August 9, 2025 • 19 mins
"American History Hotline" is a new weekly series that will follow host and history enthusiast Bob Crawford as he searches for the best historians and experts to answer listener questions about American history - from the Revolutionary War to rock & roll feuds.The first two episodes will dive into some of the most fascinating and timely aspects of American history and government. Episode 1, "Dead on the 4th of July," explores the true story of Founding Fathers Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both dying on July 4, 1826, exactly 50 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Historian Lindsay Chervinsky unpacks this uncanny coincidence, along with other surprising tales of patriotic deaths linked to Independence Day. Episode 2, "Does the Constitution Prevent a Dictator," features Jeffrey Rosen, President and CEO of the National Constitution Center, who explains how the U.S. Constitution is designed to protect our country from being taken over by a power-hungry dictator and how much of our federal government is based on political norms and precedents that are vulnerable to the whims of the masses.Episodes available here:Https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-american-history-hotline-273590600/
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I want to thank you for coming back to the conversation.
Let's do some pod crashing. Episode number three eighty one
is with Bob Crawford from The Avid Brothers. His podcast
is American History Hotline. Bob, I love the idea that
you are attached to history. I thought I was one
of the weird ones in the world, but I can't
get enough of history because I'm interested in how did
we get here? I need to know the breadcrumbs.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
How did we get here? You want to know how
I got to doing American History Hotline, or how this
nation is where it is at this very moment.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
All of it, because I mean, you know, one of
the things that I learned as a martial artist is
that before I could even get my black belt I
had to know the true Korean history of taekwondo and
it better not be wrong.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Well, yeah, I think that's great. I think that's great
for you for having to know the history, because I'm
the same way like I can't just I can't accept
one fact. I need to follow that fact back and
create that thread. I need to follow the thread to
find where the thread comes from. One of the things
(01:06):
I love doing now and your listeners aren't going to
believe how accessible so many documents are, you know, primary documents,
like every congressional debate since the founding of the nation
is at literally at our fingertips online a lot of
correspondence like you used to have to go to an
(01:28):
archive like the Massachusetts Historical Society, and you still do
for for a lot of stuff. But but more and
more of it is coming online as we speak. So
it's a matter of just knowing where to look for it.
But how did we get here? Well, I am reading
a book right now that I that has really shed
(01:49):
a lot of light for me personally on it. And
that is a history biography of William F. Buckley, who
who Sam Tannenhouse, the historian who wrote this book. It's
an incredible book, very fair, very fair to Buckley. But
he was the for those who don't know, Buckley was
(02:10):
the intellectual creator, the intellectual force behind the conservative movement
of the of the mid twentieth century. And it's largely
it is the movement that Barry, Barry Goldwater and Rob
o' reagan came to Buckley, like he didn't go to them,
they came to him, you know, and the world we're
(02:31):
living in now. I think I think was largely created
by William F. Buckley. Wow, if it's kind of where
I'm at right now.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
See, this is the reason why when when I'm driving
through Charlotte and I'm listening to your podcast, I feel
like You're sitting right there with me, going, dude, I
was just in the library. You're not gonna believe it.
I just discovered there in there, and and you shared
it in such a way that is so one on one,
and you don't make me feel stupid, you know what
I mean?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Yeah? No, no, absolutely not no, And that so American
History Hotline. The point is is you have this question
you recorded on your voice memo, you send it to
American History Hotline at gmail dot com. I'll find the expert,
we'll get it answered, and then we're all smarter.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
It's very interactive with a podcast. I mean seriously, yeah,
I mean that right there is going to say okay,
I've got a question for you. It's almost like the
days of Casey case and when we when we would
write that letter and say, Casey, was there ever a
song that did this.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Right? Right? Exactly? That's that's what I wanted to bring
I wanted to bring the listener in onto the show.
I mean, you're literally bringing what my original concept was,
Let's have people send questions, let's get the answers, and
then let's call the listener back and like talk to
them about what we found. And we just felt like
that would be too long and too complicated. We t
(03:47):
really tried to streamline this and so but I think
we found a happy medium for sure.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Well, you introduced me to Alexis Co. I had no
idea until I chapped into that podcast.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
She's brilliant. Yeah, she wrote a book. She wrote a
book called You Never Forget Your First and it's about
George Washington. It's one of the only books written about
Washington by a woman, so it is coming from a
different perspective, and she really gets into the history of
George Washington and kind of like dispels some of those
(04:17):
founding myths.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
I was gonna say, would you say that that was
probably some of the early stages of clickbaits basically, because
were those myths and things.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Yeah, it's funny. You know people say history repeats or
some people say history rhymes and all this kind of stuff,
all these things about Yeah, it's just weighs these these sayings,
and there's truth to them in some ways, but it's
really just we say these things to help us kind
of feel better about the moment we're in. But I
think the truth is that history doesn't repeat, it doesn't rhyme,
(04:49):
people don't change. We are still the same people that
we have been since the creation of the world. Whenever
you want to believe that happened or all that happened.
Where we haven't changed. Our technology has changed. We're really
good at making things and figuring out technological things. But
the human heart, it's pretty much in the human soul,
(05:13):
and greed and the lust for power, or the ability
to offer grace to our enemies, or the ability to
forgive others and ourselves. All that stuff is exactly the
same as it's ever been.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
As you continue to dig through this history, do you
find music there in the way of like? Because when
when there are many times I will go and I'll
get into a book and I swear to God they
were listening to music while they were writing. I can
feel it on that page.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Do I listen to music when I write? Well, do
you know what you're asking?
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Do you listen to it? Or do you actually feel
music coming from those pages? Because I mean, I mean,
you're a songwriter. You understand that music comes from out
of nowhere.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
I like to say that historians, most of them, aren't
very good writers. Journalists tend to be. When journalists write
history books, they tend to be better because journalists are
better writers by nature. So often a journalist will write
a history book and they they'll write it better. History
writing is very dry, and sometimes it doesn't leap off
(06:20):
the page, but when you find one that does. And
I think these days, the younger generation of historians are
better writers and are more in touch with the you know, like,
I think it's okay to write a history book but
include slang that you and I would use every day.
(06:41):
And I think it's okay to write a history book
about something that hundreds of happened hundreds of year years ago,
and within the narrative say, hey, this isn't different. Imagine
it like this person who we all know today acting
like this, like John Quincy Adams was a failed one
term president, right, Mitch. I say it that way because
(07:04):
Mitch McConnell said he wanted to make Barack Obama a
failed one term president. And that's like so if I say,
if I describe John Quincy Adams like that and his
enemies like that towards him, that can ring a bell
in a person, you know, and help them be able
to more easily relate to it.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
Speaking of ringing that bell, I'm going to tell you
I experienced that with you maybe two three minutes ago
when you brought up William F. Buckley and you talked
about that that change back there that inspired Ronald Reagan
and things. And now I sit here and look at
our present world today and we're going through some serious
ass changes here as well.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
That's right, we are, and we don't know where it's going,
but it does. It doesn't mean it's it's all going.
It's all going to go away like what we've always
I mean, well eventually like generate when you look study history,
like generations change and technology changes and society changes, and
our society will change like our society has always changed,
and our democracy has changed like it's always changed, and
(08:00):
it has it has. Our democracy, our constitution has flexed
and it's buckled at times. And we did have the
Civil War, which was a break when the system couldn't
when the system couldn't handle, you know, would would the
new land acquired from the war with Mexico? Would that
land be slave or be free? Are We could not
(08:23):
handle that, like the constitution that we had in place,
and the political world and our checks and balances could
not handle that. So so we did have a break.
And you know, whether or not we will have that
will happen again, we don't know. But but we also
we also might be okay. You know, we also might
be okay. So I encourage all citizens to do what
(08:46):
they feel, like protests things that they feel are wrong,
and support the things they feel are right and good.
Most important thing is to vote, and we will get
the nation we deserve.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Please do not move. There's more with Bob Crawford from
the Avid Brothers coming up next. The name of his
podcast is American History Hotline. We're back with Bob Crawford.
You know the way that you share these stories, it's
so one on one. And one of the things that's
happening to a lot of podcasters these days is that
they're traveling from Look. I've seen them at the Comedy
Zone here in Charlotte. I've seen him travel to the
(09:20):
Night Night Theater and they go and they share stories
like you're doing right here? Would you ever do a
live show that way?
Speaker 2 (09:28):
That would be We have done that The Roads now
my other history podcast. We've done several live shows. In fact,
we did one at Spirit Square was a Spirit Square,
and we did one at the Cat's Cradle up in
Chapel Hill. We did one into Washington, d C. Recently
and so yeah, I love doing that. Hard to find
(09:50):
time for those sometimes because of the busy band schedule
and and because of family life, but always love doing those.
Those are always a.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Lot of fun. All right. You just spoke time. Time
is one of my big things. And what especially when
it comes to research, and if you're receiving these these
questions from from listeners and they're sending them to you directly,
that means you've got to stop, take the time to
do the research, find the person to put on your show.
Where are you finding this time?
Speaker 2 (10:17):
Well? I have great help.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Good.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
I have a producer named James Morrison and another producer
named Jordan Bruntall, and the people at iHeart are amazingly
supportive and helpful, and so I have help. But yes,
here's where I find the time. It's on the road,
it's driving from place to place. It's the hours. I
(10:44):
wake up early in the morning, doesn't matter what time
I go to bed. I wake up early in the morning,
you know, seven or eight. I can be in the books,
I can be online. I can do research until soundcheck.
That's two or three in the afternoon. Then at soundcheck
I like to shut down the brand and get focused
on music.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Do you find yourself being a modern day explorer because
you're actually going back into the history, back into that rock,
and you're pulling things out of it.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
I hadn't thought of it like that, but I think
it's great. Yeah. I just want to teach. I want
people to learn. I want people to be better informed
of the history of their country. I think that my
perfect listener is not everything I do. I back up
with citations and footnotes, and I show my work that's
(11:35):
very important to me. I want a historian to look
at what I do and go, yeah, this guy, he
put the rigor in. But I want the historically curious
to be informed, and I want them to realize that
when we talk about American history, we're talking about human history,
and to better understand. I mean, there's only one way
to better understand our times. It's by looking and better
(11:58):
at understanding the.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Past, say footnotes right away, you must have been looking
at my notes because I'm sitting here thinking, why isn't
this a book? Is it going to go that to
that next level of becoming a book where that people
can hold in their hand and really take the time
to get into those pages.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Well, I'll tell you that's a great idea for an
American history highline book, and I'm open to it if
I heart wants to join me in that process. But
I do have another book coming out in March, History Book,
my first book, and so I hope I would love
to come back on and talk about that when the
time comes.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
What is your attachment to history? Is it because we're
here in the Carolinas? I mean, because when I go
down to Charleston, it's not I'll sit there and read
those signs, going Okay, what's the real story here? I
got to dig into this and you know, find out
what's going on.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
There is something rich about being in North Carolina and
into living here because the history is old, right, because
it predates the founding of the nation, and so that's
it's a really special play used to be for for history,
but but it comes from me. It just it comes
(13:06):
way back in my life as a child. For some reason,
I was always really attracted to American history in particular,
and I think my my parents kind of supported me
in that and kind of took me to historical sites
and and I was a C student at best, but
I always did very well with history. So for some reason,
you know, it was always always in my bread.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Is it because you're a storyteller?
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Maybe so?
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Maybe?
Speaker 2 (13:33):
So? Wow. Wow.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
One of the things that you bring up that really
drew me into your podcast was the fact that you know,
we've all heard this thing called the Great Depression, the
Great Depression. There are many times I've seen it as
a mile marker. What about you with your research?
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Hmmm, that's a good question. You know, they were they
were called in the nineteenth century, they were called panics,
they were called financial panics. They are they are markers
because you can't separate American history from economic history or
economic history, like the economy of the country is the
(14:08):
life of the country in a lot of ways, because
when the economy goes bad, people suffer. When people suffer,
they demand change, and so every time you have an
economic crisis, you have some kind of a cultural upheaval,
a societal upheaval. We live that, right You and I
(14:28):
live that. We all live that in the pandemic. The
world we live in right now was shaped by the
financial crisis of two thousand and eight, the financial crisis
and the financial the financial crisis that we all suffered
during the pandemic and the pandemic being locked down. I
(14:50):
think it really did something to the American psyche that
we're working through right now. We don't talk about that,
we don't talk about it that way, but we all
suffered this really emotional, crazy experience and we're not going
to therapy together as a nation because of that. This
(15:13):
is us working through it. And it's pretty.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Crazy interesting that you talk about two thousand and eight
and during the pandemic, because I'm a daily writer. Every
day my hand is on that page and I'm using
a writing instrument, and those are the time periods that
I've used as huge mile markers in my present day.
So that's really interesting that you would bring that up.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah, repeat that again so I can two eight.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
And the lockdown, because those are the things that I
write to this day. I mean, I lived it. It's
in my daily writing, it's in my journals. One day
somebody will go, what was it really like, Well, let's
go look at his journals and see how he went
through it.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Yeah, that's an important You bring up an important point
as far as journaling. We communicate via email. Where where
does all that go? Right? Like? Where where are the archives?
Where are the archives? And so I think all citizens
should keep a daily journal and mark what's happening and
(16:09):
how and how it's affecting their daily lives.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
We'd all be richer for that, right. Would you say
that historians of the past had open eyes or were
they just trying to just get things down?
Speaker 2 (16:22):
I hadn't thought about that. I think they're well, I
mean people have different motives. I mean even throughout time,
historians have had different motives for recording or retelling what happened.
You know, newspapers were all very we talk about partisan
(16:42):
press today, Well, partisan press is nothing new to this country.
It was very much like that up until the thirties
or forties. We seem to have a unique moment from
the forties until two thousand, you know, early two thousands,
where where it was this exceptional moment of I know
(17:05):
people are going to say, well, I didn't feel like
we had great prosperity, but but the gap between the
rich and the poor was with the smallest it ever was. Before.
We seem to have a stable government. Even though we
would go between Republican Democrat, the the function of the
government did not really waiver. It was it was stable,
(17:27):
and we seem to be, uh going right now, it's
like we're we're going forward, of course, but we're also
kind of going back to the way it always was
before World War Two. And and so that's that's it's
not like we're living something we we are living something new.
But if you look at history, the kind of upheaval
(17:48):
we're seeing today is not is not unusual.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
M You bring that up there about you know, going
back before uh, you know, the you know, before World
War two, and that was the silent generation. And that's
what I always call sending a text message or sending
an email. Is that's part of a silent generation. I
don't hear you, I don't see you. It's a silent generation.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
Yeah. That's a good point, right, And that's that was
the whole the whole point of like like Nixon and
you know, in the Southern Strategy and Nixon in sixty
eight he wanted to attract what was known as the
forgotten man. And it's really it's really funny that you
bring this up, because this is all in that Buckley
incredible Buckley biography. Uh, you know, and I think Trump
(18:32):
has done that in some ways. There were people who
did not feel heard or seen, and they felt betrayed
by their leaders and and they said, we're going to
give this guy a try. And and and it's possible
that and I've heard some historians ponder this. They're not
finding they're not finding it now like they've made this
(18:53):
radical change to this. This this like chaotic leadership. Love
or hate it, let's admit that it's chaotic. And and
people may not be finding it here. So people are
looking for something. We haven't found it. We still haven't
found it. We'll keep looking for it. We'll keep trying
(19:15):
things until we find something that suits us.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Wow. All right, what's that? What's that address again for
the for listeners to write to you with their questions
where you're going to answer it on American History.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Hotline Americanhistoryhotline at gmail dot com Americanhistoryhotline at gmail dot com.
American History Highline all one word, send us your question
in a voice memo, and we will get you the answer.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
You got to come back to this show anytime in
the future, dude. You know the door is always going
to be open for you.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
I appreciate it. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Will you be brilliant today? Okay, are you too?
I want to thank you for coming back to the conversation.
Let's do some pod crashing. Episode number three eighty one
is with Bob Crawford from The Avid Brothers. His podcast
is American History Hotline. Bob, I love the idea that
you are attached to history. I thought I was one
of the weird ones in the world, but I can't
get enough of history because I'm interested in how did
we get here? I need to know the breadcrumbs.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
How did we get here? You want to know how
I got to doing American History Hotline, or how this
nation is where it is at this very moment.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
All of it, because I mean, you know, one of
the things that I learned as a martial artist is
that before I could even get my black belt I
had to know the true Korean history of taekwondo and
it better not be wrong.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Well, yeah, I think that's great. I think that's great
for you for having to know the history, because I'm
the same way like I can't just I can't accept
one fact. I need to follow that fact back and
create that thread. I need to follow the thread to
find where the thread comes from. One of the things
(01:06):
I love doing now and your listeners aren't going to
believe how accessible so many documents are, you know, primary documents,
like every congressional debate since the founding of the nation
is at literally at our fingertips online a lot of
correspondence like you used to have to go to an
(01:28):
archive like the Massachusetts Historical Society, and you still do
for for a lot of stuff. But but more and
more of it is coming online as we speak. So
it's a matter of just knowing where to look for it.
But how did we get here? Well, I am reading
a book right now that I that has really shed
(01:49):
a lot of light for me personally on it. And
that is a history biography of William F. Buckley, who
who Sam Tannenhouse, the historian who wrote this book. It's
an incredible book, very fair, very fair to Buckley. But
he was the for those who don't know, Buckley was
(02:10):
the intellectual creator, the intellectual force behind the conservative movement
of the of the mid twentieth century. And it's largely
it is the movement that Barry, Barry Goldwater and Rob
o' reagan came to Buckley, like he didn't go to them,
they came to him, you know, and the world we're
(02:31):
living in now. I think I think was largely created
by William F. Buckley. Wow, if it's kind of where
I'm at right now.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
See, this is the reason why when when I'm driving
through Charlotte and I'm listening to your podcast, I feel
like You're sitting right there with me, going, dude, I
was just in the library. You're not gonna believe it.
I just discovered there in there, and and you shared
it in such a way that is so one on one,
and you don't make me feel stupid, you know what
I mean?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Yeah? No, no, absolutely not no, And that so American
History Hotline. The point is is you have this question
you recorded on your voice memo, you send it to
American History Hotline at gmail dot com. I'll find the expert,
we'll get it answered, and then we're all smarter.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
It's very interactive with a podcast. I mean seriously, yeah,
I mean that right there is going to say okay,
I've got a question for you. It's almost like the
days of Casey case and when we when we would
write that letter and say, Casey, was there ever a
song that did this.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Right? Right? Exactly? That's that's what I wanted to bring
I wanted to bring the listener in onto the show.
I mean, you're literally bringing what my original concept was,
Let's have people send questions, let's get the answers, and
then let's call the listener back and like talk to
them about what we found. And we just felt like
that would be too long and too complicated. We t
(03:47):
really tried to streamline this and so but I think
we found a happy medium for sure.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Well, you introduced me to Alexis Co. I had no
idea until I chapped into that podcast.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
She's brilliant. Yeah, she wrote a book. She wrote a
book called You Never Forget Your First and it's about
George Washington. It's one of the only books written about
Washington by a woman, so it is coming from a
different perspective, and she really gets into the history of
George Washington and kind of like dispels some of those
(04:17):
founding myths.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
I was gonna say, would you say that that was
probably some of the early stages of clickbaits basically, because
were those myths and things.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Yeah, it's funny. You know people say history repeats or
some people say history rhymes and all this kind of stuff,
all these things about Yeah, it's just weighs these these sayings,
and there's truth to them in some ways, but it's
really just we say these things to help us kind
of feel better about the moment we're in. But I
think the truth is that history doesn't repeat, it doesn't rhyme,
(04:49):
people don't change. We are still the same people that
we have been since the creation of the world. Whenever
you want to believe that happened or all that happened.
Where we haven't changed. Our technology has changed. We're really
good at making things and figuring out technological things. But
the human heart, it's pretty much in the human soul,
(05:13):
and greed and the lust for power, or the ability
to offer grace to our enemies, or the ability to
forgive others and ourselves. All that stuff is exactly the
same as it's ever been.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
As you continue to dig through this history, do you
find music there in the way of like? Because when
when there are many times I will go and I'll
get into a book and I swear to God they
were listening to music while they were writing. I can
feel it on that page.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Do I listen to music when I write? Well, do
you know what you're asking?
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Do you listen to it? Or do you actually feel
music coming from those pages? Because I mean, I mean,
you're a songwriter. You understand that music comes from out
of nowhere.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
I like to say that historians, most of them, aren't
very good writers. Journalists tend to be. When journalists write
history books, they tend to be better because journalists are
better writers by nature. So often a journalist will write
a history book and they they'll write it better. History
writing is very dry, and sometimes it doesn't leap off
(06:20):
the page, but when you find one that does. And
I think these days, the younger generation of historians are
better writers and are more in touch with the you know, like,
I think it's okay to write a history book but
include slang that you and I would use every day.
(06:41):
And I think it's okay to write a history book
about something that hundreds of happened hundreds of year years ago,
and within the narrative say, hey, this isn't different. Imagine
it like this person who we all know today acting
like this, like John Quincy Adams was a failed one
term president, right, Mitch. I say it that way because
(07:04):
Mitch McConnell said he wanted to make Barack Obama a
failed one term president. And that's like so if I say,
if I describe John Quincy Adams like that and his
enemies like that towards him, that can ring a bell
in a person, you know, and help them be able
to more easily relate to it.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
Speaking of ringing that bell, I'm going to tell you
I experienced that with you maybe two three minutes ago
when you brought up William F. Buckley and you talked
about that that change back there that inspired Ronald Reagan
and things. And now I sit here and look at
our present world today and we're going through some serious
ass changes here as well.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
That's right, we are, and we don't know where it's going,
but it does. It doesn't mean it's it's all going.
It's all going to go away like what we've always
I mean, well eventually like generate when you look study history,
like generations change and technology changes and society changes, and
our society will change like our society has always changed,
and our democracy has changed like it's always changed, and
(08:00):
it has it has. Our democracy, our constitution has flexed
and it's buckled at times. And we did have the
Civil War, which was a break when the system couldn't
when the system couldn't handle, you know, would would the
new land acquired from the war with Mexico? Would that
land be slave or be free? Are We could not
(08:23):
handle that, like the constitution that we had in place,
and the political world and our checks and balances could
not handle that. So so we did have a break.
And you know, whether or not we will have that
will happen again, we don't know. But but we also
we also might be okay. You know, we also might
be okay. So I encourage all citizens to do what
(08:46):
they feel, like protests things that they feel are wrong,
and support the things they feel are right and good.
Most important thing is to vote, and we will get
the nation we deserve.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Please do not move. There's more with Bob Crawford from
the Avid Brothers coming up next. The name of his
podcast is American History Hotline. We're back with Bob Crawford.
You know the way that you share these stories, it's
so one on one. And one of the things that's
happening to a lot of podcasters these days is that
they're traveling from Look. I've seen them at the Comedy
Zone here in Charlotte. I've seen him travel to the
(09:20):
Night Night Theater and they go and they share stories
like you're doing right here? Would you ever do a
live show that way?
Speaker 2 (09:28):
That would be We have done that The Roads now
my other history podcast. We've done several live shows. In fact,
we did one at Spirit Square was a Spirit Square,
and we did one at the Cat's Cradle up in
Chapel Hill. We did one into Washington, d C. Recently
and so yeah, I love doing that. Hard to find
(09:50):
time for those sometimes because of the busy band schedule
and and because of family life, but always love doing those.
Those are always a.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Lot of fun. All right. You just spoke time. Time
is one of my big things. And what especially when
it comes to research, and if you're receiving these these
questions from from listeners and they're sending them to you directly,
that means you've got to stop, take the time to
do the research, find the person to put on your show.
Where are you finding this time?
Speaker 2 (10:17):
Well? I have great help.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Good.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
I have a producer named James Morrison and another producer
named Jordan Bruntall, and the people at iHeart are amazingly
supportive and helpful, and so I have help. But yes,
here's where I find the time. It's on the road,
it's driving from place to place. It's the hours. I
(10:44):
wake up early in the morning, doesn't matter what time
I go to bed. I wake up early in the morning,
you know, seven or eight. I can be in the books,
I can be online. I can do research until soundcheck.
That's two or three in the afternoon. Then at soundcheck
I like to shut down the brand and get focused
on music.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Do you find yourself being a modern day explorer because
you're actually going back into the history, back into that rock,
and you're pulling things out of it.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
I hadn't thought of it like that, but I think
it's great. Yeah. I just want to teach. I want
people to learn. I want people to be better informed
of the history of their country. I think that my
perfect listener is not everything I do. I back up
with citations and footnotes, and I show my work that's
(11:35):
very important to me. I want a historian to look
at what I do and go, yeah, this guy, he
put the rigor in. But I want the historically curious
to be informed, and I want them to realize that
when we talk about American history, we're talking about human history,
and to better understand. I mean, there's only one way
to better understand our times. It's by looking and better
(11:58):
at understanding the.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
Past, say footnotes right away, you must have been looking
at my notes because I'm sitting here thinking, why isn't
this a book? Is it going to go that to
that next level of becoming a book where that people
can hold in their hand and really take the time
to get into those pages.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Well, I'll tell you that's a great idea for an
American history highline book, and I'm open to it if
I heart wants to join me in that process. But
I do have another book coming out in March, History Book,
my first book, and so I hope I would love
to come back on and talk about that when the
time comes.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
What is your attachment to history? Is it because we're
here in the Carolinas? I mean, because when I go
down to Charleston, it's not I'll sit there and read
those signs, going Okay, what's the real story here? I
got to dig into this and you know, find out
what's going on.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
There is something rich about being in North Carolina and
into living here because the history is old, right, because
it predates the founding of the nation, and so that's
it's a really special play used to be for for history,
but but it comes from me. It just it comes
(13:06):
way back in my life as a child. For some reason,
I was always really attracted to American history in particular,
and I think my my parents kind of supported me
in that and kind of took me to historical sites
and and I was a C student at best, but
I always did very well with history. So for some reason,
you know, it was always always in my bread.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
Is it because you're a storyteller?
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Maybe so?
Speaker 1 (13:33):
Maybe?
Speaker 2 (13:33):
So? Wow. Wow.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
One of the things that you bring up that really
drew me into your podcast was the fact that you know,
we've all heard this thing called the Great Depression, the
Great Depression. There are many times I've seen it as
a mile marker. What about you with your research?
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Hmmm, that's a good question. You know, they were they
were called in the nineteenth century, they were called panics,
they were called financial panics. They are they are markers
because you can't separate American history from economic history or
economic history, like the economy of the country is the
(14:08):
life of the country in a lot of ways, because
when the economy goes bad, people suffer. When people suffer,
they demand change, and so every time you have an
economic crisis, you have some kind of a cultural upheaval,
a societal upheaval. We live that, right You and I
(14:28):
live that. We all live that in the pandemic. The
world we live in right now was shaped by the
financial crisis of two thousand and eight, the financial crisis
and the financial the financial crisis that we all suffered
during the pandemic and the pandemic being locked down. I
(14:50):
think it really did something to the American psyche that
we're working through right now. We don't talk about that,
we don't talk about it that way, but we all
suffered this really emotional, crazy experience and we're not going
to therapy together as a nation because of that. This
(15:13):
is us working through it. And it's pretty.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Crazy interesting that you talk about two thousand and eight
and during the pandemic, because I'm a daily writer. Every
day my hand is on that page and I'm using
a writing instrument, and those are the time periods that
I've used as huge mile markers in my present day.
So that's really interesting that you would bring that up.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah, repeat that again so I can two eight.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
And the lockdown, because those are the things that I
write to this day. I mean, I lived it. It's
in my daily writing, it's in my journals. One day
somebody will go, what was it really like, Well, let's
go look at his journals and see how he went
through it.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Yeah, that's an important You bring up an important point
as far as journaling. We communicate via email. Where where
does all that go? Right? Like? Where where are the archives?
Where are the archives? And so I think all citizens
should keep a daily journal and mark what's happening and
(16:09):
how and how it's affecting their daily lives.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
We'd all be richer for that, right. Would you say
that historians of the past had open eyes or were
they just trying to just get things down?
Speaker 2 (16:22):
I hadn't thought about that. I think they're well, I
mean people have different motives. I mean even throughout time,
historians have had different motives for recording or retelling what happened.
You know, newspapers were all very we talk about partisan
(16:42):
press today, Well, partisan press is nothing new to this country.
It was very much like that up until the thirties
or forties. We seem to have a unique moment from
the forties until two thousand, you know, early two thousands,
where where it was this exceptional moment of I know
(17:05):
people are going to say, well, I didn't feel like
we had great prosperity, but but the gap between the
rich and the poor was with the smallest it ever was. Before.
We seem to have a stable government. Even though we
would go between Republican Democrat, the the function of the
government did not really waiver. It was it was stable,
(17:27):
and we seem to be, uh going right now, it's
like we're we're going forward, of course, but we're also
kind of going back to the way it always was
before World War Two. And and so that's that's it's
not like we're living something we we are living something new.
But if you look at history, the kind of upheaval
(17:48):
we're seeing today is not is not unusual.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
M You bring that up there about you know, going
back before uh, you know, the you know, before World
War two, and that was the silent generation. And that's
what I always call sending a text message or sending
an email. Is that's part of a silent generation. I
don't hear you, I don't see you. It's a silent generation.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
Yeah. That's a good point, right, And that's that was
the whole the whole point of like like Nixon and
you know, in the Southern Strategy and Nixon in sixty
eight he wanted to attract what was known as the
forgotten man. And it's really it's really funny that you
bring this up, because this is all in that Buckley
incredible Buckley biography. Uh, you know, and I think Trump
(18:32):
has done that in some ways. There were people who
did not feel heard or seen, and they felt betrayed
by their leaders and and they said, we're going to
give this guy a try. And and and it's possible
that and I've heard some historians ponder this. They're not
finding they're not finding it now like they've made this
(18:53):
radical change to this. This this like chaotic leadership. Love
or hate it, let's admit that it's chaotic. And and
people may not be finding it here. So people are
looking for something. We haven't found it. We still haven't
found it. We'll keep looking for it. We'll keep trying
(19:15):
things until we find something that suits us.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Wow. All right, what's that? What's that address again for
the for listeners to write to you with their questions
where you're going to answer it on American History.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Hotline Americanhistoryhotline at gmail dot com Americanhistoryhotline at gmail dot com.
American History Highline all one word, send us your question
in a voice memo, and we will get you the answer.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
You got to come back to this show anytime in
the future, dude. You know the door is always going
to be open for you.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
I appreciate it. Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Will you be brilliant today? Okay, are you too?
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