12 Fascinating Stories About Some of the Giants of History

Writer George Spencer has published more than a dozen outstanding pieces on some amazing characters in history on his Substack site, "Courage 101: True Tales of Grit and Glory." They could be part of a gripping package for beginning students of history or anyone with an interest in the topic. "Hey Bulldog! His Destiny: Save …

Baseball Legend Lou Gehrig’s Inspiring Speech in 1939

New York Yankees' first baseman and famous hitter Lou Gehrig (1903-1941) famously inspired the world with a speech after being diagnosed with the degenerative disease ALS. It is now known in popular culture as "Lou Gehrig's disease." Read more about Gehrig here.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lou_Gehrig Watch a 4 minute, 43 second excerpt from historian Ken Burns' documentary …

New Respect for Native American History in DC Region?

As professional football season gets underway, history is made as a decades-long debate over the name "Washington Redskins" has ended, with the team re-branded as the "Washington Commanders." (News). "We can finally end the debate over our sports team’s exploitation of Native American culture, a controversy that threatened to spur barroom fights for 30 years," …

10 Questions A Baby Boomer Never Thought Anyone Would Ask

I know fame is fleeting, but one doesn't understand how fleeting it is until one teaches social studies. Public memory is exceedingly short. Pop culture to one generation is entirely different from popular culture to another generation. People who are extraordinarily famous to one generation aren't even known to another generation.  Teenagers ask me questions …

How Sports Reflect American History and Culture: A Podcast

Matthew Andrews, a professor of history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has a special interest in the links between sports and American history and culture. " He is particularly interested in the ways sports both reflect and affect American politics, race and gender identities, and social reform movements. Matt Andrews has …

Not Much Competition for Greatest American Football Player of All Time

Is Tom Brady, who announced his retirement in 2022, the greatest American football player of all time? He won seven Super Bowl titles over his 22-year NFL career, "cementing his legacy as the greatest football player to ever put the pads on," assessed the Spanish sports daily AS.com, noting that Brady also holds the NFL …

Greatest ‘What If’s’ in Sports History

Mike Pesca, American radio journalist, and podcaster, is the host of The Gist, streamed on Slate.com, and a former sports reporter at NPR. He assembled a group of essayists to pose questions in an engaging, funny, and sometimes profound book called Upon Further Review: The Greatest What-Ifs in Sports History.  Among the questions asked: "What if football had been deemed …

African American Experiences As Illustrated By Six PBS Films

February is Black History Month. PBS is highlighting half a dozen films available for streaming that depict experiences from the 1920s through the 1960s. Among them: Freedom Riders (of the 1960s); The Murder of Emmett Till (in 1955); The Fight, "what some have called "the most important sporting event in history" — the rematch between …

Social Media Backlash to Removal of Iconic Robert E. Lee Statue in Richmond

Did the mythology of the valiant and romantic Southern Lost Cause finally die In Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederacy, on Sept. 8? A huge statute of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was removed from Monument Avenue, the city's main boulevard, amid cheers. Several commentators have noted that "the capital of the Confederacy has …

‘When the World Couldn’t Watch a Black Man Win’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzdq6AIr-Is Documentary filmmaker Ken Burns "unpacks the intricate connections between sports, racism, and power throughout American history. In 1908, Jack Johnson (1878-1946) was about to knock out a white man to become the first black heavyweight champion of the world. Then police stopped the fight." Explore more at UNUM: https://www.pbs.org/kenburns/unum/pla... In the Jim Crow era, …