American History Hit

Winter at Valley Forge: Washington's Darkest Hour?

After suffering defeat after defeat, George Washington’s battered army was forced to retreat into the forests of rural Pennsylvania, where they set up camp to wait out th

Nazi Scientists in America: Operation Paperclip

Why would the United States have welcomed Nazis after the Second World War? Through Operation Paperclip, more than 1,500 German and Austrian scientists and engineers move

Early Humans of Ice Age America

When did the first humans arrive in America? Archaeologists have long pushed the theory that human habitation in the Americas dates back only to about 10,000 years. But n

LBJ & the Vietnam War

How did a President who was so reluctant to ramp up America's presence in Vietnam become the one who increased it more than any other? When Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in

The Mormon Founding of Salt Lake City

What drew the Latter Day Saints to Utah? Was anyone living there before the arrival of Brigham Young? And how did the city develop? Max Perry Mueller joins Don today to

Jefferson & the Revolutionary War

Thomas Jefferson has had no issue being remembered in American History. Ask anyone, this man was fundamental to Independence. But did he fight in the Revolutionary war it

What Really Happened At Waco?

76 people died on 19th April 1993 when the compound of a religious sect, the Branch Davidians, went up in flames. It had been under siege by government agencies for 51 da

Sherman's March: Invading the South

General William Tecumseh Sherman's famous invasion of the Confederacy in 1864 has become American legend... but what did Union troops do along their route and how consequ

America's Worst President

What makes a bad President? Who was the worst of all time? In this episode from the archive, Don is joined by Professor Jeremi Suri, author of The Impossible Presidency a

The People's Founding Father

Signatory of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, James Wilson was a sitting Supreme Court justice when he died. So why is he missing from popular h

The Truth About the Louisiana Purchase

We're all taught in school about the Louisiana Purchase, supposedly the greatest bargain in American history. Napoleon's deal with the Americans is widely remembered as a

Did Lee's Surrender End the Civil War?

When and where did the Civil War end? Was it really over when Lee surrendered at Appomattox? Don is joined for this episode by Caroline E. Janney, Professor at the Unive

Why Did Reconstruction Fail?

Over the course of this series, we've discussed the extraordinary promise of Reconstruction, as well as the relentless attacks these efforts came under. In this final epi

The Fire That Changed New York

On March 5 1911, 146 people died in a fire that lasted just 18 minutes. This event was to change the history of New York, and has an ongoing impact in each of our workpla

Reconstruction Era: Terror in the South

Reconstruction promised freedom and political equality, but how quickly did that promise begin to unravel? Why did white Southern resistance become so violent, and why di

Civil War Battle Of The Ironclads

In March 1862, wooden warships had dominated global warfare for centuries. In less than 48 hours off the coast of Virginia, two experimental metal monsters made every Nav

Reconstruction Era: A False Dawn of Freedom?

With the end of the Civil War, four million formerly enslaved people in the South were now free. It was the beginning of a remarkable experiment: rebuilding the South on

Plessy v. Ferguson: The Supreme Court Case That Enshrined Jim Crow

In 1896 the Supreme Court ruled that Jim Crow segregation laws were not unconstitutional in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson. This is the case that Brown v. Board of Educat

What Happened to the Confederates?

Across the defeated Confederacy, there had been an expectation that those who had taken up arms against their citizens would be punished. This did not happen however and

How Did the Supreme Court Claim Power?

Can you think of a time in history when a law has been ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court? Having been used over 180 times, judicial review is one of the most i