Booknotes+

Two public corporations, CBS and Viacom, used to be controlled by the same man, Sumner Redstone. This is the subject of a book called "Unscripted." Our guest is reporter James B. Stewart of the New York Times. He along with his co-author Rachel Abrams write in the preface of the book that: "The drama that unfolded may have occurred at Viacom and CBS, but the recent drumbeat of greed, backstabbing, plotting, and betrayal at the upper level of American business and society has hardly been confined to one or two companies, or one wealthy family and its hangers-on." Viacom and CBS merged in late 2019. The new company is called Paramount Global.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Derek Leebaert says, in the introduction to his newest book, that "Only four people served at the top echelon of Franklin Roosevelt's presidency, from the frightening early months of Spring 1933 until he died in April of 1945 and, in their different ways, they were as wounded as he." The book is titled "Unlikely Heroes" and Mr. Leebaert puts the spotlight on people who served FDR for his entire presidency: Harry Hopkins, Harold Ickes, Frances Perkins, and Henry Wallace. They all had a major role in creating and running what is known in history as the New Deal.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Edward Achorn has been a life-long reader of Abraham Lincoln. In 2020 he published his first book on the 16th president called "Every Drop of Blood: The Momentous Second Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln." In his second book on Lincoln, just published, Mr. Achorn dropped back to the beginning of Lincoln's national political career. That year was 1860. The subject matter: inside the Republican convention held in Chicago. This time the book is titled "The Lincoln Miracle." Edward Achorn is the former editorial page editor of the Providence Journal and lives in Rehoboth, Massachusetts.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Since January 6, 2021, more than 1,000 defendants have been arrested in nearly all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Those arrested have been charged with a long list of felonies and misdemeanors, including assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers or employees of the U.S. Capitol. Over 518 individuals have already pled guilty to a number of offenses. Over 60 people have been found guilty at contested trials. A just completed Oath Keepers trial found defendants guilty of both felonies and misdemeanors. To try and understand more about the judicial trial process, we asked a juror on this recent trial to tell us her observations.    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

100 years ago, these names were in American newspapers on many days: Harry Daugherty, Jess Smith, Roxie Stinson, Burton Wheeler, and Gaston Means. Today those names can be found in a new book, "Crooked: The Roaring '20s Tale of a Corrupt Attorney General, a Crusading Senator, and the Birth of the American Political Scandal." Nathan Masters is the author and it's his first book. For the past 7 years, Masters has hosted a television series known as "Lost L.A." He works at the University of Southern California Libraries in Los Angeles.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Who killed Jane Stanford? She died in 1905. She was the wife of Leland Stanford, a former railroad magnet, governor of California and U.S. senator. Their son Leland Stanford Jr. died at age 15 in 1884 of typhoid. In his honor, Stanford University was born in 1891. But why all these years later is there a book about who killed the doyenne of Stanford's family? Our guest, Emeritus Stanford University professor Richard White, has been chasing this mystery for several years. His book on the subject is subtitled "A Gilded Age Tale of Murder, Deceit, Spirits, and the Birth of a University."  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kidada Williams is an associate professor of history at Wayne State University in Detroit. In her research work, she has focused on African Americans' accounts of lynching and the impact of terrorist night riders on the lives of enslaved people. Williams, who received her PhD from the University of Michigan in 2005, has just published her latest book, "I Saw Death Coming: A History of Terror and Survival in the War against Reconstruction." Prof. Williams stated her goal is to transport readers "into the daily existence of formerly enslaved people building hope-filled new lives." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The United States of America was originally built on two important documents. The first, the Declaration of Independence, was signed by 56 men in the middle of 1776. The second, the Constitution, was signed by 39 men in September 1787. Six of those men put their John Hancock on both documents. To find out more, we talked with authors Denise Kiernan and Joseph D'Agnese who have written short background stories about the signers in two books: "Signing Their Lives Away," for the Declaration of Independence, and "Signing Their Rights Away," for the Constitution.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In its 41 years of existence, the Southeastern Guide Dogs organization in Palmetto, Florida, has created over 3,000 human-guide dog pairs. In 2006 they launched their program to help military veterans. One of the first things you learn if you take a tour of their facilities is: "We rely 100% on private donations. No government money is involved." Titus Herman, CEO of Southeastern Guide Dogs, has led the organization since 2008. We asked him to tell us their story.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Historian Robert Kagan has been writing about foreign affairs for most of his 64 years. The first book in his planned trilogy on American foreign policy was published in 2006 and focused on U.S. history before the founding up to the Spanish-American War. Mr. Kagan, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, has just completed the second book in the trilogy titled "The Ghost at the Feast: America and the Collapse of World Order, 1900-1941." He, in conclusion, writes: "Americans have complex attitudes toward power and morality. They have a sense of distinctiveness and remoteness in a tumultuous and highly contested political system." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices