Added 8.2.19. Historian and journalist Stephen O’Shea delves with Milt into the medieval uprising in Languedoc in France’s south against the Catholic Church, by Christian Dualistic, Gnostic Cathars, or “pure ones.” O’Shea is author of a number of books, including , “The Great Heresy: The Revolutionary Life And Death Of The Medieval Cathars.” In France he studied politics and worked as a journalist and later lived in southern France to research this book.

Added 6.7.19. Loaded with historical radio clips, Milt interviews broadcast historian J. Fred MacDonald about 20th Century broadcasting history. The show starts with a vintage clip that jolts the listener back to  a national turning point. The Sunday broadcast of the New York Philharmonic, live, playing Shostakovich’s Symphony #1 in F Minor, is interrupted by a news bulletin, and then continued radio news coverage of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The episode traces the role of broadcast communications in U.S. history, politics and public opinion going forward from that point.

Added 5.24.19. Situated on the site of modern-day Istanbul, the city of Byzantium – also known for some time as Constantinople – was an empire which bridged antiquity and the dawn of modernity, and became the dominant economy, culture and military in Europe. Joining Milt in a closer look at the Byzantine Empire through the peregrinations of time are Dean Miller, professor emeritus of history at the University of Rochester, and Robert Nelson, a University of Chicago historian.

Added 5.17.19. With historians John Lynn of the University of Illinois and Brian Sandberg of Northern Illinois University, Milt in this vintage episode explores what drove conquerors such as Alexander the Great, Napoleon, and Hitler to do what they did. What was the role of “legacy preoccupation” in Alexander’s quests? How exactly did Hitler conceptualize his symbiosis with the body politic? These questions and much more get a lively treatment from the panel, and callers add their own theories and queries.

Added 5.10.19. Before email, there was this thing called the letter. As most people born prior to the digital age likely know, for many centuries letters served not only as a means of private communication but also as a rich source of material for historians and other scholars. Though we think of letters as typically extemporaneous and personal, they could be more composed, and far-reaching. Milt in this 1997 episode delves into the subject with three experts. They start with the epic and bristling letter from Samuel Johnson to his former patron Lord Chesterfield, and then jump to other points in the historical continuum to reveal the art and effect of the letter in history.