CLASSIC: How Louisiana Almost Became a Hippo Ranching Hub
Ridiculous History
iHeartPodcasts
4.2 • 4.7K Ratings
🗓️ 6 January 2026
⏱️ 44 minutes
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Summary
Nowadays beef, chicken and pork are the most common meats in the US -- but, not so long ago, that could have all changed. Join the guys as they travel back to the early 1900s, when Louisiana congressman Robert Broussard proposed an unorthodox solution to the nation's crippling meat shortage: the introduction of African Hippopotamuses to Gulf Coast swamplands. What convinced Broussard that the world's deadliest land mammal could become America's next culinary craze? Tune in to find out.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | fellow ridiculous historians, we're returning, and it's 2026. |
| 0:05.2 | Happy New Year. |
| 0:06.5 | It's the future, man. |
| 0:07.5 | It's the year Blade Runner was set, I think. |
| 0:09.6 | No, maybe not. |
| 0:10.4 | But it's, it's, you know, relative. |
| 0:12.7 | It's, you know, it's strange because just a few days into 2026, I was already thinking, |
| 0:19.5 | what a year it's been. You know, it really, thinking, what a year it's been, you know? |
| 0:22.8 | It really, really has been a year, for sure. |
| 0:26.4 | Another one. |
| 0:26.9 | Also, to jump in here real quick, Blade Runner was set in 2019. |
| 0:31.2 | Dang it. |
| 0:31.9 | Oh, yeah. |
| 0:32.5 | We are past Blade Runner. |
| 0:33.7 | We're past the Jetsons. |
| 0:35.1 | We're boldly going into the future. |
| 0:38.2 | And we still don't have widespread flying cars. |
| 0:42.9 | The gear and the sprocket are still the highest forms of technology that exist. |
| 0:47.6 | Right. |
| 0:48.0 | In this episode, though, we're returning to a classic story about a time when Louisiana was different, |
| 0:57.7 | when people were thinking ahead through their troubled present and saying, |
| 1:04.7 | perhaps we could build a better future with the hippopotamus. |
... |
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