History Ages

Giving voice to the voiceless, the Chicago Defender condemned Jim Crow, catalyzed the Great Migration, and focused the electoral power of black America. Robert S. Abbott founded the Defender in 1905, smuggled hundreds of thousands of copies into the most isolated communities in the segregated South, and was dubbed a "Modern Moses", becoming one of the first black millionaires in the process.

Gazing at the stars, falling in love, or listening to music, we sometimes feel a transcendent connection with a cosmic unity and things larger than ourselves. But these experiences are not easily understood by science, which holds that all things can be explained in terms of atoms and molecules. Is there space in our scientific worldview for these spiritual experiences?

The grandson of a slave, Dr. Ossian Sweet moved his family to an all-white Detroit neighborhood in 1925. When his neighbors attempted to drive him out, Sweet defended himself, resulting in the death of a white man and a murder trial for Sweet. There followed one of the most important (and shockingly unknown) cases in Civil Rights history. Also caught up in the intense courtroom drama were legal giant Clarence Darrow and the newly formed National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

On November 12, 1588, five young Asian men—led by a twenty-one-year-old called Christopher—traveled up the River Thames to meet Queen Elizabeth I. Christopher’s epic sea voyage had spanned from Japan, via the Philippines, New Spain (Mexico), Java and Southern Africa. On the way, he had already become the first recorded Japanese person in North America. Now Christopher was the first ever Japanese visitor to England, and no other would leave such a legacy for centuries to come.

From the best-selling author of Public Enemies and The Big Rich, an explosive account of the decade-long battle between the FBI and the homegrown revolutionary movements of the 1970s. The FBI combated these groups and others as nodes in a single revolutionary underground, dedicated to the violent overthrow of the American government. The FBI’s response to the leftist revolutionary counterculture has not been treated kindly by history, and in hindsight many of its efforts seem almost comically ineffectual, if not criminal in themselves.

The digital age is in the business of commodifying our attention. The technologies of our day are determined to keep us scrolling and swiping at all costs, plugged into a feedback loop of impatience, comparison, outrage, and contempt. Blind to the dangers, we enjoy its temporary pleasures, unaware of the damage to our souls. Jay Kim's Analog Church explored the ways the digital age and its values affect the life of the church. In Analog Christian, he asks the same question of Christian discipleship.

In Continental Reckoning renowned historian Elliott West presents a sweeping narrative of the American West and its vital role in the transformation of the nation. In the 1840s, by which time the United States had expanded to the Pacific, what would become the West was home to numerous vibrant Native cultures and vague claims by other nations.

Digital Wellbeing is a transformative guide that offers leaders, business professionals, educators, and lifelong learners a path to thrive in the digital age. Krause provides innovative strategies to enhance mindfulness, creativity, and wellbeing in a world enriched by technology. This book empowers listeners to leverage digital tools to create meaningful, positive connections and improve their overall quality of life.

The twelve entries in The Golden Age of Piracy discuss why pirates thrived in the seas of the New World, how pirates operated their plundering ventures, how governments battled piracy, and when and why piracy declined. Separating Hollywood myth from historical fact, these essays bring the real pirates of the Caribbean to life with a level of rigor and insight rarely applied to the subject.

The cave dwellers of the Stone Age were brutish and primitive compared to the human civilizations that would follow. Their technological developments were limited, and their society and culture provided few lasting legacies. Until surprisingly recently, this was the general view of the period of prehistory known as the Stone Age, an age that lasted for over 2 million years and ended only around 5,000 years ago.

Claude Shannon was a tinkerer, a playful wunderkind, a groundbreaking polymath, and a digital pioneer whose insights made the Information Age possible. He constructed fire-breathing trumpets and customized unicycles, outfoxed Vegas casinos, and built juggling robots, but he also wrote the seminal text of the Digital Revolution. That work allowed scientists to measure and manipulate information as objectively as any physical object. His work gave mathematicians and engineers the tools to bring that world to pass.

Cutting through 160 years of mythmaking, best-selling historian Michael Wallis presents the ultimate cautionary tale of America's westward expansion.

In this vivid and alluring history, medievalist Anthony Bale invites listeners on an odyssey across the medieval world. Journeying alongside scholars, spies, and saints, from Western Europe to the Far East, the Antipodes and the ends of the earth, Bale provides indispensable information on the exchange rate between Bohemian ducats and Venetian groats, medieval cures for seasickness, and how to avoid extortionist tour guides and singing sirens.

You are invited to witness the enormous power of the early church when it connected to the ultimate power. Then you are invited to request and experience it for yourself. You will again witness the enormous power of the early church as you listen to The Acts of the Apostles, a remarkable commentary on the book of Acts. Then you are invited to request it and experience it for yourself and your church.

What happened when Jane Austen’s heroines and heroes were finally wed? Marriage is at the center of Jane Austen’s novels. The pursuit of husbands and wives, advantageous matches, and, of course, love itself, motivate her characters and continue to fascinate people today. But what were love and marriage like in reality for ladies and gentlemen in Regency England? Rory Muir uncovers the excitements and disappointments of courtship and the pains and pleasures of marriage, drawing on fascinating first-hand accounts as well as novels of the period.

The medieval humoral system of medicine suggested that it was possible to die from having too much - or too little - sex, while the Roman Catholic Church taught that virginity was the ideal state. Holy men and women committed themselves to lifelong abstinence in the name of religion. Everyone was forced to conform to restrictive rules about who they could have sex with, in what way, how often, and even when, and could be harshly punished for getting it wrong.

For centuries, medicine has made reckless use of one of earth's most toxic substances: mercury - and the consequences, often invisible or ignored, continue to be tragic. Today, global emissions of mercury as well as other toxicants, make us all more vulnerable to its effects. From the worst cases of syphilis to Sigmund Freud's first cases of hysteria, from baffling new disorders in 19th century Britain to the modern scourge of autism, The Age of Autism traces the long overlooked history of mercury poisoning.

From facial recognition—capable of checking us onto flights or identifying undocumented residents—to automated decision systems that inform everything from who gets loans to who receives bail, each of us moves through a world determined by data-empowered algorithms. But these technologies didn't just appear: they are part of a history that goes back centuries, from the census enshrined in the US Constitution to the birth of eugenics in Victorian Britain to the development of Google search.

The Republic of Genoa: The History of the Italian City that Became Influential across the Mediterranean during the Middle Ages examines the highs and lows of Genoa La Superba (“The Proud”), including its humble origins in the first century CE, its felicitous rise after the fall of the Roman Empire, its golden age as a mercantile power during the “Genoese Century,” and its demise at the hands of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1797.

From the 15th to the mid-19th centuries, scurvy caused more deaths at sea than storms, shipwrecks, combat, and all other diseases combined. The cure for scurvy ranks among the greatest of military successes, yet its impact on history has mostly been ignored. In this book, Stephen R. Brown delivers a lively recounting of how three determined individuals overcame the constraints of 18th century thinking to solve the greatest medical mystery of their era. Brimming with tales of ships, sailors, and bureaucracy, Brown presents a vivid picture of life aboard the ship during the age of sail.