In the ‘Breaking History’ Podcast, Everyone Is a Historian

History podcasts are made for people interested in history. They can be easier to digest than a book. Some history podcasts are made by historians, like the incredibly popular “The Rest is History,” with Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook and “History on Fire” by Daniele Bolelli. Others like the “Martyr Made” podcast, Dan Carlin’s “Hardcore History” and “Behind the Bastards” are created by history amateurs and enthusiasts who don’t apply the same tools typically used by historians – access to archives and databases, as well as an analysis of primary and secondary sources. But these amateur efforts are often created with the aim of creating understandable – and compelling – storytelling that would in the hands of a professional historian be impenetrable and obtuse . The problem with these podcasts isn’t that they’re not presented by actual academics, but that the podcast format itself doesn’t allow for much nuance and its creators can make strange assertions that leave audiences upset and confused. When the creator of “Martyr Made,” Darryl Cooper, was interviewed by Tucker Carlson, he used the moment to claim that Winston Churchill was “the chief villain” of World War II, creating a public relations problem for Mr. Carlson. People who follow Eli Lake will not be surprised that he’s a connoisseur of podcasts. Not only does he understand the format well; he has proven to be quite cogent about many topics, from Judaism to music and now, to history. Mr. Lake launched the “Breaking History” podcast with The Free Press, where he works as a reporter. It specializes in pop history and compares the present to the past. It’s a rather simple premise, set up to show that many events occurring today aren’t really all that new. In fact, they’re repeats of prior events, what historians commonly call continuity and change. Mr. Lake’s report is easy to digest, due in part to each episode’s short length. His knowledge is wholly reliable. The podcast draws some topics from Mr. Lake’s previous podcast, “The Reeducation,” and from some episodes that he did for “Honestly,” another Free Press podcast. So far, “Breaking History” shows how historically, America has always been split between the institutional elites and the ordinary voter, and how what is old becomes new again. Anti-establishment revolts in politics are nothing new. Look at Andrew Jackson, George Wallace and Huey Long, Mr. Lake says. Those politicians are “as American as baseball as apple pie.” He focuses specifically on Jackson, arguing that he was the first populist president. He won an electoral landslide, abolished the Second National Bank and made voters more skeptical of institutions. But he couldn’t understand why the central bank was so important to infrastructure projects like building roads. On that front, he bears a lot of similarities to President Trump, and the pilot concludes that populism is not an ideology, but a mood.Mr. Lake also interviews Steve Bannon, the former adviser to Mr. Trump, who speaks enthusiastically about Jackson and his foreshadowing of current, powerful institutions. The second episode of “Breaking History” takes a look at the chaos caused by the failures of California’s progressive liberalism. The episode was recorded in the aftermath of the Palisades fires that ravaged much of Los Angeles in January. The country was appalled by the lack of support for fire victims, and by what the mayor’s detractors described as her incompetence. But Mr. Lake argues that this isn’t an anomaly. In the 1960s, San Francisco became a home for the hippies and radicals, whose vision was to revolutionize America. Then there came a wave of murders in San Francisco, including the Zebra Murders and the exploits of the Zodiac Killer. George Moscone, the city’s divisive, left-wing mayor, was assassinated alongside the legendary Harvey Milk. Unlike the previous episode, which was more straightforward and simple, this one is rather complex. The manner in which Mr. Lake weaves certain details to create a gripping story of corruption – filled with colorful, often hypocritical characters – makes for an absorbing, if not depressing, tale. The fires were part of the history of Democrats leaving the country’s biggest state in disarray through the delusion that they had noble intentions. It was no accident that these things happened. Neverthess, voters still return the same party to power over and over again. The third episode is meatier and the best in the series thus far, focusing on the convoluted conspiracy theories surrounding the John F. Kennedy assassination. Indeed, Mr. Trump’s current enthusiasm for releasing the JFK files shows that Americans are not only prone to conspiracy theories, they embrace them. The cliche goes that “history is doomed to repeat itself,” and history is built with a lot of correlation. Whether or not podcasts are a reliable source for such information is a question … for the historians. But for a podcast about history’s cycle, “Breaking History” does a fine job.

In the ‘Breaking History’ Podcast, Everyone Is a Historian

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