Here's a sketch based on an idea I pondered a while ago. My execution could be better, but what can I do.

(OPEN ON: VH1 video opening to “I Love the ‘80s,” altered to read, “I Love the 1820s” and a montage of clips)

ANNOUNCER
From the Missouri Compromise to the invention of the Electromagnet to making your own food, VH1 presents “I Love the 1820s.”

STAND-UP COMEDIAN
I’m your host, a stand-up comedian no one’s ever heard of. Remember where you were when you heard that the whaling ship Essex was rammed and sunk by a sperm whale in the Pacific Ocean?

ANNOUNCER
(over a video re-enactment of a whale ramming a ship) It was November 20, 1820, and the Essex was on the sea, looking for whales. Suddenly, the crew felt the boat shake. For 94 days, the survivors clung to life, turning to cannibalism when they ran out of food.

MANDY MOORE
I think I was getting my nails done when that happened.

HORATIO SANZ
Man, I cried myself to sleep that night. Dude.

STAND-UP COMEDIAN
We all remember hearing the terrible news that Daniel Boone had died at the age of 85.

HORATIO SANZ
Daniel Boone was da man.

MC HAMMER
Daniel Boone. Man, I miss that fellow.

ANNOUNCER
Can you imagine life without a lawnmower? Neither could Edwin Budding of Massachusetts.

STAND-UP COMEDIAN
The lawnmower was originally designed to cut the nap from cotton cloth. I don’t know about you, but *I* could sure use a nap.

MANDY MOORE
I love mowing lawns.

HORATIO SANZ
Lawnmower, man. Wow, lawnmowers. Dude.

ANNOUNCER
And in politics, Congress made the trade of foreign slaves an act of piracy.

MANDY MOORE
Go get ‘em, Congress!

STAND-UP COMEDIAN
That’s all the time we have tonight on VH1’s “I Love the 1820s.” Tune in next week for the accurate calculation of the diameter of the Earth, the life of Euclid, and Rome conquering Spain, on VH1’s “I Love the 3rd Century B.C.!”