The Road to Now

In the first episode of The Road to Now recorded over the Internet via Skype, Dr. Bradley Fidler explains the key moments in the development of the Internet and gives his take on the issues facing us as we move further into the 21st century. An episode about the Internet, recorded over the Internet? Yes, and it gets better because we recorded the interview at UCLA's Boelter Hall ARPANET exhibit, a...

During a recent trip to Nashville, Dr. Carlos Aleman caught up with Ben and Bob for a great discussion about the history of Nicaragua and US relations with Central America in the 20th Century. Carlos' expertise on this topic is both personal and professional; he was born in Nicaragua in 1979, immigrated to San Francisco, CA as a child, and earned his PhD in Latin American history from Michigan Sta...

In the lucky 13th episode of the Road to Now, Bob and Ben sit down with the multi-talented Scott Avett to talk about the influences, events, and family history that led him to his life as an artist. Scott is a founding member of the award-winning band The Avett Brothers , which he established more than a decade and a half ago along with his brother Seth, and Road to Now host Bob Crawford. Scott is...

In episode 12 of the Road to Now, Bob and Ben discuss the Hillary Clinton email controversy and the history of government documents with archives specialist Stacy Wood. Wood places the Clinton controversy within its historical context and explains how tricky it can be to walk the line between secrecy and preserving documents for posterity. Stacy Wood is a critical scholar of archives, information...

During a recent trip to Denver, Bob and Ben were fortunate enough to sit down with journalist and historian Dick Kreck at the historic Brown Palace Hotel for a conversation about the history of Denver and its establishment in the 19th and early 20th century. Dick Kreck has more than four decades of experience as a reporter for the San Francisco Examiner, The LA Times,  and The Denver Post,  and ha...

On this episode of The Road to Now , we speak with Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper about his new memoir The Opposite of Woe: My Life in Beer and Politics and the ways that his peculiar & fascinating life interact with the greater history of our country. Gov. Hickenlooper shares his family history, which he traces back to the earliest settlers of the Pennsylvania colony in the 1680s, and talks...

Tara Houska (Honor the Earth; Native American Affairs Advisor to the Bernie Sanders Campaign) and Dr. Joseph Genetin-Pilawa (Assistant Professor of History at George Mason University) join Bob and Ben to talk about Native American culture and history. They discuss the use of Native American imagery in American popular culture, and link these depictions of American Indians to a long history of disc...

Bob and Ben speak to Thomas Hanchett (former Curator of the Levine Museum of the New South) about the history of Charlotte and the rise of the "New South" cities following the Civil War. Dr. Hanchett discusses the ways that city, state, and federal policies have shaped Charlotte as it is today, as well as the ways that new patterns of migration and development are changing what it means to be "sou...

Bob Crawford of the Avett Brothers talks to Producer Alexander Trowbridge and Writer Matt Negrin of Bloomberg's "With All Due Respect," which is hosted by "Game Change" authors Mark Halpern and John Heilemann. The show was also recently picked up by MSNBC. They discuss how they got involved with the show, the history of entertainment news, and their take on the rules of politics in the 21st Centur...

In episode 1, Bob Crawford of the Avett Brothers and historian Dr. Benjamin Sawyer of Middle Tennessee State University explain their goals for the Road to Now podcast and attempt to trace the historical roots of the new populism that is reshaping American's political landscape in the lead up to the Presidential Election of 2016. Recorded May 6, 2016 at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee.