History Unplugged Podcast

The story begins in Sicily, on Friday, March 12th, 1909. Three gunshots thundered in the night, and then a fourth. Two men fled, and investigators soon discovered who they had killed: Giuseppe Petrosino, the legendary American detective whose exploits in New York were celebrated even in Italy. He was part of the “Italian Squad,” a group of immigrant NYPD members who battled increasingly powerful gangsters and crooked politicians in the early 20th century. They were famous for meting out tough justice to criminals who comprised the “Black Hand,” an international extortion ring. Beyond trying to prevent horrific crimes—nighttime bombings in crowded tenements, kidnappings that targeted children at play, gangland shootings that killed innocent bystanders—the Italian Squad commanders hoped to persuade society of what they knew for themselves: that their fellow immigrant Italians, so often maligned, would make good American citizens. Today’s guest is Paul Moses, author of “The Italian Squad: The True Story of the Immigrant Cops Who Fought the Rise of the Mafia.”See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Doubts about James Earl Ray, Dr. Martin Luther King’s lone assassin, arose almost immediately after the civil rights leader was fatally shot on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis on April 4, 1968. From the start, his aides voiced suspicions that a conspiracy was responsible for their leader’s death. Over time many Americans became convinced the government investigations covered up the truth about the alleged assassin. Exactly what led Ray to kill King continues to be a source of debate, as does his role in the murder.However, today’s guest, Mel Ayton, believe the answers to the many intriguing questions about Ray and how conspiracy ideas flourished can now be fully understood. Missing from the wild speculations over the past fifty-two years has been a thorough investigation of the character of King’s assassin. Additionally, the author examines exactly how the conspiracy notions came about and the falsehoods that led to their promulgation.Mel is the author of The Man Who Killed Martin Luther King, the first full account of the life of James Earl Ray based on scores of interviews provided to government and non-government investigators and from the FBI’s and Scotland Yard’s files, plus the recently released Tennessee Department of Corrections prison record on Ray.In the short-lived freedom he acquired after escaping from the Missouri State Penitentiary in 1967, following being sentenced to twenty years in prison for repeated offenses, he traveled to Los Angeles and decided to seek notoriety as the one who would stalk and kill Dr. King, who he had come to hate vehemently.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In June 1798, President John Adams signed the now infamous Alien & Sedition Acts to suppress political dissent. Facing imminent personal risks, a gutsy Kentucky newspaper editor ran the first editorial denouncing the law's attempt to stifle the freedom of the press. Almost immediately, government lawyers recommended his arrest and prosecution. That editor was William Hunter, amazingly, the son of a British soldier. Witnessing first-hand the terrors of combat and twice experiencing capture, Hunter wrote the only surviving account written by a child of a British soldier during the American Revolution. Previously unknown, the journal is one of the most important document discoveries in recent years. William Hunter represents a previously underappreciated community leader who made essential contributions to developing democratic and civic institutions in Early America. To discuss Hunter is today’s guest, Gene Procknow, author of William Hunter: Finding Free Speech.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The early days of American horse racing in the pre-Civil War era were grueling. Four-mile races, run two or three times in succession, were the norm, rewarding horses who brandished the ideal combination of stamina and speed. The stallion Lexington, named after the city in Kentucky where he was born, possessed these winning qualities, which pioneering Americans prized.Lexington shattered the world speed record for a four-mile race. He would continue his winning career until deteriorating eyesight forced his retirement in 1855. But once his groundbreaking achievements as a racehorse ended, his role as a sire began. Horses from his bloodline won more money than the offspring of any other Thoroughbred—an annual success that led Lexington to be named America’s leading sire an unprecedented sixteen times. Yet with the Civil War raging, Lexington’s years at a Kentucky stud farm were far from idyllic. Confederate soldiers ran amok, looting freely and kidnapping horses from the top stables. They soon focused on the prized Lexington and his valuable progeny. Kim Wickens, a lawyer and dressage rider, became fascinated by this legendary horse when she learned that twelve of Thoroughbred racing’s thirteen Triple Crown winners descended from Lexington – plus the first seventeen winners of the Kentucky Derby. She is the author of the book “Lexington” and presents an account of the raucous beginning of American horse racing and introduces them to the stallion at its heart. We see what happens to Lexington and how he and his progeny has entered the bloodline of nearly every horse who ran after him.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Halley’s Comet visits the earth every seventy-five years. Since the dawn of civilization, humans had believed comets were evil portents. In 1705, Edmond Halley liberated humanity from these primordial superstitions (or so it was thought), proving that Newtonian mechanics rather than the will of the gods brought comets into our celestial neighborhood. Despite this scientific advance, when Halley’s Comet returned in 1910 and astronomers announced that our planet would pass through its poisonous tail, newspapers gleefully provoked a global hysteria that unfolded with tragic consequences. In “Comet Madness: How the 1910 Return of Halley's Comet (Almost) Destroyed Civilization,” Richard J. Goodrich examines the 1910 appearance of Halley’s Comet and the ensuing frenzy sparked by media manipulation, bogus science, and outright deception. The result is a fascinating and illuminating narrative history that underscores how we behave in the face of potential calamity – then and now. As the comet neared Earth, scientists and journalists alike scrambled to get the story straight as citizens the world over panicked. Popular astronomer Camille Flammarion attempted to allay fears in a newspaper article, but the media ignored his true position that passage would be harmless; weather prophet Irl Hicks, publisher of an annual, pseudo-scientific almanac, announced that the comet would disrupt the world’s weather; religious leaders thumbed the Bible’s Book of Revelation and wondered if the comet presaged the apocalypse. Newspapers, confident that there was gold in these alternate theories, gave every crackpot a megaphone, increasing circulation and stoking international hysteria. As a result, workmen shelved their tools, farmers refused to plant crops they would never harvest, and formerly reliable people stopped paying their creditors. More opportunistic citizens opened “comet insurance” plans. Others suffered mental breakdowns, and some took their own lives. We will see how humans confront the unknown, how scientists learn about the world we inhabit, and how certain people—from outright hucksters to opportunistic journalists—harness fear to produce a profit.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Charles III was crowned king of England on May 6, 2023, the first of its kind in 70 years. He wore regalia that look straight out of a portrait of Charlemagne: the St. Edward’s Crown, which wegiths five pounds and has 444 gemstones; the “Sovereign’s Sceptre with Cross,” a three-foot gold rod set with the largest stone cut from the largest diamond ever discovered; and The “Sovereign’s Orb,” a huge sphere that represent his command of the known world. We look the incredibly thick symbolism of this event and compare-and-contrast it to Queen Elizabeth’s 70 years ago.To explain the significance of these ceremonies is Jennifer Robson, author of “Coronation Year,” a historical fiction book set in 1953, when Elizabeth is about to be crowned.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Many of us think that we know all there is to know about W.E.B Du Bois was the early 20th century’s most significant thinker, writer, and philosopher of the U.S. civil rights movement. He saw an extraordinary opportunity during World War 1 to advance the rights of black Americans. He encouraged them to “close ranks” and support the Allied cause in World War 1, enlisting to fight in the war. This decision would haunt him for the rest of his life. Seeking both intellectual clarity and personal atonement, for over two decades, Du Bois attempted to write the definitive history of black participation in World War 1. His book, however, remained unpublished. Today’s guest is Chad Williams, author of “The Wounded World,” an account of Du Bois’s efforts to complete what would have been one of his most significant works of history. He reveals Du Bois’s struggles to reckon with both the history and troubling memory of the war, along with the broader meanings of race and democracy for black people in the 20th century. He also addresses larger questions of why lynchings against black Americans spiked following the war.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When General Douglas MacArthur fled the Phillipines in the beginning of World War Two, he swore to return, and did so in 1944 in an epic battle in which the Allies faced banzai charges, jungle warfare, and the block-by-block battle to retake Manila. Critical players were the 11th Airborne Division, one of five of America’s paratrooper divisions, who battled a fanatical enemy but also the sweltering tropical landscape, insects, and disease. To share their story is today’s guest James Fenelon, author of Angels Against the Sun: A WWII Saga of Grunts, Grit, and Brotherhood. The Pacific theater of WWII pitted the 11th Airborne against the merciless Japanese army and the combined enemy of monsoons, swamps, mud, privation, and disease. These rowdy paratroopers, serving under General Joseph Swing answered the call and fought in some of the bloodiest campaigns of the Pacific War.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Vampire lore goes back to the ancient world (revenant legends abound from Rome to China) but vampire mythology doesn't come into its own until at least the Renaissance period. Was the inspiration for it all the bloodthirsty Wallachian ruler Vlad Tepes, the ruler who impaled tens of thousands in the 1400s? Was he the direct inspiration for Bram Stoker's Dracula? Partially yes, but it's not as clear cut as most think. In this episode we will sink our fangs into vampire lore, the reign of Vlad Tepes, and where Bram Stoker got his ideas for his most famous novel.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Have you ever wondered if you could have survived the eruption at Pompeii, escaped San Francisco's 1906 Earthquake, found a seat on Titanic's lifeboats, outrun the Goths in the Sack of Rome, or lived through the apocalyptic Chicxulub asteroid strike?Surprisingly, the answer to all those questions is yes, even the last one. Today’s guest Cody Cassidy discusses the reasons that the past had an incredibly high mortality rate, along with survival strategies that humans used to keep from extinction. He is the author of “How to Survive History” and helps us appreciate the challenges our predecessors faced.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Eleanor Roosevelt is undisputedly one of America’s most influential First Ladies. She used the office to promote international initiatives that stabilized global peace after the hellish destruction of World War Two, doing such things as securing the passage of the UN Declaration of Human Rights.But one thing few know is that for 10 days the First Lady went missing. In August of 1943, Eleanor was not attending to her domestic duties at the White House, in fact, she was nowhere to be found. Later, Americans would read in newspapers that Eleanor’s whereabouts had been discovered—she was on the other side of the world.In an unprecedented mission which only a handful of First Ladies since have ever attempted, Eleanor’s assignment was to go undercover into a battle zone and report back, firsthand, what America’s servicemen and women were facing... and bring secret information back to the Oval Office. At a time when commercial air travel was unrefined (transcontinental flights took at least 20 hours and involved several fueling stops) and war was still active in the South Pacific, Eleanor faced dangers every day to complete her secret mission and boost troop morale.Today’s guest is Shannon McKenna Schmidt, author of The First Lady of World War II: Eleanor Roosevelt's Daring Journey to the Frontlines and Back. She shares the largely untold story of Eleanor’s top-secret mission to the Pacific theater that had ripple effects throughout the 20th century.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

At the height of the witch burning craze, thousands people, largely women, were falsely accused of witchcraft. Many of them were burned, hanged, and executed, typically under religious pretense. But this phenomena largely didn’t happen in the Middle Ages, and if so it only occurred at the very end of this period.Witch burnings did not begin en masse until the Renaissance period and did not peak until the Enlightenment period in the eighteenth century. Although executions by being burn at the stake were somewhat common in the Middle Ages, they were not used on “witches”—only heretics and other disobeyers of Catholic teachings received this ignominious death. Witch trials and their accusations of weather manipulation, transforming into animals, and child sacrifices, have no documented occurrence before 1400.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Three years into a global pandemic, the fact that infectious disease is capable of reshaping humanity is obvious. But seen in the context of sixty thousand years of human and scientific history, COVID-19 is simply the latest in a series of world-changing pathogens. In fact, the role that humans play in social and political change is often overstated. Instead, bacteria and viruses have been the invisible protagonists of mankind's ever-evolving story. Today’s guest is Jonathan Kennedy, author of “Pathogensis: A History of the World in Eight Plagues.” We discuss how Neanderthals and other early species of humans died out—not because they were cognitively inferior to Homo sapiens but because they were vulnerable to the diseases they carried; how disease triggered the agricultural revolution and allowed it to spread; how plague outbreaks in the 6th and 7th centuries led to the creation of modern states in Western Europe and the transformation of Islam into a world religion; and how infectious diseases aided the colonization of the Americas but inhibited the colonization of AfricaSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The horror occurred in a rustic farming enclave in 1920s Hungary. Investigators would discover that a murder ring of women was responsible for the deaths of at least 160 men. It was an unlikely lineup of killers—village wives, mothers, and daughters. At the center of it all was a sharp-minded village midwife, a “smiling Buddha” known as Auntie Suzy, who distilled arsenic from flypaper and distributed it to the women of Nagyrév. “Why are you bothering with him?” Auntie Suzy would ask, as she produced an arsenic-filled vial from her apron pocket. In the beginning, a great many used the deadly solution to finally be free of cruel and abusive spouses. But as the number of dead bodies grew without consequence, the killers grew bolder. With each vial of poison emptied, a new reason surfaced to drain yet another. Some women disposed of sickly relatives. Some used arsenic as “inheritance powder” to secure land and houses. For more than fifteen years, the unlikely murderers aided death unfettered and tended to it as if it were simply another chore—spooning doses of arsenic into soup and wine, stirring it into coffee and brandy. By the time their crimes were discovered, hundreds were feared dead. Todays guest is Patti McCracken, author of “The Angel Makers: Arsenic, a Midwife, and Modern History’s Most Astonishing Murder Ring.” We explore whether these murders were of a very particular time and place, or if they could happen anywhere if the right conditions emerge.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Eddie Rickenbacker shouldn’t have survived—his childhood, his auto racing career, the first World War as he became America’s greatest ace, the many plane crashes that had taken others’ lives but yet, not his. A Medal of Honor recipient, he became a genuine icon and hero to the American people, providing a reason to celebrate during the Depression and inspiring them to face life’s daily challenges. But then, in his 50s in 1942, Rickenbacker faced his worst odds yet: a B-17 bomber forced to ditch in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, with only inflatable rafts to survive the searing days and freezingnights—and no way to contact anyone. To tell Eddie’s story is today’s guest, John Wukovits, author of “Lost at Sea: Eddie Rickenbacker's Twenty-Four Days Adrift on the Pacific.” We look at his fight for survival with seven other men adrift on the Pacific. We also look at how many times Eddie Rickenbacker actually defied death—including one airline crash when a dislodged eyeball dangled on his cheek, and yet he tried to help the otherpeople escape while he remained pinned inside the plane.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The American Civil War brought with it unprecedented demands upon the warring sections—North and South. The conflict required a mobilization and an organization of natural and man-made resources on a massive scale.In this episode I talk with Jeffry Wert, author of the new book Civil War Barons, which profiles the contributions of nineteen Northern businessmen to the Union cause. They were tinkerers, inventors, improvisers, builders, organizers, entrepreneurs, and all visionaries. They contributed to the war effort in myriad ways: they operated railroads, designed repeating firearms, condensed milk, sawed lumber, cured meat, built warships, purified medicines, forged iron, made horseshoes, constructed wagons, and financed a war. And some of their names and companies have endured—Carnegie, Vanderbilt, Deere, McCormick, Studebaker, Armour, and Squibb.The eclectic group includes Henry Burden, a Scottish immigrant who invented a horseshoe-making machine in the 1830s, who refined the process to be able to forge a horseshoe every second, supplying the Union army with 70 million horseshoes during the four years. John Deere’s plows “sang through the rich sod, portending bountiful harvests for a Union in peril.” And Jay Cooke emerged from the war as the most famous banker in America, earning a reputation for trustworthiness with his marketing of government bonds.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In late December 1776, the American War of Independence appeared tobe on its last legs. General George Washington’s continental forces hadbeen reduced to a shadow of their former strength, the British Armyhad chased them across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania, andenlistments for many of the rank and file would be up by month’s end.Desperate times call for desperate measures, however, and GeorgeWashington responded to this crisis with astonishing audacity. OnChristmas night 1776, he recrossed the Delaware as a nor’easterchurned up the coast, burying his small detachment under howlingsheets of snow and ice. Undaunted, they attacked a Hessian brigade atTrenton, New Jersey, taking the German auxiliaries by completesurprise. Then, only three days later, Washington struck again, crossingthe Delaware, slipping away from the British at Trenton, and attackingthe Redcoats at Princeton—to their utter astonishment. The British, now back on their heels, retreated toward New Brunswickas Washington’s reinvigorated force followed them north into Jersey.Over the next eight months, Washington’s continentals and the statemilitias of New Jersey would go head-to-head with the British in amultitude of small-scale actions and large-scale battles, eventuallyforcing the British to flee New Jersey by sea. In this narrative of the American War of Independence, today’s guest Jim Stempel, author of “The Enemy Harassed: Washington's New Jersey Campaign of 1777” brings to life one of the most violent, courageous, yet virtually forgotten periods of the Revolutionary War.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Middle Ages are seen as a bloodthirsty time of Vikings, saints and kings: a patriarchal society which oppressed and excluded women. But when we dig a little deeper into the truth, we can see that the “dark” ages were anything but.Oxford and BBC historian Janina Ramirez, today’s guest author of the new book “Femina: A New History of the Middle Ages, Through the Women Written Out of It,” has uncovered countless influential women's names struck out of historical records, with the word FEMINA annotated beside them. Only now, through a careful examination of the artefacts, writings and possessions they left behind, are the influential and multifaceted lives of women emerging. Femina goes beyond the official records to uncover the true impact of women, such as: · Jadwiga, the only female King in Europe · Margery Kempe, who exploited her image and story to ensure her notoriety · Loftus Princess, whose existence gives us clues about the beginnings of Christianity in EnglandSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this snippet from Josh Cohen's "Eyewitness History," Vietnam War veteran & "tunnel rat" Nick Sanza discusses his experience overseas, what it's like coming from a long lineage of military service, and what he learned from the tunnels in this interview from the Eyewitness History podcast. Continue listening to Eyewitness History: Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/44jShCiSpotify: https://spoti.fi/3LPfaXdDiscover more episodes of Eyewitness History: Podcasting Inventor Adam Curry: https://apple.co/44kEfQV / https://spoti.fi/410f3MFEx Double Agent & Nelson Mandela Spy Bradley Steyn: https://apple.co/3LN9EEp / https://spoti.fi/3oZtqUiHolocaust Survivor Gene Klein: https://apple.co/3EhOIQK / https://spoti.fi/3g7VGQAWWII Veteran Vince Speranza: https://apple.co/3gh33VN / https://spoti.fi/3tAxTM2Queen Keyboardist Spike Edney: https://apple.co/3Ocx6dR / https://spoti.fi/3OhXLGgSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

At its height in 660 BCE, the kingdom of Assyria stretched from the Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. It was the first empire the world had ever seen. Assyria’s wide-ranging conquests have long been known from the Hebrew Bible and later Greek accounts (and its reputation for unspeakable cruelty, with images of Assyrians skinning its enemies alive carved into stone on an Assyrian royal palace). But nearly two centuries of research now permit a rich picture of the Assyrians and their empire beyond the battlefield: their vast libraries and monumental sculptures, their elaborate trade and information networks, and the crucial role played by royal women. Today’s guest is Eckart Frahm, author of “Assyria: The Rise and Fall of the World’s First Empire.” Using archaeological research, along with the study of tens of thousands of cuneiform texts, researchers have been able to construct a more accurate depiction of Assyrian life, revealing the empire’s enduring impact on global civilization. Frahm shows how despite its war-prone image, Assyria proved innovative in the realms of architecture, arts, technology, and diplomacy. Readers will learn about the elaborate “Royal Road” that enabled trade and communication over vast distances, how Assyrian scholars created the first universal library, and about the impact of plagues and climate change on the empire’s fortunes.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One person's psychosis can be easily dismissed, but how do we account for collective hysteria, when an entire crowd sees the same illusion or suffer from the same illness? It's enough to make somebody believe in dark magic and pick up their pitchfork, ready to hang an accused witch.Sadly, such paranoia has led to many witch hunts in the past. In today's episode we look at some of the most notorious historical cases of mass hysteria and moral panics. But these cases don't only extend to Puritan-era witch panics. We will also look at cases that hit closer to home—such as economic bubbles and the housing market crash of the early 2000s.This episode includes such cases of mass hysteria as-- Dancing mania, in which German peasants in 1374 spent weeks dancing in a fugue state, with some toppling over dead from utter exhaustion-- The cat nuns of medieval France, where the sisters became to inexplicably meow together, leaving the surrounding community perplexed-- The Salem Witch trials, where 19 were executed due to claims of sorcery-- The Jersey Devil Panic, in which dozens of newspapers claimed in 1909 that a winged creature attacked a trolley car in Haddon HeightsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the 1960s, the world’s attention was focused on a nail-biting race against time: Fifty countries contributed nearly a billion dollars to save a dozen ancient Egyptian temples, built during the height of the pharaohs’ rule, from drowning in the floodwaters of the gigantic new Aswan High Dam. But the massive press coverage of this unprecedented rescue effort completely overlooked the gutsy French archaeologist who made it all happen. Without the intervention of Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, the temples—including the Metropolitan Museum’s Temple of Dendur—would be at the bottom of a huge reservoir. It was a project of unimaginable size and complexity that required the fragile sandstone temples to be dismantled, stone by stone, and rebuilt on higher ground. A willful, real-life version of Indiana Jones, Desroches-Noblecourt refused to be cowed by anyone or anything. As a member of the French Resistance in World War II she had survived imprisonment by the Nazis; in her fight to save the temples, she defied two of the most daunting leaders of the postwar world, Egyptian President Abdel Nasser and French President Charles de Gaulle. As she told one reporter, “You don't get anywhere without a fight, you know.” Yet Desroches-Noblecourt was not the only woman who played a crucial role in the endeavor. The other was Jacqueline Kennedy, America’s new First Lady, who persuaded her husband to call on Congress to help fund the rescue effort. After a century and a half of Western plunder of Egypt’s ancient monuments, Desroches-Noblecourt had done the opposite. She had helped preserve a crucial part of its cultural heritage and, just as important, made sure it remained in its homeland.Today’s guest is Lynne Olson, author of “Empress of the Nile: The Daredevil Archeologist Who Saved Egypt’s Ancient Temples.” We discuss why Christiane Desroches is something of a real-life female Indiana Jones, what tactics Desroches used to save Egyptian antiquities from flooding in the Nile basin, and how important her intervention was to the effort.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Inspired by Charles Darwin’s ideas about evolution, the theory of eugenics arose in Victorian England as a proposal for ‘improving’ the British population. It quickly spread to America, where it was embraced by presidents, funded by Gilded Age monopolists, and enshrined into racist laws that became the ideological cornerstone of the Third Reich. Despite this horrific legacy, eugenics looms large today as the advances in genetics in the last thirty years—from the sequencing of the human genome to modern gene editing techniques—have brought the idea of population purification back into the mainstream. Today’s guest, Adam Rutherford, author of “Control: The Dark History and Troubling Present of Eugenics” calls eugenics “a defining idea of the twentieth century.” Eugenics has “a short history, but a long past,” Rutherford writes. With roots in key philosophical texts of the classical world that formed the basis of the Nazi worldview and the rationale for genocide, eugenics still informs present-day discussions and beliefs about race supremacy and genetic purity. It remains an eternal temptation to powerful people who wish to sculpt society through reproductive control.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The roots of the Second World War in Europe lie within the First World War. The 1919 Treaty of Versailles formally ended the war between Germany and the western Allies, but the geopolitical situation it created was far from stable. Ten years later, the Great Depression made things even worse. In this episode preview from Key Battles of American History (the first in the World War II in Europe series), James and cohost Sean McIver discuss the unsettled state of Europe between 1918 and 1930 and the gradual fracturing of the uneasy peace that it enjoyed.To continue listening to Key Battles of American History, check out the links below!Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3nCfZZySpotify: https://spoti.fi/3nIwO5cSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The history of the American Revolution is written by and about the victors like Washington, Jefferson, and Adams. But separating the heroes from the villains is not so black and white.So how should we remember a man like Major General Henry “Light-Horse Harry” Lee III—the father of Robert E. Lee— who rose to glory, helped shape the fabric of America, but ultimately ended his life in ruin? He is responsible for valiant victories, enduring accomplishments, and catastrophic failures.Today I'm speaking with Ryan Cole, author of the new book Light-Horse Harry Lee: The Rise and Fall of a Revolutionary HeroWe discuss how he was a...Brilliant cavalryman who played a crucial role in Nathanael Greene’s strategy that led to Britain’s surrender at YorktownClose friend of George Washington—he gave the famous eulogy of “first in war, first in peace, first in the hearts of his countrymen” which is widely quoted todayStrong supporter of the Constitution—his arguments led Virginia, the most influential colony in the soon-to-be country, to ratify itVictim of a violent political mob—he was beaten with clubs, his nose was partially sliced off, and hot wax was dripped into his eyesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Abraham Lincoln, unlike most of his political brethren, kept organized Christianity at arm’s length. He never joined a church and only sometimes attended Sunday services with his wife. But over the course of his life, the erstwhile skeptic effectively evolved into the nation’s first evangelical president. The Civil War, he told Americans, was divine retribution for the sin of slavery. “Lincoln’s God: How Faith Transformed a President and a Nation” by today’s guest Joshua Zeitz, is the story of that transformation, the role Lincoln’s conversion played in the war, and the way it in turn transformed Protestantism. Rather than focus on battles and personalities, we explore the social impact of the war on Northerners’ spiritual worldview, and the ways in which religion helped millions of Northerners interpret the carnage and political upheaval of the 1850s and 1860s. about the book. Long underestimated in accounts of the Civil War, religion—specifically evangelical Christianity—played an instrumental role on the battlefield and home front, and in the corridors of government.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Saint Augustine of Hippo is one of the most important figures of the Latin Middle Ages, and his writings have shaped Western thought on marriage and sexuality. However, few have considered the deeply influential role of the women in his life and how they shaped his thinking. Drawing on how Augustine’s presents them in his startlingly intimate memoir, Confessions, it becomes clear that this canonical Western is not only arguably the first autobiography; it offers a rare account of the Classical World through the eyes of women. Today’s guest is Kate Cooper, author of Queens of a Fallen World, a book that explores the troubled world of the waning Roman Empire through the lens of four prominent women whose lives were chronicled in Saint Augustine of Hippo’s startlingly intimate memoir, Confessions — Justina, the troubled empress of ancient Rome; Tacita, the ten-year-old Milanese heiress from whom Augustine broke his engagement, irrevocably altering the course of both their lives; Monica of Thagaste, Augustine’s mother; and Una, Augustine’s mistress, companion of fifteen years and mother to his illegitimate son. It's a story of not only Augustine, but, more broadly, the role of women in Antiquity.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One year after the Civil War ended, a group of delusional and mostly incompetent commanders sponsored by bitterly competing groups riddled with spies, led tiny armies against the combined forces of the British, Canadian, and American governments. They were leaders of America’s feuding Irish émigré groups who thought they could conquer Canada and blackmail Great Britain (then the world's military superpower) into granting Ireland its independence.The story behind the infamous 1866 Fenian Raids seems implausible (and whiskey-fueled), but ultimately is an inspiring tale of heroic patriotism. Inspired by a fervent love for Ireland and a burning desire to free her from British rule, members of the Fenian Brotherhood – a semi-secret band of Irish-American revolutionaries – made plans to seize the British province of Canada and hold it hostage until the independence of Ireland was secured.When the Fenian Raids began, Ireland had been subjugated by Britain for over seven hundred years. The British had taken away Ireland’s religion, culture, and language, and when the Great Hunger stuck, they even took away her food, exporting it to other realms of the British Empire. Those who escaped the famine and fled to America were inspired by the revolutionary actions of the Civil War to fight for their own country’s freedom. After receiving a promise from President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William Seward not to interfere with any military plans, the Fenian Brotherhood - which included a one-armed Civil War hero, an English spy posing as French sympathizer, an Irish revolutionary who faked his own death to escape capture, and a Fenian leader turned British loyalist – began to implement their grand plan to secure Ireland’s freedom. They executed daring prison breaks from an Australian penal colony, conducted political assassinations and engaged in double-dealings, managing to seize a piece of Canada for three days.Today I'm speaking with Christopher Klein, author of the book WHEN THE IRISH INVADED CANADA: The Incredible True Story of the Civil War Veterans Who Fought for Ireland’s Freedom. He brings light to this forgotten but fascinating story in history.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Family has been an inexhaustible source of conflict for writers from the ancient to modern worlds – maybe even more inexhaustible than war. From Greek dramatists Aeschylus and Sophocles to Confucius, family is a source of both self-destruction and self-actualization. In this episode, we explore how family dynamics have changed over the centuries but have surprisingly universal characteristics across time and space. We are joined by Krishnan Venkatesh, host of the “Continuing the Conversation” podcast. We being with a journey deep into the heart of Thebes—where King Laius has died at the hands of his own son Oedipus, and Oedipus has unwittingly married his mother Jocasta—and a subtler journey into the world of 20th century Japanese filmmaker Yasujirō Ozu, where a happily domiciled father and daughter, Somiya and Noriko, will be ripped apart by the norms and expectations of tradition. This is an exploration of the nature of family, the tension between the safety and anxiety that family creates, and the rich and multiple ways that different societies express these insights.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Six hundred years ago, Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani —an esteemed judge, poet, and scholar in Cairo— wrote “Merits of the Plague,” a landmark work of history and religious thought that looked at accounts of centuries worth of plague outbreak and their possible origins, along with explanations of why God would allow such devastation to take place. This work wasn’t only theoretical but also based on experience. He survived the bubonic plague, which took the lives of three of his children, not to mention tens of millions of others throughout the medieval world. Holding up an eerie mirror to our own time, Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani reflects on the origins of plagues—from those of Muhammad’s era to the Black Death of his own—and what it means that such catastrophes could have been willed by God, while also chronicling the fear, isolation, scapegoating, economic tumult, political failures, and crises of faith that he lived through. But in considering the meaning of suffering and mass death, he also offers a message of radical hope. Today’s guests are Joel Blecher and Mairaj Syed, editors and translators of the book into modern English. We discuss the book and how it weaves together accounts of evil jinn, religious stories, medical manuals, death-count registers, poetry, and the author’s personal anecdotes. “Merits of the Plague” is a profound reminder that with tragedy comes one of the noblest expressions of our humanity: the practice of compassion, patience, and care for those around us.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

An oft-overlooked chapter in American History is the Creek War, a conflict between the Creek Indians and a young United States hungry for expansion in the early 1800s. It’s remembered as an important early chapter in the life of Andrew Jackson, but what few realize is that it altered the course of early American history more than any other event, opening the Deep South to plantation cultivation and setting the stage for the Civil War. Today’s guest is Peter Cozzens, author of “A Brutal Reckoning: Andrew Jackson, the Creek Indians, and the Epic War for the American South.” We discuss the dispossession of Indian lands by the young American republic and an unexplored piece of early American history, and a vivid portrait of Jackson as a young, ambitious, and cruel military commander.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The United States has yet to elect its first female president, but over a century ago, there was a woman acting as the leader of this nation—before women could even vote nationwide. Her name was Edith Bolling Galt Wilson, wife of Woodrow Wilson. When Woodrow was incapacitated by a stroke in 1919, this fact was hidden from the public, Congress, and nearly everyone but his closest allies. Edith ran the executive branch, while at the same time downplaying her own role and influence. Portrayals of Edith tended to cast her as either a naïve rube who was manipulated by sophisticated political strategists or a power-hungry climber who seized control for her own gratification. But she was far more complex than these caricatures. Edith was raised by Confederates who mourned their lost plantation lifestyle, then rose to social prominence in the glittering years of Gilded Age Washington, then was elevated of the role of First Lady, just as the U.S. was becoming an international superpower. Today’s guest is Rebecca Boggs Roberts, author of “Untold Power: The Fascinating Rise and Complex Legacy of First Lady Edith Wilson.” We look at her many contradictions – an independent woman of means (who owned her own business and was the first licensed female driver in DC), at once deeply invested in exercising her own power but also opposed to women’s suffrage.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Victory gardens are perhaps the U.S. government’s most successful and long-lasting propaganda campaign. It began during World War One, when the War Garden Commission offered free handbooks for garden tips and published stories in newspapers to encourage citizens to plant food crops in any little piece of unused land so citizens could help provide food for America’s allies fighting in Europe. The idea caught on, and by the end of the war, over 5 million gardens were planted, producing nearly $10 billion (in today’s dollars) worth of food. By World War 2, nearly 60 percent of U.S. households had some kind of garden. Over 40 percent of the nation’s fresh produce was grown in a local garden. Today’s guest is Maggie Stuckey, author of “The Container Victory Garden: A Beginner’s Guide to Growing Your Own Groceries.” With a renewed interest in home gardening during the 2020 lockdowns, she realized the astonishing surge of gardening activity was a modern-day version of wartime Victory Gardens, when Americans planted a few vegetables in whatever little patch of ground they could find. And even more surprising was how eerily the tragedies mirrored each other through the decades: World War I with its gardens and its influenza pandemic, World War II with its gardens and its devastating loss of life, and 2020’s gardens in response to the coronavirus pandemic. We look at the surprising relevance of Victory Gardens today.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The last stand at Thermopylae made the Spartans legends in their own time, famous for their toughness, stoicism and martial prowess. They were feared for never surrendering and never running from a fight, always preferring death to dishonor. But was this reputation earned? How much of it was true versus an exaggeration that compounded over the centuries?That’s the question that today’s guest, Myke Cole, asked himself when he set out to investigate their military history, which became his book “The Bronze Lie: Shattering the Myth of Spartan Warrior Supremacy,Spartan history had its moments of glory, but it was also punctuated by frequent and heavy losses. It was a society dedicated to militarism not in service to Greek unity or to the Spartan state itself, but as a desperate measure intended to keep its massive population of helots (a near-slave underclass) in line. What successes there were, such as in the Peloponnesian Wars, gave Sparta only a brief period of hegemony over Greece. Today, there is no greater testament to this than the relative position of modern Sparta and its famous rival Athens.Nevertheless, there is still plenty to appreciate about the Spartans when we look at them as real people, not as mythological figures.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

King Arthur. The search for the historical figure behind what is arguably the most famous cycle of legends ever has been relentless over the centuries. Many think he was a Romano-British military commander in the 5th/6th centuries who fought the Anglo-Saxons and saved Britain in its infancy. But other historians put the real-life Arthur at a much earlier date, arguing that the man whose story started the traditions of Arthur was a soldier name Lucius Artorius Castus who lived at the end of the second century A.D. There are enough historical clues to reconstruct Castus’s extraordinary, which career took him from one end of the Roman Empire to the other, bringing him into contact with tribespeople amongst the Steppe nomads – in particular the Sarmatians. For several decades the Sarmatians have been thought to be the inspiration behind Arthur’s Knights of the Round Table, among other British tales. Today’s guests are John Matthews and Linda Malcor, authors of “Artorius: The Real King Arthur.” We focus on Castus’s career, not only commenting on the parallels with the Arthurian tradition but also providing details about the Roman Empire of the second century A.D. along the way.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 19th century America, no science was more important than botany. Understanding plants meant more productive plantations, more wealth extracted from cash crops, and more money flowing into the United States. The science of botany became weaponized, fueling ideas of Manifest Destiny and other programs of political expansion was used for political ends. But other authors and thinkers believed that nature could teach humanity different lessons. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s struggles in his garden inspired him to write stories in which plants defy human efforts to impose order. Radical scientific ideas about plant intelligence and sociality prompted Emily Dickinson to imagine a human polity that embraces kinship with the natural world. Frederick Douglass cautioned that the most prominent political context for plants remained plantation slavery. Today’s guest is Mary Kuhn, author of “The Garden Politic: Global Plants and Botanical Nationalism in Nineteenth-Century America.” We explore how politicians of the 19th century used agriculture as a vehicle for power politics, but the same branch of science contained the seeds of alternative political visions.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the late 1830s a young black man was born into a world of wealth and privilege in the powerful, thousand-year-old African kingdom of Borno. But instead of becoming a respected general like his fearsome father (who was known as The Lion), Nicolas Said’s fate was to fight a very different kind of battle. At the age of thirteen, Said was kidnapped and sold into slavery, beginning an epic journey that would take him across Africa, Asia, Europe, and eventually the United States, where he would join one of the first African American regiments in the Union Army. Nicholas Said would then spend the rest of his life fighting for equality. Along the way, Said encountered such luminaries as Queen Victoria and Czar Nicholas I, fought Civil War battles that would turn the war for the North, established schools to educate newly freed black children, and served as one of the first black voting registrars.Today’s guest is today’s guest Dean Calbreath, author of“The Sergeant, a biography of Said. Through the lens of Said’s continent-crossing life, Calbreath examines the parallels and differences in the ways slavery was practiced from a global and religious perspective, and he highlights how Said’s experiences echo the discrimination, segregation, and violence.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What do Italian unification, Pinocchio and pizza have in common? In this episode preview from History of the Papacy, host Steve Guerra dives in!The Risorgimento was a period of political and social upheaval in Italy that lasted from the early 19th century to the mid-20th century. The movement aimed to unite the various states and regions of Italy into one unified nation. Pinocchio, the beloved children's story written by Carlo Collodi, can be seen as a metaphor for Italian unification through the character's journey from a wooden puppet to a real boy. And last but not least, let's talk about pizza. Italy's most famous export, pizza, is a symbol of the country's rich cultural heritage and culinary traditions. Whether you're a fan of traditional Margherita or a more unconventional topping, there's a pizza for everyone. To continue listening to History of the Papacy, check out:Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3L4IzN9 Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3ZtqsEd Parthenon: https://www.parthenonpodcast.com/history-of-the-papacy-podcastSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

November 4, 1791, was a black day in American history. General Arthur St. Clair’s army had been ambushed by Native Americans in what is now western Ohio. In just three hours, St. Clair’s force sustained the greatest loss ever inflicted on the United States Army by American Indians—a total nearly three times larger than what incurred in the more famous Custer fight of 1876. It was the greatest proportional loss by any American army in the nation’s history. By the time this fighting ended, over six hundred corpses littered an area of about three and one half football fields laid end to end. Still more bodies were strewn along the primitive road used by hundreds of survivors as they ran for their lives with Native Americans in hot pursuit. It was a disaster of cataclysmic proportions for George Washington’s first administration, which had been in office for only two years. Today’s guest is Alan Gaff, author of Field of Corpses: Arthur St. Clair and the Death of the American Army. We look at the first great challenge of Washington’s presidency, a humiliating defeat that the United States needed to strengthen its military or die. It’s a war story that emphasizes individuals and small units rather than grandiose armies and famous generals, making St. Clair’s defeat all the more immersive and personable.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Rudolf Ivanovich Abel was one of the most integral agents of the KBG, the Soviet Union’s most renowned spy network during the Cold War of the 1950s. He may have infiltrated Los Alamos labs and fed critical intelligence back to Moscow through the use of cloak-and-dagger techniques like sneaking microfilm in hollowed- out coins and dropping bundles of cash at lamppost hideaways. He kept it up until his cover was blown by an incompetent colleague who wanted to defect to the United States. This lead resulted in a frenzied search by the FBI to discover the identity and whereabouts of the spymaster. The month long stake out of his hotel in Manhattan leading to his eventual arrest and transfer to a Texas deportation facility where he was put under extensive interrogation. His three-month trial and guilty verdict for violating U.S. espionage laws resulted in 30 years in prison rather than the electric chair. The exchange for his freedom several years later involved the American Spy Francis Gary Powers. To discuss this story is today’s guest Cecil Kuhne, a prominent litigator, who has long been interested in the world of Cold War. He is the author of KGB Man: The Cold War’s Most Notorious Soviet Agent and the First to be Exchanged at the Bridge of Spies.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1848, a year of international democratic revolt, a young, enslaved couple, Ellen and William Craft, achieved one of the boldest feats of self-emancipation in American history. They escaped slavery through daring, determination, and disguise, with Ellen passing as a wealthy, disabled white man and William posing as “his” slave. They made their escape together across more than 1,000 miles, riding out in the open on steamboats, carriages, and trains that took them from bondage in Georgia to the free states of the North.Along the way, they dodged slave traders, military officers, and even friends of their enslavers, who might have revealed their true identities. The tale of their adventure soon made them celebrities and generated headlines around the country. Americans could not get enough of this charismatic young couple, who traveled another 1,000 miles crisscrossing New England, drawing thunderous applause as they spoke alongside some of the greatest abolitionist luminaries of the day—among them Frederick Douglass and William Wells Brown.But even then, they were not out of danger. With the passage of an infamous new Fugitive Slave Act in 1850, all Americans became accountable for returning refugees like the Crafts to slavery. Then yet another adventure began, as slave hunters came up from Georgia, forcing the Crafts to flee once again—this time from the United States, their lives and thousands more on the line, and the stakes never higher. Today’s guest is Ilyon Woo, author of “Master, Slave, Husband, Wife: An Epic Journey From Slavery to Freedom.” We look at this story of escape, emancipation, and the challenges of Antebellum, Civil War, and Reconstruction America.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The December 7, 1941, surprise attack on Pearl Harbor thrust theUnited States into World War II. Just six months later in May 1942,flying new C-47 transport aircraft, the 60th Troop Carrier Group ledthe way as the first U.S. TCG to deploy to England and the EuropeanTheater of Operations in World War II. Leading the way to victory,the 60th TCG’s first mission—dropping U. S. paratroopers outside ofOran, North Africa—was not only the first combat airborne missionin U.S. Army history, but also the longest airborne mission of theentire war. This drop spearheaded Operation TORCH, also known asthe Invasion of North Africa, by taking key Axis airfields just inlandfrom the amphibious landing zones. The 60th TCG went on to fly some of the first combat aeromedical evacuation missions and the first combat mission towing CG-4A “Waco” gliders during Operation HUSKY—the Invasion of Sicily. As the new airborne, air land,aeromedical evacuation, and glider missions matured in World WarII, the 60th TCG continued to play a major role, paying in blood forvaluable lessons learned in the school of hard knocks. The group laterflew dramatic missions into Yugoslavia, supporting Partisans as partof the secret war in the Balkans, an episode of World War II historystill all but unknown today and dropped British paratroops in theairborne invasion of Greece. The Group was inactivated at the end ofthe war. Today’s guest is Col. Mark C. Vlahos, author of “Leading the Way to Victory: A History of the 60th Troop Carrier Group 1940-1945.” We look at the group’s battles, adversity, hardships, and triumphs from inception through the Allied victory in Europe.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Growing up in New York as the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, Nina Siegal had always wondered about the experience of her mother and maternal grandparents living in Europe during World War II. She had heard stories of the war as a child from her mother and grandfather, and read Anne Frank’s diary in school, but the tales were crafted as moral lessons — to never waste food, to be grateful for all you receive, to hide your silver — while the details of the past went untold to make it easier to assimilate into American life. When Siegal moved to Amsterdam as an adult, those questions came up again, as did another horrifying one: Why did seventy five percent of the Dutch Jewish community perish in the war, while in other Western European countries the proportions were significantly lower? How did this square with the narratives of Dutch resistance she had heard so much about? Siegal decided to get into the archives and look at wartime diaries of Dutch citizens from all walks of life and eventually wrote “The Diary Keepers World War II In The Netherlands, as Written by the People Who Lived Through It.” Siegal joins us to discuss a part of history we haven’t seen in quite this way before. We look at stories of a Dutch Nazi police detective, a Jewish journalist imprisoned at Westerbork transit camp, a grocery store owner who saved dozens of lives, and several others into a braided nonfictional narrative of the Nazi occupation and the Dutch Holocaust, as individuals experienced it day by day.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There are countless ways Shakespeare has made his way into unexpected corners of American life. It starts at the top with our presidents. Shakespeare is a longtime ally of America’s Commanders-in-Chief: Thomas Jefferson took a pilgrimage to his house, John Adams took lessons from King Lear about child usurpers, and JFK thought that the Bard spoke so directly to the U.S.’s Cold War challenges that he was more American than British. But Shakespeare speaks to many other classes of people. In 1849, a riot broke out in New York between working class and aristocratic theatre fans over which actor did the best Hamlet, and 31 were left dead.Today’s guest is Barry Edelstein, a seasoned director of Shakespeare and host of the new podcast Where There’s a Will: Finding Shakespeare. . From a Henry V performance in a maximum security prison to a look at how Shakespeare assists children on the autism spectrum, we explore why the Bard’s works permeate our history and culture, and what that says about him, and about our society.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Some remember Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidency as a time of peace and prosperity, but in reality, it was an era of constant global crises. In this episode preview from This American President, host Richard Lim explores how Eisenhower skillfully navigated the perils of the Cold War.To continue listening to This American President, check out:Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3RNJS4jSpotify: https://spoti.fi/3jTClEjParthenon: https://www.parthenonpodcast.com/this-american-president Hear more episodes of This American President:Theodore Roosevelt and the Pursuit of Greatness: https://apple.co/3IgUAx9 / https://spoti.fi/3E0zoZvZachary Taylor, America's Only Homeless President: https://apple.co/40OuGaW / https://spoti.fi/3DUzzFBThe Turbulent Life and Improbable Presidency of Grover Cleveland: https://apple.co/3xdIUER / https://spoti.fi/3ltBmLFSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1861, just as the Civil War began, the leaders of the Confederacy soon realized they were outmatched when it came to military might, especially in terms of Naval power. (For example, the U.S. Navy had 42 commissioned ships as of the start of the year—the Confederacy had 1.) And the Northern states had much more industrial might in order to get more ships built. With such a stark advantage, the Union was able to form a naval blockade that could choke the Confederacy militarily, and also economically.The leaders of the Confederacy realized that the only way to outfit a strong navy was to receive support from aboard—namely, from the still-neutral Great Britain. Neutral though its leaders claimed to be, public sentiment in Britain at the time leaned toward the Confederacy. The Southern leaders dispatched the charming and devious Captain James Bulloch to Liverpool to lead the way to clandestinely acquire a cutting-edge fleet of ships (and weapons) that would break President Lincoln’s blockade of Confederate ports, sink Northern merchant vessels, and drown the U.S. Navy’s mightiest ships at sea. The profits from gunrunning and smuggling cotton—Dixie’s notorious “white gold”—would finance the scheme.Opposing him was the American consul named Thomas Dudley, a resolute Quaker lawyer and abolitionist. Knowing that the state of the Union was at stake, he was determined to stop Bulloch by any means necessary in a spy-versus-spy game of move and countermove, gambit and sacrifice, intrigue and betrayal. If Dudley failed, Britain would likely ally with the South and imperil a Northern victory.The battleground for these spy games was the Dickensian port of Liverpool, whose dockyards built more ships each year than the rest of the world combined, whose warehouses stored more cotton than anywhere else on earth, and whose merchant princes, said one observer, were “addicted to Southern proclivities, foreign slave trade, and domestic bribery.”To tell this story is today’s guest Alexander Rose, author of “The Lion and the Fox: Two Rival Spies and the Secret Plot to Build a Confederate Navy.”See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One of the lowest points of World War 2 for the Allies was autumn 1943, when bombing runs from England to Germany were ramping up. Hundreds of B-17s flew out to strike military targets, but they flew unescorted due to being the only planes with enough range (fighters could only make it from England to Belgium and back) and were sitting ducks for German fighters. Losses were as high as 25 percent. Flight crews were grounded and murmured mutiny.But what change everything was the revolutionary P-51 Mustang fighter. It had a top speed of over 400 mph and fly over 2,000 miles – outrunning and outlasting any other fighter in the war. But not many know the story of how it gained its reputation—how it nearly didn’t make it to the skies at all. Today’s guests are David and Margaret White, author of “Wings of War: The World War II Fighter Plane that Saved the Allies and the Believers Who Made It Fly.”We discuss how the P-51 Mustang airplane was not only used in the war, but how it was created, the roadblocks that almost prevented it from taking flight against the Luftwaffe, and how it ultimately won the war.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

No British General of the Revolutionary War has been written about more than John Burgoyne. That’s because of his surrender of his army at Saratoga, New York in 1777, widely seen as the turning point in the Revolutionary War. He is considered a reckless lout, and there’s plenty in his life story to support this characterization. He gambled heavily and possibly had to flee England as a young man to escape his debtors. His father-in-law eventually paid Burgoyne’s debts and got him another commission in the army, just in time for the 7 Years War. There he served admirably and became a war hero. But 300 years after his birth, the many lives of Burgyone -- dashing cavalry colonel of the Seven Years War, satirical London playwright, reformer Member of Parliament, gambler in the clubs on St James’s Street – have been forgotten.Today’s guest is Norman Poser, author of From the Battlefield to the Stage: The Many Lives of General John Burgyone. We look not only at the Saratoga campaign, but also elements of Burgoyne’s eventful life that have never been adequately explored. He was a socialite, welcome in London’s fashionable drawing rooms, a high-stakes gambler in its elite clubs, and a playwright whose social comedies were successfully performed on the London stage. Moreover, as a member of Parliament for thirty years, Burgoyne supported the rule of law, fought the corruption of the East India Company – he was a sworn enemy of Clive of India whom he denounced with all his might – and advocated religious tolerance.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

"How might the British have handled Hitler differently?” remains one of history’s greatest "what ifs."Many fault the Neville Chamberlain administration of the 1930s with trying to appease the Fuhrer by any means necessary. But they failed, still got a war, and earned a reputation for cowardice. Or as Winston Churchill said to Chamberlain, “You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor, and you will have war.” But what if we haven’t given Britain enough credit for trying to stave off the war in ways that weren’t dishonorable?It turns out they did, and they got very creative. One method involved using a handful of amateur British intelligence agents who wined, dined, and befriended the leading National Socialists between the wars. With support from royalty, aristocracy, politicians, and businessmen, they hoped to use the recently founded Anglo-German Fellowship as a vehicle to civilize and enlighten the Nazis.At the heart of the story are a pacifist Welsh historian, a World War I flying ace, and a butterfly-collecting businessman, who together offered the British government better intelligence on the horrifying rise of the Nazis than any other agents. They infiltrated the Nazi high command deeper than any other spies, relaying accurate intelligence to both their government and to its anti-appeasing critics. Having established a personal rapport with President Franklin D. Roosevelt, they delivered intelligence to him directly, paving the way for American military support for Great Britain against the Nazi threat.To tell this story is today’s guest, Charles Spicer, author of “Coffee With Hitler.” His book is based on eight years of research among letters, intelligence reports, and other primary sources, many of which have been lost or overlooked by historians.While these men didn’t succeed in their goal, they did feed critical intelligence to the British Establishment and gave them a very clear understanding of the threat that Hitler posed. That’s why when war did finally break out, Britain wasn’t caught asleep at the switch. It had spent years arming itself and training for the outbreak of hostilities. More could have been done – and that’s always the case when it comes to total war – but we have these men to credit for trying to avoid and neutralize an enemy that was unavoidable and immovable.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What if one book could contain the sum of mankind’s knowledge? Scholars and chroniclers have tried to write this book since antiquity, penning several so-called universal histories (perhaps the best was Rashid al-Din’s “Compendium of the Chronicles” that was commissioned by a Mongol Empire daughter state in 14th century). This goal was reached in 1768 with the first edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica was published in Scotland by Enlightenment thinkers who believed that human thinking could be categorized. It became a fixture of American households in the 19th century and occupied the bookshelves of every library and school in the United States until very recently.Today’s guest is Jill Lepore's show, host of the show “The Last Archive,” about the US's post-truth crisis -- of how we know what we know and why it seems lately as if we can't agree on anything at all. She both reckons with the present moment through her historical expertise and also presents solutions that are forward and current.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.