The Road to Now

It's difficult to fathom how Benjamin Franklin accomplished so much in a single lifetime. It's equally difficult to imagine how to take such an incredible life and consolidate it into four hours of documentary film. In this episode, we cover both feats with writer Dayton Duncan and producer David Schmidt, two of the great minds behind Ken Burns' documentary on Benjamin Franklin . Dayton and David...

The Allman Brothers' 1971 album At Fillmore East features one of the era's great rock bands at its prime, selling over a million copies despite not producing a single "hit" song. It is also the last album produced by the Allman Brothers prior to the death of the band's founder, Duane Allman. In this episode we speak with Bob Beatty, whose new book Play All Night!: Duane Allman and the Journey to F...

John Fea is taking on the history of Christianity and American politics in the 21 st century. In three volumes. In this (single) episode, we talk about this tremendous task that John is undertaking and also get his thoughts on why the political Christian right came to feel disappointed in the Bush administration, why they later rallied around Donald Trump, and what this might mean for American pol...

Juneteenth, which celebrates the emancipation of enslaved Americans at the end of the Civil War, has gone from a local holiday in Texas to a national day of celebration for many Americans. In this episode we speak with legal scholar and Pulitzer Prize winning historian Annette Gordon-Reed about her new book On Juneteenth and the ways that the holiday, her personal story and the history of the US c...

Mark McKinnon is a political advisor, reform advocate, and host of Showtime's The Circus . In this episode he joins Ben & Bob to talk about his work to found the non-partisan group No Labels , which advocates for independent candidates in presidential elections, and what a third-party might mean for the elections of 2024 and beyond.   This episode was edited by Ben Sawyer.

In the last few years, many on the left have been calling for a "Green New Deal," but we might have already had that. Between 1933 and 1942, the Civilian Conservation Corps enlisted more than three million young men in a project that planted two billion trees, slowed soil erosion on forty million acres of farmland, and enjoyed support across political and geographic divides. In this episode we tal...

It's been seven years since Ben & Bob launched the first episode of The Road to Now, so we invited two of our early guests – Doug Heye & Margaret Talev – to join us for a conversation about how things have changed since 2016 and the events of the preceding years that now appear to be most pivotal in creating those changes. Our conversation covers campaign finance reform, social media and the impac...

The "Amazon economy" seems like something new, but it rests on the physical and intellectual infrastructure built by those who came long before the age of the internet and leaves many of the same marks on the environment. Prominent in this story are five companies- Coca-Cola, Delta Airlines, Walmart, Bank of America, and FexEx-   all of which have global reach and southern roots. In this episode,...

Today's Republican party looks a lot different than it did just a few decades ago, but it rests on many of the same organizations and ideologies that formed the modern conservative movement in the 1970s. In this episode,  Rick Perlstein joins us for a conversation about his newest book Reaganland: America's Right Turn, 1976-1980 and how Ronald Reagan, Orrin Hatch and other prominent Republicans we...

In 2021, Neil King Jr. threw a few basic items into a backpack and walked from his home in Washington, DC to New York City. Along the way he met new people, uncovered forgotten moments of history, and spent many days thinking about America. In this episode, Neil joins Ben and Bob to discuss his new book, American Ramble: A Walk of Memory and Renewal , and the lessons he learned along the way. Befo...

Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers' is a historian whose work has shed new light on the roles that women played in American slavery. In this episode, she joins Ben and Bob to share some of the significant findings of her work, the sources she's used to learn more about enslaved people and female slaveowners, and her new project, which reorients our understanding of the British Atlantic slave trade by cente...

For most of us, dust is a surface-level annoyance. For Anita Radini, it is a fountain of information about the past. In this episode, Anita joins us to share the fascinating new details about the lives of Medieval women that she discovered in the tiny remains of dust that collected in their dental plaque, and how her interdisciplinary work in archaeological science and paleoecology is reshaping th...

On Thursday, April 13 th , the first episode of Bob's new audio documentary Founding Son: John Quincy's America premieres (on all podcast platforms), so Ben & Bob decided to celebrate the occasion by talking Adams' life, his place in American history, and inspiration behind Bob's decision to create the series. Subscribe to  Founding Son: Apple Podcasts Spotify Stitcher Or anywhere else you get you...

On September 11, 2012, al-Qaeda-affiliated militants attacked a US mission in Benghazi, Libya and killed four Americans. That tragic loss of life abroad turned into a political fiasco at home, as the story of the attack became interpreted within the context of a Presidential election and a widening ideological gap between America's two major political parties. In this episode, we speak with Ethan...

Ken Burns joins Bob and Ben for a conversation about American history and the themes he sees playing out in the US today. Ken shares his process for selecting subjects for his films and explains how his new 3-part film Hemingway (co-directed w/ Lynn Novick) highlights Ernest Hemingway's individual genius while also revealing the universal aspects of life that we all share. We also discuss how our...

The Athletic's Dana O'Neil joins Bob & Ben for a conversation about the history of the NCAA tournament, how college basketball built the fan base it has today, and how rule changes have changed the sport from the 3-point line to the more recent Name, Image & License (NIL) contracts that allow college athletes to receive compensation for playing. Dana O'Neil is a Senior Writer for The Athletic , an...

Jimmy Carter only served four years as President (1977-1981) but his approach to foreign policy produced big results, including the return of the Panama Canal to Panama, a strategic nuclear arms treaty with the Soviet Union (SALT-II), and US formal recognition of the People's Republic of China. In this episode we welcome Nancy Mitchell back to the show to discuss the key moments in Carter's Presid...

Andrew Young was already an iconic civil rights leader and sitting Congressman from Georgia's 5 th District when a dark horse candidate named Jimmy Carter asked for his support in the 1976 Presidential election. Young found Carter to be an honest man and spoke highly of him. Carter, in turn, appointed Young as the US Ambassador to the United Nations and tasked him with reshaping American foreign p...

A Presidency is defined by the decisions that a person makes while serving as Executive, but a Presidential legacy is about much more than that. In the new book, Mourning the Presidents: Loss and Legacy in American Culture , (UVA Press, 2023) Lindsay Chervinsky and Matthew Costello have brought together a collection of chapters that explore the ways that mourning ceremonies, causes of death, and m...

In the 20 th Century, leaders in Atlanta and Charlotte championed a "New South" vision that they hoped would attract the investment needed to transform their regional trading hubs into world-class urban centers. The success in both cases was undeniable, but it was also not equal. Despite Charlotte's success as a banking hub, it has lagged far behind Atlanta in terms of its economy and its place in...

Jordan Gross played 11 seasons as an Offensive Tackle for the Carolina Panthers. In his rookie season, he was a starting member of the Panthers team that made it to Super Bowl XXXVIII in 2004. In his final season (2011) he was selected for his third Pro Bowl. Today he is a farmer in Idaho and one of the happiest people we've ever met. Jordan joins Bob & Ben for a conversation about his career, the...

January 20th was the official halfway mark of the Biden Administration's first term. That might seem like a an odd time to discuss Presidential transitions, but with the justice department still prosecuting participants in the January 6th insurrection it's never too soon to ask ourselves what lay ahead for 2024. Our guest in this episode, David Marchick is Dean of the Kogod School of Business at A...

At the end of World War II, the United States had few laws protecting the environment. Just 30 years later, the Environmental Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act had been enacted, representing the urgency of, and widespread support for, environmental protections in those years. Douglas Brinkley, author of Silent Spring Revolution: John F. Kennedy, Rachel Carson, Lyndon Johnson, Richard N...

This is part two of our conversation w/ Maximillian Potter & Richard Stayskal. For part 1, check out RTN episode # 257. Since 1950, the Feres Doctrine has prevented active-duty members of the US Armed Forces from suing the government for wrongful injury or death that occurred outside of combat. In this episode we speak with journalist Maximillian Potter and decorated Green Beret Richard Stayskal t...

Since 1950, the Feres Doctrine has prevented active-duty members of the US Armed Forces from suing the government for wrongful injury or death that occurred outside of combat. In this episode we speak with journalist Maximillian Potter and decorated Green Beret Richard Stayskal to learn about the injustice many service members have endured, the reasoning behind the decision, and what can be done t...