Episodes

Mike again leads us in our narrative of how America continued to fall short of its goals for China in World War II during the second half of the war. We meet General Claire Chennault of 'Flying Tigers' fame, whose ideas for h...

Mike leads our discussion of the American experience in China during World War II. Chiang Kai-shek, Franklin Roosevelt, and General “Vinegar Joe” Stilwell are the central figures in this episode, which explores many aspects o...

Marshall, Blake, and Mike discuss America’s view of China from the 1920s through the early 1940s and the strong influence Americans raised by missionaries in China, notably Henry Luce and Pearl Buck, had on that view. Chiang ...

Mike walks us through the events of the Boxer Rebellion, a conflict in which Chinese rebels attempted to slaughter all foreigners and Chinese Christians in China. Marshall then explains how this drove missionaries into isolat...

As the Manchu dynasty weakens during the 19th century, U.S. missionaries arrive. Christian evangelization leads to the outbreak of the long, bloody, brutal, and genocidal Taiping Rebellion, whose leader claims to be the young...

Where trade goes, conflict follows! While Britain and the East India Company focus on the opium trade with China, Americans of the first half of the 19th century try to break into the Chinese market with...well...opium, but a...

Ben Franklin got China wrong, and America still does today! Marshall again will lead our discussion in a new series, “Tea, Drugs, and Jesus,” looking at how the United States keeps misunderstanding China, in no small part bec...

Marshall, Blake, and Mike wrap up the America First series by dissecting the America First principles of non-involvement in World War II, then discussing the effect on America of the shockingly rapid 1940 fall of France, American support to Britain through Lend-Lease, Charles Lindbergh’s ascent to …

Marshall leads our discussion of the disorganized and dispersed nature of mid-1930s America First opposition to FDR, the 1936 presidential election, Republican opposition to New Deal reforms and help to Americans during the Great Depression, Nazi Germany's penetration of German-American cultural gr…

Marshall, Blake, and Mike discuss the America First movement in the 1930s, including its relation to racial policies and lynchings. Marshall describes how World War I cast its long shadow over 1930s America and how new America First leaders and organizations arose to lead their followers in opposit…

After a failed attempt at a Swedish accent, Marshall leads our discussion of the America First movement as it related to the 1928 election, the onset of the Great Depression, the Smoot-Hawley tariffs, the Dust Bowl, FDR and the New Deal, the end of Prohibition, and the 1930's decline of the Ku Klux…

Marshall, Blake, and Mike discuss how "America First" supporters influenced – and were influenced by – the Russian Revolution, the 1920 Wall Street bombing, anarchists and the Palmer Raids, the aftermath of World War I, The Great Gatsby, the elections of 1920 and 1924, Prohibition, the growth of ci…