Founding Son: John Quincy's America

In 1979, the world watched as NASA’s 77-ton space station made its fiery plunge back to Earth. When Skylab broke apart over a sleepy Australian town, the falling debris set off a global media frenzy. This is the story of the night the sky actually fell — and the teenager who became an improbable hero.

Hi, Founding Son fans! Check out this story from the Very Special Episodes podcast. You can listen to new episodes of VSE every Wednesday wherever you get your podcasts. 

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Today's episode is a production of iHeartPodcasts and School of Humans. 

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Was Johnny Appleseed a real person or just another American tall tale? On this week's American History Hotline, Bob Crawford gets to the core of the issue with author William Kerrigan (Johnny Appleseed and the American Orchard: A Cultural History) to see how one man's true story inspired an enduring folk legend. 

In this episode Bob and William explore how John Chapman's religious revival led him to pioneer apple nurseries across Pennsylvania and Ohio. Just like some hybrid apples, Chapman was a mix of naturalist and capitalist. He bought vast tracts of land for apple orchards but believed in America’s lost simplicity and a connection to nature.

So, kick off your shoes and put a pot on your head as we travel around spreading seeds of knowledge. 

GUEST: William Kerrigan, author of Johnny Appleseed and the American Orchard: A Cultural History

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We all have that relative that tells us there was actually no green bean casserole at the first Thanksgiving. Yeah, we know, Grandma! But how much do we really know about that first feast between the Pilgrims and the Indians? 

Well, a lot. But the story most of us learned in school is completely wrong. Author David J. Silverman, (This Land Is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving) joins us to carve up the myths about Turkey Day and serve a nice helping of truth. 

In this episode, Bob and David explore the origins of Thanksgiving, from the Wampanoag people’s strategic decision to ally with the English, to Abraham Lincoln’s role in turning that footnoted feast into a national holiday. 

Tell your family to turn down the yacht rock and play this episode of American History Hotline as you avoid talking about politics and stir the gravy. 

GUEST: David J. Silverman, author of This Land Is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving. He has a new book coming out in February of 2026 titled, The Chosen and the Damned: Native Americans and the Making of Race in the United States

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Was it the rise of hitchhiking? Lead in the water pipes? Or was it something a little darker in our culture? Bob rings up private investigator and host of the podcast Hell & Gone: Murder Line — Catherine Townsend — to learn why there were so many serial killers in America during the 1970s.

From Ted Bundy to the Night Stalker and John Wayne Gacy, we dive into the “golden age” of serial killers to see how difficult it was to catch predators in a world before DNA testing, cell phones, and surveillance cameras. But that also begs the question: Are there fewer serial killers today? Listen, and find out! 

GUEST: Catherine Townsend, host of Hell and Gone: Murder Line and Red Collar

Listen to Bob Crawford's American History Hotline wherever you get your podcasts.

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In 1859, Congressman Daniel Sickles murdered Philip Barton Key (son of the man who wrote The Star-Spangled Banner) in a fit of jealous rage just steps from the White House. The resulting trial became America’s first true media circus, and gave rise to the “crime of passion” defense. In short, it basically became legal to kill a man for sleeping with your wife. While this wasn't technically a law, it was the "Unwritten Law" for way longer than you might think. 

Chris DeRose, author of Star Spangled Scandal: Sex, Murder, and the Trial that Changed America, joins Bob to talk about how this legal defense played out in America. 

GUEST: Chris DeRose, author of Star Spangled Scandal: Sex, Murder, and the Trial that Changed America

Listen to Bob Crawford's American History Hotline wherever you get your podcasts. 

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You won't see it on the ballot, but it's always the winner in American elections. That's right, we're talking about big tech. From Facebook to Google and AI, technology not only has the power to affect the outcomes of our elections ... it's already doing it! 

Who could have seen this coming? Well, we're glad you asked, because Roger McNamee has been ringing alarm bells since you were playing Snake on your Nokia. 

Roger joins Bob to talk about the evolution of technology in politics, from the rise of data-driven campaigning in the 1970s to Facebook’s influence on the 2016 election and the new threat of AI.

Let's just say our future is beginning to look a lot like an episode of Black Mirror. 

GUEST: Roger McNamee, author of  Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe

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In 1897, a Swedish engineer set out to reach the North Pole ... by balloon. With two companions, a crate of champagne, and the faith of a nation, he rose into the Arctic fog — and vanished. Decades later, their frozen journals and undeveloped film emerged from the ice, revealing the haunting truth behind one of exploration’s great mysteries.

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On the Very Special Episodes podcast, we tell one incredible story each week. Follow us down a different rabbit hole every Wednesday. 

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How did America’s presidents really make—and manage—their money? Bob Crawford sits down with financial expert and author Megan Gorman to explore the personal finances of presidents from George Washington to Donald Trump. Drawing from her new book, All the Presidents’ Money: How the Men Who Governed America Governed Their Money, Gorman reveals who thrived, who failed, and what their choices say about leadership, power, and legacy.

Discover why Thomas Jefferson died in debt, how Abraham Lincoln overcame his impoverished childhood, why FDR’s polio treatment transformed presidential fundraising, and how modern presidents like Obama, Clinton, and Trump built post-White House fortunes. 

Also, do you have to be wealthy to become president? Or has the oligarchy already began? 

GUEST: Megan Gorman: All the Presidents’ Money: How the Men Who Governed America Governed Their Money

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Which witch is which? You probably heard a lot of lawyers saying that in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. That was the year of America's largest witch hunt ever. But what sparked this mass hysteria that led to false accusations, sham justice and wrongful executions? Teenagers, of course. 

Bob is joined by historian Emerson Baker (A Storm of Witchcraft) to explore how religion, politics, and panic fueled the Salem Witch Trials. A time when no one was above suspicion! 

Guest: Emerson Baker, author of A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Trials and the American Experience

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In the 1960s, there were 36,000 Americans living in the Canal Zone. They had Friday night high school football games, sock hops, and Hollywood movies at the local theater. It looked like a mid-century American town had been dropped into the Panamanian jungle — because that’s exactly what it was. But many Panamanians weren’t happy with this “country-in-a-country” arrangement. What would it take to get the Americans to leave? The answer, it turns out, was a bunch of teenagers.

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Check out Marixa Lasso's Erased: The Untold Story of the Panama Canal and Wendy Tribaldos' books about the history of Panama and the Canal Zone.

Hosted by Dana Schwartz, Zaron Burnett, and Jason English
Written by Dave Roos
Senior Producer is Josh Fisher
Editing and Sound Design by Chris Childs
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Special thanks to our voice actors Chris Childs and Josh Fisher
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Executive Producer is Jason English

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