Axelbank Reports History and Today

In this episode, historian Keri Leigh Merritt explores how a pandemic exacerbated simmering inequalities in American society to produce mass death at an unprecedented scale. The book she co-edited with Rhae Lynn Barnes and Yohuru Williams, "After Life: A Collective History of Loss and Redemption in Pandemic America," is a collection of essays where authors explore the damage that grief a...

In his book, "The Year that Broke America," Andrew Rice doesn't just argue that the year 2000 changed things, he argued that it broke everything . From the presidential election, to the seeds of the 9/11 plot, to Elian Gonzalez to reality TV, he explains how a confluence of unfortunate incidents led America down a path from which it has never recovered. It's also easy to forget...

In this episode, Dr. Jeremi Suri explains how the Civil War was only the most violent part of the attempt to subvert American democracy by southern states. During the late 1860s until the 1890s, he explains how southern politicians, white supremacists and Confederate veterans stopped Black Americans from participating in public life. In his book, "Civil War by Other Means: America's Long...

There are few presidents as highly regarded and as misunderstood as John F. Kennedy. The horrific death of the 35th president froze him in time, allowing his legacy to be crafted by those who wished to see him lionized, while squeezing out the critique all presidents must face in order for the nation to learn from their successes and failures. In "Coming to Terms with John F. Kennedy," D...

The car is the ultimate two-sided coin. It takes you where you want to go, but it pollutes. You're outside, but trapped inside. It's easier than walking or biking, but MUCH more expensive. And the history of it is loaded with incredible technological advancements, but it brought mass death to our society. In his book, "The Car: The Machine that Made the Modern World," Bryan App...

The beginning of the movie "Lincoln" shows a horrific battle scene, where men in blue and gray are locked in hand to hand combat. There are fists, spears and guns. The division and the brutality are apparent, as soldiers discard the humanity of their opponents. Some of them died on the battlefield. We have certainly spent our fair share of time honoring the giants of the war itself. But...

The next time you watch a movie, give credit where credit is due. No, it wasn't Thomas Edison who invented movie cameras, it was a now-forgotten fellow named Louis Le Prince. Only two years after he designed his groundbreaking camera and filmed the "Roundhay Garden Scene" (which can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAiYFEHI9o8 ), he disappeared, leaving others to grappl...

Many attempts have been made to understand the insurrection at the Capitol Building. But to fully grasp what happened January 6th, 2021, to see how Donald Trump incited a mob that temporarily stopped the counting of electoral votes, chief New York Times White House correspondent Peter Baker argues we must grapple with all four years of the Trump administration. He and co-author Susan Glasser argue...

We made it to a hundred episodes! Our celebration features a discussion between four hobbyists who have taken their passion for history to a whole new level. Listen as host Evan Axelbank chats with Alicya Asai of the podcast "Civics and Coffee," Jeremy Anderberg of the newsletter "What to Read Next," and Steve Floyd of the website "Best Presidential Bios." We all expl...

The president of the United States stood at the podium, faced members of a Black church who had just lost nine parishioners in a racist attack, and offered comfort, not only with words, but with silence. After twelve seconds, Barack Obama sang the hymn that had been a comfort in moments of crisis for generations. Amazing Grace. In his new book, "Grace: President Obama and Ten Days in the Batt...

Jackie Robinson's #42 is the only number retired across Major League Baseball, as his contributions to baseball and to American society can hardly be calculated. As Kostya Kennedy describes in his book, "True: The Four Seasons of Jackie Robinson," he became a hero to generations of Americans thanks to his stoic, determined and thoughtful approach to dealing with the horrors of racia...

On this episode, we talk with veteran journalist James Kirchick about his new book, "Secret City: The Hidden History of Gay Washington." He explains how government officials who were gay became the focus of investigations, campaigns to out them, and even lost everything. He shows how Washington attracted gay men and women who hoped to serve their country, but who found that it was both t...

In her new book, "When the Moon Turns to Blood: Lori Vallow, Chad Daybell and a Story of Murder, Wild Faith and End Times," Leah Sottile describes how a history of belief in the supernatural can be deadly. Although the story of how Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell allegedly killed their children is not too far into the past, the history of religion, missing children and deception are front a...

In his book, "Rebels at Sea: Privateering in the American Revolution," Dr. Eric Jay Dolin explains how a previously unheralded force, independent boat captains, played a crucial role in helping the colonists win the Revolutionary War. He explains how they captured British ships, upset shipping routes, upset their financial system and contributed to their weariness in fighting the patriot...

On all our gravestones, there will be a date of birth, a dash, and a date of death. The dash (-) will represent the entirety of our lives. In his new book, "It Was All a Dream: Biggie and the World that Made Him," Justin Tinsley argues that the life of Notorious BIG is important for every American to understand because "the world that made him" is the one that made all of us, b...

Who ARE the newsmakers who we see on TV or the web? What makes them tick? Who are they when they aren't running for office, starring in Hollywood or battling criminals in court? In this episode, we talk with legendary Boston anchor Natalie Jacobson about the technique she used to document Boston's newsmakers over her four-decade career as a journalist. She explains how she realized that...

It has become cliche to say that the roots of modern New York City can be found in the 1970s. But in his book, "Manhattan Phoenix: The Great Fire of 1835 and the Emergence of Modern New York," Daniel Levy argues that the leveling of 700 buildings in lower Manhattan is truly the key moment. The fire devastated lower Manhattan, left thousands homeless or out of work and exposed several way...

If George Floyd had been killed by police in almost any other era of American history, before we all carried high definition cameras in our pocket, there's a good chance the perpetrator would have escaped justice. In "Seen and Unseen: Technology, Social Media and the Fight for Racial Justice," BET news anchor Dr. Marc Lamont Hill and longtime reporter Todd Brewster explore how chang...

During the 2016 presidential election, we got an up-close look at how a foreign nation can influence domestic politics. US intelligence has found that Russia worked to spread disinformation, poison social media and steal documents. But that was not the first time America has been manipulated by a foreign power.  In the run up to World War I, Boston Globe "Spotlight" reporter Mark Arsenau...

Lynching is often and understandably thought of as a southern problem. But Philip Dray's new book, "A Lynching at Port Jervis: Race and Reckoning in the Gilded Age," explores the only lynching that occurred in New York State between 1882 and 1899. He explains why northerners must come to grips with not only the violent incident that happened in the "idyllic" Delaware Water...

What does it mean to be white in America? What does it mean to be Black? Is it merely the color of our skin? How does the history of how different races have been treated by the law and by fellow Americans weigh on those labels? What would it be like to straddle both worlds? In "White Lies: The Double Life of Walter F. White and America's Darkest Secret," AJ Baime explains how an Af...

Where do rights come from? Do they come from the Constitution? The Supreme Court? From God? The voting booth? Bestselling author Dr. Kate Clifford Larson argues in her biography of Fannie Lou Hamer that rights also come from those willing to fight for them, from heroes who risk their lives while demanding the full promise of what America offers. Hamer was born a Mississippi sharecropper who would...

Before the phrase, "the trial of the century," became a cliche, there was New England slave trader Joseph White and the greatest whodunit of the 19th Century. The wealthy, powerful and supremely disliked shipping magnate had apparently swam with too many sharks to escape justice forever. But who would go into a man's bedroom and kill him in his sleep? Edward Renehan's book, &qu...

"To study history, you must study the historian." Are the writers who make history also a part of history? Are the stories they tell what actually happened, or have we all been had? What motivates a historian to practice her craft? In "Making History: Storytellers Who Shaped the Past," veteran writer and publisher Richard Cohen explains how the earliest historians built their n...

The end of slavery came thanks - in part - to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans. At the Civil War's conclusion, the abolitionist movement had finally achieved its most sacred goal. But in, "The Republic of Violence: The Tormented Rise of Abolition in Andrew Jackson's America," JD Dickey argues that movement gained momentum decades before, during the 1830s, as abo...