The Blue Collar Scholar

Why and how did England plant its flag on the Eastern Seaboard of North America? What was the purpose of the 13 colonies? Were the colonies established for different reasons and purposes? What role did religion, business, and war play? We will explore these and other similar topics that lay a foundation of British colonization of the East Coast of North America.

The Fall 2023 class for the NCCC Lifetime Learning program was called "Women in the Bible." Over the next few weeks, this podcast feed will provide lecture audio for that class. But before we can dig into individual women in the Bible and their stories, we need to back up and look at the entire Bible's timeline from a bird's eye view. From the earliest days of prehistory in Genesis to the height of Roman Imperial control of Israel as documented in the New Testament, this episode attempts to cover (briefly) all of it.

This episode launches our Spring 2024 class: The American Revolution. Join us as we travel back to the birth of democracy in ancient Athens, the Magna Carta in 1215 England, the Protestant Reformation, and the Age of European exploration and colonization in the Americas. We also, admittedly, chase a few bunny trails about WWII, Jewish history, the 27th Amendment, etc.

This episode is the finale that closes out The World Wars class. We will briefly cover the rapid growth of the American and Soviet nuclear programs after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as the beginning of the Cold War.

The development of the atomic bomb remains one of the greatest scientific achievements of all time, as well as one of the most controversial tools of death ever used against other human beings. This episode digs into the origins of the Manhattan Project, which saw the United States & Allies invest billions of dollars into a project that made sure that the Allies got the A-Bomb before Hitler or Imperial Japan.

The Second World War in the Pacific hinges on Midway. Before Midway, Japan found unbelievable success. After Midway, Japan lost territory, as well as their necessary manpower to hold all that they conquered. But Midway was in the first year of the Pacific war. Japan fought tooth-&-nail to hold their conquests, and made the Allies fight with all that they had for another 3 years. In this episode, we will cover the events from Midway to Okinawa, often referred to as "island hopping."

Imperial Japan had an incredible undefeated streak that went a half of a year after their attack on Pearl Harbor. The US, the UK, Australia, the Netherlands, and the other Allies were unable to stop Japan as they spread their Empire over many islands and peninsulas all over the Pacific Ocean and coastal Asia. But Imperial Japan met their match when they went toe-to-toe with the US Navy at the tiny island of Midway. Though WWII in the Pacific would drag on for three more long years, the Battle of Midway proved to be the turning point in the Pacific.

Why did Japan attack Pearl Harbor? How did they do it? What military moves did Imperial Japan make immediately following their successful first strike? Download, listen, and find out!

This episode explains the history of Japan, from the origins of the Emperor's Chrysanthemum Throne, to the rise of the shoguns, to rise of late-19th Century and early-20th Century Japanese militarism. We will examine Japan's multiple military successes from the late 1890s to the early 1940s, the atrocities of the Rape of Nanking, and the military reasons for attacking the United States.

As you can see on this podcast page, The Blue Collar Scholar has been on hiatus for some time. However, we are back! This episode attempts to get caught up a bit. This podcast episode covers the lecture notes for four different lectures, all related to WWII in Europe: (1) The Battle of Britain & Operation Barbarosa, (2) The Holocasut, (3) D-Day, & (4) Allied Victory.