Stan interviews Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Steven Hahn about his latest book, Illiberal America: A History, which argues that what happened on January 6, 2021, was not an aberration but has deep roots in the American past.
Stan talks to historian Jacqueline Jones about her book, No Right to An Honest Living: The Struggles of Boston’s Black Workers in the Civil War Era, winner of the 2024 Pulitzer Prize in History.
Join Stan as he launches a new season of Off the Deaton Path with a recap of one of the most momentous weeks in American political history, plus a deep dive into Fun Facts Known By Few (a tunnel behind Lincoln’s head on Mt. Rushmore? Are you living in a nuclear sponge? What is the mysterious Greek fire? Why was the flow of the Chicago River reversed in 1900?) Also, a sneak peek at upcoming podcast author interviews, and the 45th anniversary of the death of the King.
Stan’s guest this week is DeKalb County CEO Michael Thurmond, who talks about his new book, James Oglethorpe, Father of Georgia: A Founder’s Journey From Slave Trader to Abolitionist, published by the University of Georgia Press. Michael argues that Oglethorpe has never gotten credit for his pathbreaking efforts to keep slavery out of the Georgia colony and his subsequent impact on the emerging abolitionist movement in England.
Why do the days of the week have their own particular feeling, and how did that happen? This week Stan’s guest is historian and author David Henkin from the University of California, Berkeley, discussing his book, The Week: A History of the Unnatural Rhythms that Made Us Who We Are. We take the seven-day week for granted, rarely asking what anchors it or what it does to us, yet weeks are not dictated by the natural order. They are, in fact, an artificial construction of the modern world.
