Ever wonder how today's technology works? Modern Marvels goes behind the world's most fascinating innovations to see how they came to be.
Parks play an even more important role than simply offering city dwellers a scenic break from the urban landscape. They keep temperatures down and supply much-needed oxygen in congested cities, like Los Angeles and New York.
Espionage has been used for at least the last 4,000 years—and where there are spies, there are gadgets! We focus on the last 100 years of cloak and dagger technology and take a look at the James Bond-type gadgets of the Cold War.
Avalanches, earthquakes & bombings—all mean tragedy unless rescuers respond in a moment's notice. The latest rescue tech: a searchcam that locates buried victims & the Jaws of Life that can extricate a person from a crushed car in seconds.
Trace the evolution of jet-powered aircraft from the beginning, with a special look at test pilots who stake their lives on each new engine and the legendary institutions at the heart of U.S. jet development.
Discover more about this priceless commodity essential to our very survival. It has over 14,000 uses, from de-icing our roads to softening our water.
Dive with the best as we test out scuba diving’s past technology, and explore a future of mechanical gills and other new breakthroughs.
Offshore drilling is to onshore drilling what Ginger Rodgers was to Fred Astaire—she did everything he did except she did it backwards & in high heels. Drilling oil offshore may be one of the most dangerous acts mankind has ever attempted.
Built in less than seven years and considered a herculean task at the time, the Hoover Dam remains an engineering marvel.
Take a tour of those amazing edifices of the national pastime—baseball stadiums! From the sandlots and wooden ballparks of the 1800 and 1900s to the monolithic multipurpose stadiums of today, baseball parks have grown into technological wonders.
Much of NYC's history can be viewed via its bridges—all 18 that connect Manhattan Island to its neighbors. See how these architectural masterpieces have changed destinies, linking some to opportunity, and others to ruin.
A look at the little-known, hugely important, multi-billion-dollar industry of product testing—where wrinkles get ironed out and goods are stripped of marketing and hype to see if they really work.
The idea of floating to earth from great heights dates back centuries, and from the beginning, parachutes combined entertainment with life-saving utility. We'll see how parachute technology has been used in war and made the world safer and more fun.
Emergency room medicine has only been a recognized specialty since 1989—and took almost 2 millennia. Examine what led to the modern ER—from the Byzantine's establishment of the first hospitals around 1050 A.D. to today's telemedicine.
They're fast, they're powerful, and for the last hundred years they've been tantalizing riders with their promise of unparalleled speed and endless adventure.
Well over 2 million years before the evolution of modern man, his primitive ancestors were making tools. Thought to be the one of the keys to human evolution itself, tools permeate nearly every aspect of history.
Throughout history the same builders and engineers that paved man's path out of the caves and into the modern world also caused some of mankind's worst disasters. Revisit notable disasters and their probable causes.
Place your bets and join us for an exciting spin through the history of the casino. We'll go behind the neon lights and free drinks to see how the gaming industry has evolved into a high-tech multi-billion dollar industry.
