U.S. History

The Rev. Roy Hawthorne is one of the original windtalkers. They were a group of Navajo men who developed a secret code for American World War II fighters. The Japanese were able to break every other code the military developed. The Navajo code was the only one never solved by the Japanese and is considered the key tool in winning that war. The code was declassified in 2001, and the code talkers received Medals of Honor from President Bush. The new film Windtalkers is based on the story of the codemakers. Hawthorne gives talks about the codemaking process to schoolchildren nationwide.

Last year, Gates uncovered a manuscript of a novel purportedly written in the 1850s by an African American woman who had been a slave. It is the first known work of its kind and has great historical and literary significance. The Bondwomans Narrative by Hannah Crafts, edited by Henry Louis Gates, has just been published (Warner Books). Well talk with Gates about the process of finding, authenticating and publishing the novel. Gates is the W.E.B. DuBois Professor of Humanities and chair of the Department of African-American Studies at Harvard University.

His book Reaching for Glory: The Secret Lyndon Johnson Tapes, 1964-1965 (Simon & Schuster) is now out in paperback. It is Beschloss’s second volume on the LBJ tapes. Beschloss will talk about the tapes, and we will hear excerpts, including some recordings of conversations about Vietnam, Civil Rights, and with Jackie Kennedy. Beschloss has written 5 previous books on American presidents. He is also a regular contributor to The News Hour with Jim Lehrer.

Journalist Gary Cohen's article in this months Atlantic Monthly is about the World War II case that the Bush administration says sets the precedent for use of military tribunals. Cohen studied 3,000 pages of trial transcripts at the National Archives and the Roosevelt Presidential Library, in Hyde Park, New York for the article. Cohen is a former member of the investigative unit at US News & World Report.

Author Philip Dray is the author of the book, At the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America. Dray chronicles lynching. He looks at the perpetrators, the groups and individuals who courageously took a stand against it (the NAACP, Ida Wells, and W.E.B. Du Bois) and the legacy it left behind. Dray researched his book at the Tuskegee Institute where records about lynchings have been kept from 1882. He is also the co-author of We Are not Afraid: The Story of Goodman, Schwerner, and Chaney and the Civil Rights Campaign for Mississippi.

Presidential historian Michael Beschloss' second volume on the LBJ tapes is called Reaching for Glory: The Secret Lyndon Johnson Tapes, 1964-1965. Beschloss talks about the tapes and we hear excerpts — including recordings of conversations about Vietnam and the Civil Rights movement. We also hear Johnson speaking with Jackie Kennedy. Beschloss has written five previous books on American presidents and is a regular contributor to The News Hour with Jim Lehrer.

Jay Winik's new book, a bestseller, is April 1865: The Month That Saved America (HarperCollins). He writes that April 1865 is a month that could have unraveled the American nation. Instead it saved it. During that month the war ended with Lee surrender, Lincoln was assassinated, and the rebuilding of the nation began. Winik is a senior scholar at the University of Maryland School of Public Affairs and a regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal.

Historian and civil rights activist Roger Wilkins has written a new book Jefferson Pillow: The Founding Fathers and the Dilemma of Black Patriotism (Beacon Press). Wilkins considers our founding fathers and their conflicting attitudes toward race and how it affects his own sense of patriotism. Wilkins is a professor of history at George Mason University, a Pulitzer-prize winner, and former Assistant Attorney General under President Johnson.

New York Times reporters David Barstow and Don Van Natta, Jr. went to Florida following the closest presidential election in history. During a six month investigation, the two journalists found –under intense pressure from the Republicans, Florida officials accepted hundreds of overseas absentee ballots that failed to comply with state election laws.— (NYT 7/15/01) However, the outcome of the investigation is inconclusive. If all invalid overseas ballots had been thrown out, Bush would have still maintained a narrow margin over Gore.

Historian David Mccullough is the Pulitzer-Prize winning author of Truman. His new book is the biography of founding father and second President of the United States. The book is John Adams.

The Bay of Pigs invasion in which Cuban exiles trained by the CIA unsuccessfully tried to invade Cuba and overthrow Castro. A talk with Peter Kornbluh of the National Security Archives. He edited the new book Bay of Pigs Declassified (The New Press). Among the documents released is the agencys post-mortem on the disastrous invasion, written after a six-month investigation. It was one of the most closely guarded secrets of the Cold War. Recently Kornbluh organized an international conference in Havana on the Bay of Pigs.

Alfredo Duran who was 24 years old when he was part of the Brigade 2506, the group that invaded Cuba. And Robert Reynolds who was chief of the CIAs Miami station during the Bay of Pigs.

Garbage expert Benjamin Miller discusses the history of rubbish in New York. He’s the former director of policy planning for the New York City Department of Sanitation. He’s just written a book on the subject, entitled “Fat of the Land: Garbage in New York – The Last 200 Years.” (Four Walls Eight Windows) Miller says that the dumping of garbage has literally shaped New York City as it took over surrounding islands and bulked up Brooklyn, Queens and Manhattan.

Historian Alexander Keyssar. In his new book “The Right to Vote: The Contested History of Democracy in the United States” (Basic Books), he examines the checkered history of our country’s right to vote, and how this right was not for a time extended to certain groups of people, from propertyless white men, to women, immigrants, and African-Americans. Even now, he argues, that the wealthy and well-educated are for more likely to go to the polls than the poor and under educated. Keyssar is Professor of History and Public Policy at Duke University.

Curtis Gans an expert on voter turnout and participation, and the director of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate, a non-partisan group which analyzes the habits of voters. Gans supports the electoral process. Akhil Amar is Southmayd Chair of Consitutional Law at Yale Law School. He would like to see the electoral college system abolished.

Professor Michael A. Bellesiles on the history of gun culture in America. His new book, “Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Culture” (Knopf) looks at our country’s obsession with guns. Historically, he says it began around the civil war. Before that, there was virtually no access to firearms. His research refutes the conventional lore that Colonial families were armed, and that the gun was the symbol of the frontier. Bellesiles is a Colonial historian at Emory University, and the Director of Emory’s Center for the Study of Violence.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews “American Moderns: Bohemian New York and the Creation of a New Century” by Christine Stansell.

Law Professor Alfred Brophy. In 1921, what many call the bloodiest race riot in US history took place in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Now 80 years later, a state commission has recommended reparations be made to the aged black survivors of the riots. Brophy, a professor at the Oklahoma City University Law School, researched the issue of reparations and the riot for the state commission.

Kinney Booker. He is one of the survivors of the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. He provides a first person account of the riot.

Law Professor Alfred Brophy. In 1921, what many call the bloodiest race riot in US history took place in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Now 80 years later, a state commission has recommended reparations be made to the aged black survivors of the riots. Brophy, a professor at the Oklahoma City University Law School, researched the issue of reparations and the riot for the state commission.