1787: four years after the Revolutionary War, America was in crisis thanks to widespread piracy, violent rebellions, interstate rivalries, and a post-war government too weak to do anything about any of them. So to rescue the young nation, 55 delegates from across the 13 states assembled to write The Constitution.

It was a genius document built on innovative concepts like separate powers and checks and balances, that united the states under a new common government with a President, Congress, and Supreme Court.

At least, that’s the story we’ve all heard. But it’s not really true. Sure, that is the Constitution we got. But the Constitution — and America — almost looked completely different.

Did you know America almost had three presidents? Or that they were almost directly elected by the people? Or that the Supreme Court was an accident? Or that, for most of the Constitutional Convention, the delegates disagreed about whether separate powers and checks and balances were even good ideas in the first place?

We've forgotten the history of how America's founding document was really made. So, join us on a journey through this forgotten history, through bizarre and fascinating visions of an America with three Presidents, no Supreme Court, and an all-powerful Congress, through the debates and disagreements that made America what it is today and explore The America That Almost Was.

The first episode, on the Presidency, is out now. You can watch a teaser now on YouTube, but the full episode is available exclusively on Nebula: the streaming service built by and for creators like us that runs on your subscriptions, instead of ad dollars from big corporations.

That’s right. Our new series is a Nebula Original. That means it’s produced with Nebula’s help, and it’s only available there, alongside tons of other Originals: longer, higher budget, innovative projects made possible by the pay-walled business model of Nebula. The platform is designed to be a better home to creators' best work, removing the click-chasing incentives of an ad-supported video platform and replacing them with the incentives to make projects so good that people stay subscribed month-to-month.

And paywall is kind of a strong term, because Nebula is a screaming good deal. When you use our link, spectacles.link/nebula you'll get a whole 50% off a Nebula subscription, which brings the cost down to just $30 for the entire year. There are other streaming services that are approaching that per month. And if you do sign up, thank you, because you're helping to both support Spectacles and build a better creative ecosystem for independent digital creators.