)
  • (2006)
  • Failure Is Not an Option (2003)
  • Fact To Film (2006)
  • Fear Files (2006)
  • Full Throttle (2004–2005)
  • The Great Ships
  • Gangland (2007)
  • Great Crimes and Trials
  • Guts + Bolts (2003-2004)
  • Haunted History (1999)
  • Heavy Metal (TV series) (2000-2004, initially called Battle Stations.)
  • Hidden House History (2006)
  • History IQ (2000)
  • History's Lost & Found (1999)
  • History's Mysteries (1999–date)
  • History Rocks (2007)
  • History's Turning Points
  • History vs. Hollywood
  • Human Weapon (2007)
  • Ice Road Truckers (2007)
  • Incredible but True? (2001)
  • In Search of History (1996-2000)
  • Investigating History (2003–date)
  • Jumbo Movies (2006)
  • Last Stand Of The 300 (2007)
  • Lost Worlds (2006)
  • Mail Call (2002–date)
  • Man, Moment, Machine (2005–date)
  • Mega Disasters
  • Mega Movers
  • Modern Marvels (1995–date)
  • Monster Quest (2007)
  • The Most
  • Rats, Bats & Bugs
  • Reel to Real
  • Sahara (2006)
  • Save Our History3
  • Shockwave (TV Series) (2007)
  • Shootout! (2005–date)
  • Spy Web
  • Sworn to Secrecy
  • Tactical to Practical (2003–2004)
  • Tales of the Gun
  • Targeted
  • Tech Effect (2004)
  • The Dark Ages (2007)
  • The Long March (2007)
  • The Lost Evidence
  • The Real West (reruns from A&E TV: 1995–date)
  • The States
  • This Week In History (2000-1)
  • Time Machine (1995-2004)
  • Trains Unlimited (1997-1998)
  • True Action Adventures (1995-7)
  • UFO Files (2005?–date)
  • UFO Hunters (The History Channel) (2008)
  • Weapons At War (renamed Tech Force in 2002: 1995–2002)
  • Wild West Tech (2003–2005)
  • Weird US (television series) (2004–2005)
  • The XY Factor
  • Unforgettables (2006)
  • Zero Hour

    • Specials and mini-series

  • 10 Days that Unexpectedly Changed America (2006)
  • 12 Days That Shocked The World (2007)
  • 1968 With Tom Brokaw (2007)
  • The American Revolution (2006)
  • Ape to Man (2005)
  • Banned from the Bible (2003)*
  • Band of Brothers (2004)
  • Barbarians
  • Ben Franklin (2005)
  • (originally aired in 1999)
  • Comic Book Superheroes Unmasked (2003)
  • Conquest of America (2005)
  • Da Vinci and the Code He Lived By
  • (November 2005)
  • Fabulous Treasures (2006)
  • (2005)
  • (September 11, 2004)
  • The French Revolution (2005)
  • (December 2006)
  • Heroes under Fire
  • The History of Sex (1999)
  • The Holy Grail (2005)
  • History's Greatest Mysteries (2005)
  • To The Best of My Ability
  • Hitler's Women (2001)
  • Hitler's Henchmen (1996)
  • (2000)
  • How The Earth Was Made (2007)
  • (2003)
  • (1998)
  • Life After People (2008)
  • Lincoln (2006)
  • The Lincoln Assassination (1995)
  • Mavericks, Miracles & Medicine (2004)
  • Napoleon
  • (February 2007)
  • The Plague (2005)
  • The Presidents (2005)
  • Quest for King Arthur (2004)
  • The Real Scorpion King
  • (2005)
  • (2002)
  • Russia, Land of the Tsars (2003)
  • Secret Societies (show)
  • Sex in World War II
  • Legacy of Star Wars (2007)
  • Star Wars Tech (2007)
  • Sherman's March (2007)
  • The States (2007)
  • Style Icon (2006)
  • The True Story of Alexander the Great
  • The True Story of Hannibal (2003)
  • True Caribbean Pirates (2006)
  • The Universe (TV series) (2007)
  • Warrior Queen Boudica
  • We Can Make You Talk (2004)
  • Where Did It Come From? (2006)
  • Who Wrote the Bible
  • The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles

    • Specials

  • Blood Diamonds (2006)
  • How William Shatner Changed the World (2005)
  • (2007)
  • The Last Stand of the 300 (2007)
  • (2007)
  • The St. Valentine's Day Massacre (1998)
  • Life After People (2008)
  • History Of The Joke (2008)

    Syndication

  • In Search of... History Channel Run (Ca. 1998-2003) Original 1976-1982.
  • The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones and related historical documentaries

    Video games

  • The History Channel: Great Battles of Rome
  • The History Channel: Civil War The Game
  • The History Channel: ShootOut! The Game
  • The History Channel: Dogfights The Game

  • DVD (not including regular programs availiable through the network's online store)

  • The Unknown Hitler DVD collection, including Hitler and the Occult
  • Dogfight: Season 1 DVD set Further Information

    Get more info on 'History Channel'.


    External Link Exchanges

    Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

      <a href="http://the_history_channel.totallyexplained.com">The History Channel Totally Explained</a>

    Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
       As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.



    • Copyright © 2007-8 totallyexplained.com | Licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License | Site Map
    This article contains text from the Wikipedia article The History Channel (History) and is released under the GFDL | RSS Version