The biggest scandals to ever hit the History Channel

Long ago, when the internet was young and facts still had meaning, there was a television network known as the History Channel. It featured shows about history. You know, past events that actually happened in real life? The channel specialized in documentaries about wide-ranging subjects, like World War II and the aftermath of World War II. It had adequate ratings and a solid audience of dads. But then something happened (extraterrestrial intervention?), and the History Channel began to pivot away from strictly historical programming. Instead, we were presented with a slew of reality shows about pawn shops, swamp people, and truckers driving on icy roads, plus a whole bunch of incoherent "documentary" series about how aliens built the pyramids (they didn't) and how Bigfoot was finally captured by scientists (he wasn't).

This baffling switch from history to nonsense has been a huge ratings boost for the channel, which has since rebranded from "The History Channel" to the sleeker, increasingly inaccurate name of "History." However, it has also landed the former History Channel in a whole lot of hot water. Here are some of the biggest scandals to hit the History Channel, and historical inaccuracy is just the beginning.

Ancient Aliens might hold the dubious crown of the History Channel's least historical show. It's well known for featuring men with wild haircuts spouting conspiracy theories about aliens and pyramids, but the show has also made its way onto Southern Poverty Law Center's Hatewatch blog for showcasing so many white supremacist theories.

Yeah, Ancient Aliens might seem like a bit of silly, conspiratorial fun at first. But the idea that ancient African, Asian, and Native American architectural marvels could have only been built by some kind of mysterious, alien entity isn't a new one. Hatewatch reminds us that this concept was actually used as one of Andrew Jackson's justifications for the Indian Removal Act of 1830. Jackson insisted that Native Americans could not possibly have built all those big, cool, ancient mounds scattered throughout North America, and therefore they had murdered the magical super-race that came before them, and therefore the Trail of Tears was totally okay and scientifically sound.

In fact, quite a lot of white supremacist literature over the years has suggested that non-European civilizations didn't really build any wonders of the past, and that ancient Aryans are somehow secretly responsible. Switch out Aryans for aliens and you can see why some people find the show so distasteful. And, as Hyperallergic points out, we already know how the pyramids were built (ramps). Insisting on aliens at this point is more than a little willfully ignorant.

Swamp People rounds out the chaotic triumvirate of the History Channel's most inexplicable reality shows, alongside Ice Road Truckers and Pawn Stars. Instead of trucking or pawning, though, Swamp People follows the lives of alligator hunters living in Louisiana. Of course, alligators seem to be the least of the cast's worries. Sure, some of the alligator violence is exaggerated for dramatic effect, but according to TMZ, Swamp People stars R.J. Molinere and Jay Paul Molinere really were arrested for attacking a man with a beer bottle. TMZ also reported that Trapper Joe was arrested for burning his girlfriend with a lit cigarette and then punching her in the chest. Screenrant detailed a time that Roger Rivers Jr. got in trouble with the law for selling illegal meat.

The swamp people of Swamp People proved so troublesome, in fact, that the History Channel decided to just replace them. Starcasm reports that most of the cast was suddenly fired before season seven of the popular reality show, shocking fans and sending angry cast members into social media rants. The cast has denied rumors that they asked for more money, and they were vocally displeased with the network's abrupt, unexplained decision. Producers held firm, though, and remaining fans just had to deal with a whole new bunch of (hopefully less violent) swamp people.

If the History Channel isn't yelling about aliens or pawn shops, there's a very good chance they're following up on a debunked conspiracy theory about Hitler. The channel was jokingly known as the "Hitler Channel" in the '90s, after all, and they haven't forgotten their roots. According to Variety, the show Hunting Hitler upset plenty of people by trivializing Hitler and giving credence to weird conspiracy theories about his escape to Argentina. The program was framed like any other thrilling cold case reality show, without much reverence for the fact that Hitler is a little less whimsical than Bigfoot. Even more upsetting is the fact that the History Channel promised anonymity to one of their key sources, and then clearly broadcast his entire face (an unpixelated version of the shot above) to more than 180 countries.

As the New York Daily News reports, the grandson of a Nazi war criminal agreed to appear on the program with the understanding that his face would be pixelated to protect him from the kind of people who are jazzed about watching Hunting Hitler. They do blur his face out — except for one shot where it is clearly visible, an obvious editing error that could have had serious consequences for someone who really doesn't want to broadcast that his grandfather was a Nazi.

American Pickers is one of History's many reality shows, and it's totally about history because … because … sometimes they find stuff that's from history? Anyway, the show follows a couple of guys while they travel around the country and sift through piles of other people's junk in the hopes of finding treasure. The show's producers have occasionally been accused of planting the good stuff in those piles of junk, but until someone actually catches that on a cell phone camera, we can't really substantiate those kinds of rumors.

What we can say, though, is that at least one of the show's two stars have been caught doing less-than-upstanding stuff. According to a local television station, Frank Fritz recently pled guilty to charges of "operating while intoxicated," which is bad enough, but his charges also included driving the wrong way on the interstate.

Fritz was under the influence of Xanax and alcohol. According to the police report, his vehicle was "weaving about the roadway crossing the fog line and center markers multiple times," so it's not like Fritz was just borderline not okay to drive — he was probably borderline not okay to walk. Still, Fritz isn't the first reality star to get into trouble for that kind of behavior, and at least he can take comfort knowing that an OWI is pretty tame compared to what the Swamp People get into.

It's one of the world's most ridiculous conspiracy theories: the government is filling the air with chemicals so that they can mind-control everyone on planet Earth, or make everyone sick, or control the weather or something. Just pick your favorite. Most people intuitively understand the sheer stupidity of this idea, because if it was actually true that the government was filling the air with chemicals in a bid to mind-control everyone, they appear to be really, really bad at it. Have you noticed an unusually large number of people stumbling around in our streets muttering things like, "Must manipulate futures prices?" Neither have we.

Anyway, the whole idea is so patently stupid that most people don't even think about it, except History, who evidently felt like it was worth an entire show. But according to Contrail Science (and now everyone who believes this stuff is shouting, "You can't trust Contrail Science because they are totally in on it!") the History special basically just repeated the whole stupid conspiracy theory and provided a platform to the whack-jobs who actually believe it, thus making the theory seem credible … which is just such an awesome thing to do in an era where half the population already doesn't trust science. Thanks, History, for making it someone else's job to remind everyone that you can't trust a conspiracy nut, even one who gets to be on the History Channel.

The reality competition Alone is totally about history, because everything you'll see in any given episode was shot in the historical timeframe of six months ago.

This particular reality show tries to one-up Survivor by abandoning its contestants in the middle of nowhere and then following their journey to survive alone in the wilderness. Happily, none of these people are naked, because another truly awful reality show already did that.

The really stupid thing about all of this is that no matter how alone the series makes it look like these people are, of course they're not really alone. What about all the camera people, who are literally everywhere? 

According to E-Celebrity, there's also the fact that contestants aren't being forced to survive miles from civilization, which is what the showrunners want you to believe. No, in many cases the contestants are actually within an hour's walk of the nearest town, and sometimes they're in a place where there is a network of trails, which definitely seems to suggest that they're just not really that isolated. After all, the camera people need to be close to a town so they can charge their cell phones and pick up a burger on their lunch breaks.

When you think of lumberjacks, you usually think of burly dudes in plaid, chopping down trees, putting "wipe your butt on a spotted owl" stickers on their trucks, and maybe pressing wildflowers like in that Monty Python song. You don't typically think of them pulling stuff out of the water, because that's not where trees usually are.

According to NPR, though, there was a time when lumberjacks used to put felled trees on rafts and float them down the river, and every now and then the trees would fall off the raft and sink to the bottom. And they don't rot down there, either — if the water is cold, the trees will stay preserved at the bottom for a long time, and can eventually be salvaged.

The problem is, salvaging sunken trees is not legal in the state of Washington. That didn't stop Ax Man star Jimmy Smith from fishing those logs out of the river on national freaking television, which was either ridiculously arrogant or ridiculously stupid. Smith had an entirely altruistic reason for his actions, though: to protect people participating in water sports on the river, in case they're using like an 11-foot-long oar or something and they accidentally get it stuck on a log. "If I can save on kid or one boater, I think it's worth it," Smith said. And we're sure that the money he got for those logs didn't factor into it at all.

Pawn Stars fan favorite Austin Lee Russell is better known by his stage name, Chumlee. He's portrayed as the comic foil at the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop, where he's often the butt of jokes. Occasionally he'll impress his fellow pawn shop workers with his talent at the game of pinball. More frequently, he'll deliver his lines in a way that lets you know the money is only barely keeping him on the show. In non-televised reality, though, Chumlee's life is somewhat less whimsical and comedic.

As USA Today reports, police carried out a search of his house while following up on sexual assault allegations in 2016. They did not find the evidence to convict Chumlee of sexual assault, but they did find drugs in his regrettably named "Chum Chum" room, including marijuana and meth, as well as numerous illegal firearms, and quite a few items usually found with people who package and sell narcotics. According to the New York Daily News, however, the reality star was able to avoid jail time with a plea deal despite being charged with quite a few felonies.

When your livelihood depends on your reputation as a purveyor of high-quality work, and your work is suddenly on display to an enormous television audience, it seems like it would be in your best interests to make sure you keep producing high-quality work. Sure, you might feel like your fame has put you on the top of the world and it will never end, but that's how Spencer Pratt felt, too. Who is Spencer Pratt, you ask? Exactly.

So our advice to reality stars is this: Do high-quality work. According to the Vegas Tourist, though, at least one reality star has failed to follow that piece of advice.

Rick Dale from American Restoration was called out in 2012 for restoring a 1950s-style jukebox but failing to actually repair the thing. He kept the jukebox for two months, did a great job making it look good, but when the owner got it back he discovered that it wasn't in working order, even though restoring it to working order was part of the original agreement. Now, it's great to have a sharp-looking, jukebox but what you really want is a sharp-looking jukebox that plays music, and you especially want that if you paid someone $4,000 to make it look sharp and play music. But not only did Dale reportedly fail to acknowledge that the work wasn't complete, he also cashed the check and stopped returning his customer's phone calls. How professional.

Shows about buried/sunken treasure and unsolved historical mysteries tend to do well for History, but as anyone who was inspired by Indiana Jones to become an archaeologist can tell you, real treasure hunting is super-boring. So to get people to actually tune in to a show about buried/sunken treasure, you kind of need to sensationalize, embellish, and just make things up as you go along. The trouble is, most people believe reality television will contain some actual reality, and the accuracy of most treasure hunting shows is questionable at best.

The History show Pirate Treasure of the Knights Templar was a short-lived series starring forensic geologist Scott Wolter and treasure hunter Barry Clifford. Their team was searching sunken wrecks off the coast of Madagascar that they believed were connected to the Portuguese Templars.

The show was called out for unprofessionalism by UNESCO, which accused them of treating the research and recovery of the vessels in "an unscientific manner, without the necessary precautions and leading to damage to the sites as well as making it more difficult to understand the historic background of the sites." In response, Wolter basically claimed that UNESCO was just jealous. "UNESCO hates Barry Clifford simply because he is the most successful pirate ship discoverer in history," he wrote on his blog. Oh, okay, that must be it. Still, the show only lasted one season, so he clearly isn't that successful of a discoverer.

You will be shocked to hear that History's Vikings is a dramatization, not a documentary.

Now in History's defense, Vikings is based on the old Norse sagas, which National Geographic says were written down in the 13th century but were passed down verbally for centuries before that. So the "facts" that are recorded in the Norse sagas probably aren't really facts — they've likely been embellished, altered, or even completely made up. Historians don't really even agree on whether the show's central character, Ragnar Lothbrok, even existed.

One of the biggest liberties showrunners took was with the relationship between Ragnar and Rollo. In real life (assuming Ragnar existed, obviously), the two men were not only not brothers, it's unlikely they ever even met. And the show's timeline is all off, too — we see our favorite marauders raiding a monastery in Season 1, and then attacking Paris in Season 3, which are two events that happened 120 years apart. Also, the Vikings did wear helmets (though not horned helmets like you're probably picturing), Christians didn't crucify heathens (crucifixion was purely a Jesus thing), the Vikings almost never fought pitched battles (they preferred raids), and as much as we love the shield maidens, there probably weren't that many of them, if they existed at all. Sadly, that doesn't leave a whole lot of room for the truth.