

Ben Franklin's World
Liz Covart
This is a multiple award-winning podcast about early American history. It’s a show for people who love history and who want to know more about the historical people and events that have impacted and shaped our present-day world.
Each episode features conversations with professional historians who help shed light on important people and events in early American history.
Each episode features conversations with professional historians who help shed light on important people and events in early American history.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Feb 2, 2021 • 59min
294 1774: The Long Year of Revolution
When we think of important years in the history of the American Revolution, we might think of years like 1765 and the Stamp Act Crisis, 1773 and the Tea Crisis, 1775 and the start of what would become the War for American Independence, or 1776, the year the United States declared independence.Award-winning historian Mary Beth Norton, the Mary Donlan Alger Professor Emerita at Cornell University and the author of 1774: The Long Year of Revolution, joins us to discuss another year that she would like us to pay attention to as we think about the American Revolution: the year 1774.Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/294 Complementary Episodes🎧 Bonus: The Boston Stamp Act Riots 🎧 Episode 112: Mary Beth Norton, The Tea Crisis of 1773🎧 Episode 144: Robert Parkinson, The Common Cause of the American Revolution🎧 Episode 160: The Politics of Tea🎧 Episode 161: Smuggling and the American Revolution🎧 Episode 229: Patrick Griffin, The Townshend Moment🎧 Episode 243: Joseph Adelman, Revolutionary Networks REQUEST A TOPIC📨 Topic Request Form📫 liz@benfranklinsworld.comWHEN YOU'RE READY🗞️ BFW Gazette Newsletter 👩💻 Join the BFW Listener CommunityLISTEN 🎧🍎 Apple Podcasts 💚 Spotify 🎶 Amazon Music🛜 PandoraCONNECT🦋 Liz on Bluesky👩💻 Liz on LinkedIn🛜 Liz’s WebsiteSAY THANKS💜 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts💚 Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jan 19, 2021 • 1h 6min
293 Jamaica Ladies: Female Slaveholding in Jamaica
How did Jamaica grow to become the "crown jewel" of the British Atlantic World?Part of the answer is that Jamaica’s women served as some of the most ardent and best supporters of the island’s practice of slavery.Christine Walker, an Assistant Professor of History at the Yale-NUS College in Singapore and the author of the award-winning book, Jamaica Ladies: Female Slaveholders and the Creation of Britain’s Atlantic Empire, leads us on an investigation of female slave holder-ship in 17th and 18th-century Jamaica.Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/293 Complementary Episodes🎧 Episode 008: Gregory O’Malley, Final Passages 🎧 Episode 036: Abigail Swingen, Competing Visions of Empire🎧 Episode 070: Jennifer Morgan, How Historians Research🎧 Episode 236: Daniel Livesay, Mixed-Race Britons & Atlantic Family🎧 Episode 282: Vincent Brown, Tacky’s Revolt REQUEST A TOPIC📨 Topic Request Form📫 liz@benfranklinsworld.comWHEN YOU'RE READY🗞️ BFW Gazette Newsletter 👩💻 Join the BFW Listener CommunityLISTEN 🎧🍎 Apple Podcasts 💚 Spotify 🎶 Amazon Music🛜 PandoraCONNECT🦋 Liz on Bluesky👩💻 Liz on LinkedIn🛜 Liz’s WebsiteSAY THANKS💜 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts💚 Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jan 5, 2021 • 58min
292 Craft in Early America
What was everyday life like for those who lived in early America?To understand the everyday lives of early Americans we need to look at the goods they made and how they produced those goods. In essence, nothing explains the everyday as much as the goods in people’s lives.Glenn Adamson, author of Craft: An American History, joins us to investigate craft and craftspeople in Early America.Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/282 Complementary Episodes🎧 Episode 050: Marla Miller, Betsy Ross and the Making of America🎧 Episode 130: Paul Revere’s Ride Through History🎧 Episode 160: The Politics of Tea🎧 Episode 207: Nick Bunker, Young Benjamin Franklin🎧 Episode 234: Richard Bushman, Farms & Farm Families in Early America🎧 Episode 243: Joseph Adelman: Revolutionary Print Networks 🎧 Episode 288: Tyson Reeder, Smugglers & Patriots in the 18th-Century Atlantic World REQUEST A TOPIC📨 Topic Request Form📫 liz@benfranklinsworld.comWHEN YOU'RE READY🗞️ BFW Gazette Newsletter 👩💻 Join the BFW Listener CommunityLISTEN 🎧🍎 Apple Podcasts 💚 Spotify 🎶 Amazon Music🛜 PandoraCONNECT🦋 Liz on Bluesky👩💻 Liz on LinkedIn🛜 Liz’s WebsiteSAY THANKS💜 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts💚 Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dec 18, 2020 • 10min
Bonus: The Plimoth Patuxet and Tomaquag Museums
This episode is a companion episode to the 2-episode World of the Wampanoag series. This bonus episode allows us to speak with two guests from the World of the Wampanoag series: Jade Luiz, Curator of Collections at the Plimoth Patuxet Museums, and Lorén Spears, Executive Director of the Tomaquag Museum in Rhode Island. Both Jade and Lorén help us explore their museums and what it will be like when we visit them in person. Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/290 Become a subscriber! https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dec 15, 2020 • 54min
291 The World of the Wampanoag, Part 2: 1620 and Beyond
Before New England was New England, it was the Dawnland. A region that remains the homeland of numerous Native American peoples, including the Wampanoag. When the English colonists arrived at Patuxet 400 years ago, they arrived at a confusing time. The World of the Wampanoag people had changed in the wake of a destabilizing epidemic.This episode is part of a two-episode series about the World of the Wampanoag. In Episode 290, we investigated the life, cultures, and trade of the Wampanoag and their neighbors, the Narragansett, up to December 16, 1620, the day the Mayflower made its way into Plymouth Harbor.In this episode, our focus will be on the World of the Wampanoag in 1620 and beyond.Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/291 Complementary Episodes🎧 Episode 104: Native Americans and Colonists on the Northeastern Coast🎧 Episode 132: Indigenous London: Native Travelers at the Heart of Empire🎧 Episode 184: Thundersticks: Firearms and the Violent Transformation of Native America🎧 Episode 220: New England Indians, Colonists, and Origins of Slavery🎧 Episode 235: A 17th-Century Native American Life 🎧 Episode 267: Snowshoe Country REQUEST A TOPIC📨 Topic Request Form📫 liz@benfranklinsworld.comWHEN YOU'RE READY🗞️ BFW Gazette Newsletter 👩💻 Join the BFW Listener CommunityLISTEN 🎧🍎 Apple Podcasts 💚 Spotify 🎶 Amazon Music🛜 PandoraCONNECT🦋 Liz on Bluesky👩💻 Liz on LinkedIn🛜 Liz’s WebsiteSAY THANKS💜 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts💚 Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dec 8, 2020 • 46min
290 The World of the Wampanoag, Part 1: Before 1620
Before New England was New England, it was the Dawnland. A region that remains the homeland of numerous Native American peoples, including the Wampanoag.Over the next two episodes, we’ll explore the World of the Wampanoag before and after 1620, a year that saw approximately 100 English colonists enter the Wampanoags’ world. Those English colonists have been called the “Pilgrims” and this year, 2020, marks the 400th anniversary of their arrival in New England. The arrival of these English settlers brought change to the Wampanoags’ world. But many aspects of Wampanoag life and culture persisted, as did the Wampanoag who lived, and still live, in Massachusetts and beyond.In this episode, we’ll investigate the cultures, society, and economy of the Wampanoags’ 16th- and 17th-century world. This focus will help us develop a better understanding for the peoples, places, and circumstances of the World of the Wampanoag.This two-episode “World of the Wampanoag” series is made possible through support from Mass Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this episode do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/290 Complementary Episodes🎧 Episode 104:Native Americans and Colonists on the Northeastern Coast🎧 Episode 132: Indigenous London: Native Travelers at the Heart of Empire🎧 Episode 184: Thundersticks: Firearms and the Violent Transformation of Native America🎧 Episode 220: New England Indians, Colonists, and Origins of Slavery🎧 Episode 235: , A 17th-Century Native American Life 🎧 Episode 267: Snowshoe Country REQUEST A TOPIC📨 Topic Request Form📫 liz@benfranklinsworld.comWHEN YOU'RE READY🗞️ BFW Gazette Newsletter 👩💻 Join the BFW Listener CommunityLISTEN 🎧🍎 Apple Podcasts 💚 Spotify 🎶 Amazon Music🛜 PandoraCONNECT🦋 Liz on Bluesky👩💻 Liz on LinkedIn🛜 Liz’s WebsiteSAY THANKS💜 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts💚 Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nov 24, 2020 • 1h 3min
289 Maroonage in the Great Dismal Swamp
The name “Great Dismal Swamp” doesn’t evoke an image of a pleasant or beautiful place, and yet, it was an important place that offered land speculators the chance to profit and enslaved men and women a chance for freedom in colonial British America and the early United States.
Marcus Nevius, an Assistant Professor of History at the University of Rhode Island and author of City of Refuge: Slavery and Petit Maroonage in the Great Dismal Swamp, 1763-1856, has offered to guide us into and through the Great Dismal Swamp and its history, so that we can better understand maroons and maroon communities in early America and learn more about how enslaved people used an environment around them to resist their enslaved condition.Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/289 Complementary Episodes🎧 Episode 133: Patrick Breen, The Nat Turner Rebellion🎧 Episode 176: Daina Ramey Berry, The Value of the Enslaved from Womb to Grave🎧 Episode 226: Ryan Quintana, Making the State of South Carolina🎧 Episode 250: Virginia, 1619🎧 Episode 263: Sari Altschuler, The Medical Imagination🎧 Episode 282: Vincent Brown, Tacky’s RevoltREQUEST A TOPIC📨 Topic Request Form📫 liz@benfranklinsworld.comWHEN YOU'RE READY🗞️ BFW Gazette Newsletter 👩💻 Join the BFW Listener CommunityLISTEN 🎧🍎 Apple Podcasts 💚 Spotify 🎶 Amazon Music🛜 PandoraCONNECT🦋 Liz on Bluesky👩💻 Liz on LinkedIn🛜 Liz’s WebsiteSAY THANKS💜 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts💚 Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nov 10, 2020 • 1h 4min
288 Smugglers & Patriots in the 18th-Century Atlantic
In what ways did the Atlantic World contribute to the American Revolution?Empire, slavery, and constant warfare interacted with each other in the Atlantic World. Which brings us to our question: In what ways did the Atlantic World and its issues contribute to the American Revolution?Tyson Reeder, an editor of the Papers of James Madison and an affiliated assistant professor at the University of Virginia, is a scholar of the Atlantic World, who will help us see how smuggling and trade in the Luso-Atlantic, or Portuguese-Atlantic, World contributed to the development and spread of ideas about free trade and republicanism.Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/288 Complementary Episodes 🎧 Episode 090: Caitlin Fitz, Age of American Revolutions 🎧 Episode 099: Mark Hanna, Pirates & Pirate Nests in the British Atlantic World🎧 Episode 121: Wim Klooster, The Dutch Moment in the 17th-Century Atlantic World🎧 Episode 161: Smuggling in the American Revolution🎧 Episode 229: Patrick Griffin, The Townshend Moment🎧 Episode 254: Jeffrey Sklansky, The Money Question in Early America REQUEST A TOPIC📨 Topic Request Form📫 liz@benfranklinsworld.comWHEN YOU'RE READY🗞️ BFW Gazette Newsletter 👩💻 Join the BFW Listener CommunityLISTEN 🎧🍎 Apple Podcasts 💚 Spotify 🎶 Amazon Music🛜 PandoraCONNECT🦋 Liz on Bluesky👩💻 Liz on LinkedIn🛜 Liz’s WebsiteSAY THANKS💜 Leave a review on Apple Podcasts💚 Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nov 6, 2020 • 5min
Our History Has Always Been Spoken: Trailer for Massachusetts, 1620 Series
Join the Omohundro Institute and Mass Humanities for a special two-episode series about the World of the Wampanoag before and after 1620. The Wampanoag’s history has always been spoken. Hear it on Ben Franklin’s World in December 2020. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Oct 30, 2020 • 20min
Bonus. Listener Q&A: The Early History of the United States Congress
This special bonus episode previews the Ben Franklin's World Subscription program and its monthly bonus episode for program subscribers. In this bonus episode, Historian of the United States House of Representatives Matt Wasniewski and Historical Publications Specialist Terrance Rucker answer your questions about the early history of the United States Congress. Show Notes: https://www.benfranklinsworld.com/202 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices


