This episode of The American Tapestry Project continues our exploration of Protest Songs – that music of the excluded demonstrating the truth of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s exhortation that “the greatness of America is the right to protest for rights”. We’ll explore the music of the women’s movement then pivot to the Civil Rights Movement’s antecedents in gospel music and anti-slavery abolitionist music before asking who were the great Black artists singing songs of freedom seeking civil rights. Finally, we’ll hear a clip from the song many consider the greatest protest song of all time. Like they say on the late night infomercials, ‘all this and more’ as we explore American patriotic music and the freedom of which it sings – American freedom holidays on The American Tapestry Project.

This episode of The American Tapestry Project is the first of three exploring Protest Songs – that music of the excluded demonstrating the truth of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s exhortation that “the greatness of America is the right to protest for rights”. We’ll explore what is protest music, its global origins and examples from Beethoven’s celebration of the rights of man in the 9th Symphony’s “Ode to Joy” and Irish songs of rebellion, but we’ll focus on American protest music from “Yankee Doodle” to abolitionist songs to labor anthems to the great Civil Rights songs of mid-20th century America to anti-war songs during the Viet Nam War era down to today and songs seeking racial justice. Like they say on the late night infomercials, ‘all this and more’ as we explore American patriotic music and the freedom of which it sings – American freedom holidays on The American Tapestry Project.

This episode of The American Tapestry Project is the second of two exploring how Americans celebrate freedom through holidays and music. Who was Francis Scott Key and why did he write “The Defence of Fort McHenry” and how did that become “The Star-Spangled Banner”? Which child of immigrants wrote “Stars and Stripes Forever” and “The Washington Post March”? Which other immigrant wrote “God Bless America”? And who was “the Yankee Doodle Dandy” who wrote “It’s a Grand Old Flag”? And who was Katharine Lee Bates, the poet Boston.com called “a gay, feminist badass from Massachusetts” who wrote “America the Beautiful”? Like they say on the late night infomercials, ‘all this and more’ as we explore American patriotic music and the freedom of which it sings – American freedom holidays on The American Tapestry Project.

This episode of The American Tapestry Project is the first of  two exploring how Americans celebrate freedom through holidays and  music. What was Decoration Day and how did it become Memorial Day? What  Longfellow poem defined the day? Why did Julia Ward Howe write The  Battle Hymn of the Republic and what was the origin of Taps? What happened on June 19, 1865 and how did it evolve into Juneteenth? How do Swing Low Sweet Chariot and Lift Every Voice and Sing shine a light on  Juneteenth? Finally, before The Star-Spangled Banner what was the American national anthem?

This episode of The American Tapestry Project continues our exploration of how Americans weave the common objects of their love into the fabric of their national story through the things they celebrate, the games they play and sometimes the politics they forget. We’ll meet more Unsung American heroes – people who changed America who you might not know. Who was Ann Reeves Jarvis and her daughter Anna Maria Jarvis and what did they have to do with Mother’s Day? Who was Sonora Smart Dodd and Marian McQuade? Everyone knows Jackie Robinson, but who were Larry Doby, William Clarence Matthews and Moses “Fleetwood” Walker? Who was  Ed Abbaticchio? And, although he’s scarcely unsung, who was Henry Clay and what was his “The American System”?

We’ll begin with Henry Clay’s “The American System” which invented the business model upon which America was built. Then we’ll switch to Freedom’s Faultlines and The Immigrant’s Tale exploring baseball, segregation & immigration. And, since this program first airs on Mothers’ Day, we’ll conclude with a detailed look into the origins of those venerable American holidays – Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and Grandparent’s Day.

Who was Irene Morgan Kirkaldy? John Stark? Frances Perkins? Or, more famously, Levi Strauss? This episode of The American Tapestry Project explores yet another new thread in the stories of how Americans weave the common objects of their love into the fabric of their national story by introducing you to some Unsung American Heroes. The Cambridge Dictionary defines unsung as “not noticed or praised for hard work, courage or great achievements”. An unsung hero does great deeds but receives little or no recognition for them.

We’ll begin correcting that by telling you their story and the contribution they made to America’s tapestry of stories from Fred Harvey to Elizabeth Peratrovich, from Sergey Brin to Lydia Maria Child. While we’re at it, we’ll also answer listener questions about some books of interest behind the series: Jill Lepore’s The Case for the Nation, Joseph Ellis’ His Excellency and John Lewis Gaddis’ The Landscape of History.

How many holidays do Americans celebrate? 256! That’s probably a low count based only on those listed by timeanddate.com. American holidays range from the mega-famous to the obscure, from Christmas and Thanksgiving to August 21st Senior Citizens Day, from July 4th to Colorado’s Francis Xavier Cabrini Day.

This episode of The American Tapestry Project explores a new thread in the stories of how Americans weave the common objects of their love into the national fabric by examining American holidays.  First airing on March 14th with St. Patrick’s Day following in three days, we’ll launch our journey through America’s holidays by perusing America’s many ethnic holidays as a nation of immigrants celebrates their origins. We’ll study in some detail St. Patrick’s Day, Juneteenth and Columbus Day and a number of other vital but less famous ethnic celebrations, such as National Tartan Day, Leif Erikson Day and St. David’s Day. While were at it, we’ll begin the episode by also answering listener questions about books of interest behind the series.

Continuing our weaving of The American Tapestry Project, today, searching for the “common objects of our love”, we’ll examine America’s great diversity in three classic American songs – Irving Berlin’s God Bless America, Woody Guthrie’s This Land Is Your Land and James Weldon Johnson’s Lift Every Voice and Sing. We’ll also ask whatever happened to Washington’s Birthday and what is the Uniform Monday Holiday Act that created Presidents Day? Speaking of Washington’s birthday, in a mini-bio we’ll examine George Washington, the man whose name everyone knows and about whom most know nothing at all beyond he could not tell a lie (he could) and he chopped down a cherry tree (he didn’t). Whose view of Washington is correct – the 1776 Project Report that says he is “a peerless hero” or the San Francisco Board of Education, who, scorning him, removed his name from a school building? (Hint – neither; he is both greater and more complicated than either seem to understand).

The American Tapestry Project: We Tell Ourselves Stories concludes in Episode #6: The Immigrant’s Tale and The Fusion Thread. ‘The Immigrant’s Tale’ explores the history of immigration to America from John Smith and John Winthrop in the 17th century to the Irish and Catholic Germans in the mid-19th century to the great influx of southern and Eastern Europeans  in the late 19th/early 20th centuries to the post-1965 surge in Asian, African and Latino immigration with side stops examining the meaning of “citizenship”, evolving immigration law and a look at the Know Nothings of the 19th century and their 21st century white nationalist cousins. The series concludes with The Fusion Thread – Roth’s sense of the “American Story” as the interwoven threads of American ideals (freedom, equality & opportunity), the ongoing experiment in self-government and the ever-expanding definition of “We” in our founding documents, as in “We the People…”

Tracing the story of The American Dream: Success Stories, Horatio Alger and a Nation of ‘Hustlers, Episode 5 of The American Tapestry Project analyzes the tension between two stories: our Jeffersonian sense of ourselves as yeoman farmers living in small towns versus the reality that we live in Alexander Hamilton’s world of high finance, manufacturing and entrepreneurial zeal.