This week we take an overview of the progressive period…and we’ll find out it’s actually a conservative movement - What? Progressives are conservative?! We’ll see the muckrakers digging into the seamier side of life to highlight the problems that need to be addressed, and Upton Sinclair giving everyone some severe nausea when he exposes the grossness that was the meatpacking industry.

I know you occasionally hear from my Teaching Assistants in my podcast, but the majority of their “help” is edited out…here’s a quick look at what really goes on while I’m recording!

We’ll be talking about the hypocrisy of the United States taking colonies, touring the Spanish-American War with our favorite Rough Rider, Teddy Roosevelt, seeing the rise of Yellow Journalism and the NY Newspaper Wars, and being shocked that we were in a war with the Philippines that most people probably didn’t know about. 

In this episode we cover the politics of the late 1800s, including the rise of the Populist party, how The Wizard of Oz can help you remember all the crazy politics of the era, and a couple more presidential assassinations….enough to finally make us realize we might need to organize the Secret Service. Plus Teddy Roosevelt makes an appearance, which is always entertaining.

Come take a tour of the frontier in the late 1800s that will include getting a glimpse of people like Buffalo Bill Cody and General Custer. We'll see how the native tribes were faring in the late 1800s and how the United States gradually took over the rest of the West.

This tour we’ll look at how pro sports like baseball become our national pastime. We’ll also tour city politics, the changes in education and literature, the expansion of the middle class, and a little Supreme Court ruling called Plessy v. Ferguson that established the idea of separate but equal. We’ll even meet distinguished black educators Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois, so come take the tour!

This episode looks at immigration in the late 1800s - who’s coming over and why, and how they’re treated by the immigrants who were here before them. We also see signifcant growth in the cities on our tour, and how that affects the people living there. Come join the tour!

In the last episode we saw a rise of big business and the problems that came along with that, and now we see the reactions of the working class. Between the 1870s and the turn of the century we’ll see a lot of labor unrest and attempts to get better working conditions, hours, and pay for the working class by setting up labor unions. Come check it out!

Today we're touring the inventors, the entrepreneurs, and the big businesses formed after the Civil War, as well as taking a look at the results of these burgeoning industries - things like the widening income gap, the working conditions, and just who was working at what jobs.  Come join the tour!

The second half of American history begins next week! Stay tuned, and catch up on all of your previous tours while you wait.