For the Ages: A History Podcast

By New-York Historical Society

Education History

What's For the Ages: A History Podcast about?

Explore the rich and complex history of the United States and beyond. Produced by the New-York Historical Society, host David M. Rubenstein engages the nation’s foremost historians and creative thinkers on a wide range of topics, including presidential biography, the nation’s founding, and the people who have shaped the American story. Learn more at nyhistory.org.

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Justice Deferred: Race and ...

12.04.2023

While the Supreme Court is often presented in American history as a protector of civil liberties, its record across the centuries provides a more complex picture. While the short period of the 1930s to the 1970s saw the Court end ...

For the Ages: A History Podcast episodes:

12.04.2023 Justice Deferred: Race and the Supreme Court While the Supreme Court is often presented in American history as a protector of civil liberties, its record across the centuries provides a more complex picture. While the short period of the 1930s to the 1970s saw the Court end ...
11.27.2023 The Cabinet: George Washington and the Creation of an American Institution The US Constitution did not create or provide for the presidential cabinet. When George Washington called for the first convening of his department secretaries two and a half years into his presidency, he drew on his military experience to seek ...
11.20.2023 The Liberation Trilogy: The War in Western Europe, 1944-1945 Exploring the final installment of the Liberation Trilogy, historian Rick Atkinson discusses the titanic battle for Western Europe that defined the later years of the Second World War. Beginning with the commencement of D-Day, this period of the war saw ...
11.13.2023 The Liberation Trilogy: The War in Sicily, Italy, and North Africa In this first of two conversations, Pulitzer Prize winner Rick Atkinson dives into the first two volumes of his monumental Liberation Trilogy, looking at North Africa during WWII and the harrowing campaigns that took place in Sicily and Italy. A ...
11.06.2023 Land: How the Hunger for Ownership Shaped the Modern World Since the dawn of civilization, land stewardship has served as the foundation for how societies coalesce and interact. In a wide-ranging conversation that examines European imperialism, the dispossession of Native American populations, and Joseph Stalin’s brutal collectivization in Society territories, ...
10.30.2023 The Witches: Salem, 1692 In the harsh New England winter of 1692, a minister’s daughter began to scream and convulse, as if possessed by a demonic spirit. This incident marked the beginning of a year-long panic in Salem, Massachusetts, which culminated in the infamous ...
10.23.2023 Beyond the White House: From George Washington to Donald Trump While American presidents are only eligible to serve two terms in office and are beholden to protect the peaceful transfer of power to their successors, their influence in politics and public service can span decades following their presidency. Douglas Brinkley ...
10.16.2023 The Unfinished Presidency: Jimmy Carter's Journey Beyond the White House Although Jimmy Carter left the White House in January 1981 following a failed bid for reelection, his career in public service was far from over. Outside the boundaries of the Oval Office, he dedicated himself to finding peaceful solutions to ...
10.02.2023 Virginia Dynasty: Four Presidents and the Creation of the American Nation Making up the earliest class of United States presidents, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and James Monroe were all born and raised within the same sixty-mile circle east of the Blue Ridge Mountains, making up a “Virginia Dynasty” that ...
09.25.2023 American Republics, 1783–1850: Slavery, Native Americans, and American Identity Historian Alan Shaw Taylor continues his conversation with David M. Rubenstein on the decades that followed the American Revolution. This defining era saw Native Americans seeking to defend their homes from a flood of American settlers, the intertwining of slavery ...
09.18.2023 American Republics, 1783–1850: Democracy and Empire Contrary to the popular narrative of a confident and stable young republic, the United States emerged from its constitution as a fragile, internally divided union of states still contending with European empires and other independent republics on the North American ...
06.26.2023 The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America Hailed as the founding father of America’s conservation movement, President Theodore Roosevelt championed the protection of the nation's natural treasures and embarked on visionary initiatives to preserve 234 million acres of wilderness for posterity. In conversation with David M. Rubenstein, ...
06.19.2023 American Moonshot: John F. Kennedy and the Great Space Race In 1961, as the Cold War cast a shadow across the globe, John F. Kennedy inspired Americans to look up to the sky as he announced his goal of putting a man on the moon by the end of the ...
06.12.2023 Flora MacDonald: Journey to the New World and the Revolutionary War Flora MacDonald’s life continued to be marked by dramatic political upheaval following her involvement in the escape of Prince Charles Edward Stuart. In this second conversation with David M. Rubenstein, Flora Fraser details Flora MacDonald’s marriage, her move to the ...
06.05.2023 Flora Macdonald: The Escape of “Bonnie” Prince Charlie Biographer Flora Fraser tells the thrilling story of the young Scotswoman who helped Prince Charles Edward Stuart evade capture following the defeat of the Jacobite army at Culloden, Scotland, which marked the end of the House of Stuarts’ attempts to ...
05.22.2023 Twilight of the Gods: War in the Western Pacific, 1944–1945 World War II in the Pacific entered its endgame in June 1944, after the U.S. waged a crushing assault on the Japanese navy in the Battle of the Philippine Sea. In a conversation that explores the conflict’s harrowing final year—from ...
05.15.2023 Our Composite Nation: The Reconstruction of American Democracy in the Age of the Civil War The period of Reconstruction following the Civil War saw a transformation of the United States from a slaveholding republic into an interracial democracy, all alongside the rise of industrial capitalism and the violent and ambitious conquest of the American West. ...
05.08.2023 American Happiness and Discontents: The Unruly Torrent, 2008-2020 For decades, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and journalist George F. Will has been regarded as one of this country’s leading columnists and public intellectuals. In an expansive conversation that encompasses American history, the Supreme Court, and beyond, Will shares his perspective ...
05.01.2023 Hanoi's War: An International History of the War for Peace in Vietnam Half a century later, the contested history of the war in Vietnam continues to elicit national debate, deep soul-searching, and purported lessons for America's role overseas. In a conversation that visits new historical terrain of the Vietnam War past, award-winning ...
04.24.2023 Our First Civil War: Patriots and Loyalists in the American Revolution Long before the first battle of the American Revolution, the conflict between Loyalists and Patriots swept through all facets of American society, with colonists, Native Americans, and the enslaved all forced to choose a side. Would this constitute America’s first ...
04.17.2023 Silent Spring Revolution: American Presidents and the Great Environmental Awakening The post-World War II economic boom came at a high cost: smog made breathing difficult in cities, the oceans were dying, wilderness vanished, and species went extinct at alarming rates. Acclaimed historian Douglas Brinkley chronicles how Rachel Carson’s 1962 book, ...
04.10.2023 The Year of Peril: America in 1942 In the United States, World War II is often regarded as a time of unrivaled national unity and optimism, however in reality this traumatic period tested the American resolve in the most significant way since the Civil War. How did ...
04.03.2023 Cuba: An American History Whether you are looking at proxy conflicts during the Cold War, the power of the Cuban-American voting bloc, or how Cuban-American relations are used as a cipher for a president’s foreign policy, the power of Cuba on American politics is ...
03.27.2023 The Great War, a Violent Peace, and Democracy’s Forgotten Crisis: Part II Adam Hochschild, author of American Midnight: The Great War, a Violent Peace, and Democracy's Forgotten Crisis, once again joins David M. Rubenstein to discuss the culture of violence, vigilantism, and censorship that permeated US government and society in the years ...
03.20.2023 The Great War, a Violent Peace, and Democracy's Forgotten Crisis: Part I The US’s entrance into World War I marked the beginning of a period in American history characterized by lynching, aggressive union-busting, mass civilian arrests, and stringent government censorship of the press, all amidst the backdrop of the war, a pandemic, ...
03.13.2023 Ways and Means: How the Confederacy Financed the Civil War Roger Lowenstein once again joins David M. Rubenstein to discuss the complex financial circumstances of the Civil War. In this episode, he explores the financial challenges faced by the Confederacy; looking at the resources they had available to them compared ...
03.06.2023 Ways and Means: How the Union Financed the Civil War For both the Union and the Confederacy, one of the most persistent battles of the Civil War was financing. To meet this challenge head-on both Lincoln and Jefferson Davis attempted a number of strategies to tackle the enormous financial demands ...
02.27.2023 American Inheritance: Slavery and the New Republic How was slavery written into America’s founding? David M. Rubenstein is once again joined by historian Edward J. Larson to discuss this question and explore how legal frameworks around slavery evolved in the new republic. Looking at the battle between ...
02.20.2023 American Inheritance: Slavery in the Revolutionary Era While the Revolutionary War was waged as a fight for freedom, slavery was omnipresent in America before, during, and after the war. In this two-part conversation, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Edward J. Larson discusses how the twin strands of liberty and ...
02.13.2023 How to Invest: Masters on the Craft In an age of global economic transformation, what lessons can we learn from the world’s most successful investors? Throughout his career, David M. Rubenstein, co-founder of one of the world’s largest investment firms, has interviewed some of the most internationally ...
02.06.2023 The Arc of a Covenant: The United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People, Part II Author Walter Russell Mead joins David M. Rubenstein once again to examine the connections between Israel, the Jewish people, and American political history. In this conversation, they dive into the history of Jewish people in America, including their experience of ...
01.30.2023 The Arc of a Covenant: The United States, Israel, and the Fate of the Jewish People, Part I The nuances of the Israeli-American relationship extend far into the past. Author Walter Russell Mead joins David M. Rubenstein for a two-part conversation to examine the connections between Israeli and American political history. This first of two episodes examines the ...
01.23.2023 Lincoln and Emancipation Edna Greene Medford, professor of history at Howard University, examines the ideas and events that shaped President Lincoln’s responses to slavery, following the arc of his ideological development from the beginning of the Civil War, when he aimed to pursue ...
01.16.2023 And There Was Light: Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle A president who governed a divided country has much to teach us in a twenty-first-century moment of polarization and political crisis. Hated and hailed, excoriated, and revered, Abraham Lincoln was at the pinnacle of American power when implacable secessionists gave ...
01.09.2023 The Bald Eagle Part Two: The History of the Bald Eagle in America Pulitzer Prize-winning environmental historian Jack E. Davis once again joins David M. Rubenstein to dive deep into the history, and patriotic symbolism of the bald eagle. In this talk, they discuss how the bald eagle came to be tied to ...
12.26.2022 The Bald Eagle Part One: The Improbable Journey of America's Bird Pulitzer Prize-winning environmental historian Jack E. Davis delves into the story of America’s most famous bird: the bald eagle. In conversation with David M. Rubenstein, Davis explores the story of the bald eagle as a unique and efficient predator predating ...
12.19.2022 My Life in Special Operations: Operation Neptune Spear and the Raid on the bin Laden Compound Admiral William H. McRaven once again joins David M. Rubenstein to discuss some of his most historic military missions as a member of the Navy SEALs and as commander of America’s Special Operations Forces. In this conversation, he outlines his ...
12.12.2022 My Life in Special Operations: The Capture of Saddam Hussein In the first of two conversations centered on his book Sea Stories: My Life in Special Operations, Admiral William H. McRaven joins David M. Rubenstein to discuss how growing up the son of a fighter pilot and a Texas schoolteacher ...
12.05.2022 In That Time: Michael O’Donnell and the Tragic Era of Vietnam New York Metropolitan Museum of Art President and CEO Dan Weiss explores the American experience of the Vietnam war through the lens of Michael O’Donnell. O’Donnell, a musician and poet who served as a soldier and helicopter pilot, never fired ...
11.28.2022 Breathless: The Scientific Race to Defeat a Deadly Virus While COVID-19 caused tragedy and disruption in ways that few had ever seen before, scientists and infectious disease experts had warned of the likelihood of the ‘next big’ pandemic for decades. While political and economic interests often took precedence over ...
11.21.2022 The Nation That Never Was: Reconstructing America's Story There’s a common story we tell about America: that our fundamental values as a country were stated in the Declaration of Independence, fought for in the Revolution, and made law in the Constitution. But, with the country increasingly divided, are ...
11.14.2022 His Truth Is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope U.S. Congressman John Lewis (1940–2020) dedicated his life to public service and the pursuit of civil rights. A member of Martin Luther King Jr.’s inner circle, Lewis channeled his faith in humanity and in God to champion nonviolence as not ...
11.07.2022 The Peaceful Transfer of Power: An Oral History of America’s Presidential Transitions The peaceful transfer of power from one U.S. President to another is the most delicate and hazardous period in the entire political cycle. Americans learned the stakes in 2020, when President Donald Trump’s refusal to trigger the formal start of ...
10.24.2022 A Conversation with Tom Brokaw Tom Brokaw, one of the most respected and trusted figures in U.S. broadcast journalism—best known for his more than 20-year tenure as managing editor and sole anchor of NBC Nightly News—joins David M. Rubenstein for an in-depth conversation on his ...
10.17.2022 A Conversation with Annette Gordon-Reed Acclaimed historian Annette Gordon-Reed is renowned for her work uncovering both the political and the private life of one of America’s most celebrated Founders, Thomas Jefferson. In a conversation moderated by American philanthropist David M. Rubenstein, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author ...
10.10.2022 Presidential Elections and the Supreme Court On the evening of December 12, 2000, following weeks of confusion surrounding the outcome of the recent presidential election, the Supreme Court handed down its decision to halt further vote counting in Florida, thus confirming the electoral victory of George ...
10.03.2022 A Conversation with Billie Jean King Billie Jean King—former No. 1 tennis player in the world and the first female athlete and first member of the LGBT community to be honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom—speaks with David M. Rubenstein about her iconic life and ...
09.26.2022 Exercise of Power: American Failures, Successes, and a New Path Forward in the Post-Cold War World How has global perception of the United States shifted since the end of the Cold War? Once seen as a dominant international leader, the country’s reputation has evolved into that of a disorganized entity, seemingly unwilling to accept the mantle ...
09.19.2022 Robert E. Lee: A Life In a tale ranging from Lee’s wealthy but scandal-ridden upbringing in Virginia to his long career in the U.S. Army, award-winning historian Allen C. Guelzo takes a hard look at Lee’s character, including his deceptively genteel demeanor and corrosive insecurities. ...
09.12.2022 A Conversation with Eric Foner Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Eric Foner discusses his illustrious career, including his work on American icons such as Thomas Paine and Abraham Lincoln. In a wide-ranging conversation moderated by David M. Rubenstein, Eric Foner covers his substantial scholarship on the Civil ...

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