This is an I-Heart podcast.

Guaranteed Human.

This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories.

Up next, we have our regular contributor, Ashley Lubinsky. Ashley is the former

co-host of Discovery Channel's Master of Arms, and she's also the co-founder of the University of

Wyoming College of Law's Firearms Research Center. Here's Ashley. When we speak about the British

invasion, pretty much everyone is referring to the cultural

phenomenon when British rock stars, especially the Beatles, came to America in the 1960s,

which of course sparked fear into the homes of American parents everywhere.

And now this has happened again. Last Sunday, on our show, New York, the Beatles played to the greatest TV audience

that's ever been assembled in the history of American TV.

Now, tonight here in Miami Beach,

again the Beatles face our record-busting audience.

Ladies and gentlemen, here are four of the nice

challenges we've ever had on our stage.

The Beasles, bring them on.

But how about a century earlier in the 1860s?

In 1868, there was another British invasion that created outright hysteria in the middle class,

thanks of course to the media.

Lydia Thompson and her British blondes brought a popular performance art to the United States back in 1868.

And surprisingly it actually didn't exist in the US before that, and that was the art of burlesque.

Now one thing that should be noted is that this idea of burlesque or belly dancing or any form of kind of

...