Dan and Tom from podcast AdeLOL reveal the hilarious side of South Australia’s history your teachers conveniently skipped. See why history’s better when it’s weird at this year’s History Festival.
Think South Australian history’s boring? Clearly, you haven’t heard about cheesecake marijuana mishaps, ostrich-riding bushrangers, or our very late official peace treaty with Germany.
Lucky for you, Dan Schmidt from the AdeLOL podcast is here to change all that.
From mental health to history laughs
Dan Schmidt didn’t start out as a history nerd. His career began in mental health – but after co-creating the AdeLOL podcast, he quickly realised his knack for storytelling (and comedic timing) deserved its own stage.
“My podcast partner Tom Stewart and I were working together at Headspace, and I realised pretty quickly he could spin a tale like nobody else,” Dan says. “He’s British, knew absolutely nothing about South Australian history, and I had heaps of quirky stories up my sleeve. It was a perfect match.”
AdeLOL launched in 2017 and has had an impressively long run. While Dan and Tom both juggle full-time jobs and family life (three kids each!), AdeLOL remains strictly a passion project – no money, just two mates exploring forgotten, bizarre, and hilarious tales from South Australia’s past.
This isn’t school history lessons – it’s juicy, adults-only gossip best told over beers. But it will teach you something new about your state.
Weed cakes and Commonwealth Games bribes
AdeLOL isn’t just Wikipedia-level history, either. Dan’s storytelling involves genuine historical detective work – digging through old newspapers, chasing down forgotten scandals, even learning how to use microfilm at the State Library.
“There’s a real blank period in SA’s recorded history from the ’60s to the early 2000s – ironically when a lot of really cool stuff happened,” Dan explains. “So you’ve got to get creative.”
One example is the legendary local cheesecake scandal. “A bloke working at a cheesecake shop accidentally sold a marijuana-laced cake to the wrong family,” Dan says. “That was a real goose chase – but totally worth it.”
Then there was Adelaide’s doomed 1990s bid for the Commonwealth Games. “We lost out to Kuala Lumpur partly because we were being investigated for one of the stupidest bribes ever attempted – car parts,” Dan says. “Only in Adelaide.”
Bushrangers, trampolines, and killer camels
South Australia’s history is packed with bizarre characters and forgotten gems – perfect for AdeLOL’s irreverent style.
Dan puts it down to “the combination of being somewhat isolated, progressive in strange ways, and having a community that’s just weirdly supportive of oddball stories – you don’t get that everywhere.”
“We cover everything from ‘The Bird Man of the Coorong’ – a bushranger who rode ostriches – to the local woman taken to court for having sex with her neighbours on a trampoline,” Dan says. “It might not be highbrow history, but it’s definitely memorable.”
Then there’s explorer John Horrocks, who brought the first camels to South Australia – only to be accidentally shot and killed by one named Harry.
Or Olympic hopeful Reg Spiers, who famously mailed himself home from London in a box. Dan remembers plotting to get Reg himself to appear at a live AdeLOL show: “I pointed him out mid-performance, surprising Tom, who had no idea he was there.”
It’s stories like these, Dan says, that remind you Adelaide history isn’t locked away in archives – it’s alive, unexpected, and often sitting right beside you.
Psychics, tsunamis, and the wars that wouldn’t end
Plus, there are historical oddities like SA technically being at war with Germany until 2002. “Yeah, it took [then Premier] Mike Rann to officially end WWII for us,” Dan says. “Better late than never, right?”
Yes, for most of the world the Second World War ended in 1945, but in South Australia the conflict kept going into the new millennium thanks to a long-forgotten piece of legislation.
And did you hear about the clairvoyant tsunami prediction? “In 1976, a psychic house painter claimed Adelaide would be destroyed by a tsunami because homosexuality had been decriminalised,” Dan says.
“Some people were so terrified they even sold their homes. In the end, Premier Don Dunstan famously stood at Glenelg beach and promised to personally hold back the waves – like King Cnut.” Spoiler: No tsunami.
The real reason SA history matters (it’s not what you learned in school)
Sure, these stories are funny and wild – but is history actually important? “Absolutely,” says Dan.
“Understanding history helps us make better decisions today,” Dan says. “It’s cliché, but true. We see what worked, what went spectacularly wrong, and hopefully avoid making those mistakes again.”
Yet despite this importance, Dan points out, South Australian history gets surprisingly little airtime in school classrooms. “We all learn a bit of Australian colonial history,” he says, “but not many people actually know our local history.”
Did you know South Australia’s history makes us a national leader in:
- Women’s voting rights
- LGBTQI+ rights
- Indigenous recognition?
“There’s a rich Indigenous history here that predates European settlement,” Dan says. “It’s crucial we recognise and celebrate these stories – especially given the terrible treatment of First Nations people that’s part of our past and, sadly, continues today.”
One AdeLOL episode highlights the story of Logic (Pinba), an Aboriginal man falsely imprisoned in Yatala Jail. “He escaped and found people along the way who heard his story, sheltered him, and eventually helped him gain his freedom. Stories like Logic’s remind us why highlighting these histories matters.”
SA’s History Festival: bringing history to life
South Australia’s History Festival, supported by the History Trust of South Australia, runs throughout May and offers more than 500 events across the state designed to showcase local stories, communities, and culture.
From self-guided market tours and interactive workshops to quirky performances and fascinating talks, it’s your chance to rediscover your state.
Dan encourages everyone to get involved: “People always come up to us at these events and share amazing stories – sometimes personal, often unwritten,” he says.
“You’ll discover so much about your own community, and it’s a great reminder that history isn’t just dusty old books – it’s stories told by real people. That’s exactly why everyone should get involved.”
History’s never been this entertaining, plus most events are free or super affordable. So grab your mates, choose something weird, and make history fun again.
Ready to jump in? Check out these 10 top History Festival picks:
- Learn to shoot an 1850s musket
- Go underground at Australia’s oldest magic club
- Attend a champagne masterclass in a speakeasy
- Solve an Adelaide Oval whodunnit
- Taste your way through the history of British puddings
- Experience cinema like it’s the 1920s
- Go ghost hunting at the Old Adelaide Gaol
- Learn Ngarrindjeri weaving with Cedric Varcoe
- Take an epic nine-hour tasting tour of regional bakeries
- Attend a poetry slam in a historic butter factory
Catch AdeLOL live
Want to catch Dan and Tom in action as part of SA’s History Festival? AdeLOL hits the Adelaide City Library stage on Friday, 16 May, bringing historical chaos, hilarious tales and audience banter you won’t find anywhere else.
Bookings are free but required so secure your spot here.
Their fresh approach to history hasn’t gone unnoticed. The History Council of SA awarded the AdeLOL duo the Emerging South Australian Historian Award in 2018, and Dan himself won the SA Digital Technologies History Award in 2024.
Check out the full SA History Festival program and snag tickets for other fascinating, funny, and downright odd events here.
For more AdeLOL antics, visit their Facebook page and listen on Spotify.
