When the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was formed in 1927 one of the goals of the founders was to recognize achievements in the industry. That recognition quickly took the form of annual awards banquets, with the first one hosted in 1929. Over time the format shifted from banquet to the Oscars telecast we all know today, as the categories and even membership of the Academy adapted to the shifts in filmmaking. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Monica Sandler, a film and media historian at Ball State University, whose forthcoming book is The Oscar Industry: Creative Labor, Cultural Production, and the Awards System in Media Industry.

Our theme song is “Frogs Legs Rag,” composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “He’s working in the movies now,” composed by Henry Lodge, with lyrics by Harry Williams and Vincent Bryan; the song was performed by Billy Murray on February 27, 1914, in Camden, New Jersey; it’s in the public domain and is available via the Library of Congress National Jukebox. The episode image is of Grace Kelly and Marlon Brando at the Academy Awards on March 30, 1955, published in the Los Angeles Times on March 31, 1955; the copyright is held by the UCLA Charles E. Young Research Library Department of Special Collections, and this work is licensed under a "Creative Commons BY Attribution 4.0 International" .

Sources:

• “Experience over nine decades of the Oscars from 1927 to 2026,” Oscars.org.
• “Why Are the Academy Awards Called ‘Oscars’?” by Elizabeth Nix, History.com, January 22, 2026.
• “The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences [Pamphlet],” June 20, 1927, Available via the Margaret Herrick Library Digital Collections.
• “The Academy Awards Scandal That First Got PwC Its Job Counting Oscars Votes,” by Olivia B. Waxman, Time Magazine, March 2, 2018.
• “How Television Changed the Oscars,” by Lily Rothman, Time Magazine, February 22, 2015.
• ““TV – That’s Where Movies Go When They Die”: Rewatching the First Televised Oscars,” by Thomas Doherty, The Hollywood Reporter, March 26, 2022.
• “What Determines Whether a Performance Is Lead or Supporting? Oscar Rules Explained,” by Eliza Thompson, US Weekly, March 7, 2024.

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George Washington privately condemned slavery while actively holding hundreds of people in enslavement. He championed gradual emancipation plans while scheming to keep the people he enslaved from accessing them. He ruthlessly pursued a woman who escaped his enslavement and then emancipated the slaves he owned outright in his will. Washington’s complicated and contradictory legacy around slavery has been debated by Americans since his death. Joining us to discuss is Dr. John Garrison Marks, the Vice President of Research and Engagement at the American Association for State and Local History and author of Thy Will Be Done: George Washington's Legacy of Slavery and the Fight for American Memory.

Our theme song is “Frogs Legs Rag,” composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The episode music is “I think we’ve got another Washington,” composed by George Fairman and performed by the Peerless Quartet on October 32, 2015, in New York City; the recording is in the public domain and is available via the Library of Congress National Jukebox.The episode image is “Washington at Mount Vernon plantation, 1797,” lithographed and published by Nathaniel Currier in 1852; the image is in the public domain and is available via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional Sources:

• Never Caught: The Washingtons' Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge, by Erica Armstrong Dunbar, 37 Ink, 2015.
• “The Enslaved Household of President George Washington,” by Lindsay M. Chervinsky, White House Historical Association, September 6, 2019.
• “George Washington on the abolition of slavery, 1786,A Spotlight on a Primary Source by George Washington,”Gilder Lehrman Institute.
• “George Washington’s Last Will and Testament, 9 July 1799,” Founders Online, National Archives. 
• “Forgotten No Longer: Archaeology of the Slave Memorial & African American Burial Ground at George Washington's Mount Vernon,” by Joe A. Downer, Archaeological Field Research Manager, George Washington's Mount Vernon.
• “People Enslaved at Monticello Who Gained Their Freedom,“ Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.
• “Trump administration ordered to restore George Washington slavery exhibit it removed in Philadelphia,” by Hannah Schoenbaum, AP News, February 16, 2026.

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One hundred years ago, Dr. Carter G. Woodson created and launched the inaugural Negro History Week after his professors told him that Black people didn’t have a history worth studying. Negro History Week built on the success of Douglass Day and quickly spread through Black communities in the United States. Fifty years later, at the urging of the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History, President Gerald Ford called for Americans to celebrate Black History Month, which was finally ordered by Presidential Proclamation in 1986. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Jarvis Givens, Professor of Education and African and African American Studies at Harvard University and author of I'll Make Me a World: The 100-Year Journey of Black History Month.

Our theme song is “Frogs Legs Rag,” composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode audio is “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” with lyrics by James Weldon Johnson and music by Jon Rosamond Johnson; this public domain performance is by the United States Army Field Band and the 82nd Airborne Chorus and features Staff Sgt. Kyra Dorn. The episode image is a portrait of Carter G. Woodson taken on 19 December 1915 by Addison Norton Scurlock; the image is in the public domain and is available via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional Sources:

• “The Origins of Douglass Day,” by Jennifer Morris, Smithsonian Digital Volunteers, February 14, 2023.“The story behind the Frederick Douglass birthday celebration,” by Scott Bomboy, National Constitution Center, February 14, 2024.
• “Black History Month: A Commemorative Observances Legal Research Guide,” Library of Congress.
• “The Origins of Black History Month,” by Daryl Michael Scott, The Association for the Study of African American Life and History. 
• “Here's the story behind Black History Month — and why it's celebrated in February,” by Jonathan Franklin, NPR, February 2, 2022.
• “W. E. B. Du Bois and Black History Month,” by Phillip Luke Sinitiere, Black Perspectives, February 18, 2016.
• “Message on the Observance of Black History Month, February 1976,” by Gerald Ford, February 10, 1976.
• “Proclamation 5443—National Black (Afro-American) History Month, 1986,” by Ronald Reagan, February 24, 1986.
• “Proclamation: National Black History Month, 2026,” by Donald Trump, February 3, 2026.

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Reed Peggram, born in Boston in 1914, a gay Black man in a world that put up barriers to his success, excelled at Harvard before heading to a Europe on the brink of war. In Europe he fell in love with a Danist artist, and despite pleas from everyone in his life and from the US government to leave the war-torn continent, Reed refused to depart without Arne, leading to his imprisonment in an Italian concentration camp. Even then, Reed overcame the barriers in his way, escaping with Arne and surviving until they were rescued by the US Army. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Ethelene Whitmire, Professor of African American Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and author of The Remarkable Life of Reed Peggram: The Man Who Stared Down World War II in the Name of Love.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode audio is “Do it Again!” composed by George Gershwin and performed by the Paul Whiteman Orchestra; the piece, which is in the public domain, was recorded on March 28, 1922 in New York, and is available via the Library of Congress National Jukebox. The episode image is a 1935 photograph of Reed Peggram retrieved from Reed Peggram's Harvard student records in the Harvard University archives; it is in the public domain and available via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional source:

• “Unpacking Reed Peggram’s Library,” by Ethelene Whitmire, Journal of Cultural Analytics, vol. 9, no. 2, May 2024.

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Charles C. Diggs, Jr., founder of the Congressional Black Caucus, spent 25 years in Congress, pushing for change, on issues from segregation in commercial aviation to home-rule for the residents of Washington, DC, to the anti-apartheid movement. His legislative accomplishments were overshadowed by his downfall, and today his story doesn’t receive the attention of other Civil Rights heroes. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Marion Orr, Frederick Lippitt Professor of Public Policy and Professor of Political Science at Brown University and author of House of Diggs: The Rise and Fall of America's Most Consequential Black Congressman, Charles C. Diggs Jr.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-audio is “Bad Luck Blues,” performed by Gertrude “Ma” Rainey in 1923; the performance is in the public domain. The episode image is an official Congressional photo of Charles Diggs, Jr., in the public domain and available via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional sources:

• “DIGGS, Charles Coles, Jr.,” Office of the Historian, United States House of Representatives.
• “Charles Diggs, 75, Congressman Censured Over Kickbacks,” by Irvin Molotsky, The New York Times, August 26, 1998.
• “Eyes on the Prize; Interview with Charles Coles Diggs Jr., 1985-11-06 [video],” Film and Media Archive, Washington University in St. Louis, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC.
• “Regional Council of Negro Leadership,” by Ten Ownby, Mississippi Encyclopedia.
• “Mound Bayou (1887- ),” by Herbert G. Ruffin II, BlackPast, January 18, 2007.
• “Emmett Till's Death Inspired a Movement,” Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History & Culture.
• “About the CBC,” Congressional Black Caucus.
• “D.C. Home Rule,” Council of the District of Columbia.

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When All in the Family premiered in January 1971, CBS was nervous enough about the content that they added an advisory message at the beginning. Despite their fears, the show was a success, quickly garnering both awards and top Nielsen ratings. All in the Family not only changed television in the United States but also the practice of politics. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Oscar Winberg, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Turku Institute for Advanced Studies and the John Morton Center for North American Studies at the University of Turku, and author of Archie Bunker for President: How One Television Show Remade American Politics.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “I Don’t Like Your Family,” composed by Joseph E. Howard, with lyrics by Will M. Hough and Frank R. Adams; this recording, from October 4, 1906, is in the public domain and is available via the Library of Congress National Jukebox. The episode image is a photo of the Cast of the television program All in the Family from a press release dated March 12, 1976; the photo is in the public domain and is available via Wikimedia Commons.

All in the Family streaming:

• Meet the Bunkers (Season 1, Episode 1) on YouTube
• Seasons 2 and 3 on Pluto TV
• Seasons 7 and 8 on Tubi

Additional Sources:

• “Till Death Us Do Part, 6 June 1966,” History of the BBC. 
• “Norman Lear, Whose Comedies Changed the Face of TV, Is Dead at 101,” by By Richard Severo and Peter Keepnews, The New York Times, December 6, 2023.
• “For Good or Bad, Norman Lear Helped Erase Rural America from TV,” by Jeffrey H. Bloodworth, The Daily Yonder, February 22, 2024.
• “How Archie Bunker Forever Changed in the American Sitcom,” by Sascha Cohen, Smithsonian Magazine, March 21, 2018.
• “Looking Back on the Legacy of ‘All in the Family’ 50 Years Later,” by Tim Gray, Variety, January 12, 2021.
• “Looking Back on “All in the Family,” the Sitcom That Reshaped America,” by Tim Brinkhof, The Progressive Magazine, May 30, 2024.
• “Rob Reiner was more than a Hollywood liberal. He was a sophisticated political operator,” by Melanie Mason, Politico, December 15, 2025.

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When It’s a Wonderful Life was first released, it wasn’t a box office hit, but it did draw the attention of the FBI and its investigation into the Communist Infiltration of the Motion Picture Industry (COMPIC). The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) didn’t end up doing anything with the FBI’s allegations of subversion in the film, but the pressure of investigations like this led to a shift in Christmas films over the next 15 years away from stories of social problems to more lighthearted romances and musicals. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Vaughn Joy, author of Selling Out Santa: Hollywood Christmas Films in the Age of McCarthy. Dr. Joy’s public scholarship website with her husband, Dr. Ben Railton, is Black and White and Read All Over.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is "Carol of the Bells," composed by Mykola Leontovych and performed by the Concert Band of the United States Air Force Band of the Rockies; the performance is in the public domain and available via Wikimedia Commons. The episode image is a still from It’s a Wonderful Life, which is in the public domain.

Films Discussed:

• It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
• Susan Slept Here (1954)
• Babes in Toyland (1961)

Additional Sources:

• “Breaking Hollywood's 'Pattern of Sameness'; That is the task the independent producers have set themselves, says Frank Capra, who is one of them.” by Frank Capra, The New York Times, May 5, 1946.
• “The Truman Doctrine, 1947,” U.S. Department of State Office of the Historian.
• “House Un-American Activities Committee,” Harry S. Truman Library & Museum.
• “Screen Guide for Americans,” by Ayn Rand, the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, 1947.
• “FBI File on Communist Infiltration- Motion Picture Industry (COMPIC),” via archive.org.
• “When 'It's a Wonderful Life' Came Under FBI Scrutiny,” by Christopher Klein, History.com, December 11, 2025.
• “How ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ Went From Box Office Dud to Accidental Christmas Tradition,” by Jay Serafino, Mental Floss, December 6, 2024.

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Americans love their coffee; according to the Fall 2025 National Coffee Data Trends Report, 66% of adult Americans drink coffee every day, averaging three cups per day. This devotion to the caffeinated beverage is nothing new. Even before Bostonians dumped over 90,000 pounds of tea in the harbor, Americans were sipping cups of joe. George and Martha Washington served tea at the President’s House in New York, and after he stepped down as president, George Washington even tried growing coffee trees at Mount Vernon. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Michelle Craig McDonald, Director of the Library & Museum at the American Philosophical Society, and author of Coffee Nation: How One Commodity Transformed the Early United States.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Coffee in the Morning and Kisses in the Night,” by Gus Arnheim, 1934, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The episode image is of a coffee pot, made by Robert and William Peaston and accompanying sugar bowl, creampot, and tongs, made by Myer Myers; the items were owned by Dorothy Remsen, who married Abraham Brinckerhoff of New York in 1772. The coffee set is on view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 704; and the image is available as part of the Met's Open Access policy.

Additional Sources:

• “Coffee’s Creation Myth: How Coffee Conquered the World,” by Blake Stilwell, Coffee or Die Magazine, April 16, 2022.
• “The Boston Tea Party at 250: History steeped in myth,” by Gabrielle Emanuel, WBUR, December 14, 2024. 
• “Coffee and the White House,” by Tianna Mobley, The White House Historical Association, May 2, 2022.
• “Coffee,” George Washington’s Mount Vernon.
• “Coffee: World Markets and Trade,” by United States Department of Agriculture Foreign Agricultural Service, December 2024. 
• “Poll reveals America’s coffee consumption habits,” by Georgia Smith, Global Coffee Report, September 11, 2025.

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Global rum sales are expected to reach nearly $28 billion USD by the year 2033, making it one of the ten most popular alcoholic beverages in the world. In this episode we look at the early history of rum, how its invention and production were intertwined with the transatlantic slave trade, and how abolitionists tried to find free-labor sources of the popular liquor. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Jordan B. Smith, Associate Professor of History at Widener University, and author of The Invention of Rum: Creating the Quintessential Atlantic Commodity (use code PENN-JSMITH30 at Penn Press for 30% off).

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Fun Island,” by Geoff Harvey - Pixabay; used under the Pixabay Content License. The episode image is “Barrels of Rum,” by MAClarke21, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional Sources:

• “How Authentic Caribbean Rum Is Made [video],” West Indies Rum and Spirits Producers' Association (WIRSPA), YouTube, May 16, 2014.
• “About Barbados: History Of Barbados,” Barbados, org.
• “The History of Jamaica,” Jamaica Information Service.
• “Historical Context: Facts about the Slave Trade and Slavery,” by Steven Mintz, The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.
• “Top 10 best-selling rum Brand Champions 2025,” by Lauren Bowes, The Spirits Business, July 1, 2025.
• “Global Rum Market Size, Share, Growth, and Regional Forecast, 2025 – 2032,” Persistence Market Research, June 20, 2025.
• “20 Countries that Export the Most Rum in the World,” by Sultan Khalid, Insider Monkey via Yahoo Finance, March 18, 2024.

Donate to Recovery Efforts in Jamaica:

• Jamaican Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM)
• World Central Kitchen
• Project Hope
• One Love Brigade

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New Orleans is known for its unique cuisine that blends and highlights the many cultural roots of the city and its residents. The history of food distribution in New Orleans is just as unique within the American landscape, relying heavily on public food systems, both street vendors and municipally-run public markets. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Ashley Rose Young, a curator and public historian who serves as the American History Curator in the Rare Book and Special Collections Division at the Library of Congress and is a Smithsonian Research Associate. Her book, Nourishing Networks: The Public Culture of Food in New Orleans has just been published.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “On my way to New Orleans,” composed by Albert Von Tilzer with lyrics by Ballard MacDonald; this performance was sung by George O’Connor on February 10, 1915, in New York, and is in the public domain and available via the Library of Congress National Jukebox. The episode image is: “French Market, New Orleans, La.,” Detroit Publishing Company, 1910; there are no known restrictions on publication, and the image is accessible via the Library of Congress.

Additional sources:

• “New Orleans History 101: A beginner’s guide to understanding the Crescent City,” by Historic New Orleans Collection Visitor Services Staff, January 21, 2022.
• “Timeline: New Orleans,” PBS American Experience.
• “New Orleans Then and Now: The French Market,” by Ellen Terrell, Library of Congress Blog, July 12, 2018.
• “The Native Roots of the French Market,”by Kalie Rhodes, New Orleans Historical: A project by The Midlo Center for New Orleans Studies at the University of New Orleans, February 11, 2021. 
• “200 Years of Commerce, Community & Culture,” French Market District. 
• “New Orleans Street Vendors: A long history of African American entrepreneurship,” by Zella Palmer, 64 Parishes, December 1, 2019.

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