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Aural History Productions
Talking History, based at the University at Albany, State University of New York, is a production, distribution, and instructional center for all forms of "aural" history. Our mission is to provide teachers, students, researchers and the general public with as broad and outstanding a collection of audio documentaries, speeches, debates, oral histories, conference sessions, commentaries, archival audio sources, and other aural history resources as is available anywhere. We hope to expand our understanding of history by exploring the audio dimensions of our past, and we hope to enlarge the tools and venues of historical research and publication by promoting production of radio documentaries and other forms of aural history. In addition to our weekly radio program, we are engaged in numerous educational efforts, from running and sponsoring workshops to offering full-semester courses on radio production and oral history. Some of the most talented radio producers and engineers currently working in public and non-commercial radio now contribute to Talking History—both to our programming and to our educational efforts through production workshops. Here, you'll also find digital archives of their enormously creative and captivating works.
Our weekly broadcast/internet radio program, Talking History, focuses on all aspects of history. Follow the link to the left, "The Radio Show," for more information on the program and to access the live WWW broadcast. Below you will find our latest archived shows; to enjoy more, make use of the pop-down menu to the left; it will give you access to our full radio archive.
August 28, 2008 Segments 1 and 3: "Barbara Epstein on the Minsk Ghetto" (2008).
Segment 1:
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Time: 27:38. Segment 2:
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MP3. Time: 22:34. This piece -- a lengthy interview with historian Barbara Epstein -- comes to us from Pacifica Radio's Against the Grain and focuses on the resistance movement against the Nazis in Belorussia: "In Poland, Lithuania, and elsewhere in Nazi-occupied Europe, Jews imprisoned in ghettos fought back valiantly yet with little support from non-Jews. But, as historian Barbara Epstein narrates, a very different story took place in Belorussia, orchestrated by a grassroots communist-led underground." Epstein is the author of The Minsk Ghetto 1941-1943: Jewish Resistance and Soviet Internationalism (U. of California Press, 2008). She is currently a Professor in the History of Consciousness Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Segment 2: "The Story of Sosua."
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Time: 9:58.
Sosua: Haven in the Caribbean is a 1941 film produced by the Dominican Republic Settlement Association. It tells the (incomplete) story of a Jewish war refugee community established in the late 1930s in the Dominican Republic, with the blessings of its dictator, Rafael L. Trujillo. Trujillo, hardly known for his human rights record, took advantage of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's call for an international conference to address the plight of European refugees -- particularly Jewish refugees. A 32-nation conference to address the problem was convened in Évian, France in 1938. Only the Dominican Republic made a firm commitment to admit refugees, and soon afterwards took in around 500 Jews. Trujillo's motives were hardly humanitarian: he was not only trying to redeem his reputation as an ethnic cleanser (the term was not used then), but he also sought to racially transform his people. Trujillo had adopted a policy that strove to "whiten" the Dominican population and had practiced a vicious policy of racial discrimination against mostly-black Haitians -- one that came to be known as "antihaitianismo." In 1937 he ordered the massacre of thousands of Haitians residing in the Dominican Republic. The admission of white Jews -- the victims of racism in Germany and Austria -- served Trujillo's racist goal of "whitening" his own nation. Here, we present the sountrack from this archival film as a springboard to tell the story of Trujillo's racial policies and the fate of the lucky 500 Jews who were ironically saved by it.
August
21, 2008
Eric Foner: "Abolitionism and the Idea of American Freedom" [ORIGINALLY BROADCAST ON AUGUST 20, 2002; OUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED SEGMENT WAS PRE-EMPTED BY A SPECIAL WRPI-FM PROGRAM. WE'LL BE BACK WITH A NEW SHOW NEXT WEEK.]
Part 1:
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Time: 19:22.
Part 2:
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Time: 22:41.
Eric Foner, DeWitt
Clinton Professor of History at Columbia University and
former president of the Organization of American Historians (OAH), talks about
the contributions that the 19th century Abolitionist Movement made to the development
of American ideas about freedom. Foner is the author of a number of books, including:
Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party Before
the Civil War (1970), Tom Paine and Revolutionary America (1976), Politics
and Ideology in the Age of the Civil War (1980), Nothing But Freedom: Emancipation
and Its Legacy (1983), Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution,
1863–1877 (1988), Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory of Black Officeholders
During Reconstruction (1993), The Story of American Freedom (1998),
and Who Owns History? Rethinking the Past in a Changing World (2002).
Foner delivered this talk in Elizabethtown, New York, on August 11, 2002 as part
of the John Brown Lives! lecture series. [Recorded, edited and produced
by Talking History ~ University at Albany.]
August 14, 2008 Segments 1 and 3: "A Passel of Pomp and a Circus of Circumstance: America's National Party Conventions (Part 2)." (2004).
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Time: 26:25. Segment 3:
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MP3. Time: 23:28. This is the second and final part of a two-hour documentary (which we have slightly edited for length) narrated by Amy Goodman and produced in 2004 by the Pacifica Radio Archives and featured recently on Pacifica's From the Vault. As described by the Archives: "From the formal speeches of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1936, to the battles inside and outside the Chicago 1968 convention and to the radical sounds of Rage Against the Machine in the streets of Los Angeles in 2000, the two-part radio/TV documentary on America's national party Conventions showcases the Pacifica Network's progressive reporting at its most daring. A Passel of Pomp and a Circus of Circumstance includes highlights of the Republican and Democratic conventions, the Mississippi Freedom Party convention in the 60’s, and the Shadow Conventions of 2000, with the voices in the streets of those protesting outside convention halls." To obtain a copy of the full documentary, contact Pacifica Radio Archives at http://www.pacificaradioarchives.org
Segment 2: "'Happy Days are Here Again' and the Democratic Party."
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Time: 3:19.
"Happy Days Are Here Again," composed by Milton Ager and Jack Yellen -- ironically, just before the 1929 stock market crash -- became the theme song for the Democratic Party during the 1932 election. The song came to suggest the promise of national economic recovery under an FDR administration. It continued to be closely identified with the Democratic party throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries. The version we are making available here was released by Ben Selvin and the Crooners in 1930 -- two years before the song was adopted by the Democratic party. For more information about the 1932 convention and election of FDR, see Steve Neal's Happy Days Are Here Again: The 1932 Democratic Convention, the Emergence of FDR--And How America Was Changed Forever (HarperCollins, 2004). For information about Ager and Yellen and the song "Happy Days Are Here Again," see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Days_Are_Here_Again.
Segment 2: "John Hersey's Hiroshima: A Dramatic Reading."
August 7, 2008
Segments 1 and 3: "A Mushroom Cloud" (2008).
Segment 1:
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Time: 22:12.
Segment 2:
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MP3. Time: 29:01.
This piece comes to us from the series Hearing Voices; it focuses on the many ways in which the Cold War and nuclear weapons permeated our culture. Here's a summary: "'Enola Alone' Antenna Theater interviews bomber pilots, bombing victims, and Colonel Paul Tibbets, pilot of the Enola Gay. Political speeches and popular songs chart our changing attitudes towards the 'Atomic Age.' Residents recall the 1950s Nevada and Utah nuclear bomb tests in Claes Andreasson series 'Downwinder Diaries.' Poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti has 'Wild Dreams of a New Beginning.' Americans across the country answer Scott Carrier's question: 'What Are You Afraid Of?' The band Lemon Jelly presents 'Page One,' presents the Big Bang with a beat. And we select some 'Atomic Platters: Cold War Music from the Golden Age of Homeland Security' compiled by CONELRAD.com."
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Time: 51:50.
Here is long selection from a 2003 dramatic reading of John Hersey's journalistic masterpiece "Hiroshima" written following his journey to Japan in the months following the U.S. atomic bombing on Aug. 6, 1945. Produced by Brian DeShazor and Mark Torres, in association with Artists United and The Feminist Majority. Adapted for radio by John Valentine. Directed by Michael Haney. Music by Mark Snow." Readings by Tyne Daly, Ruby Dee and Roscoe Lee Brown, Daniel Benzali, Roscoe Lee Browne, Esther K. Chae, Michael Chinyamurindi, Tony Plana, Jeanne Sakata, Chris Toshima and John Valentine. For information about John Hersey and Hiroshima, see http://www.herseyhiroshima.com/hiro.php. For information on how to obtain the entire program, contact Pacifica Radio Archives at: http://www.pacificaradioarchives.org/welcome.html.
Segment 2: "From the Archives: The U.S. Supreme Court and the Regulation of Electoral Primaries ~ The Case of Tashjian v. Republican Party of Connecticut."
July 31, 2008
Segments 1 and 3: "A Passel of Pomp and a Circus of Circumstance: America's national party Conventions" (2004).
Segment 1:
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Time: 31:48.
Segment 2:
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MP3. Time: 24:05.
This is the first part of a two-hour documentary narrated by Amy Goodman and produced in 2004 by the Pacifica Radio Archives and featured recently on Pacifica's From the Vault. As described by the Archives: "From the formal speeches of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1936, to the battles inside and outside the Chicago 1968 convention and to the radical sounds of Rage Against the Machine in the streets of Los Angeles in 2000, the two-part radio/TV documentary on America's national party Conventions showcases the Pacifica Network's progressive reporting at its most daring. A Passel of Pomp and a Circus of Circumstance includes highlights of the Republican and Democratic conventions, the Mississippi Freedom Party convention in the 60’s, and the Shadow Conventions of 2000, with the voices in the streets of those protesting outside convention halls."
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Time: 19:47.
Here is a selection from the oral arguments delivered before the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Tashjian v. Republican Party Of Connecticut. The case is our springboard to a discussion of the history of Supreme Court rulings regulating primary elections in American politics. Her is a selection from the court summary of the case: "A Connecticut statute (§ 9-431), enacted in 1956, requires voters in any political party primary to be registered members of that party. In 1984, appellee Republican Party of Connecticut (Party) adopted a Party rule that permits independent voters -- registered voters not affiliated with any party -- to vote in Republican primaries for federal and statewide offices. The Party and the Party's federal officeholders and state chairman (also appellees) brought an action in Federal District Court challenging the constitutionality of § 9-431 on the ground that it deprives the Party of its right under the First and Fourteenth Amendments to enter into political association with individuals of its own choosing, and seeking declaratory and injunctive relief. The District Court granted summary judgment in appellees' favor, and the Court of Appeals affirmed." The recording comes from the National Archives via The Oyez Project. For more information about the Oyez Project, go to: www.oyez.org.
Segment 2: "From the Archives: Jeremy Bentham on 'Offenses Against One's Self (1785)."
July 24, 2008
Segments 1: "BackStory: Serving Time ~ Punishment in America." (2008)
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Time: 25:14.
Segment 2:
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MP3. Time: 25:11.
This week, we bring you another segment from the new history call-in show titled "BackStory," featuring U.S. historians Ed Ayers, Peter Onuf, and Brian Balogh. Each week, they explore a topic drawn from recent headlines -- probing its historical roots. In this segment they examine the history of incarecation in America: "For the first time in history, more than one in every 100 American adults is behind bars. For black men between the ages of 20 and 34, that figure is one in nine. Our incarceration rate dwarfs that of every other nation, but our overall crime rate is average for Western countries. How did we get to this point? How did Americans used to punish wrongdoers, and what does that have to do with today?s prison-industrial complex? Have the various prison reform movements worked? Or have they made things worse?"
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Time: 17:54.
Here is a short excerpt from a reading of a 1785 manuscript written by the founder of Utilitarianism, Jeremy Bentham. "Offences Against One’s Self: Paederasty" is an early defense of the decriminalization of homosexuality. Bentham evaluated homosexual acts on the same basis that he evaluated all social practices: whether they produce "the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people." He argued that that sexual behaviors outside the mainstream should in fact not be prohibited since they do little harm and bring pleasure to some. Bentham's position on this issue -- as on others -- was quite outside the mainstream for late 18th century England, when homsexual acts were still punishable by death. In fact, "Offenses Against Oneself" was not even published until 1931! This excerpt comes to us from LibriVox.org and we thank them and their many volunteer readers again for the wonderful work they do in bringing so many literary classics to life in audio. For more information on Jeremy Bentham's life and contributions, see: http://www.iep.utm.edu/b/bentham.htm and http://www.ucl.ac.uk/Bentham-Project/info/jb.htm.
Segment 1: Douglas Blackmon: Slavery by Another Name.July 17, 2008
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Time: 27:00.
In this edition of Building Bridges, Recorded on July 7, 2008, Ken Nash and Mimi Rosenberg speak with Douglas Blackmon, author of Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II. Blackmon discusses how his discovery of an unmarked African American burial ground on land owned by U.S. Steel led to his quest to explore the policies that were responsible for the Post-Reconstruction re-enslavement of Blacks.
Segments 2 and 3:
"The Poor People's Campaign of 1968: The Reverend Ralph Abernathy at Resurrection City Opening Ceremonies."
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Time: 17:15.
"The Poor People's Campaign of 1968: The People's Voices."
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Time: 41:36.
The previous two segments come to us from the Pacifica Radio Archives and From The Vault as part of their ongoing look at the many events of 1968 and their lasting impact.
"In 1968, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was planning The Poor People’s March on Washington D.C. as part of the War on Poverty. Dr. King was adamant that the Poor People’s March and campaign did not focus just on poor African Americans but included poverty-stricken people without deference to race, creed or color. He planned to lobby congress for an Economic Bill of Rights which would include affordable housing and a guaranteed annual income for the poor of this country.
Segment 2: From the Archives: "W. E. B. Du Bois and the Origins of Pan Africanism." (1937).
July 10, 2008
Segments 1: "BackStory: Environmental Crises." (2008)
Segment 1:
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Time: 31:36.
Segment 2:
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MP3. Time: 18:54.
This week, we bring you a segment from a new history call-in show titled "BackStory," featuring U.S. historians Ed Ayers, Peter Onuf, and Brian Balogh. Each week, they explore a topic drawn from recent headlines -- probing its historical roots. In this segment they examine enviromental crises. Here is their description of the segment: "It seems that Americans are finally waking up to the reality of climate change, but scientists tell us it may be too little, too late. This may be the most far-reaching environmental threat Americans have ever faced, but it's certainly not the first. In this hour, we consider the history of American anxieties about the environment. Historian Bill Cronon weighs in on when 'nature' became a thing to protect and not to fear. And we travel up into Virginia's Shenandoah National Park to look for remnants of the communities that were displaced to make way for Nature. Also: calls that tackle Mother Nature's gender, Populist politics, and the merits of an apocalyptic mindset."
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Time: 3:32.
Here is a short excerpt of a 1964 recording of W. E. B. Du Bois recalling his involvement with the establishment of the earliest Pan African Congresses in the post-World War I era. Recording date: 4-24-1964. For more information about W. E. B. Du Bois and Pan Africanism, see: http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_1741500827/pan-africanism.html.
Segment 2: From the Archives: "Father Charles Coughlin on the Christian Front and the Popular Front." (1937).
July 3, 2008
Segments 1: "The Zeeland Flood of 1953." (2003)
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Time: 29:14.
This documentary comes to us from Radio Netherlands. "For centuries, the Dutch have reclaimed land from the sea. But in February 1953, the sea tried to take back a huge portion from the province of Zeeland in the south of The Netherlands. The worst flood in centuries surprised residents in the middle of the night. Houses were swept out to sea; livestock and farmland were destroyed; and more than 1800 people lost their lives. This historic disaster is recreated with the eye-witness accounts of survivors and the on-scene reports of Radio Netherlands’ journalists who brought news of the tragedy to the world over fifty years ago." Produced in 2003.
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Time: 24:10.
Father Charles Coughlin, known as "The Radio Priest," was a prominent voice on radio in the 1930s. First supportive of FDR and the New Deal and then turning against it, he promoted various conspiracy theories and was a rabid anti-semite and anti-Communist. Here, in this broadcast, we present an example of his anti-communist rhetoric. For a short biography of Coughlin, see: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAcoughlinE.htm.
Segment 2: From the Archives: "Mario Savio and the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley (1964)."
June 26, 2008
Segments 1 and 3: "The Carlin Case. (2008)."
Segment 1:
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Time: 39:29.
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Time: 17:38.
This production, featuring Tony Diaz and Kym King and produced by Ernesto Aguilar, utilizes audio from the Pacifica Radio Archives and other sources "to explore the so-called Carlin case, the context, the evolution of free speech and the generation that pushed its rights beyond the scope of what was conceivable back in Independence Hall."
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Time: 5:27.
Mario Savio was one of the leaders of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement of 1965. This selection from one of his public addresses -- delivered at the Sproul Hall sit-in at The University of California at Berkeley on December 2, 1964 -- is perhaps the most famous of his speeches. For a transcription of the speech, see http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mariosaviosproulhallsitin.htm.
Segment 2: From the Archives: "The Souls of Black Folk: A Reading (1903; 2008)."
June 19, 2008
Segments 1 and 3: "An Interview with Jean Renoir (1960)."
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Time: 25:45.
Segment 3:
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Time: 27:50.
From From The Vault -- an exploration of the life and career of French film director Jean Renoir, in his own words. Renoir's "influence on the art of cinema is indisputable with iconic films as Rules of the Game (1939), Diary of a Chambermaid (1946), The River (1951) and his masterpiece Grand Illusion (1933), which was the first Foreign Language film to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture. In 1960, Pacifica station WBAI producer Dale Minor sat down for a lengthy interview with an animated, opinionated and charming Jean Renoir." Also included are some comments from film critic Pauline Kael.
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Time: 25:58.
"The Souls of Black Folk, written by W.E.B. Du Bois and published in 1903, is one of the most lyrical and pathbreaking explorations of race in America. Du Bois not only explored the sociological and cultural dimensions of black culture, but also took on Book T. Washington's notions of how best for blacks to advance in a white, Euro-American society. Our thanks to LibriVox.Org for making this and many more recordings of classic texts available to the general public.
Segment 2: "Frank Zappa Takes on the PMRC" (1985).
June 12, 2008
Segment 1: Emmanuel Okocha on the Biafran Secession of 1967 (2008).
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Time: 27:37.
Dialogue's George Liston Seay interviews Emmanuel Okocha, the author of Blood on the Niger: The First Black on Black Genocide. "The Biafran secession from Nigeria in 1967 unleashed one of Africa’s most brutal wars as the federal government quelled the rebellion. So savage were reprisals that many view the Nigerian response as a precursor of the genocidal tragedies in Rwanda and Darfur a generation later. Emmanuel Okocha, orphaned by the conflict, details the dreadful massacre of the village of Asaba during the Biafran War."
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Time: 32:30.
In 1985, the Parents' Music Resource Center (PMRC), led by Tipper Gore, pressured both Congress and the record industry to adopt a music ratings system, similar to that already adopted by the film industry. On September 19th, 1995, in response to this pressure, the U.S. Senate's Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, held a hearing on the issue. Among those who testified were: Dee Snider of Twisted Sister, John Denver, and Frank Zappa. Today we present Zappa's testimony. For a transcript of Zappa's testimony, see: http://downlode.org/Etext/zappa.html. For a short biography of Zappa, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Zappa.
Segment 3: "Anthony Lewis on the First Amendment."
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Time: 25:58.
Francesca Rheannon, producer of Writers Voice, talks with two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Anthony Lewis about his pithy and thought-provoking study of the evolution of the First Amendment, Freedom for the Thought that We Hate: A Biography of the First Amendment (Basic Books, 2007).
Segment 2: From the Archives: Louisa May Alcott's Hospital Sketches (1863; Librivox, 2008)."
June 5, 2008
Segment 1: Tahima Anam on Bangladesh's Creation: A Golden Age (2008).
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Time: 26:55.
Dialogue's George Liston Seay interviews Tahima Anam, author of A Golden Age. "In 1971, East Pakistan rose in revolt against the oppressive regime that had, for so long, exploited its wealth and disdained its people. That regime was based in West Pakistan, the dominant portion of a political state whose physical entity was separated by a thousand miles of Indian territory. Like all wars this conflict was written in the blood of individuals. In her new book author of "A Golden Age" Tahmima Anam tells the story of Bangladesh's creation through the eyes of a courageous young widow."
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Time: 24:14.
From LibriVox [www.librivox.org], here is a partial reading of the chapter three of Louisa May Alcott's Hospital Sketches (1863; expanded edition, 1869). Alcott, the Transcendentalist, abolitionist, and feminist author best known for her work Little Women (1868), served for around six weeks in a Union hospital in Georgetown, DC in the winter of 1862-63. She wrote extensive letters about her experiences there as a nurse and edited them together to produce Hospital Sketches in 1863. While in service, Louisa contracted typhoid fever and although she recovered after treatment with calomel (a drug heavily laden with mercury and used to cure typhoid), the heavy dosage of mercury she received in her treatment plagued her for the rest of her life. There are extensive WWW sites focusing on Alcott. For a good start, see:
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Time: 27:36.
Francesca Rheannon, producer of Writers Voice, interviews author Susan Cheever about her book, American Bloomsbury: Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller and Henry David Thoreau: Their Lives, Their Loves, Their Work, an examination of the intellectual life of a group of distinguished writers and thinkers whose lives revolved around Concord, MA. There the Transcendentalists "invented a new form of American literature that often came from the yearnings, erotic passions, and disappointments they so deeply felt. Cheever tells us about the ambivalent relationship between Emerson and Thoreau, how Nathanial Hawthorne turned his despair into THE SCARLET LETTER and why Louisa May Alcott began writing LITTLE WOMEN. The daughter of the American writer John Cheever, Susan Cheever is the also the author of the memoir AS GOOD AS I COULD BE, published in 2001, as well as numerous other books."