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Aural History Productions   


The Radio Archive ~ January - June, 2006

June 29, 2006
Segments 1 and 3: "William Morris and the Arts and Crafts Movement."

PART 1: MP3. Time: 26:39.
PART 2: MP3. Time: 15:26.
This program comes to us from Pacifica's Against the Grain; it examines the Arts and Crafts movement -- a late 19th-century design and architecture movement founded in part on a critique of industrial society. Curator Martin Chapman of the de Young Museum in San Francisco offers an overview of the movement and its international dimensions. Historian Peter Stansky follows, discussing the life and ideas of movement founder William Morris, who turned to socialism in the 1870s. Against the Grain is produced by C.S. Soong and Sasha Lilley. [Originally broadcast by Against the Grain on 4-24-2006].

Segment 2: "From the Archives: An Interview with Photographer William Henry Jackson" (1941).
MP3. Time: 23:58.
This sound recording comes from the Records of the Department of the Interior, Office of the Secretary of the Interior. It is an interview with William Henry Jackson (April 4, 1943-June 30,1942), photographer and painter of the pioneer West, conducted a day before his 98th birthday. It offers -- to borrow NARA's catalog summary: "a general review of Jackson's career as a landscape photographer and artist, with special attention to the frontier period and his work with the great geological surveys of the 1870s. The interview was conducted by Shannon Allen, director of the Interior Department's radio station." The Department of Interior records contain additional interviews with Jackson, though their audio quality is poor. For more information about Jackson, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Henry_Jackson. For information about this recording contact Talking History/University at Albany, or the National Archives' Motion Picture, Sound, and Video Records LICON, Special Media Archives Services Division, College Park, MD.

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June 22, 2006
Segment 1: "The Emergence of Gender Hierarchies in Ancient Societies."

MP3. Time: 27:42.
In this program, from Pacifica's (KPFA) Against the Grain, C.S. Soong interviews Bruce Lerro about the emergence of gender inequality in the ancient world. Lerro is the author of Power in Eden: The Emergence of Gender Hierarchies in the Ancient World (Trafford Publishing, 2005). Against the Grain is produced by C.S. Soong and Sasha Lilley.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: The Young Isaac Newton" (1937).
MP3. Time: 4:53.
This segment of a longer dramatic documentary, titled "Heroes and Heroines of Science," was produced by the Smithsonian Institution in 1937. It portrays some of the scientific contributions of a young Issac Newton. For more information about Newton, see: http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/rhatch/pages/01-Courses/current-courses/08sr-newton.htm. For more information about this recording contact Talking History/University at Albany, or the National Archives' Motion Picture, Sound, and Video Records LICON, Special Media Archives Services Division, College Park, MD.

Segment 3: "Stonewall Revisited."
MP3. Time: 12:12
This segment from Pacifica Radio WBAI's Morning Show, features an interview with David Carter, the author of Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution (St. Martin's Press, 2004). Carter reexamines the story behind the six days of rioting that broke out on June 28, 1969 against a popular Greenwich Village gay bar, the Stonewall Inn, and that helped catalyze the Gay Liberation movement in the United States. Originally broadcast in 2005.

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June 15, 2006
Segment 1: "From the Vault: Margaret Mead."

MP3. Time: 28:43.
Dr. Margaret Mead (December 16, 1901 � November 15, 1978) was an American cultural anthropologist whose controversial life and career spanned decades of radical social and cultural changes. Over the decades, Pacifica Radio Archives collected hours of recordings of her speeches, interviews, and radio broadcasts. In this episode of From the Vault, Pacifica Radio Archive's new series based on the almost 60,000 recordings in its collection, Christopher Sprinkle has edited some of the recordings of Mead to produce this profile of the woman and her ideas. From the Vault is executive produced by Pacifica Radio Archives & Brian DeShazor. For more information about From the Vault, see http://www.pacificaradioarchives.org/. For more about Dr. Margaret Mead, see: http://www.interculturalstudies.org/Mead/biography.html.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: The Achievements of Joseph Henry and John Wesley Hyatt."
MP3. Time: 8:31.
This dramatic documentary portraying the lives and scientific contributions of two 19th century inventors -- Joseph Henry (electromagnetism; self-inductance) and John Wesley Hyatt (celluloids) -- was produced around 1950 as part of the New York State Bureau of Social Studies (Education Department) series titled "The Price of Liberty." The series consisted of dramatic documentaries reconstructing (with actors) key events in American and New York history and was produced as an educational tool and for radio broadcast by the Junior Leagues of Albany in cooperation with the State Education Department. According to the New York State Archives, the recordings may have been connected to the popular "Freedom Train" movement of the early 1950s: "In 1949 a Temporary State Commission for the New York State Freedom Train was established and historical documents celebrating American liberty were sent on tour. In conjunction with such efforts, suggestions to elementary school teachers for teaching about freedom were produced by the Education Department." This recording comes from a set of 16" transcription disks donated to Talking History/University at Albany and the UAlbany Library; another set can be found in the New York State Archives, and consists of "twelve recorded segments, each contained on one side of a 16-inch, 33 1/3 rpm sound disk. They are entitled: the Iroquois Confederacy; Flushing Remonstrance; Trial of John Peter Zenger; Sir William Johnson; Coxsackie Remonstrance; Battle of Oriskany; New York Becomes a State; the Story of Transportation; the Story of Agriculture; the Story of Industry; the Story of Free Education; and the Story of World Trade." For more information aboput the series, contact Talking History/University at Albany or the New York State Archives, Cultural Education Center, Albany, NY.

Segment 3: "Black Baseball: The Negro League."
MP3. Time: 19:00
Talking History/OAH's Eileen Dugan explores the history of the Negro League with Neil Lanctot, author of Negro League Baseball: The Rise and Ruin of a Black Institution (Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 2006). Produced: April, 2006.

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June 8, 2006
Segment 1: "The Communist Manifesto Revisited."

MP3. Time: 33:52.
In this program, from Pacifica's (KPFA) Against the Grain, Sasha Lilley interviews Phil Gasper about the continuing significance of Marx's seminal work. Gasper is the editor of The Communist Manifesto: A Road Map to History's Most Important Political Document (Haymarket Books, 2005). Against the Grain is produced by C.S. Soong and Sasha Lilley.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Andrew Carnegie on the Gospel of Wealth (1914)."
MP3. Time: 5:50.
This is steel mogul and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie summarizing his views on wealth and responsibilities of the wealthy, recorded January 20, 1918 at the Edison motion picture film studio in Bronx, NY.

Segment 3: "American Gunfight: The Attempt to Assassinate Truman."
MP3. Time: 19:00
On this Talking History/OAH segment, Linna Place interviews Stephen Hunter, co-author -- with John Bainbridge -- of American Gunfight: The Plot to Kill Harry Truman and the Shoot Out That Stopped It. American Gunfight tells the story of the November 1st, 1950 attempt by Puerto Rican nationalists Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola to assassinate President Harry S. Truman.

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June 1, 2006
Segment 1: "Alienable Rights."

MP3. Time: 25:57.
In this program, from Radio Curious host Barry Vogel interviews Dr. Francis D. Adams, co-author of Alienable Rights: The Exclusion of African Americans in a White Man�s Land, 1619 to 2000, a book which focuses on the continual frustration of the drive for equal rights for black people in the United States. Adams is an independent scholar living in Los Angeles, California.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: An Interview With Fannie Lou Hamer (1965)."
MP3. Time: 13:41.
This is an edited selection from an interview conducted (most likely in 1965) with the Mississippi-born civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer and now archived in the Pacifica Radio Archive. It focusing on Hamer's early voter registration and voting rights work in SNCC and in the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. For more on Hamer, see the University of Southern Mississippi's excellent on-line digitial archive interview and biography: http://www.lib.usm.edu/~spcol/crda/oh/hamer.htm?hamertrans.htm~mainFrame.

Segment 3: "Catherine Clinton on Harriet Tubman."
MP3. Time: 18:39
On this Talking History/OAH segment, Bryan Le Beau interviews historian Catherine Clinton about Harriet Tubman, the conductor on the Underground Railroad who has become an American legend. Clinton is author of Harriet Tubman: The Road to Freedom (Little, Brown, and Co., 2004). .

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May 25, 2006
Segments 1 and 3: "King and Gandhi's Nonviolence."

PART 1: MP3. Time: 26:34.
PART 2: MP3. Time: 22:54.
This program comes to us from Pacifica's Against the Grain. Stanford University Professor of History and Martin Luther King Jr. Papers Project editor Dr. Clayborne Carson and Barnard College Professor and Gandhi expert Dennis Dalton discuss ideas about nonviolence as promoted by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi. They note that both men's notions of nonviolent resistance did not simply involve an advocacy of avoidance of violence, but something far more sophisticated and carefully considered. [Originally broadcast by Against the Grain on 1-16-2006].

Segment 3: "From the Archives: The HUAC Testimony of Bertolt Brecht (1947)."
MP3. Time: 4:36.
This is a selection from Bertolt Brecht's October 30, 1947 testimony before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Brecht's full testimony lasted around an hour and he willingly asnwered all questions put to him by the Committee, carefully noting that because he was a "guest" of the United States, he did not feel that he could avail himself of the constitutional protections that other non-cooperative witnesses claimed. Still, his "ccoperation" was carefully orchestrated by him and his friend Hermann Budzislawski, who helped him rehearse for his Committee appearance and come up with seemingly honest though quite imprecise answers to Committee members' probing questions. The following day, Brecht left the U.S. for Europe; he never came back. For more about Brecht and his American years, see: http://www.usc.edu/isd/archives/arc/libraries/feuchtwanger/exhibits/Brecht/.

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May 18, 2006
Segments 1, 2 and 4: "Japanese War Crimes and Tribunals, Yesterday and Today."

PART 1 (Introduction): MP3. Time: 2:53.
PART 2: MP3. Time: 27:04.
PART 3: MP3. Time: 19:44.
Dr. Herbert Bix is Professor (Joint with Sociology) & Vice Chair of the Department of History, Binghamton University. He is an expert on the political, military, and social history of 19th and 20th century Japan. His current research centers on the Asia-Pacific War and its aftermath, Western images of the Showa emperor Hirohito, and Japanese constitutional thought. In 2001, he won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award for his book Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan. He has also published Peasant Protest in Japan, 1590-1884, as well as numerous articles and book chapters. Here, in this talk delivered as the Twenty-sixth Annual Phi Alpha Theta Lecture at the University at Albany, he presents some of his thoughts on the history and long-term implications of the Japanese War Crimes trials that immediately followed World War II.

Segment 3: "From the Archives: Truman, World Order, and the United Nations."
MP3. Time: 2:47.
This is a selection from President Harry Truman's address in New York City at the Opening Session of the United Nations General Assembly on October 23, 1946. In it, he focuses on the role of the UN in promoting justice, and preventing war and war crimes.

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May 11, 2006
Segment 1: "Susan Gauss on Mexican Workers after the Revolution."

MP3. Time: 23:01.
Prof. Susan Gauss is Assistant Professor of History at the University at Albany, SUNY (where is also holds a joint appointment with the Department of Latin American and Caribbean Studies). She is a specialist in Latin American History -- with particular expertise in Latin American labor and economic history. On May 1, 2006, at the 8th annual Hudson-Mohawk May Day festival held at Russell Sage College in Troy, N.Y., she delivered this talk, entitled "The World of Mexican Workers in Historical Perspective." Gauss is currently working on a book examining the political and social origins of industrialization in post-revolutionary Mexico.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Julia Ward Howe, the Battle Hymn of the Republic, and the First Mother's Day."
Off-site Link (includes several recordings).
Julia Ward Howe was the author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," but she was far more than that; she was a poet, a reformer, a champion for world peace, a public speaker, and a biographer. Profoundly influenced by the Civil War and particularly by the carnage that accompanied the Franco-Prussian war in 1870, Howe began a world peace crusade and in that year wrote a woman's peace manifesto -- an "appeal to womanhood" to rise up against the brutality of war. She initiated a Mothers' Peace Day observance in her home city, Boston, on the second Sunday in June -- the first American "Mother's Day." Howe funded its celebration for a decade, but the observance never really took hold until it was transfigured and replaced in the early 1900s by a very different sort of celebration, one that did take hold, our present-day Mothers' Day, the creation of Anna Jarvis.

Segment 3: "Spring Forward: On Daylight Savings Time."
MP3. Time: 16:28.
Every spring Americans turn their clocks forward. Talking History/OAH'sBryan Le Beau discusses the history of this practice with Michael Downing, the author of Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time (Shoemaker & Hoard, 2006). Michael Downing is also the author of five other books, including Shoes Outside the Door, Perfect Agreement, and Breakfast with Scot. He teaches creative writing at Tufts University and lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Produced: April, 2006.

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May 4, 2006
Segment 1: "The KGB File of Andrei Sakharov."

MP3. Time: 27:32.
George Liston Seay interviews Joshua Rubenstein, co-editor (with Alexander Gribanov) of The KGB File of Andrei Sakharov, about the history of KGB surveillance of Nobel Prize winning scientist Andrei Sakharov, a stinging critic of Soviet repression.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Harold MacMillan and the British H-Bomb (1957)."
MP3. Time: 4:27.
On May 15th, 1957 the British Prime Minister Harold MacMillan announced that England had successfully conducted thermonuclear tests. In this BBC talk, MacMillan justifies Britain's testing program.

Segment 3: "American Prometheus: The Life of J. Robert Oppenheimer."
MP3. Time: 17:17.
Talking History/OAH's John Herron is joined by Kai Bird and Martin Sherwin, coauthors of American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer, to discuss the complexities and nuances of the life of the nuclear physicist Robert Oppenheimer. Produced: April 2006.

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April 27, 2006
Segment 1: "Surviving the Holocaust."

MP3. Time: 28:12.
Barry Vogel, producer of Radio Curious, interviewed Bernard Offen last year (in May of 2005) about his experience as a conentration camp survivor. Offen recalled his experiences in five Nazi concentration camps in Poland during World War Two, when he was a young teenager.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Edward Murrow on Buchenwald (1945)."
MP3. Time: 10:17.
The Third U.S. Army reached the Buchenwald Concentration Camp on April 11, 1945, liberating the remaining 21,000 inmates still alive within the camp. CBS reporter Edward R. Murrow arrived at Buchenwald the following day and surveyed the horrid scene the German SS had left behind. Three days later, he was able to broadcast this account to the world. His broadcast is still considered one of the most memorable and powerful radio transmissions in broadcasting history.

Segment 3: "Private Thompson."
MP3. Time: 16:45.
Talking History/OAH's Linna Place interviews Laura Leedy Gansler to shed some light on the life of Sarah Emma Edmonds, the young girl who transformed herself into a man -- Private Frank Thompson. Gansler, a writer and lawyer, is author of The Mysterious Private Thompson: The Double Life of Sarah Emma Edmonds, Civil War Soldier. Produced: March 2006.

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April 20, 2006
Segment 1 and 3: "Mark Klempner on Dutch Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust."

PART 1: MP3. Time: 29:56.
PART 2: MP3. Time: 22:44.
Talking History's Gerald Zahavi interviews Mark Klempner, an oral historian and folklorist who recently published a book on Dutch rescuers of Jews during World War II. The Heart Has Reasons: Holocaust Rescuers and Their Stories of Courage (Pilgrim Press, 2006), began as a research project during Klempner's senior year as an English major at Cornell in 1996-97. It explores the stories of men and women who took immense risks to resist Nazi invaders during the occupation of Holland by helping Jews hide and escape during the war. The interview includes audio excerpts from some of the individuals Klempner interviewed.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Adolph Eichmann on Trial."
MP3. Time: 1:49.
This excerpt from the audio track from a Universal Studios newsreel offers a brief overview of the Adolph Eichman trial. In this segment, the judges read the charges against Eichmann. Source: The Internet Archive. For more information about Eichmann and his trial, see: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/GEReichmann.htm and http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/e/eichmann-adolf/transcripts/.

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April 13, 2006
Segment 1: "Abraham Lincoln, Redeemer President."

MP3. Time: 17:23.
Abraham Lincoln's life and history have been the topics of countless books. Talking History's James Madison is joined by Allen Guelzo to offer a new understanding of the fallen leader. Professor Allen C. Guelzo is Henry R. Luce Professor of the Civil War Era and Professor of History at Gettysburg College. Guelzo�s essays, reviews, and articles have appeared in publications ranging from the American Historical Review and The Wilson Quarterly to newspapers such as The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Wall Street Journal. His book Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President won both the Lincoln Prize and the Abraham Lincoln Institute Prize.

Segment 2: "American Brutus: John Wilkes Booth and the Assassination of Lincoln."
MP3. Time: 17:19.
OAH/Talking History's John Herron joins his guest Michael Kauffman to shed light on the motives and conspiracy surrounding the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Kauffman is the author of American Brutus: John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Conspiracy, which recently won the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award for biography. Produced: April, 2006.

Segment 3: "From the Archives: Jane Fonda's North Vietnam Broadcasts (1972)."
MP3. Time: 10:44.
Actress Jane Fonda toured North Vietnam in 1972, during which she made several radio broadcasts supportive of North Vietnam and critical of the U.S. role in Vietnam. All of her radio addresses were broadcast on Radio Hanoi and were monitored by the CIA. The following recording, made on July 20, 1972, comes from the CIA media collection at the National Arrchives, College Park. The quality of the recording is only fair at best. There are extensive transcriptions of Fonda's North Vietnam addresses available on the WWW (most of them on virulantly anti-Fonda sites); any search engine will find them. For more information on this recording, contact the National Archives (Archives II), College Park, Maryland or Talking History/University at Albany.

Segment 4: "Pocahontas and the Powhatan Confederacy."
MP3. Time: 16:53.
OAH/Talking History's Bryan Le Beau interviews Camilla Townsend, author of Pocahontas and the Powhatan Dilemma, about the complex geo-political world that Pocahontas inhabited. Townsend is a professor of history at Colgate University. Produced: March, 2006.

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April 6, 2006
Segment 1: "I Remember When: You Work at Stetson's?"

MP3. Time: 37:07.
"You Work at Stetson's?" was broadcast in November of 1982 as the first of a radio documentary series titled "I Remember When." The series was devoted to recounting various aspects of Philadelphia's history. "By 1886, John B. Stetson owned the world�s biggest Hat factory in Philadelphia and employed nearly 4,000 workers. The factory was putting out about 2 million hats a year by 1906. Stetson was a pioneer in mechanizing the art of hat manufacturing. He was also part of a movement of liberal business reform in the early 20th century, now referred to as "welfare capitalism." He offered a variety of benefits to his employees, including free health care -- and gave shares in his company to valued workers. As a philanthropist, he founded Stetson University in Deland, Florida, and built a Philadelphia hospital. This documentary, based on oral interviews with former Stetson employees, looks as the industrial world that Stetson created."

Segment 2: "From the Archives: A Conversation with Phil Ochs."
MP3. Time: 42:33.
The U.S. folksinger Phil Ochs committed suicide on April 9, 1976. We remember his life and career in this segment of a long interview of Ochs, originally conducted in 1973 by the oral historian Studs Terkel. Bob Gibson was also present at this interview. For a short biography and more information on Ochs, see: http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~trent/ochs/.

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March 30, 2006
Segment 1 and 3: "Tom Summerhill on Agrarianism in 19th Century New York."

PART 1: MP3. Time: 27:57.
PART 2: MP3. Time: 18:27.
Thomas Summerhill, Associate Professor of History at Michigan State University, and author of Harvest of Dissent: Agrarianism In 19th Century New York (Univ. of Illinois Press, 2005), joins Gerald Zahavi in a discussion of agrarian movements in nineteenth-century central New York. Summerhill explores Northern farmers� complex attitudes toward a spreading capitalist market and their tendencies to both embrace and resist it. Zahavi and Summerhill focus on such topics as the Anti-Rent Wars, the debate over the construction of the Albany and Susquehanna Railroad, and the rise and significance of the Grange.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: The Bently Boys' 'Down on Penny's Farm' (1929)."
MP3. Time: 2:47.
On October 23, 1929, in Johnson City, Tennessee, the Bently Boys first recorded this song about the trials and tribulations of being a renter and sharecropper. It was later taken up by a number of folksingers and modified in various ways. Perhaps the most famous variation on the original theme -- and the one that strayed furthest from the melody and lyrics of the original -- was Bob Dylan's "Maggie's Farm" (1965). A few years earlier, Dylan produced a version much closer to the melody of the Bently Boys tune. He called that song: "Hard Times in New York Town" (1962).

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March 23, 2006
Segment 1: "Mel Fiske: Radical Reporter."

MP3. Time: 23:40.
Barry Vogel, the host of Radio Curious, interviews Mel Fiske, the author of Radical: A Memoir of Wars, Communists & Work (2002), an autobiographica account of his life as a journalist and a communist. Fiske recounts how he was radicalized after a 15,000 mile journey across America during the Great Depression -- and the various jobs he held as a labor organizer, steel and railroad worker, freight-car assembler, and tire factory laborer. Fiske ended up working for various newspapers around the country and served as a Washington D. C. correspondent for the Daily Worker, the Communist party paper. As a reporter, he covered the rise of the post-WWII Red Scare.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Clement Attlee and the Rise of the English Welfare State."
MP3. Time: 14:40.
In the 1945 United Kingdom General Election, Labor Party leader Clement Attlee (1883-1967) and his party overwhelmed the Conservatives, and returned the Labor party back into power (it had spent a decade as the minority party -- the "loyal opposition"). During his years as Prime Minister--from 1945 until 1951--Attlee and his ministers initiated some of the most dramatic social, economic, and foreign policy reforms in Britain's history, helping to create the modern British welfare state. Besides giving British colonies India and Burma their independence, Attlee's government nationalized key sectors of the economy, including banks, coal mines, airlines, gas and electricity, train services, and the steel industry. Perhaps most revolutionaly and pioneering, was Labour health minister Nye Bevan's creation of the world's first and most comprehensive national health plan -- the National Health Service. The NHS was the cornerstone of the post-war Labour government's commitment to build a democratic, socialist state. In this speech, delivered over the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Attlee describes some of the far reaching reforms his government was on the verge of implementing.

Segment 3: "Marriage: From Obedience to Intimacy."
MP3. Time: 18:24.
OAH/Talking History's Linna Place interviews Stephanie Coontz about the history of marriage and its changing role -- from primarily a social and political necessity to the romantic institution we know today. Stephanie Coontz is author of Marriage, A History: From Obedience to Intimacy or How Love Conquered Marriage. Produced: February, 2006.

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March 16, 2006
Segment 1: "Holy Wars in Beulah Land: The Contest among Evangelical Protestants in the Early Nineteenth-Century South."

MP3. Time: 39:31.
Christine Leigh Heyrman explores the divisions among Evangelical Protestants in the early 19th century South, highlighting the intellectual foundations of those divisions. Her talk was delivered at the University at Albany as the Twentieth Annual Janice D. and Theodore H. Fossieck Lecture. Heyrman received her Ph.D. from Yale. She is currently a Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Delaware. Her publications include Commerce and Culture: The Maritime Communities of Colonial Massachusetts, 1690-1750 and Southern Cross: The Beginnings of the Bible Belt. Dr. Heyrman received the prestigious Bancroft Prize in 1998 for Southern Cross.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: The Blackout of 1965."
MP3. Time: 31:48.
On November 9, 1965, the entire Northeast area of the United States went dark. Thirty million people were left without electricity. Thousands were trapped in subways, elevators, and in traffic pile-ups caused by inopperative traffic signals. From the Voice of America archive, we present this documentary on the Great Blackout of 1965.

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March 9, 2006
Segment 1: "From the Archives: Fidel Castro at Harvard (April 25, 1959)."

BROADCAST EXCERPT: MP3 Time: 29:00.
FULL RECORDING: MP3 Time: 76:16.
Fidel Castro visited the United States in April of 1959, three months after his ascendency to power with the successful end of the Cuban revolution. On April 15th of 1959, he began a 12-day tour of the United States. One of the many places he visited, on April 25th, was Harvard University's Law School, to which he had applied for admission (unsuccessfully) more than a decade earlier. This is a selection from his talk at Harvard (broadcast on April 27th by Harvard's radio station and by the Voice of America) in which Castro answers questions from law students. The recording comes to us from the Voice of America audio collection at the National Archives (Archives II) in College Park, Maryland. Background on Castro's visit to Harvard is available at: http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/forum/Castro.html. We include above an MP3 of the full recording as well as the segment broadcast on Talking History.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: John F. Kennedy Defends the Bay of Pigs Invasion to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 20, 1961."
MP3. Time: 14:08.
On April 15, 1961, an American-sponsored countrerrevolutionary force invaded Cuba with the intention of stimulating a counter-revolutionary movement on the island and overthrowing Fidel Castro. The invasion was a fiasco. The Cuban government was anticipating the invasion, and the invading force failed to obtain either the anticipated indigenous support or full-blown US military support. Closer to twelve hunded invaders were captured, four U.S. pilots, and over a hundred Cuban invaders were killed in the invasion attempt. The Kennedy Administration tried hard to deny its involvement in the attempt, but each fabricated cover story it spread to the media was ultimately shown up as, indeed, a fabrication. Here, just days after the event, Kennedy offers his explanation of the Bay of Pigs Invasion. Source: Voice of America collection at the National Archives (Archives II). For a full chronology of the Bay of Pigs invasions go to: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/bayofpigs/chron.html.

Segment 3: "From the Archives: John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy Discuss the Stennis Committee and the Bay of Pigs Invasion (March 2, 1963)."
MP3. Time: 6:18.
In 1963, Mississippi Senator John C. Stennis headed a committee reviewing the Bay of Pigs invasion. Here, in two phone conversations from the John F. Kennedy Presidential Recordings -- available at the National Archives and on-line at the National Security Archive www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/bayofpigs -- President Kennedy and his brother, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, discuss the Stennis committee investigations. Both conversations took place on March 2, 1963.

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March 2, 2006
Segment 1 and 3: "William Loren Katz's interview of Herbert Aptheker."

PART 1: MP3. Time: 27:57.
PART 2: MP3. Time: 17:34.
Herbert Aptheker, a pioneering Marxist scholar of African American history, died on March 17th, 2003. In the mid-1990s, William Loren Katz at WBAI-FM interviewed Aptheker about his life, activism, relationship with Paul Robeson, and approach to the study and teaching of African American history. This is Katz's interview. For a short on-line biography of Aptheker, see the Organization of American Historian's obituary of Aptheker at: http://www.oah.org/pubs/nl/2003may/aptheker.html.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Ted Kennedy and Robert Bork (1987)."
MP3. Time: 28:26.
In July of 1987, President Ronald Reagan nominaed Robert H. Bork to the Supreme Court (Bork was then serving as Circuit Judge of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit). In the late summer and fall of that year, a massive battle over Bork's confirmation broke out in the national press and in the Senate. During the Senate Judiciary Committee's confirmation hearings, Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts became Bork's most aggressive interrogator, attacking the latter for his conservative positions on abortion and civil rights. Bork was denied confirmation by the Senate on October 23 of that year.

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February 23, 2006
Segment 1 and 3: "Slavery in New York: Slavery Where?"

PART 1: MP3. Time: 26:35.
PART 2: MP3. Time: 23:42.
Black slavery in the U.S. was not just a Southern phenomenon, it was also alive and well in the North -- at least through the early decades of the 19th century. Slavery was a central and ubiquitous part of the lives of New Yorkers for more than two centuries. Slavery in New York (New Press, 2005), edited by Ira Berlin & Leslie Harris (published in conjunction with the Fall 2005 Slavery and the Making of New York exhibition at the New-York Historical Society), "chronicles and analyzes New York City's African-American presence, both slave and free, from the 17th-century to the end of the 19th century." Here, co-editor Leslie Harris and contributor Patrick Rael ("The Long Death of Slavery") discuss the centrality of slavery to New York City's development, and why its elimination took so long. Leslie Harris is a professor of History and African American Studies at at Emory University; Patrick Real, is a professor of History at Bowdoin College. This program comes to us from Against the Grain, a radio and web media project based at the studios of Pacifica station KPFA-FM in Berkeley, California and devoted to providing in-depth analysis and commentary on a variety of matters -- political, economic, social and cultural. We thank C.S. Soong (host/producer) and Sasha Lilley (producer) for permission to air and archive this segment on our site. For more information about Against the Grain, go to: www.againstthegrain.org/about.htm.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Lena Horne on Paul Robeson's Influence, 2-21-1967."
MP3. Time: 3:42.
In this excerpt from a 1967 KPFA-Pacifica interview, Lena Horne describes the importance of Paul Robeson on her life and career. Source: Pacifica Radio Archives.

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February 16, 2006
Segment 1: "The Tuskegee Airmen."
MP3. Time: 27:53.
Ira O�Neal, Former First Lieutenant with the Tuskegee Airmen, joins Dialogue host George Liston Seay to discuss the history of the Tuskegee Airmen. The all-black army air force unit took on both foreign fascism and domestic racism in their combat roles during World War II and advanced the cause of racial equality at home.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Werner von Braun on Apollo 11, July 26, 1969 (edited selection)."
MP3. Time: 7:14.
Dr. Wernher von Braun, former German missile scientist and later director of the U.S. Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, spoke about the importance of Apollo 11, the first successful human landing on the moon. Neil A. Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin Aldrin Jr. were members of the crew on that mission, which was propelled into space on a Saturn V rocket--developed by von Braun's team. Recorded July 25, 1969. This is an edited selection of the original recording which resides in Record Group 306 (Records of the U.S. Information Agency / Voice of America) at the National Archives (Archives II), College Park, Maryland. For more information on Wernher von Braun, see http://history.msfc.nasa.gov/vonbraun/index.html.

Segment 3: "Chocolate: A History"
MP3. Time: 15:44.
OAH/Talking History's Bryan Le Beau joins Marcy Norton to discuss the history of chocolate, specifically its transformation from a sacred good to a secular commodity. Marcy Norton is Assistant Professor of History at George Washington University. Produed: December, 2005.

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February 9, 2006
Segment 1: "Daniel Horowitz on Betty Friedan."
MP3.
Time: 35:23.
On Saturday, February 4th, 2006, Betty Friedan died at her Washington, D.C., home of congestive heart failure. In memory of her, we are rebroadcasting our 12/9/1999 program, a conversation between Prof. Daniel Horowitz of Smith College and Lisa Kannenberg of the College of St. Rose, focusing on Horowitz's book, Betty Friedan and the Making of The Feminine Mystique. Kannenberg and Horowitz explore the personal, political, and intellectual origins of Betty Friedan's feminist ideas. Friedan is the author of The Feminist Mystique, the 1963 book that explored the roots of the discontent of housewives�"the problem that has no name"�and in the process helped launch modern feminism. The Feminine Mystique, along with the organization Friedan co-founded, the National Organization for Women (NOW), radically changed every sphere of modern American public and private life�from politics, to family dynamics, to daycare. Horowitz challenges the notion that feminism emerged in the 1960s without any connection to prior organized attempts to improve women's political, social, and economic status. Contrary to the concept of a "sharp historical break between 1960s feminism and what went on before," Horowitz asserts that Friedan and other feminists, "were quite aware of women's issues and women's movements in the period before the 1960s." His book argues that part of modern feminism's origins are to be found in left-wing labor union culture and activism in the 1940s and 1950s. Horowitz is Sylvia Dlugasch Bauman Professor of American Studies and director of the American studies program at Smith College.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Studs Terkel interviews Simone de Beauvoir (edited selection)."
MP3. Time: 2:32.
Simone de Beauvoir (1/9/1908-4/14/1986) was interviewed by Studs Terkel in May of 1960. In the context of our discussion of seminal feminist thinkers in the 20th century, we bring you here a short segment of that interview, Simone de Beauvoir, French author and philosopher, wrote extensively on philosophy, politics, and social issues. Perhaps her greatest contribution to modern feminism came in 1949, when she published the now classic Le Deuxi�me Sexe (The Second Sex), an analysis of the foundations of women's oppression in modern society. Like Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique, The Second Sex is considered now one of the "foundational tracts of contemporary feminism." For more informatiuon about Simone de Beauvoir, see: http://www.iep.utm.edu/b/beauvoir.htm. Our thanks to the Pacifica Radio Archives for this archival audio segment.

Segment 3: "Betty Friedan at the Teach-In With the Labor Movement, Columbia University, October 3, 1996."
MP3. Time: 17:03.
"The Fight for America's Future: A Teach-In with the Labor Movement," was held on October 3-4, 1996 at Columbia University, NYC. Plenary speeches were delivered by a number of scholars and activists, among them Betty Friedan. Continuing our rememberance of Betty Friedan, we offer her plenary speech here. The original tapes of the teach-in are held by Talking History / University at Albany, Albany, N.Y.

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February 2, 2006
Segment 1: "Sara and Eleanor"
MP3.
Time: 28:23.
Dialogue's George Liston Seay interviews Jan Pottker, author of Sara and Eleanor: The Story of Sara Delano Roosevelt and Her Daughter-in-Law (St. Martin's Griffin, 2005), about the complicated and contentious relationship between Eleanor Roosevelt and her mother-in-law.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Orson Welles Reads John Brown's Speech."
MP3. Time: 4:02.
Orson Welles reads a selection from John Brown's last speech, recited at the conclusion of his trial at Charles Town, Virginia in 1859. Brown was executed for attacking the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry in October, 1859 -- in an attempt to stimulate an insurrection by slaves. For more information on Brown's attack on Harper's Ferry and trial, go to: http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/johnbrown/brownlinks.html.

Segment 3: "Sundown Towns."
MP3. Time: 17:03.
Talking History's Linna Place interviews James Loewen, author of Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong and Lies Across America: What Our Historic Sites Get Wrong (see previous interviews with Loewen at Talking History) about his research on the widely used but historically hidden practice of barring minorities from American communities after sundown. Loewen is emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Vermont and author of Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism. Produced: Februrary 2006.

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January 26, 2006
Segment 1: "Men in the Middle"
MP3.
Time: 28:21.
Dialogue's George Liston Seay interviews James Gilbert about his recent book, Men in the Middle: Searching for Masculinity in the 1950s: "During the 1950s, American society appeared to be a calm sea of unthreatened stability. But appearances were deceiving. A lot was being challenged and rapidly changing during the much misunderstood decade. One subject under assault was manhood itself. What was manly and what was not were up for redefinition in a way that still affects us."

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Emile Zola's Defense."
MP3. Time: 4:43.
Orson Welles reads French writer Emile Zola's famous speech recited at Zola's 1898 libel defense trial. Zola had defended Capt. Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish artillery officer in the French army who had been falsely convicted of treason. In an article, J'Accuse!, Zola gave a detailed explanation of how Dreyfus had been falsely convicted of a crime he never committed. The article helped precipitate a deep division in French society over Dreyfus' guilt and innocence. Soon after J'Accuse! appeared, Zola himself was placed on trial for some of the assertions he made in his article. For more infomation about Dreyfus and Zola's trials, see our July 1, 1999 show and: http://www.law.uga.edu/academics/profiles/dwilkes_more/his9_jaccuse.html.

Segment 3: "Steven Watts on Henry Ford."
MP3. Time: 17:03.
Talking History's Bryan Le Beau interviews Steven Watts about Henry Ford and his role as "the man who recognized American society for what it had become--one of abundance and consumerism." Steven Watts is the author of The People's Tycoon: Henry Ford and the American Century (Borzoi Books, 2005) and The Magic Kingdom: Walt Disney and the American Way of Life (Houghton Mifflin, 1998). Produced: January 2006.

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January 19, 2006
Maintainence on the WRPI transmission tower required a power shut-down of the WRPI-FM transmitter, therefore, we were unable to broadcast Talking History this week. Tune in next week -- over the air at 91.5 in the Albany, New York region or on the WWW at www.wrpi.org. While you are visiting Talking History, we invite you to browse our archived shows dating from 1998; you may find something you haven't heard yet!

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January 12, 2006
Segment 1: "Martin Luther King at the National Conference for New Politics." Chicago, August 31, 1967.
MP3.
Time: 43:14.
Civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. attended the National Conference for New Politics on 8/31/67 and delivered this address, titled "The Three Evils of Society." The analog recording is available at the National Archives, in RG 306, Records of the U.S. Information Agency/Voice of America collection (at Archives II, College Park, Maryland). The speech was digitized by Talking History/University at Albany, SUNY.

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Daniel Patrick Moynihan on 'The Negro Family: The Case for National Action' (1965) (selection)."
MP3. Time: 6:01.
In 1965, then Assistant Secretary of Labor for Policy Planning Daniel Patrick Moynihan, sat down before a group of reporters to discuss his Department of Labor report on the Black family, "The Negro Family: The Case for National Action." The report, which soon became known as "The Moynihan Report" suggested that one of legacies of American slavery was the destruction of the patriarchal, two-parent family and its replacement by a "matrifocal" family in which the male parent is merely a transient presence. Moynihan's report suggested the need to establish "more stable" 2-parent families in the black community to remedy the continuing deterioration of personal and community life. The Moynihan Report was highly controversial and provoked intense and highly critical responses from black and white scholars and civil rights activists. The late historian Herbert G. Gutman was one of Moynihan's sharpest critics, and nine years after the Moynihan report was issued, Gutman producing a lengthy monograph, The Black Family in Slavery and Freedom," which challenged much of Moynihan's historical analysis of the black family.
This is an edited version of the original recording which resides in Record Group 306 (Records of the U.S. Information Agency / Voice of America) collection at the National Archives, College Park.; interviewers questions and some of Moynihan's comments were deleted. Broadcast 12/13/1965. For a brief biography of Moynihan, additional background on the Moynihan Report, and the text of the actual report, go to: 1) http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=M001054; 2) http://partners.nytimes.com/books/98/10/04/specials/moynihan-report.html; 3) http://www.city-journal.org/html/15_3_black_family.html ; 4) http://www.dol.gov/asp/programs/history/webid-meynihan.htm.

Segment 3: "Charles C. Mann on the Americas Before Columbus."
MP3. Time: 17:15.
Talking History's John Herron intrerviews Charles C. Mann, an award winning author and correspondent for Science and The Atlantic Monthly, about the subject of his latest book: 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. Together, they explore the surprising realities of the Americas before Columbus. Produced: December, 2005.

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January 5, 2006
Segment 1: "Adam Nicolson on the Battle of Trafalgar."
MP3.
Time: 27:40.
Dialogue host George Liston Seay interviews Adam Nicolson about the October 12, 1805 Battle of Trafalgar and its hero, Horatio Nelson. The Battle of Trafalgar was the most significant naval battle of the Napoleonic Wars, helping to re-affirm the maritime supremacy of Britain. Nicolson is the author of Seize the Fire: Heroism, Duty, and the Battle of Trafalgar (HarperCollins, 2005).

Segment 2: "From the Archives: Cesar Chavez at Harvard University, 1992" (selection).
MP3. Time: 8:32.
Civil rights activist and United Farm Workers (UFW) leader Cesar Chavez (1927-1993) talks about the "role of boycotts in attaining greater social justice in American Society." The original speech from which this segment comes was delivered at Harvard University - John F. Kennedy School of Government by Chavez on April 7, 1992. We thank the Pacifica Radio Archives for permission to air and archive it on Talking History. The recording was produced by Mark Torres for Pacifica. To obtain a copy of the entire speech, contact the Pacifica Archives at www.pacificaradioarchives.org. For a brief biography of Chavez, go to: http://www.ufw.org/cecstory.htm.

Segment 3: "Collapse."
MP3. Time: 16:59.
Talking History's Fred Nielsen joins author Jared Diamond "to delve into the historical and cultural patterns of catastrophe, and discuss the interdependent relationship between a society's development and its environment. Jared Diamond is Professor of Geography and Physiology at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an award winning author. His latest book, and the subject of our discussion is Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed." Produced: December, 2005.

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