Was January 6, 2021 an aberration or was it part of a long history of political violence in the United States? Join Hilary and Geoff as they discuss the role political violence played in the nation’s founding, its presence in the Capitol Building prior to January 6, and its potentially cyclical nature. Along the way we’ll cover Tulsa 1920, the Oklahoma City Bombing of 1995, and the BLM movement.
Join us as we continue discussing the American West!
Here are some of the books we’ve mentioned in the two-part overview:
Patricia Limerick – Legacy of Conquest
Richard White – The Middle Ground
William Cronon – Changes in the Land
Anne Hyde – Empires, Nations, and Families
Pekka Hämäläinen – Comanche Empire and Lakota America
February 14th isn’t just about flowers, candy, and dinner with your sweetheart. It is also the anniversary of one of the bloodiest gangland confrontations in US history. On February 14, 1929 seven men were shot in a north Chicago garage. This wasn’t just the ratcheting up of Prohibition-era violence in Chicago, a city seemingly out-of-control. It was also a key moment in the expansion of the Federal Government’s powers to override local control.
In our discussion of the massacre we also cover the valorization of crime, issues surrounding the racialization of criminals, and the legacy of gangs and men like Al Capone on US pop culture.
