History in the Dark

Joshua (born: ), better known online as History in the Dark or 'Darkness the Curse', is a YouTuber from Pennsylvania. With a passion for untold and unique stories, he makes videos covering obscure and interesting history with a large focus on all sorts of vehicles. 
He owns three other YouTube channels: Prehistory in the Dark, which focusses on dinosaur-related topics, Darkness the Curse, where he uploads videos of him playing games or talking about them, and Museum Girls, a web series focused on sentient vehicles.
== Early Life ==
Joshua was born on July 23, 1990 in West Virginia. During his childhood, he got into Thomas & Friends and other railway videos which sparked an interest in real life trains. He also liked to play video games, such as Pokémon, Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog. 
Not much else is known about Joshua's early life, other than that he became a single dad who tries hard to protect his kid against prying internet eyes and that he moved to Pennsylvania.
He lived on with his life until he decided to create the Darkness the Curse YouTube channel in 2012, after which he created History in the Dark in 2019 and Prehistory in the Dark in 2021 as dinosaur videos didn't really fit on HitD.
== YouTube & Video making ==
=== Early on ===
The first videos that were put on the HitD channel were related to the second World War. This didn't last long as after only four videos a yearlong hiatus was taken during which Joshua must have reignited his passion for railways as most of the following videos were mostly about trains. This also started his long running "Top 5 of the WORST trains ever" series, though at the time it did not have an intro, and his love-hate relationship with British Rail, who managed to somehow sneak at least one locomotive onto every list he made. 
The content stayed train-focused, though an occasional airplane or boat video would pop up, which would set the tone for his content later on. 
=== Modern day ===
Nowadays the content remains very train-focused, though considerable effort has been put into creating videos that are not about locomotives or about any vehicles at all. The "Top 5 of the WORST trains ever" list has reached over 20 episodes and two additional top 5 lists, about the best and weirdest successful trains, are doing quite well. 
Other vehicles have had top 5 videos made about them too, though none have received a part two.
The relation with British Rail has devolved into a hopeless mess where the appearance of a BR locomotive is met with merely some disappointed acceptance. Luckily, viewers need not to fear their entertainment value because some avid Dutch fans of History in the Dark have taken it on themselves to get as much Dutch rolling stock into the top 5 lists as possible, much to Darkness' displeasure.
As of recently, Joshua has also created a web series named Museum Girls.
== Running Gag ==
As mentioned above, he has a love-hate relationship with British Rail. Although this technically didn't start until the SR Leader class appeared in the first "Top 5 of the WORST trains ever" video, leading to the quote above. Each time they appear in one of the "Top 5" videos, he has a different reaction each time and, as of the later videos, a remix of the "Diseasel" theme from Thomas the Tank Engine plays over the part, referencing the fact that British Rail made a lot of really bad diesels during the so-called "Modernization Plan". In fact, one of his Patreon tiers was called "British Rail Critics".
== Merchandise ==
He made a couple of merchandise which are the logo which has the same name as his profile picture, the other brand he made was a quote from Alfred E. Pearlman as he was voicing him in his videos, "I WANT. THAT. STEAM. ENGINE", Another one was with the Union Pacific Big Boy with the title "Big Chungus", another brand was "We would like all of them" with the British Rail Class 17 Diesel Paxman Locomotive, and another brand with the CHAD British Rail with the BR logo covering The 1988 (Russian (Soviet) Treasure Island character "Dr. Livesey".
Category:Educational YouTubers
Category:American YouTubers
Category:Users who joined in 2019
Category:Commentary YouTubers
Category:Gaming YouTubers
Category:Film YouTubers
Category:Review YouTubers