Did you know that Abraham Lincoln’s best friend was a slave owner? Anyone familiar with the Civil War shouldn’t be shocked, but the particulars might be unfamiliar. The History Channel series “10 Things You Don’t Know About” is full of things like that. Benjamin Franklin belonged to a sex club? Anyone who ever read about that most unconventional of Founding Fathers knows that, but “10 Things” banks on a public doesn’t know much. The caffeinated host, Columbia University’s David Eisenbach, moves the fast-paced episodes from fact to factoid. John F. Kennedy was a secret courier in Nazi Germany? OK, he carried one message from the U.S. ambassador in Berlin to his father, Joseph Kennedy, America’s representative in London. It’s not James Bond, but it is an interesting footnote in the adventurous life of a man who would become legendary.
“10 Things You Don’t Know About” is out on DVD.
