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.

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.

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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