Archive for 2008
American Idle: A History of Leisure
T-G-I-F — four of the most beloved letters in the alphabet… but who’d be thankful if Saturday weren’t a day off? In fact, it wasn’t officially part of the American weekend until 1940 (although “St. Monday” was often reserved for nursing hangovers). In this episode: The history of time-off. When did leisure become something for [...]
Traffic: How We Get From Here to There
America’s story is one of migration and expansion. In this hour, we explore the history of America’s highways and byways. We hear from Gridlock Sam, who fights traffic for a living, and Peter Norton, who takes us back to the dawn of the motor age. Then we travel through America’s canalways with batteau reenactors and [...]
Controversial Wars
Critics of the war in Iraq compare it – rightly or wrongly – to Vietnam. But there’s no disputing that like Vietnam, this war has split the nation down the middle. It’s enough to make one yearn for earlier times, when the nation united against a common enemy. Or did it? This hour of BackStory [...]
Newcomers in American Government
With all the talk we’ve been hearing lately about potential “presidential firsts,” it’s easy to forget that the history of American government is a history of firsts. In our inaugural episode, the History Guys take on the age-old Beltway tradition of posturing as a “Washington outsider,” examine how women, African Americans and immigrants have found [...]
