In this conversation, historian Robert Tracy McKenzie reflects on a career spent studying and teaching America’s past, from the Civil War to the broader story of democracy. He shares how his upbringing in Tennessee and the influence of family and mentors shaped his calling as a historian. McKenzie discusses the challenges of writing about divided communities like Knoxville during the Civil War, the importance of resisting presentism, and the misconceptions many Americans still hold about that conflict. Throughout, he emphasizes how history, rightly approached, is less about collecting facts than about cultivating wisdom for the present.

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Breaking Nation: A Civil War Podcast is a production of Waveland Creative.
Host: Scott Holmgren