At the dawn of the 20th century, American finance looked modern—telegraphs, syndicates, Wall Street empires—but it had no brakes. In this episode of Built to Divide, host Dimitrius Lynch follows the chain reaction from the Panic of 1907 to the creation of the Federal Reserve, revealing how crises, central banking, and policy choices concentrated power at the top and quietly reshaped who gets to own a home in America.

We move from J.P. Morgan locking bankers in his library to stabilize markets, to the secret Jekyll Island meeting that birthed the blueprint for the Fed, to a global financial order built on austerity, gold, and central banks. Lynch unpacks how this shift—from robber barons to central bankers—centralized control over money and credit, setting the stage for a financial system that could either stabilize the economy or supercharge inequality.

In parallel, the episode traces a second, brutal story: the clash between slave labor and wage labor, the Civil War, broken promises like Special Field Orders No. 15, Reconstruction, the 13th and 14th Amendments, and the massive land giveaways of the Homestead and Railway Acts that seeded a two-track wealth system. That system was later hardened by Black Codes, Jim Crow, and the rise of the National Association of Realtors, whose restrictive covenants and ethics codes turned racism and class exclusion into standard practice.

As Lynch connects the Roaring Twenties, the Great Depression, Hoover’s homeownership gospel, and New Deal housing programs—HOLC, FHA, Fannie Mae—listeners see how federal support for mortgages expanded opportunity for some while redlining, racial covenants, and “good neighborhood” ideology locked others out. Housing was transformed into a mass wealth engine built on division.

This episode is a deep dive into how central banking, war finance, slavery, segregation, real estate professionalization, and federal housing policy fused into a system where housing isn’t just shelter or asset—it’s a sorting mechanism. If you want to understand why today’s housing market feels rigged, this chapter shows how the rig was built.

Episode Extras - Photos, videos, sources and links to additional content found during research.

Episode Credits:

Production in collaboration with Gābl Media

Written & Executive Produced by Dimitrius Lynch

Audio Engineering and Sound Design by Jeff Alvarez