Episode 05 – Conspiracies!

4″x3″ slide depicting John Wilkes Booth leaning forward to shoot President Abraham Lincoln as he watches Our American Cousin at Ford’s Theater in Washington, D.C. 14 April 1865.

Join us as we discuss conspiracy theories throughout American history. Have we always been obsessed with alternative explanations of events? Was historian Richard Hofstadter correct when he pointed to an American form of governing characterized by paranoia? Hilary and Geoff move from the Early Republic to the Civil War to the Cold War and even the War on Terror as they discuss conspiracy theories and how historians address them.