In May 1992, Johnny Carson stepped down in his role as host of NBC's "The Tonight Show". The scramble for the role as his replacement and subsequent new shows spawned from that scramble changed the landscape of late-night American TV moving forward.
What would have been different if David Letterman had assumed the host role with Carson's departure instead of Jay Leno?
The podcast is enjoying "spring break" before releasing a number of new episodes in the coming months starting next week with a series of listener-suggested topics and new guests to accompany some of them.
In the meantime, here is an episode from our archives that many of our newer listeners (based on download statistics) may never have heard. Originally released on October 10, 2019, this was Episode 22: "No PARCing". It probes an alternate path where Xerox could have been synonymous with "computer" instead of "photocopy".
(Topic suggestion from listener, Joey Gibson)
Vietnamese revolutionary lead Ho Chi Minh is said to have twice approached the United States seeking assistance in gaining independence from France as a colonial power.
How would the course of history have been different if either overture had met a receptive audience?
