July 3, 2026 • 21 mins
Sure, we know Lafayette as a street. And a college. And some of us know him as the charismatic Frenchman from Hamilton. But did you know he was France's richest orphan? And that his real name was Gilbert? And he might have been closer to George Washington than anyone really knew. Best-selling author Nathan Hale stops by to talk about his book Lafayette! and the man who inspired it.
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This episode originally aired on February 16, 2019.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Guess what will?
Speaker 2 (00:03):
What's that?
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Mano? So did you know that Lafayette started wearing a
wig at age thirteen?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
You know, I have a list of when everyone starts
wearing their wigs, but Lafayette's not on there for some reason.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
I also didn't know that kids used to make fun
of him for riding his horse like a goose. Apparently
he was a goose rider. But I only know this
because my son is obsessed with these history books called
Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales, and he keeps quizzing me on
all this trivia about historical figures, and I kind of
love it.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
I mean, it is kind of in the family business,
if you want to be honest about it.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Yeah. But you know, for a long time, Henry was
not a reader, and it kind of stunned me because
Lizzie and I both read a ton and he just
wasn't excited by reading. But then his aunt gave him
this Nathan Hale series, and it was almost like it
unlocked a new part of his personality, Like he just
started devouring nonfiction and graphic novels and reading all sorts
of other books and then telling me about French boys
(00:59):
and powdered wigs. You know the books he keeps going
back to and rereading. Is this Nathan Hale series? All right?
So why don't you tell us what are the books
all about? I mean everything from history. For like, Harriet
Tubman is one. He got really into ironclads, those ships.
He started talking about World War one and two. But
the character he's completely obsessed with right now is Lafayette.
(01:20):
But you know, since we haven't had an author on
in a while, I thought it'd be really fun to
invite Nathan haleon to talk about how he draws these books,
how he can relate grim history in just such a
funny way, and also to thank him for keeping my
son occupied for long swots of the time so I
don't have to parent as much. But let's dive in.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Hey, their podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm
Will Pearson, and as always I'm joined by my good
friend Mangesh hot Ticketter and sitting behind the soundproof glass
wearing a try corner hat that he made from paper
mache mango by hand. Is this not impressive?
Speaker 1 (02:13):
And I think he's actually doing a celebratory minuet? Is
that right?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Tristan. That's impressive. That's our friend and producer, Tristan McNeil.
So today we're just going to dive right in because
we've got the best selling author of the kids graphic
novel history series, Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales, on the line
with us today. Nathan Hale, Welcome to Part Time Genius.
Speaker 3 (02:32):
Hello, Hello, I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
So we want to talk to you about your latest
book in your series. It's Lafayette.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
I'm excited about that one. It just came out last fall,
and it's been interesting to see because it's the eighth
in the series. And when I meet with readers with
kids who read the books, I always ask him what
their favorite is. Lately, I've been getting a lot of
kids stay in as the favorite one. It's weird how
much be taken off because I did not expect them
to be popular and in children's publishing since two thousand
(03:01):
and five, the is my fourteenth year and children's publishing,
and I've had a lot of kind of dead ends,
and it was shocking when I thought, you know, I'm
not going to chase trends anymore. I'm just going to
do my own thing and I'm interested in history. I'm
just going to try it. It's going to fail that
I'm going to try it. And then seeing kids just
light up and get into American history. That's never happened,
(03:23):
but it's been fun.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
And do you do you enjoy the writing more or
the drawing.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
They're two such different things. The research is so fascinating,
and it's hard to kind of take all of these
little stories and then have to decide which ones you
have to cut to make it all fit. And then
since the books are all dialogue, it's not only how
do we cut it, but how do we show it
and tell it in just dialogue? So the writing is
(03:49):
pretty nerve wracking, but the drawing takes forever. So it's
kind of a toss up. You know, they're both awful,
and they're little fun in their way, but they're both
awful in.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
The Yeah, be awesome. So did having the name Nathan
Hale get you into history as a kid or was
that just kind of a convenient.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
Way in Oh, you know how every every day at
the first day of school, when the teacher you're meeting
your new teacher, My teacher would always be like, oh,
we have a famous patriot in our class and Hale
and then that say, oh what you said, give me
liberty or give me death? And I'd be like, no,
(04:26):
that was Patrick Henry. I said, I regret that I
had but one last to give for my country every year.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Maybe that's maybe that's where you developed your sense of humor,
you know, it's it's it's fun saying that these books
are literally gallows humor, and they're you know, narrated by
Nathan Hale trying to procrastinate his death and telling all
these great history stories. And I was just curious, how
did that come about.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
The funny thing is I had to feel in place
for a history series before we came up with the
conceit of the spy Nathan Hale being our kind of
omnificent narrator. But my editor insisted we have a narrator.
So I was brainstorming on ideas for what kind of
narrator would be good, and then we were going back
and forth on cover elements, and I was like, can
(05:13):
we cut one of those things if we combined the
offer name into the series title? And then I was like,
hang on, hang on, what if you know there was
this spine Ethan hail from British. He was executed by
the British. Hang On, hang On, And my editor was like,
I don't know what you're talking about, but I like
this sound of it. Hang ups and writes this down, and.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
That hangman character is so funny, like and just breaks
up the story really nicely. I am not actually into
military history, like I love history, but some of the
military stuff has just never really been that appealing to me.
But it's funn to see my kid just spouting all
these facts about various wars and be so into like
iron planets and whatever. And you know, I am curious, like,
(05:53):
how do you choose what stories to turn into books?
And how do you balance humor with some of these
very serious topics.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
I never super interested in military specific history either, but
every time I find a story that I'm excited about,
I go, oh, this is this military story. And it's
funny because I've been to some schools, whether the parents
are like, we love all of your books. We're a
couple of hippies, and our children are still militant about
(06:20):
this World War One stuff. I don't know if it's
terrifying or exciting that so many third and fourth and
fifth graders kind of love the structure of a military story.
I don't know what it is, and I will say
that our lay that book has anything to do with
a certain musical, but that may have come into play.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
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(09:16):
in the episode description. Well, actually that was my next
question was because I do want to focus on the
Lafayette story, which is fascinating, but I guess like he's
one of these characters we kind of know about as
a hero of the Revolutionary War, but his really, his
full story isn't that well known.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
When I started this book, I was a little nervous
about it because Lafayette could not be a more privileged person.
I mean, it was one percent aristocracy, and you know,
the stories people are interested in right now are not
stories about the world wealthy. Is the most privileged people? Sure,
I'm certainly not, but Lafette himself was in aristocratic French
family that went you know, back to the CRUs Aids,
(10:00):
back to Jordan of Bark. He was friends with Marie Antoinette,
who his friends with all of the wealthiest people in France.
But at heart he was like a country kid who
liked exploring, and he liked adventures, and more than anything else,
he wanted to be part of his family's That was
his line of, you know, warriors. And when he saw
(10:21):
that the Americans were fighting the British, he was like, well,
maybe I'll go over there. He watches up in America
because of his background and as well bumped straight up
in the George Washington's company because everybody was like, we
don't know anything about this kid. That he is richer
than anyone in this country. Maybe we can manipulate that.
(10:42):
And then the crazy Fluke is He turned out to
be pretty talented at battle.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Nathan Hale I love hearing about Lafayette. But first a
quick ad break. Welcome back to part time Jeeves. We
(11:07):
were talking with author Nathan Hale about his book Lafayette
and just about writing graphic novels in general.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
You know the stories that you tell here, there's some
pretty wild ones. You know, You've got this story about
Lafayette falling on his face on the dance floor and
one about him writing a kid's book with Ben Franklin.
I'm just curious, you know, in the writing process, how
do you find and then fact check stories like those?
Speaker 3 (11:31):
I read and read and read. I try to get
my hands on as many kind of primary sources as possible.
I read a lot of contemporary books and articles on
these people, and I'm always just kind of combing over
it for the big picture of the history story, but
also for the wacky stuff. The fact that he did
team up with Benjamin Franklin to write a story a
(11:53):
picture books for children about how evil the British were.
That is something they talked. They never pulled it off,
but they did talk about it. I do as careful
of research as I can, and then when I send
it into the publisher, before I do any drawing, but
I basically write the whole manuscript, and I send the
manuscript into the publisher, and they do, you know, they
(12:14):
take it through proof reading and editorial and then they
kick it over to the publisher's fact checker, and even
with their really excellent factset being and all of the
research that I view. I'll still run into a third
grade if it's like, hey, you got this wrong, and
then they'll point it out and I'll find it and
be like.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Ah, you've got.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
One of the things I really liked was that story
of his being an orphan really plays into sort of
his admiration for Washington, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
So one of the interesting things about his relationship. They
were very, very close. Washington and Lafay had this this thing.
There's a page in the book that I really enjoy.
After one of the longest battles of the Revolution, they
would have been fighting all day. Nobody could find Lafayette.
They like, where's Lafaette, where's the general? Where where's George Washington?
They couldn't find either one of them. And they found
(13:07):
them in a little clearing and they had just been
fighting and racing back and forth and doing all this
stuff all day, and George Washington had spread his cloaks
down on the ground and just zonked out, fell asleep,
and Lafaette was right there with them, just the two
of them, just sleeping with all of their battle gear on.
So and this incredibly close relationship. I think a lot
of people have read into the fact that Lafette was
(13:28):
kind of looking for a father figure so he didn't
have one, and you know, he stawed George Washington as
powerful charismatic military leader and probably saw you know, a
father figure there. And then Washington had lost children of
his own. There's a story I didn't get to use
in the book that I really liked. I guess Washington
was like that he did not like physical contact. And
(13:52):
one of one of his generals was talking and was like,
I will bet you everybody in this room, I'll buy
you all a drink if Washington comes in and I
touch him on the shoulder and Washington doesn't care. Probably
this run Washington came in and you know, he touched
him on the shoulder, and Washington jet like gave him
just the meanest cold to stare drink. And then Lafayette
(14:16):
comes into the room and you know, throws his arms
around him, kisses him on both cheeks and nothing, you know,
no problem. It's definitely had.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
A that's that's that's pretty interesting.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
You know.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
One of the things that struck me about Lafayette's character
in the book is that he kind of comes across
as is both this military genius, you know, being very
brave and wily, but yet also comes across as like
completely trusting and innocent, And I'm curious, is that how
you see him as well?
Speaker 3 (14:43):
Yeah. I one of the cool things about Lafayette is
we have a lot of his letters that he wrote
in English, and he was learning English as fast as
he could when he got to the States, but he
did not arrive with great English. But we have letters
that he wrote, so you can read his actual letters.
And I don't know if it's just because he didn't
have a grasp on the language, but he comes across
(15:04):
his really kind of sweet and almost I don't know,
a little bit silly, because you know, he's kind of
grabbing it that language, and he just he's one of
these people that when you read his actual letters to people,
that personality just comes shining through. And you know, I
could have a totally wrong but to me, he just
seemed like just like a fun guy, like a fun
(15:25):
and silly but brave and crazy the sweetheart. You know,
maybe that's the wrong read. Maybe he's couled with language
and that's what comes across that way, but he is
just kind of bubbly and enthusiastic and a little bit goofy.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
I was surprised by and and really came away admiring
how many times he ends up going into battle just
being so incredibly brave. I was curious, when does Lafayette
actually become a star in France, because I know that's
a part of this story too, right, Like when does
news of his bravery end up coming back home and
he gets celebrated there.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
So the flow news going back and forth, you know,
traveling by ship, but of course when the news gets
to France, they're making a way bigger deal out of it.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
You know.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
The by the time the stories get to France, you
know he's practically leading the armies and he's the biggest
deal ever. And so you know when he came to
the United States, he'd be in the United States for
years of the time. He did go home for period
during the Revolutionary War, because they were like, sure, he's great,
we like him here, but he'd be more valuable to
(16:32):
us if he was talking up, if he's getting that
French money, getting the French alliance put together. I mean,
the story is just constantly him wanting to fight and
be in the battles, but Washington and everybody else wanting
France's armies to come and help, you know. So it's
just a lot of back and forth and they you know,
(16:53):
when the French armies and ships finally show up, you know,
sometimes it pans out, sometimes it does, but it's you know,
I think one thing that's interesting to kids when they
read it is just seeing how many others, how many
of these huge plans put together by Washington, which is
kind of belly flop. You know, France would send a
whole bunch of troops but they're all too sick to
get off the ship, or you know, they just one
(17:15):
you know, they finally get finally get a French navy
to come and help, and then a big storm comes
up and you know, breaks them all down, and just
so many failed attempts over and over. In fact, I
was worried when I wrote the book. I'm like, no man,
so many of these things, but they try to just
colossal stale.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
Hears were with Nathan Hale right after this break Welcome
back to part time, geez. We were talking with my
kid's favorite author, Nathan Hale.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
So, Nathan, I love how you slip in Benedict Arnold's
story and as well like as this kind of like
an extended sidebar. But you know, he's actually a much
more sympathetic character than I feel like I'd remembered from
a history class and never quite gets his doo right.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
He is super interesting and when I put him into
the book. He actually appears in the first book in
the series, one that's buy as a hero because he
was a really amazing hero in the American Revolution. For
the first several years of it, he was just great.
But you know, through like military jealousies and a long
(18:31):
injury that kind of worn down and a feeling of
not being thanked enough for what he did, he was
kind of put into a position where he was just like,
you know what, I'm sick of being mistreated by Washington's army.
And he saw a way out and he took it,
and he you know, Americans have not liked the name
(18:53):
Benedict until Benedict's Cumberbatch came along, and we love it.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
So my son Henry wrote a list of questions for
me to prep me for this interview. He was just
so excited that I was going to get to chat
with you. But you know, most of the questions he
had were things like what is One Trick Pony about?
Or what is Alamo All Stars about? Like all the
books he hasn't read, he wanted you to summarize for him.
But one question I liked was who is your favorite
(19:22):
side character from this book and who do you identify
with most?
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Ah, my favorite side character from Lafayette. Lafayette as one
of my favorite kind of lesser known American history characters.
A guy named Henry Knock who was a big canva,
being one of the big kind of He's a major
general by the time we get to Lafayette. This guy,
Henry Knox, was the Boston bookstore owner in his twenties
(19:48):
and all his life he's been fascinated with guns, and
he just read books about them, read books about cannons
and artillery. He was so into guns that he blew
his fingers off when he was a kid with a shotgun.
But he was just fascinated by them and a lot
of bookstore And when the revolution broke out, he's like
putting a clothes sign on the bookstore and I'm gonna
(20:08):
go cal Washington's army. And he actually does one of
these the crazier things of the Revolutionary War when he
gets these guns from Fort Techons Ruger, he maybe may
have a per termed to them to Fort Taiton Roger,
and he marches them just through the impossible odds across
frozen rivers and everything to get these guns in place.
And he's got a couple of little cameos in Lafayette's
(20:29):
lot like him. A lot there are. There's Baron von Steuben,
another foreign national who came into help, who's an amazing
drill sergeant who does some fool stuff. The British contact
who was feeding Benedict Arnold's trader wies back to the
British again. In John Andre is a really cool guy.
(20:50):
And when they caught him and executed him, he put
the noose over his own necks. That's how a much
of a serious soldier this guy was. There's lots of
really good, juicy characters in this story.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Yeah, I love the way you depict Baron von Steuben
in this book, where he's just but not only super efficient,
but he's got this dog with him and he's cursing,
and the way the curses are shown in the book
is just so funny. It's really very sweet. But I
do want to thank you so much for being here today, Nathan,
and thank you for writing these books and bringing so
(21:26):
much story to my kiddo. The books are Nathan Hale's
Adventurous Tales. His most recent book is Lafayette and you
can find them everywhere.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Thanks for having me, This was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Well that's it for today's show from Gabe, Tristan, Mango,
and me. Thanks so much for listening.
Guess what will?
Speaker 2 (00:03):
What's that?
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Mano? So did you know that Lafayette started wearing a
wig at age thirteen?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
You know, I have a list of when everyone starts
wearing their wigs, but Lafayette's not on there for some reason.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
I also didn't know that kids used to make fun
of him for riding his horse like a goose. Apparently
he was a goose rider. But I only know this
because my son is obsessed with these history books called
Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales, and he keeps quizzing me on
all this trivia about historical figures, and I kind of
love it.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
I mean, it is kind of in the family business,
if you want to be honest about it.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Yeah. But you know, for a long time, Henry was
not a reader, and it kind of stunned me because
Lizzie and I both read a ton and he just
wasn't excited by reading. But then his aunt gave him
this Nathan Hale series, and it was almost like it
unlocked a new part of his personality, Like he just
started devouring nonfiction and graphic novels and reading all sorts
of other books and then telling me about French boys
(00:59):
and powdered wigs. You know the books he keeps going
back to and rereading. Is this Nathan Hale series? All right?
So why don't you tell us what are the books
all about? I mean everything from history. For like, Harriet
Tubman is one. He got really into ironclads, those ships.
He started talking about World War one and two. But
the character he's completely obsessed with right now is Lafayette.
(01:20):
But you know, since we haven't had an author on
in a while, I thought it'd be really fun to
invite Nathan haleon to talk about how he draws these books,
how he can relate grim history in just such a
funny way, and also to thank him for keeping my
son occupied for long swots of the time so I
don't have to parent as much. But let's dive in.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Hey, their podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm
Will Pearson, and as always I'm joined by my good
friend Mangesh hot Ticketter and sitting behind the soundproof glass
wearing a try corner hat that he made from paper
mache mango by hand. Is this not impressive?
Speaker 1 (02:13):
And I think he's actually doing a celebratory minuet? Is
that right?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Tristan. That's impressive. That's our friend and producer, Tristan McNeil.
So today we're just going to dive right in because
we've got the best selling author of the kids graphic
novel history series, Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales, on the line
with us today. Nathan Hale, Welcome to Part Time Genius.
Speaker 3 (02:32):
Hello, Hello, I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
So we want to talk to you about your latest
book in your series. It's Lafayette.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
I'm excited about that one. It just came out last fall,
and it's been interesting to see because it's the eighth
in the series. And when I meet with readers with
kids who read the books, I always ask him what
their favorite is. Lately, I've been getting a lot of
kids stay in as the favorite one. It's weird how
much be taken off because I did not expect them
to be popular and in children's publishing since two thousand
(03:01):
and five, the is my fourteenth year and children's publishing,
and I've had a lot of kind of dead ends,
and it was shocking when I thought, you know, I'm
not going to chase trends anymore. I'm just going to
do my own thing and I'm interested in history. I'm
just going to try it. It's going to fail that
I'm going to try it. And then seeing kids just
light up and get into American history. That's never happened,
(03:23):
but it's been fun.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
And do you do you enjoy the writing more or
the drawing.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
They're two such different things. The research is so fascinating,
and it's hard to kind of take all of these
little stories and then have to decide which ones you
have to cut to make it all fit. And then
since the books are all dialogue, it's not only how
do we cut it, but how do we show it
and tell it in just dialogue? So the writing is
(03:49):
pretty nerve wracking, but the drawing takes forever. So it's
kind of a toss up. You know, they're both awful,
and they're little fun in their way, but they're both
awful in.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
The Yeah, be awesome. So did having the name Nathan
Hale get you into history as a kid or was
that just kind of a convenient.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
Way in Oh, you know how every every day at
the first day of school, when the teacher you're meeting
your new teacher, My teacher would always be like, oh,
we have a famous patriot in our class and Hale
and then that say, oh what you said, give me
liberty or give me death? And I'd be like, no,
(04:26):
that was Patrick Henry. I said, I regret that I
had but one last to give for my country every year.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Maybe that's maybe that's where you developed your sense of humor,
you know, it's it's it's fun saying that these books
are literally gallows humor, and they're you know, narrated by
Nathan Hale trying to procrastinate his death and telling all
these great history stories. And I was just curious, how
did that come about.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
The funny thing is I had to feel in place
for a history series before we came up with the
conceit of the spy Nathan Hale being our kind of
omnificent narrator. But my editor insisted we have a narrator.
So I was brainstorming on ideas for what kind of
narrator would be good, and then we were going back
and forth on cover elements, and I was like, can
(05:13):
we cut one of those things if we combined the
offer name into the series title? And then I was like,
hang on, hang on, what if you know there was
this spine Ethan hail from British. He was executed by
the British. Hang On, hang On, And my editor was like,
I don't know what you're talking about, but I like
this sound of it. Hang ups and writes this down, and.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
That hangman character is so funny, like and just breaks
up the story really nicely. I am not actually into
military history, like I love history, but some of the
military stuff has just never really been that appealing to me.
But it's funn to see my kid just spouting all
these facts about various wars and be so into like
iron planets and whatever. And you know, I am curious, like,
(05:53):
how do you choose what stories to turn into books?
And how do you balance humor with some of these
very serious topics.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
I never super interested in military specific history either, but
every time I find a story that I'm excited about,
I go, oh, this is this military story. And it's
funny because I've been to some schools, whether the parents
are like, we love all of your books. We're a
couple of hippies, and our children are still militant about
(06:20):
this World War One stuff. I don't know if it's
terrifying or exciting that so many third and fourth and
fifth graders kind of love the structure of a military story.
I don't know what it is, and I will say
that our lay that book has anything to do with
a certain musical, but that may have come into play.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
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in the episode description. Well, actually that was my next
question was because I do want to focus on the
Lafayette story, which is fascinating, but I guess like he's
one of these characters we kind of know about as
a hero of the Revolutionary War, but his really, his
full story isn't that well known.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
When I started this book, I was a little nervous
about it because Lafayette could not be a more privileged person.
I mean, it was one percent aristocracy, and you know,
the stories people are interested in right now are not
stories about the world wealthy. Is the most privileged people? Sure,
I'm certainly not, but Lafette himself was in aristocratic French
family that went you know, back to the CRUs Aids,
(10:00):
back to Jordan of Bark. He was friends with Marie Antoinette,
who his friends with all of the wealthiest people in France.
But at heart he was like a country kid who
liked exploring, and he liked adventures, and more than anything else,
he wanted to be part of his family's That was
his line of, you know, warriors. And when he saw
(10:21):
that the Americans were fighting the British, he was like, well,
maybe I'll go over there. He watches up in America
because of his background and as well bumped straight up
in the George Washington's company because everybody was like, we
don't know anything about this kid. That he is richer
than anyone in this country. Maybe we can manipulate that.
(10:42):
And then the crazy Fluke is He turned out to
be pretty talented at battle.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Nathan Hale I love hearing about Lafayette. But first a
quick ad break. Welcome back to part time Jeeves. We
(11:07):
were talking with author Nathan Hale about his book Lafayette
and just about writing graphic novels in general.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
You know the stories that you tell here, there's some
pretty wild ones. You know, You've got this story about
Lafayette falling on his face on the dance floor and
one about him writing a kid's book with Ben Franklin.
I'm just curious, you know, in the writing process, how
do you find and then fact check stories like those?
Speaker 3 (11:31):
I read and read and read. I try to get
my hands on as many kind of primary sources as possible.
I read a lot of contemporary books and articles on
these people, and I'm always just kind of combing over
it for the big picture of the history story, but
also for the wacky stuff. The fact that he did
team up with Benjamin Franklin to write a story a
(11:53):
picture books for children about how evil the British were.
That is something they talked. They never pulled it off,
but they did talk about it. I do as careful
of research as I can, and then when I send
it into the publisher, before I do any drawing, but
I basically write the whole manuscript, and I send the
manuscript into the publisher, and they do, you know, they
(12:14):
take it through proof reading and editorial and then they
kick it over to the publisher's fact checker, and even
with their really excellent factset being and all of the
research that I view. I'll still run into a third
grade if it's like, hey, you got this wrong, and
then they'll point it out and I'll find it and
be like.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Ah, you've got.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
One of the things I really liked was that story
of his being an orphan really plays into sort of
his admiration for Washington, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
So one of the interesting things about his relationship. They
were very, very close. Washington and Lafay had this this thing.
There's a page in the book that I really enjoy.
After one of the longest battles of the Revolution, they
would have been fighting all day. Nobody could find Lafayette.
They like, where's Lafaette, where's the general? Where where's George Washington?
They couldn't find either one of them. And they found
(13:07):
them in a little clearing and they had just been
fighting and racing back and forth and doing all this
stuff all day, and George Washington had spread his cloaks
down on the ground and just zonked out, fell asleep,
and Lafaette was right there with them, just the two
of them, just sleeping with all of their battle gear on.
So and this incredibly close relationship. I think a lot
of people have read into the fact that Lafette was
(13:28):
kind of looking for a father figure so he didn't
have one, and you know, he stawed George Washington as
powerful charismatic military leader and probably saw you know, a
father figure there. And then Washington had lost children of
his own. There's a story I didn't get to use
in the book that I really liked. I guess Washington
was like that he did not like physical contact. And
(13:52):
one of one of his generals was talking and was like,
I will bet you everybody in this room, I'll buy
you all a drink if Washington comes in and I
touch him on the shoulder and Washington doesn't care. Probably
this run Washington came in and you know, he touched
him on the shoulder, and Washington jet like gave him
just the meanest cold to stare drink. And then Lafayette
(14:16):
comes into the room and you know, throws his arms
around him, kisses him on both cheeks and nothing, you know,
no problem. It's definitely had.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
A that's that's that's pretty interesting.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
You know.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
One of the things that struck me about Lafayette's character
in the book is that he kind of comes across
as is both this military genius, you know, being very
brave and wily, but yet also comes across as like
completely trusting and innocent, And I'm curious, is that how
you see him as well?
Speaker 3 (14:43):
Yeah. I one of the cool things about Lafayette is
we have a lot of his letters that he wrote
in English, and he was learning English as fast as
he could when he got to the States, but he
did not arrive with great English. But we have letters
that he wrote, so you can read his actual letters.
And I don't know if it's just because he didn't
have a grasp on the language, but he comes across
(15:04):
his really kind of sweet and almost I don't know,
a little bit silly, because you know, he's kind of
grabbing it that language, and he just he's one of
these people that when you read his actual letters to people,
that personality just comes shining through. And you know, I
could have a totally wrong but to me, he just
seemed like just like a fun guy, like a fun
(15:25):
and silly but brave and crazy the sweetheart. You know,
maybe that's the wrong read. Maybe he's couled with language
and that's what comes across that way, but he is
just kind of bubbly and enthusiastic and a little bit goofy.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
I was surprised by and and really came away admiring
how many times he ends up going into battle just
being so incredibly brave. I was curious, when does Lafayette
actually become a star in France, because I know that's
a part of this story too, right, Like when does
news of his bravery end up coming back home and
he gets celebrated there.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
So the flow news going back and forth, you know,
traveling by ship, but of course when the news gets
to France, they're making a way bigger deal out of it.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
You know.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
The by the time the stories get to France, you
know he's practically leading the armies and he's the biggest
deal ever. And so you know when he came to
the United States, he'd be in the United States for
years of the time. He did go home for period
during the Revolutionary War, because they were like, sure, he's great,
we like him here, but he'd be more valuable to
(16:32):
us if he was talking up, if he's getting that
French money, getting the French alliance put together. I mean,
the story is just constantly him wanting to fight and
be in the battles, but Washington and everybody else wanting
France's armies to come and help, you know. So it's
just a lot of back and forth and they you know,
(16:53):
when the French armies and ships finally show up, you know,
sometimes it pans out, sometimes it does, but it's you know,
I think one thing that's interesting to kids when they
read it is just seeing how many others, how many
of these huge plans put together by Washington, which is
kind of belly flop. You know, France would send a
whole bunch of troops but they're all too sick to
get off the ship, or you know, they just one
(17:15):
you know, they finally get finally get a French navy
to come and help, and then a big storm comes
up and you know, breaks them all down, and just
so many failed attempts over and over. In fact, I
was worried when I wrote the book. I'm like, no man,
so many of these things, but they try to just
colossal stale.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
Hears were with Nathan Hale right after this break Welcome
back to part time, geez. We were talking with my
kid's favorite author, Nathan Hale.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
So, Nathan, I love how you slip in Benedict Arnold's
story and as well like as this kind of like
an extended sidebar. But you know, he's actually a much
more sympathetic character than I feel like I'd remembered from
a history class and never quite gets his doo right.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
He is super interesting and when I put him into
the book. He actually appears in the first book in
the series, one that's buy as a hero because he
was a really amazing hero in the American Revolution. For
the first several years of it, he was just great.
But you know, through like military jealousies and a long
(18:31):
injury that kind of worn down and a feeling of
not being thanked enough for what he did, he was
kind of put into a position where he was just like,
you know what, I'm sick of being mistreated by Washington's army.
And he saw a way out and he took it,
and he you know, Americans have not liked the name
(18:53):
Benedict until Benedict's Cumberbatch came along, and we love it.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
So my son Henry wrote a list of questions for
me to prep me for this interview. He was just
so excited that I was going to get to chat
with you. But you know, most of the questions he
had were things like what is One Trick Pony about?
Or what is Alamo All Stars about? Like all the
books he hasn't read, he wanted you to summarize for him.
But one question I liked was who is your favorite
(19:22):
side character from this book and who do you identify
with most?
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Ah, my favorite side character from Lafayette. Lafayette as one
of my favorite kind of lesser known American history characters.
A guy named Henry Knock who was a big canva,
being one of the big kind of He's a major
general by the time we get to Lafayette. This guy,
Henry Knox, was the Boston bookstore owner in his twenties
(19:48):
and all his life he's been fascinated with guns, and
he just read books about them, read books about cannons
and artillery. He was so into guns that he blew
his fingers off when he was a kid with a shotgun.
But he was just fascinated by them and a lot
of bookstore And when the revolution broke out, he's like
putting a clothes sign on the bookstore and I'm gonna
(20:08):
go cal Washington's army. And he actually does one of
these the crazier things of the Revolutionary War when he
gets these guns from Fort Techons Ruger, he maybe may
have a per termed to them to Fort Taiton Roger,
and he marches them just through the impossible odds across
frozen rivers and everything to get these guns in place.
And he's got a couple of little cameos in Lafayette's
(20:29):
lot like him. A lot there are. There's Baron von Steuben,
another foreign national who came into help, who's an amazing
drill sergeant who does some fool stuff. The British contact
who was feeding Benedict Arnold's trader wies back to the
British again. In John Andre is a really cool guy.
(20:50):
And when they caught him and executed him, he put
the noose over his own necks. That's how a much
of a serious soldier this guy was. There's lots of
really good, juicy characters in this story.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Yeah, I love the way you depict Baron von Steuben
in this book, where he's just but not only super efficient,
but he's got this dog with him and he's cursing,
and the way the curses are shown in the book
is just so funny. It's really very sweet. But I
do want to thank you so much for being here today, Nathan,
and thank you for writing these books and bringing so
(21:26):
much story to my kiddo. The books are Nathan Hale's
Adventurous Tales. His most recent book is Lafayette and you
can find them everywhere.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Thanks for having me, This was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Well that's it for today's show from Gabe, Tristan, Mango,
and me. Thanks so much for listening.
Part-Time Genius News
Hosts And Creators
Will Pearson
Mangesh Hattikudur
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