History Channel
History is an American pay television network and the flagship channel of A+E Global Media, a joint venture between Hearst Communications and the Disney Entertainment Television division of the Walt Disney Company's Disney Entertainment segment.
The network was originally focused on history-based, social/science documentaries as well as the news. During the 2000s, the History Channel pivoted into reality television programming and ancient alien conspiracy hypotheses. In addition to this change in format, the network has been criticized by many scientists, historians, and skeptics for broadcasting pseudo-documentaries and pseudoscientific, unsubstantiated, sensational investigative programming.
, the History Channel is available to approximately 63,000,000 pay television households in the United States-down from its 2011 peak of 99,000,000 households. International localized versions of the History Channel are available, in various forms, in India, Canada, Europe, Australia, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Latin America.
History
Twentieth century
The company indicated that plans for a history channel were in the works in 1993, it purchased the Lou Reda Productions documentary library and long-term rights for the Hearst Entertainment documentaries archive. The History Channel was launched on January 1, 1995, initially owned by A&E Television Networks. Its UK counterpart in a partnership with British Sky Broadcasting, followed on November 1, 1995. Its original format focused entirely on historical series and specials.In the 1990s, the channel was known for the amount of airtime it gave to World War II documentaries. In 1997, Salon.coms Mark Schone wrote in an article called "All Hitler, all the time" that the History Channel "airs as many as 40 hours of World War II programming weekly, and sometimes as many as 12 hours in a single day". Since then, much of its military-themed programming has been shifted to its sister network Military History.
A&E Networks considered the History Channel to be the driver in international expansion due to a lack of international rights to A&E international co-productions. As expected, the History Channel led A&E's overseas expansion in Brazil with TVA, the Nordic and Baltic regions with Modern Times Group, and in Canada.
The History Channel expanded in 1998 into tours of US landmarks with Mayflower Tours having an affiliated website, History Channel Traveler, and a planned quarterly magazine. While in October, the History Channel and MSG Network teamed up to produce several short-form sports history programs. A&E launched History International as a spin-off from the History Channel in November 1998, which was renamed H2 in 2011.
Twenty-first century
On February 16, 2008, a new logo was launched on the U.S. network as part of a rebranding effort. While the trademark "H" was kept, the triangle shape on the left acts as a play button for animation and flyouts during commercials and shows. On March 20, 2008, as part of that same rebranding effort, the History Channel dropped "The" and "Channel" from its name to become simply "History".In 2012, half of A&E would be purchased by the Walt Disney Company and the other half by Hearst Communications, also putting History under their joint ownership.
In 2015, the channel would undergo another rebranding, this time by Joseph Kiely. The slogan of this rebranding was "Make Your Mark.” The logo was slightly changed, but retained the golden letter 'H' that had become synonymous with the channel.
The "History 100" documentary initiative was announced in March 2018 that would produce 100 documentaries covering major events and notable figures from last 100 years.
On December 7, 2021, History received a major rebrand for the first time since February 16, 2008. The logo still kept the golden letter 'H' that had been used since its launch in 1995.
H2
H2 was an American specialty television channel that was owned by A&E Networks, available on multi-channel television providers in the United States. It was launched on November 16, 1998 as History International, a spin-off of the History Channel that focused on international history. On launch, History International occasionally featured shows in languages other than English, such as French or Spanish for use with the National Cable & Telecommunications Association's Cable in the Classroom initiative. By 2010, this was reduced to an hour-long Spanish language program on weekday mornings titled El Canal de Historia.On September 26, 2011, the network was rebranded as H2, with its programming being refocused to feature documentary content from the main History channel prior to its shift towards more reality programming, along with original programs, as well as exclusive new episodes of the former History series The Universe, Ancient Aliens and Modern Marvels, in addition to international-focused programming. H2 did not have plans to add reality series as its sister channel has done. Newer documentaries more recently seen on History migrated to the network as part of the rebrand, which would rotate with the documentaries from History International that primarily span from the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s.
In August 2014, A&E Networks acquired a 10% stake in Vice Media, and on November 3, 2015, A&E announced that H2 would be "replaced" by Viceland, a new lifestyle-focused network programmed by Vice Media. H2 signed off on February 29, 2016 at 6:00 a.m. ET, being replaced by pre-launch programming for Viceland.
, H2 was available to 70.1 million households in the United States.
Programming
Programming on the History Channel has covered a wide range of historical periods and topics, while similar themed topics are often organized into themed weeks or daily marathons. Subjects include warfare, inventions, aviation, mechanical and civil engineering, technology, science, nature, artists, composers, authors, mythical creatures, monsters, unidentified flying objects, conspiracy theories, aliens, religious beliefs, disaster scenarios, apocalyptic "after man" scenarios, survival scenarios, alternate history, dinosaurs, doomsday, organized crime, secret societies, and 2012 superstitions. Occasionally, some programs compare contemporary culture and technology with that of the past.The channel's programming would expand into scripted dramas with the premiere Vikings in 2013.
Criticism and evaluations
Initially, the network received mixed reviews. In an article from the American Historical Association released about a year into the channel's lifespan, the channel's historical consultant Libby Haight O' Connell noted that professional historians have been enlisted to work on the channel's programs and many letters have come in from viewers both pointing out historical errors and opening up discussion with the channel creators about the events portrayed in the channel's programs.However, in recent years the network has been criticized for having a bias towards US history. Another former sister network, History International, more extensively covered history outside the US until 2011, when it was re-branded as H2 and started broadcasting more material that had to do with US history.
Stanley Kutner criticized the network for the series The Men Who Killed Kennedy in 2003. Kutner was one of three historians commissioned to review the documentary, which the channel disavowed and never aired again. Programs such as Modern Marvels have been praised for their presentation of detailed information in an entertaining format.
Some of the network's series, including Ice Road Truckers, Ax Men, and Pawn Stars, garnered increased viewership ratings in the United States, while receiving criticism over the series' nonhistorical nature. US Senator Chuck Grassley is a critic of the channel and its lack of historical or educational programming, showing particular disdain for the latter two programs.
Professor Jeremy Stoddard, in his article published in 2010, raised the concern that the productions of the network presented value-laden perspectives which may mislead audiences, a phenomenon he termed "the History Channel effect". Stoddard also claimed that the History Channel did not contribute to this phenomenon alone, but rather, it was caused by the misperception that documentaries are "objective sources of history".
In 2011, Forbes staffer Alex Knapp wrote, "The History Channel shouldn't run stuff like this 'ancient astronaut' nonsense." Forbes contributor Brad Lockwood criticized the channel's addition of "programs devoted to monsters, aliens, and conspiracies", attributing a perceived intent of boosting ratings to the network's decision to focus on pseudoarchaeology instead of documented facts. Knapp refers readers to the Bad Archaeology website's founder Keith Fitzpatrick-Matthews who comments, "I find it incredible and frightening that a worldwide distributed television channel...can broadcast such rubbish as Ancient Aliens." Archaeologist Kenneth Feder, author of Frauds, Myths, and Mysteries: Science and Pseudoscience in Archaeology, called the channel's hosting the ancient astronaut theory "execrable bullshit".
In his book 2012: It's Not the End of the World, Peter Lemesurier describes the channel's Nostradamus series, in which he was invited to participate, as "largely fiction" and "lurid nonsense". He also lists numerous allusions made in its films to the alleged Mayan "end of the world" and the "rare" galactic alignment that was supposed by John Major Jenkins to accompany it in 2012, while Jenkins himself has described Decoding the Past as "45 minutes of unabashed doomsday hype and the worst kind of inane sensationalism."
In December 2011, Politifact gave the History Channel's claim that the United States Congress stayed open on Christmas Day for most of its first 67 years of existence a "pants on fire" rating, the lowest of its ratings, noting that its own research showed that both the Senate and the House had convened only once in those 67 years on a Christmas Day. It noted that because one in seven Christmases falls on a Sunday, the claim is "ridiculous". The claim had first been broadcast on the History Channel program Christmas Unwrapped – The History of Christmas before being subsequently picked up by the American Civil Liberties Union's website on the "Origins of Christmas" and by the Comedy Central series The Daily Show. Daily Show host Jon Stewart responded the next day by stating it was their fault for trusting the History Channel and satirized a clip from the History Channel about UFOs and Nazis by stating, "The next thing you know we'll all find out the Nazis did not employ alien technology in their quest for world domination."
The History Channel was also singled out in a post for Smithsonian magazine. Science writer Riley Black took issue with the show Ancient Aliens for postulating the "idea that aliens caused the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs." The online magazine Cracked also lampooned the channel for its strange definition of history. Cracked singled out the programs UFO Hunters and Ancient Aliens as being the very definition of non-history by presenting pseudoscience and pseudohistory. In 2015, skeptic Brian Dunning listed it at #2 on a "Top 10 Worst Anti-Science Websites" list.