The Memory Palace

thememorypalace.us · Group blog · on HN since 2015

Nate DiMeo hosts The Memory Palace, a podcast of short, narrated stories from American and world history.

What HN saysHN commenters recommend it warmly, calling it a favorite podcast and linking episodes on topics such as the wheel, a year without summer, and handwashing.
18HN people shared it
17linked it in comments
1stories submitted
1story points
4 months agolast shared
2015people per year2026

Most-shared posts

  1. 1
    Homepage
    3 people · first shared 2015
  2. 2
    Butterflies
    2 people · first shared 2023
  3. 3
    The wheel
    2 people · first shared 2016
  4. 4
    Episode 33 lost lobsters
    2 people · first shared 2015
  5. 5
    Butterflies
    1 people · 1 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
  6. 6
    No summer
    1 people · first shared 2020
  7. 7
    Safe passage
    1 people · first shared 2021
  8. 8
    Episode 26 citius altius fortius horrendius
    1 people · first shared 2020
  9. 9
    Keyhole
    1 people · first shared 2023
  10. 10
    400000 stars
    1 people · first shared 2022
  11. 11
  12. 12
    Dreamland
    1 people · first shared 2020
  13. 13
    Music to wash hands by
    1 people · first shared 2020
  14. 14
    Episode 4
    1 people · first shared 2018
  15. 15
    No summer
    1 people · first shared 2020

What HN people wrote when they linked it

ortusdux · 2022-09-13
"The Memory Palace", one of my favorite podcasts, does a touching ode to the women behind this operation. https://thememorypalace.us/400000-stars/
jfengel · 2020-12-02
Handwashing became less important than mask wearing, but The Memory Palace did a fantastic episode of 20-second stories for hand washing: https://thememorypalace.us/music-to-wash-hands-by/ He recently named it his Episode of the Year, despite it being only November, because there was nothing going to top it.
jgrantme · 2020-02-24
There's a teriffic episode of 'The Memory Place' podcast about this, that's well worth a listen (10 mins): https://thememorypalace.us/2018/06/no-summer/
readtheplaque · 2018-08-07
There's a great episode of The Memory Palace about this: http://thememorypalace.us/2009/01/episode-4/
brownbat · 2016-07-25
Excellently dramatized by Nate DiMeo in The Memory Palace earlier this year: http://thememorypalace.us/2016/02/the-wheel/ If you want a hundred other brilliant moments from history, beautifully told, that's the podcast.
acjohnson55 · 2016-01-10
There was a fantastic episode on this topic, on the fantastic podcast, Memory Palace: http://thememorypalace.us/2013/10/im-still-alive/
tomkinstinch · 2015-03-15
I get enough tech in my daily life, so I look to podcasts to enrich my life in other dimensions and teach me new things. Here are some of my favorites: * Cooking, food, and molecular gastronomy; Cooking Issues: http://www.heritageradionetwork.org/programs/51-Cooking-Issues * Outdoor adventure; Dirtbag Diaries: http://dirtbagdiaries.com * Music and poetic music breakdown (uniquely well-suited to audio as a medium); Song Exploder: http://songexploder.net * History; the Memory Palace: http://thememorypalace.us * Design; 99% Invisible: http://99percentinvisible.org * Electic subjects: http://loveandradio.org * RadioLab: http://www.radiolab.org I'd love to find a good fiction podcast, with either short form stories or episodic long form arcs in the fashion of old-school radio shows.
surprisetalk · 2023-11-02
I used GPT to add links and short descriptions :) My current listens: • 99% Invisible (https://99percentinvisible.org): Design's unnoticed marvels explored. • Articles of Interest (https://www.radiotopia.fm/podcasts/articles-of-interest): A podcast about clothing, style, and wear. • Conversations with Tyler (https://conversationswithtyler.com): Tyler Cowen's dialogues on economics and culture. • Derek Sivers (https://sive.rs): Musings of a musician turned entrepreneur. • Radiolab (https://www.radiolab.org): A journey through curious scientific and philosophical landscapes. • The Memory Palace (https://thememorypalace.us): History's footnotes brought to life. • Cortex (https://www.relay.fm/cortex/): Two YouTubers discuss productivity and workflow. • What's Your Problem? (https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/whats-your-problem): Problem-solving strategies in business and life. • Software Unscripted (https://twitter.com/sw_unscripted?lang=en): Conversations on the realities of software engineering. Bingeworthy series that are completed or on indefinite hiatus: • S-Town (https://stownpodcast.org/): A deep dive into a quixotic Alabama tale. • The Anthropocene Reviewed (https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/anthropocene-reviewed): John Green reviews facets of the human-centered planet. • On the Metal (https://oxide.computer/podcast/on-the-metal): Tech veterans unpack computing and engineering layers. • Björk: Sonic Symbolism …
grappler · 2019-11-24
I knew I'd heard recently about someone brilliant who had obsessed over bus tickets. Thanks for helping me recall it. A recent episode of Radiolab, dated August 27, 2019, introduced a large audience (including me) to another podcast, The Memory Palace: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/memory-palace With that strong endorsement I began going through the whole back-catalog of The Memory Palace, and Episode 36, dated January 7, 2011, “six scenes from the life of william james sidis, wonderful boy”, talks about Sidis' obsession with bus tickets. Or maybe more precisely, streetcar transfers. http://thememorypalace.us/2011/01/six-scenes-in-the-life-of-william-ja… I think it said he figured out ways to traverse great distances on a single fare by connecting transfers. That kind of graph traversal thinking strikes me as ahead of its time for the age of streetcars, and could plausibly have led to some interesting places.
r00tbeer · 2017-06-11
Here's my playlist. First the good ones that are actively in my queue (in general order of recommendation): - The Memory Palace: http://thememorypalace.us/ (these are stunningly good historical stories) - On the Media: http://www.wnyc.org/shows/otm/ - Reply All: https://gimletmedia.com/reply-all/ (this is the one I expected to see on every list at hackernews, and don't) - The Gist: http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/gist.html - The Daily: https://www.nytimes.com/column/the-daily - 99% Invisible: http://99percentinvisible.org/ - Economist Radio: https://radio.economist.com/ - New Yorker Radio Hour: http://www.wnyc.org/shows/tnyradiohour/ - Planet Money: http://www.npr.org/sections/money/ (not the juggernaut of content they once were) - This American Life: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/ Shorter series (or just defunct or really rarely updated) that I can recommend to this crowd: - Zachtronics Podcast: http://www.zachtronics.com/podcast/ - Revisionist History: http://revisionisthistory.com/ (should be starting a new season soon) - Mystery Show: https://gimletmedia.com/mystery-show/ - A Life Well Wasted: http://alifewellwasted.com/ (great videogamey series) - Containers: https://www.flexport.com/blog/alexis-madrigal-containers-podcast/ - S-Town: https://stownpodcast.org/ Listening at 1.8x for most of these shows forces me to pay attention, and let's me consume more content. The exception is for The Memory Palace which deserves to be heard exactly as…
m4d · 2026-07-11
Anytime Thomas Midgley Jr. pops up, I take the opportunity to re-listen to his episode on the Memory Palace. Wonderful bit of historical biography: https://thememorypalace.us/butterflies/
plusfour · 2023-09-04
Do whales forgive? The Memory Palace has done a moving episode on sperm whales. https://thememorypalace.us/keyhole/ If you're not familiar with the podcast, the episodes are incredibly well written and narrated humanity-focused vignettes.
Symmetry · 2023-03-22
The Memory Palace episode on him was really good: https://thememorypalace.us/butterflies/ But, as a joke, on potential EA cause area would be banning everything Thomas Midgely invented, just to be sure.
ianbicking · 2020-11-22
You all might also enjoy a 10-minute podcast on the Year Without Summer: https://thememorypalace.us/no-summer/
jvm_ · 2020-03-11
"This is the Memory Palace - I'm Nate DiMeo" https://thememorypalace.us/2016/02/the-wheel/
tobych · 2020-01-13
Voices. Music. Emotions. Whimsy. Try this episode of "The Memory Palace": http://thememorypalace.us/2012/12/dreamland/ That's four minutes twenty-five seconds you might find not wasted. And none of the information in it is likely to be useful to you whatsoever. I listen to podcasts while I'm doing the dishes, cleaning the floor, cooking, tidying the house, sewing patches, reseating the heatsink onto a GPU. No need to be driving. Pop songs are usually an incredibly inefficient way to consume information too, but I listen to those a lot. I wonder if you do.
EvanAnderson · 2017-05-22
Others who are into lobster folklore I suspect will enjoy listening to episode 33 of "The Memory Palace" podcast: http://thememorypalace.us/2010/08/episode-33-lost-lobsters/

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