Drafting the Past

In this episode, Kate is joined by Dr. John Garrison Marks, whose new book is Thy Will Be Done: George Washington's Legacy of Slavery and the Fight for American Memory. This is a fantastic book that takes a careful, and often surprising look, at how generations of Americans have remembered and forgotten George Washington's relationship to slavery and used that memory to bolster their own arguments.

John Garrison Marks is the vice president of research and engagement at the American Association for State and Local History, so he is steeped in the role of public history across the country. He is the author of a previous book, Black Freedom in the Age of Slavery, and co-editor of an anthology. John has written essays and op-eds for outlets including TIME and Smithsonian Magazine. Recently, his expertise on the memory of Washington's relationship to slavery became particularly relevant when the National Park Service removed an exhibit about the history of slavery at the President's House in Philadelphia, and John was ready to jump into the fray and offer vital historical context. I asked John about the relationship between his work with public historians and how he thinks about writing history, as well as how he manages to write while having a busy day job and a young family.

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Mentioned in this episode:

John Garrison Marks, Thy Will Be Done: George Washington's Legacy of Slavery and the Fight for American Memory
John Garrison Marks, Black Freedom in the Age of Slavery: Race, Status, and Identity in the Urban Americas
John's website
American Association for State and Local History (AASLH)
John Garrison Marks, "We've Never Agreed About George Washington and Slavery," TIME
Write Now with Scrivener Episode 60: John Garrison Marks, Historian
Mary V. Thompson, The Only Unavoidable Subject of Regret: George Washington, Slavery, and the Enslaved Community at Mount Vernon
Bill Hader's excellent writing advice
John Vaillant, Fire Weather: On the Front Lines of a Burning World
David Grann, The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder
Megan Greenwell, Bad Company: Private Equity and the Death of the American Dream Amanda Mull, "Do You Want a Boring Floor Lamp or an Ugly Floor Lamp?,"The Atlantic
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In this episode, Kate welcomes back episode 1 guest Dr. Megan Kate Nelson as the very first return guest on Drafting the Past! Megan is a historian and the author of five books, and a Pulitzer Prize finalist. In our first conversation, we talked about Megan's writing process, favorite writing advice, and more. But in this episode, we're going deeper! While we talk about Megan's new book, The Westerners: Mythmaking and Belonging on the American Frontier, she's sharing a look behind the scenes at the timeline of a trade press book, how she balances promoting one book and researching the next one, and even some of the behind-the-scenes drama. Plus, she let me take a look at the book's original proposal, and share FIVE failed proposals before she landed on a winner for her next book. This episode is a rare glimpse into the nitty gritty of publishing as a trade press historian, and you're going to get a ton out of it. Plus, stick around to the end—we have a little (okay, BIG) announcement to share!
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Mentioned in this episode:
Megan Kate Nelson, The Westerners: Mythmaking and Belonging on the American Frontier
 

Megan Kate Nelson, Saving Yellowstone: Exploration and Preservation in Reconstruction America
 

Megan Kate Nelson, The Three Cornered-War: The Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West
 

Megan Kate Nelson, Ruin Nation: Destruction and the American Civil War
 

Megan Kate Nelson, Trembling Earth: A Cultural History of the Okefenokee Swamp
 

Drafting the Past Episode 1: Megan Kate Nelson Experiments with Structure
 

Isabel Wilkerson, The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration

Before we get to the episode, I need a favor: Will you take a minute to fill out this survey about Drafting the Past, and let me know what is and isn't working for you about the show? It will help me bring even better episodes to you. Thanks in advance for your help!
In this episode, I'm happy to welcome historian of religion Dr. Matthew Avery Sutton. Matt's newest book is called Chosen Land: How Christianity Made America and Americans Remade Christianity, following the relationship between Christianity and the nation from the arrival of the first Europeans up to Donald Trump's second term in office. Matt is the author of three previous books, along with an edited collection and a documentary history, and he regularly writes about the history of Christianity in America for a general audience. We talked about how he thinks about all those different audiences and how he keeps writing so much despite many personal and professional responsibilities—including seven years as department chair.

Mentioned in this episode:

Matthew Avery Sutton, Chosen Land: How Christianity Made America and Americans Remade Christianity
Matthew Avery Sutton, Double Crossed: The Missionaries Who Spied for the United States During the Second World War
Matthew Avery Sutton, American Apocalypse: A History of Modern Evangelicalism
Matthew Avery Sutton, Aimee Semple McPherson and the Resurrection of Christian America
American Experience: Sister Aimee
Jane Sherron De Hart, Ruth Bader Ginsburg: A Life
Grant Wacker, Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture
David Hollinger
Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
John le Carré
Jill Lepore, These Truths: A History of the United States
Matthew Avery Sutton, "The antichrist has long haunted American politics. Now it's rearing its head again," The Guardian
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In this episode, host Kate Carpenter is joined by Dr. Rhae Lynn Barnes to talk about book Darkology: Blackface and the American Way of Entertainment. Rhae Lynn is an assistant professor of history at Princeton University. With meticulous research and piles of evidence, Darkology reveals the widespread and persistent use of amateur blackface minstrelsy across the United States from the Civil War through the early 2000s. Rhae Lynn is also the co-editor of three books, the founder of open-access teaching resource U.S. History Scene, and was featured in and served as an executive advisor for the PBS documentary series Reconstruction.
Researching and writing Darkology took a stunning amount of research, as well as a mental toll, and I'm grateful to Rhae Lynn for talking about how she grappled with all of it, the unusual challenges she faced when thinking about visuals for the book, and much more. Plus, she shares some excellent wisdom for how to keep going even when it seems too hard, or when you don't feel like you belong.
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Mentioned in this episode:
Rhae Lynn Barnes, Darkology: Blackface and the American Way of Entertainment
Rhae Lynn Barnes, Keri Leigh Merritt, and Yohuru Williams, eds., After Life: A Collective History of Loss and Redemption in Pandemic America
Rhae Lynn Barnes and Catherine Clinton, eds., Roe v. Wade: Fifty Years After
Rhae Lynn Barnes and Glenda Goodman, eds., American Contact: Objects of Intercultural Encounters and the Boundaries of Book History
Rhae Lynn Barnes, "Yes, politicians wore blackface. It used to be all-American 'fun.'" The Washington Post
Maya Angelou's 1992 commencement address at Spelman College, in which she tells her audience "bring your people with you"
Sandra Cisneros, "I Hate the Iowa Writers Workshop"
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Historian and writer Emily Lieb's professional history is a fascinating one, from crafting textbooks for kids to leaving a job as a professor to become a full-time writer. She taught history and urban studies at Seattle University for more than a decade. Now, in addition to her work as a historian, she also works for the Derfner & Sons writing agency.  
Her first book came out in 2025 after many years of research, writing and revision. It's called Road to Nowhere: How a Highway Map Wrecked Baltimore, and it tells the story of a plan to build an expressway through Black, middle-class community in Baltimore, and how even though the road was never built, the plan paved the way for the destruction of a vibrant neighborhood. It's a history that echoes similar ones in cities across the United States, and Emily uses it to tell a fascinating but frustrating, deeply human story about racial inequality and the resistance of determined residents. Emily had a clear vision of how she wanted to tell this history, right down to the kind of book it should be, and you'll learn a lot in this interview from how she got there and her frank approach to writing and editing.
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Mentioned in this episode:
Emily Lieb, Road to Nowhere: How a Highway Map Wrecked Baltimore
Derfner & Sons 
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird, the origin of the phrase "shitty first drafts"
Andrew Hartman also praised editor Tim Mennel in episode 69
 Calvin Trillin, "Thoughts Brought On By Prolonged Exposure to Exposed Brick"
Note that bookshop.org links are affiliate links that generate a small commission to support the show if you purchase books using these links.