Unsung History

Latest Episodes:

The Long History of the Chicago Portage Nov 20, 2023

Show notes

When Europeans arrived in the Great Lakes region, they learned from the Indigenous people living there of a route from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, made possible by a portage connecting the Chicago River and the Des Plaines River. That portage, sometimes called Mud Lake, provided both opportunity and challenge to European powers who struggled to use European naval technology in a region better suited to Indigenous birchbark canoes. In the early 19th century, however, the Americans remade the region with major infrastructure projects, finally controlling the portage not with military power but with engineering, and setting the stage for Chicago’s rapid growth as a major metropolis.

Joining me in this episode is Dr. John William Nelson, Assistant Professor of History at Texas Tech University and author of Muddy Ground: Native Peoples, Chicago's Portage, and the Transformation of a Continent.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is "Water Droplets on the River," composed and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons.

The episode image is a photograph of a statue that depicts members of the Kaskaskia, a tribe of the Illinois Confederation, leading French explorers Louis Jolliet and Father Jacques Marquette, to the western end of the Chicago Portage in the summer of 1673. The statue was designed by Chicago area artist Ferdinand Rebechini and erected on April 25-26, 1990. The photograph is under the creative commons license CC BY-SA 2.0 and is available via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional sources:

“Chicago Portage National Historic Site,” National Park Service.
“STORY 1: Chicago Portage National Historic Site/Sitio Histórico Nacional de Chicago Portage,” Friends of the Chicago River.
“Portage,” Encyclopedia of Chicago.
“The Chicago Portage,” Carnegie Mellon University Libraries Digital Collection.
“Marquette and Jolliet 1673 Expedition,” by Roberta Estes, Native Heritage Project, December 30, 2012.
“Louis Jolliet & Jacques Marquette [video],” PBS World Explorers.
“Cadillac, Antoine De La Mothe,” Encyclopedia of Detroit.
“Chicago’s Mythical French Fort,” by Winstanley Briggs, Encyclopedia of Chicago.
“Seven Years’ War,” History.com, Originally posted on November 12, 2009 and updated on June 13, 2023.
“Treaty of Paris (1783),” U.S. National Archives.
“The Northwest and the Ordinances, 1783-1858,” Library of Congress.
“The Battle Of The Wabash: The Forgotten Disaster Of The Indian Wars,” by Patrick Feng, The Army Historical Foundation.
“The Battle Of Fallen Timbers, 20 August 1794,” by Matthew Seelinger, The Army Historical Foundation.
“History of Fort Dearborn,” Chicagology.
“How Chicago Transformed From a Midwestern Outpost Town to a Towering City,” by Joshua Salzmann, Smithsonian Magazine, October 12, 2018.
“Chicago: 150 Years of Flooding and Excrement,” by Whet Moser, Chicago Magazine, April 18, 2013.

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The Haudenosaunee Confederacy Nov 13, 2023

Show notes

Before Europeans landed in North America, five Indigenous nations around what would become New York State came together to form the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. When the Europeans arrived, the French called them the Iroquois Confederacy, and the English called them the League of Five Nations. Those Five Nations were the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas; the Tuscaroras joined the Confederacy in 1722. Some founding father of the United States, including George Washington and Benjamin Franklin admired the Haudenosaunee and incorporated their ideas into the U.S. Constitution. Despite that admiration, though, the United States government and the state government of New York did not always treat the Haudenosaunee with respect, and Haudenosaunee leaders had to navigate a difficult terrain in maintaining their sovereignty. Today we’re going to look at the relationship between the Haudenosaunee and the United States through the stories of four individuals: Red Jacket, Ely S. Parker, Harriet Maxwell Converse, and Arthur C. Parker.

Joining me in this episode is Dr. John C. Winters, Assistant Professor of History at the University of Southern Mississippi and author of The Amazing Iroquois and the Invention of the Empire State.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Falling Leaves (Piano),” by Oleksii Holubiev, from Pixabay, used under the Pixabay Content License. The episode image is “Red Jacket (Sagoyewatha),” painted by Thomas Hicks in 1868; the painting is in the public domain and can be found in the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution.

Additional Sources:

Haudenosaunee Confederacy
“Haudenosaunee Guide For Educators,” National Museum of the American Indian.
“The Haudenosaunee Confederacy and the Constitution,” by Jennifer Davis, Library of Congress, September 21, 2023.
“Indian speech, delivered before a gentleman missionary, from Massachusetts, by a chief, commonly called by the white people Red Jacket. His Indian name is Sagu-ua-what-hath, which being interpreted, is Keeper-awake,” Library of Congress, 1805.
“The Graves of Red Jacket,” Western New York Heritage.
“Red Jacket Medal Returned to Seneca Nation [video],” WGRZ-TV, May 17, 2021.
“Ely S. Parker,” Historical Society of the New York Courts.
April 2, 2015
in From the Stacks
“‘We Are All Americans:’ Ely S. Parker at Appomattox Court House,” by Mariam Touba, New York Historical Society, April 2, 2015.
“Engineer Became Highest Ranking Native American in Union Army,” by David Vergun, DOD News, November 2, 2021.
“Building to be Named for Ely S. Parker First Indian Commissioner of the BIA Recognized,” U.S. Department of the Interior, December 15, 2000.
“‘The Great White Mother’: Harriet Maxwell Converse, the Indian Colony of New York City, and the Media, 1885–1903,” by John. C. Winters, The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, 21(4), 279-300.
“Harriet Maxwell Converse,” PBS.org.
“Harriet Maxwell Converse,” Poets.org.
“Research and Collections of Arthur C. Parker,” New York State Museum.
“Arthur C. Parker and the Society of the American Indian, 1911-1916,” by S. Carol Berg, New York History, vol. 81, no. 2, 2000, pp. 237–46.

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Gun Capitalism & Gun Control in the U.S. after World War II Nov 06, 2023

Show notes

In 1945, the population of the United States was around 140 million people, and those Americans owned an estimated 45 million guns, or about one gun for every three people. By 2023, the population of the United States stood at just over 330 million people, and according to historical data from the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the number of guns produced and imported for the US market since 1899 exceeds 474 million firearms. Even assuming some of those guns have broken or been destroyed or illegally exported, there are easily more guns than people in the United States today. How and why the number of guns rose so precipitously in the US since World War II is our story today.

Joining me to help us learn more about guns in the United States in the second half of the 20th Century is Dr. Andrew C. McKevitt, the John D. Winters Endowed Professor of History at Louisiana Tech University and author of Gun Country: Gun Capitalism, Culture, and Control in Cold War America.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Johnny Get Your Gun,” composed by Monroe H. Rosenfeld and performed by Harry C. Browne, in New York on April 19, 1917; the audio is in the public domain and available via the Library of Congress National Jukebox. The episode image is a Hi-Standard ad from 1957.

Additional sources:

“How Many Guns Are Circulating in the U.S.?” by Jennifer Mascia and Chip Brownlee, The Trace, Originally posted March 6, 2023, and Updated August 28, 2023.
“The Mysterious Meaning of the Second Amendment,” by James C. Phillips and Josh Blackman, The Atlantic, February 28, 2020.
“Timeline of Gun Control in the United States,” by Robert Longley, ThoughtCo, updated on January 08, 2023.
“Do Black People Have Equal Gun Rights?” by Charles C. W. Cooke, The New York Times, October 25, 2014.
“Gun Control Is as Old as the Old West,” by Matt Jancer, Smithsonian Magazine, February 5, 2018.
“The NRA Wasn't Always Against Gun Restrictions,” by Ron Elving, NPR, October 10, 2017.
“How NRA’s true believers converted a marksmanship group into a mighty gun lobby,” by Joel Achenbach, Scott Higham and Sari Horwitz, Washington Post, January 12, 2013.
“Opinion: The reality of gun violence in the US is bleak, but history shows it’s not hopeless,” by Julian Zelizer, CNN, April 1, 2023.
“Firearms and Federal Law: The Gun Control Act of 1968,” by Franklin E. Zimring, The Journal of Legal Studies 4, no. 1 (1975): 133–98.
“Remarks Upon Signing the Gun Control Act of 1968,” by President Lyndon B. Johnson, The American Presidency Project.
“The Inside History of How Guns Are Marketed and Sold in America,” by Olivia B. Waxman, Time Magazine, August 19, 2022.
“The Supreme Court will hear a case that could effectively legalize automatic weapons,” by Ian Millhiser, Vox, November 3, 2023.

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The History of the Nutrition Facts Label Oct 30, 2023

Show notes

If you go to a grocery store in the United States and pick up a box of cereal, you expect to find a white box on the back of the package with information in Helvetica Black about the food’s macronutrients (things like fat and protein) and micronutrients (vitamins and minerals). The Nutrition Facts label is so ubiquitous that you may not even notice it. But how did it get there and why does it look the way it does? The history of that label is our story this week.

Joining me to discuss the history of food labeling in the United States is Dr. Xaq Frohlich, Associate Professor of History of Technology in the Department of History at Auburn University, and author of From Label to Table: Regulating Food in America in the Information Age.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Oh, you candy kid,” composed by John L. Golden, with lyrics by Bob Adams, and performed by Ada Jones in 1909; the audio is in the public domain and available via the Library of Congress’s National Jukebox. The episode image is “FDA Label Man,” an ad produced by the FDA for the nutritional label; the image is in the public domain as a United States government work and is available via the FDA Flickr.

Additional Sources:

“Milestones in U.S. Food and Drug Law,” U.S. Food & Drug Administration.
“Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906: Topics in Chronicling America,” Lobrary of Congress Research Guides.
“The Pure Food and Drug Act,” History, Art & Archives, United States House of Representatives.
“The American Chamber of Horrors [video],” U.S. Food & Drug Administration YouTube Channel, June 29, 2018.
“The Accidental Poison That Founded the Modern FDA,” by Julian G. West, The Atlantic, January 16, 2018.
“F. D. A. Proposes Sweeping Change in Food Labeling,” by Richard D. Lyons, The New York Times, January 18, 1973.
“H.R.3562 - Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990,” Congress.gov.
“How to Understand and Use the Nutrition Facts Label,” U.S. Food & Drug Administration.
“The FDA wants to change what counts as ‘healthy’ food. Big food makers say that's unfair.” by Irina Ivanova, CBS Moneywatch, February 27, 2023.
“FDA to test new package labels that could change how consumers make food choices,” by Madeline Holcombe, CNN Health, June 21, 2023.
“The FDA is attempting to ban partially hydrogenated oils for good. But what in the world are they?” by Joy Saha, Salon.com, August 16, 2023.
“Burkey Belser, designer of ubiquitous nutrition facts label, dies at 76,” by Michael S. Rosenwald, Washington Post, September 25, 2023.

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The History & the Present of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe Oct 23, 2023

Show notes

During the 19th Century, the Northern Cheyenne people made a number of treaties with the United States government, but the U.S. repeatedly failed to honor its end of the treaties. In November 1876, the U.S. Army, still fuming over their crushing defeat by the Lakota and Northern Cheyenne at the Battle of Little Bighorn, attacked a village of Northern Cheyenne, destroying 200 lodges and driving the survivors, including women and children, into the freezing cold with few supplies. When the weakened survivors surrendered at Fort Robinson the following spring, believing they would be located on a northern reservation, they were instead forced north to Indian Territory in Oklahoma, where they faced miserable conditions. Finally in 1884, the Northern Cheyenne Reservation was established in what is now southeastern Montana.

Joining me in this episode is writer Gerry Robinson, a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe, and author of The Cheyenne Story: An Interpretation of Courage.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The episode image is “Little Coyote (Little Wolf) and Morning Star (Dull Knife), Chiefs of the Northern Cheyennes,” photographed by William Henry Jackson in 1873; the image is in the public domain and is available via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional Sources:

Northern Cheyenne Tribe
Chief Dull Knife College
“Northern Cheyenne Reservation Timeline,” Montana Tribal Histories.
"Beyond "Discovery" Lewis & Clark from an Indigenous Perspective: Journal of American Indian Higher Education," by Richard Littlebear, Tribal College 14(3):11.
“Treaty & Occupation,” Sand Creek Massacre Foundation.
“In 1868, Two Nations Made a Treaty, the U.S. Broke It and Plains Indian Tribes are Still Seeking Justice,” by Kimbra Cutlip, Smithsonian Magazine, November 7, 2018.
“Little Wolf and President Grant,” by Catherine Denial, TeachingHistory.org.
“Battle of the Little Bighorn,” History.com, Originally posted on December 2, 2009, and updated on December 21, 2020.
“Treaty With The Cheyenne Tribe, 1825,” Tribal Treaties Database.
“Treaty Of Fort Laramie With Sioux, Etc., 1851,” Tribal Treaties Database.
“Treaty With The Arapaho And Cheyenne, 1861,” Tribal Treaties Database.
“Treaty With The Northern Cheyenne And Northern Arapaho, 1868,” Tribal Treaties Database.

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The Borinqueneers of the Korean War Oct 16, 2023

Show notes

In 1950, President Harry Truman ordered US troops to the Korean peninsula to help the South Koreans repel the invading North Korean People’s Army, which was supported by the communist regimes of the Soviet Union and China. One of the regiments shipped overseas to fight was the 65th Infantry Regiment, the Borinqueneers, made up of soldiers from Puerto Rico. In Korea, the Borinqueneers served heroically, despite harsh conditions and racist treatment.

Joining me in this episode to help us learn more about the 65th Infantry Regiment is writer Talia Aikens-Nuñez, author of the young adult book Men of the 65th: The Borinqueneers of the Korean War.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode audio is “La Borinqueña,” performed by the United States Navy Band in 2003; the audio is in the public domain and available via Wikimedia Commons.The episode image is “Members of the 65th Infantry Regiment pose for a photo after a firefight during the Korean War;“ the photo is by the U.S. Army, in the public domain, and available via the Department of Defense.

Additional sources:

“Puerto Rico’s 65th Infantry Fought Bravely in Korea—Then Had to Fight for Redemption,” by Iván Román, History.com, Originally published November 20, 2021, and updated August 17, 2023.
“The Borinqueneers: The Forgotten Heroes of a Forgotten War,” Center for Puerto Rican Studies, CUNY Hunter.
“The 65th Infantry Regiment: A Storied History,” National Museum of the United States Army.
“Congress Honors Puerto Rican Regiment for Heroic Korean War Service,” by Shannon Collins, DOD News, October 7, 2016.
“Bloodied in Battle, Now Getting Their Due,” by David Gonzalez, The New York Times, October 2, 2007.
“65th Infantry Regiment ‘Borinqueneers’ Highlight Hispanic Heritage Month,”by Tim Oberle, Eighth Army Public Affairs, U.S. Army, September 18, 2015.

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The Student Right in the late 1960s Oct 09, 2023

Show notes

In the late 1960s, as college campuses became hotbeds of liberal protest, conservative college groups, like the Intercollegiate Society of Individualists (ISI), the Young Americans for Freedom (YAF), and College Republicans, backed by powerful conservative elders and their deep pockets, fought back, staging counter protests, publishing conservative newspapers, taking over student governments, and suing colleges to remain open.

Joining me in this episode to discuss the campus right in more detail is Dr. Lauren Lassabe Shepherd, author of Resistance from the Right: Conservatives and the Campus Wars in Modern America.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Row Your Boat,” by The Goldwaters, Sing Folk Songs to Make the Liberals Mad, 1964. The episode image is "Ban SDS sign,” Columbia University Student Strike, April 1968, Office of Public Affairs Protest & Activism Photograph Collection, Collection number: UA#109, University Archives, Columbia University, accessed October 9, 2023.

Additional Sources:

“The Attack on Yale,” by McGeorge Bundy, The Atlantic, November 1951.
“Debunking a Longstanding Myth About William F. Buckley,” by Matthew Dallek, POlitico, March 31, 2023.
“About Us,” Young America’s Foundation.
“Young Americans for Freedom,” Civil Rights Digital History Project, University of Georgia.
"Young Americans for Freedom and the Anti-War Movement: Pro-War Encounters with the New Left at the Height of the Vietnam War," by Ethan Swift, Kaplan Senior Essay Prize for Use of Library Special Collections. 2019.
“About Us,” Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
“1968: Columbia in Crisis,” Columbia University Libraries.
“How Columbia’s Student Uprising of 1968 Was Sparked by a Segregated Gym,” by Erin Blakemore, History.com, Originally published April 20, 2018, and updated July 7, 2020.
“‘The Whole World Is Watching’: An Oral History of the 1968 Columbia Uprising,” by Clara Bingham, Vanity Fair, March 26, 2018.
“The Right Uses College Campuses as Its Training Grounds,” by Scott W. Stern, Jacobin, August 2023.
“Critical race theory is just the new buzzword in conservatives’ war on campuses,” by Lauren Lassabe, The Washington Post, July 7, 2021.

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The History of the National Organization for Women (NOW) Oct 02, 2023

Show notes

At the Third National Conference of Commissions on the Status of Women, a group of women, led by writer Betty Friedan and organizer and attorney Pauli Murray, decided that to make progress they needed to form an independent national civil rights organization for women. Within months, the National Organization for Women had 300 founding members, a slate of officers, and a statement of purpose. By 1974, NOW boasted 40,000 members in over 700 chapters, and today NOW claims hundreds of thousands of members in all 50 states and DC, working toward equal rights for women and girls.

Joining me to discuss the history of NOW is Dr. Katherine Turk, Associate Professor of History and Adjunct Associate Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and author of The Women of Now: How Feminists Built an Organization That Transformed America.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode audio are “Light Thought Var. 2” and “Vision of Persistence," by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com);Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License.The episode image is: “ERA March from Governor's mansion to the capitol - Tallahassee, Florida,” photographed by Donn Dughi; this work is from the Florida Memory Project hosted at the State Archive of Florida, and is released to the public domain in the United States under the terms of Section 257.35(6), Florida Statutes.

Additional Sources:

“United States President's Commission On The Status Of Women Records,” John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum.
“American Women: Report of the President’s Commission on the Status of Women, 1963,” Department of Labor.
“The Powerful, Complicated Legacy of Betty Friedan’s ‘The Feminine Mystique,’” by Jacob Muñoz, Smithsonian Magazine, February 4, 2021.
“National Organization for Women, ‘Statement of Purpose’ (1966),” The American Yawp Reader.
“National Organization for Women (NOW) founding documents, 1966–1968,” National Organization for Women Records, Schlesinger Library
“National Organization for Women Founder on Group's 50th Anniversary and Finding Success in Anger,” by Olivia B. Waxman, Time Magazine, June 30, 2016.
“Feminist Factions United and Filled the Streets for This Historic March,” by Maggie Doherty, The New York Times, Originally published August 26, 2020, and updated September 3, 2020.
“The Equal Rights Amendment: The Most Popular Never-Ratified Amendment,” by Christine Blackerby, National Archives Education Updates, December 5, 2013.
“How Phyllis Schlafly Derailed the Equal Rights Amendment,” by Lesley Kennedy, History.com, Originally published March 19, 2020, and updated September 29, 2023.
“The 1978 Equal Rights Amendment March,” by Henry Kokkeler, Boundary Stones, WETA, April 12, 2022.
National Organization for Women

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The Murder of Maria Cornell Sep 25, 2023

Show notes

When farmer John Durfee found the body of a local factory girl hanging from a fence post on his property on the morning of December 21, 1832, he and the rest of the townspeople assumed she had died by suicide. But a cryptic note she had left among her possessions pointed the investigation in a different direction, and the ensuing murder trial captured the public imagination.

Joining me to discuss the murder of Maria Cornell and the shifting cultural milieu of New England in the 1830s is Dr. Bruce Dorsey, Professor of History at Swarthmore College and author of Murder in a Mill Town: Sex, Faith, and the Crime That Captivated a Nation.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Midnight,” by Aleksey Chistilin (Lexin_Music) via Pixabay; available for use under the Pixabay License. The episode image is “A very bad man - Ephraim Kingsbury Avery,” published by Henry Robinson & Company in 1833; the image is in the public domain and is available via the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

Additional Sources:

“Sarah Maria Cornell,” The Town & the City: Lowell before and after The Civil War, University of Massachusetts Lowell Library.
“Trial of Rev. Mr. Avery ; a full report of the trial of Ephraim K. Avery, charged with the murder of Sarah Maria Cornell : before the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, at a special term in Newport, held in May, 1833 ; Avery's trial ; Additional medical testimony by Professor Channing on the part of the defendant, and Dr. William Turner, for the government,” reported by Benjamin F. Hallett, 1832, Harvard Library.
“Letters of the law : the trial of E. K. Avery for the murder of Sarah M. Cornell,” by J. Barbour, Law Text Culture, 2, 1995, 118-133.
“Religious Revivals and Revivalism in 1830s New England,” TeachUSHistory.org.
"The Second Great Awakening and the Making of Modern America," by Kerry Irish, Faculty Publications - Department of History and Politics. 78, 2018.
“Religion and Reform,” The American Yawp.
“The Mill Girls of Lowell,” National Park Service.

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The Great New York City Fire of 1776 Sep 18, 2023

Show notes

Just days after British troops captured New York City from General Washington and his army in September 1776, fire broke out, destroying a fifth of the city. The British blamed rebels who had remained hidden in Manhattan, but Washington, who had been ordered by Congress to leave the city standing on his retreat, never claimed responsibility, though he complained that the blaze hadn’t caused more destruction. So who did start the fire and why?

Joining me this week to discuss the New York fire and the question of who started it is Dr. Benjamin Carp, Professor and Daniel M. Lyons Chair of History at Brooklyn College, and author ofThe Great New York Fire of 1776: A Lost Story of the American Revolution.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The poetry is from selections of “Conflagration: A Poem,” Printed in New York from High Gaine in 1780 and performed by Theodore Weflen-Pollock. The episode image is "Representation du Feu terrible a Nouvelle Yorck," The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library; the image is in the public domain.

Additional Sources: