Mayhem: The 1970s You Never Knew, Episode 1

The Preamble

Sharon McMahon

Education, History

4.9 • 15.3K Ratings

🗓️ 6 April 2026

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

As the decade devolved into war at home and abroad, Apollo 13 flew high above Earth with the hope of landing safely on the surface of the moon. But then, disaster struck, and time was on no one’s side. Meanwhile, thousands of miles below the Apollo 13 spacecraft, a nationwide uprising among college students ended in disaster at Kent State and Jackson State Universities. With special guest Apollo 13 astronaut Fred Haise.

Thank you to the Kent State Shootings Oral History Project. Kent State University Libraries. Special Collections and Archives.

Transcript

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0:00.0	We lost O2 Tank 2 pressure.
0:05.5	Okay.
0:06.2	We've had a problem here.
0:08.3	This is Houston.
0:09.2	Say again, please.
0:10.8	Oh, Houston.
0:11.3	We've had a problem.
0:14.3	Hello, friends.
0:15.2	Welcome.
0:16.0	Welcome to our new series where we are set to explore a bit more than shag carpet, smiley face pins, and
0:23.6	bell bottoms. We're going to look at what was happening politically and socially in this decade.
0:29.3	That brought so many advancements, setbacks, and controversies. Writer Tom Wolfe called the 70s
0:36.9	the me decade to point out the turn American society
0:41.0	was taking from the more communal, countercultural nature of the 60s to the individualism of
0:48.0	the 70s.
0:49.6	The baby boom was over.
0:52.9	And Gen X, the last generation to experience childhood without the internet, was born.
1:00.5	Historians sometimes refer to the 1970s as the pivot of change. If I toss out a few examples
1:06.6	like Watergate, Vietnam, Atari, Roe v. Wade, Kent State, Star Wars. And the kidnapping of
1:14.7	Patty Hurst, it's easy to see how what happened in the 1970s is still impacting us today. So
1:22.9	stay tuned as we take you through all of that and more with some fun facts sprinkled throughout.
1:30.3	So let's peace out and dive in.
	...

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