Audiobooks by Charles River Editors

Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman: The History of the Most Influential Black Activists in 19th C

With the possible exception of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., no African American has been more instrumental in the fight for minorities’ civil rights in the United States than Frederick Douglass, an American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman. His list of accomplishments would be impressive enough even without taking into account the fact that he was born into slavery. Douglass was born into slavery, and it’s believed his father was a white man, even perhaps his master Aaron Anthony. When Douglass was about 12, his slaveowner’s wife, Sophia Auld, began teaching him the alphabet in defiance of the South’s laws against teaching slaves how to read. When her husband Hugh found out, he was furious, reminding her that if the slave learned to read, he would become dissatisfied with his condition and desire freedom. Those words would prove prophetic. Douglass is noted as saying that 'knowledge is the pathway from slavery to freedom,” and he took that advice to heart, teaching himself how to read and write with his knowledge of the alphabet. On September 3, 1838, Douglass successfully escaped slavery, traveling by boat to Delaware, Philadelphia, and finally New York, all in the span of a day. Douglass found a “new world had opened upon me.” Harriet Tubman is one of the most famous women in American history, and from an early age every American learns of her contributions to abolition and the Underground Railroad. The woman who became known as the Moses of her people personally led more than 13 expeditions to free slaves in the South, and she was so integral in helping escaped slaves achieve freedom that her name is practically synonymous with the Underground Railroad today. If anything, the central role she played in the Underground Railroad has become so ingrained among subsequent generations that Tubman’s life has been shrouded in legend, and other important aspects have been overlooked.

Charles River Editors (Author), Mary Rossman (Narrator)

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The Innovations of World War I: The History of the Technological Advances that Defined the Great War

World War I, also known in its time as the “Great War” or the “War to End all Wars”, was an unprecedented holocaust in terms of its sheer scale. Fought by men who hailed from all corners of the globe, it saw millions of soldiers do battle in brutal assaults of attrition which dragged on for months with little to no respite. Tens of millions of artillery shells and untold hundreds of millions of rifle and machine gun bullets were fired in a conflict that demonstrated man’s capacity to kill each other on a heretofore unprecedented scale. Since the industrial revolution, arms and materiel output had increased by orders of magnitude, as had the quality and uniformity of the products. Several developments had already taken place in the years building up to the conflict, stepping stones towards the vast escalation in military innovation which took place immediately prior to and during World War I. Innovations included the adoption into service of the first belt-fed machine guns, predecessors of those which would wreak such slaughter in the trenches, and the development of cannon which did not roll backwards after each shot as 19th century pieces did, but remained fixed in place. The arms race before the war and the attempt to break the deadlock of the Western and Eastern Fronts by any means possible changed the face of battle in ways that would have previously been deemed unthinkable. Before 1914, flying machines were objects of public curiosity; the first flights of any account on rotor aircraft had been made less than 5 years before and were considered to be the province of daredevils and lunatics. By 1918, all the great powers were fielding squadrons of fighting aircraft armed with machine-guns and bombs, to say nothing of light reconnaissance planes. Tanks, a common feature on the battlefield by 1918, had not previously existed outside of the realm of science fiction stories written by authors like H.G. Wells.

Charles River Editors (Author), Bill Caufield (Narrator)

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The Fight for North America: The History of the European Rivalries and Conflicts Before the American

Jamestown is remembered today because the settlement did survive through the hardships and go on to serve as the capital of the English colony for much of the 17th century. Likewise, the English would forge a settlement in Massachusetts Bay that also maintained tenuous relations with nearby natives. But while conflicts between settlers and natives remain well known, some of the European conflicts in North America have been overlooked, including England’s competitions with Spain and the Netherlands. When the West India Company, which presided over Dutch trade in the Americas, was created in 1621, a little settlement at the tip of Manhattan began to both grow and falter. When Willem Kieft arrived as director in 1638, it was already a sort of den of iniquity, full of “mischief and perversity,” where residents were given over to smoking and drinking grog and beer. Under Kieft’s reign, more land was acquired mostly through bloody, all-but-exterminating wars with the Native American population, whose numbers also dwindled at the hands of European-borne diseases. On September 13, 1759, a battle was fought on the Plains of Abraham outside the old city of Quebec that was one of the turning point battles in world history. Thanks to the British victory and the events that followed, Canada went from being a colony of France (New France) to being a colony of Great Britain, which permanently changed Canadian history. In many ways, the outcome of the battle brought about several American attempts to seize Canada during the Revolutionary War and War of 1812, and ultimately it ensured that when Canada became an independent country, it was part of the British Commonwealth with an Anglophone majority and a Francophone minority. Frictions over cultural and political issues between the English Canadians and the Québécois, dating back to the battle, continue to impact the state of affairs in Canada today.

Charles River Editors (Author), Jim Walsh (Narrator)

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The Islamic Invasions of Europe: The History of the Ottoman and Moorish Campaigns across the Contine

The history of the Spanish Peninsula is closely bound to that of the Moors. The term “Spain” was not in wide use until the region was united by the monarchs of Aragon and Castile, and the Moors called the lands they ruled in the Iberian Peninsula Al-Andalus, traditionally thought to be an Arabic transliteration of Vandal, the Germanic tribe which briefly ruled the region in the early fifth century. The English name Andalusia derives from the Spanish Andalucia, which is still used by Spain to name its southern region. Not surprisingly, three religions attempting to coexist during medieval times resulted in nearly incessant conflicts, marked by high taxation, disparate societies, rigid cultural controls, and systemic violence. Despite the odds, these three religions managed to live in a state of quasi-acceptance and peace in most of the major cities in the Iberian Peninsula like Cordoba and Tolaydough, with sporadic warfare occurring on the borders between Al-Andalus and the Christian kingdoms near the Pyrenees Mountains. Muslims, Christians, and Jews would attempt to reorganize their societies several times over the centuries through warfare, always with Jews on the lower rungs and Christians and Muslims fighting it out above them. The end of the Byzantine Empire had a profound effect not only on the Middle East but Europe as well. Constantinople had played a crucial part in the Crusades, and the fall of the Byzantines meant that the Ottomans now shared a border with Europe. The Islamic empire was viewed as a threat by the predominantly Christian continent to their west, and it took little time for different European nations to start clashing with the powerful Turks. In fact, the Ottomans would clash with Russians, Austrians, Venetians, Polish, and more before collapsing as a result of World War I, when they were part of the Central Powers.

Charles River Editors (Author), Jim Walsh (Narrator)

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The Guelphs and Ghibellines: The History of the Rival Political Factions in Medieval Italy

Papal supremacy in ecclesiastical matters had long been asserted and was, by and large, unchallenged. But in the late 11th century, Pope Gregory VII asserted authority in the temporal sphere as well. In a long dispute with Emperor Henry IV over who had the right to appoint bishops and abbots, Gregory decreed that the pope “alone may use the imperial insignia,” that “all princes shall kiss the feet of the pope alone,” and “that it may be permitted to him to depose emperors.” The popes asserted their dominion over the whole of Christendom, based on a spurious document known as the Donation of Constantine. This 8th century forgery asserted that Constantine the Great had gifted all of the West to Pope Sylvester I, in gratitude for his baptism. There is, of course, no evidence of Sylvester ever exercising imperial powers, and the document was determined to be a forgery in the 15th century. But beyond the Donation, Gregory could also point to the fact that emperors had received the imperial anointing and crown from the hands of the pope since Charlemagne. What was new was the vehemence with which Gregory pursued his claims. After a bitter exchange between pope and emperor over ecclesiastical governance, he attempted to break the impasse by excommunicating and deposing Henry. Conversely, the emperors asserted that God had charged the temporal authorities with the protection and guidance of the Church of God. After all, the German emperors before Henry IV had confirmed papal elections, resolved ecclesiastical disputes, regulated dioceses, and appointed their bishops. In conjunction with these disputes, supporters of each side formed political factions and thus found themselves at odds with their rivals. The Guelphs and Ghibellines fought several conflicts in Italy in the 12th and 13th centuries, and they were significant in laying the grounds for the independence of the Italian city-states, as well as for Germany.

Charles River Editors (Author), KC Wayman (Narrator)

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Escaping Slavery in America: The History of Slave Uprisings and Escape Routes Before the Civil War

The Underground Railroad is one of the most taught topics to young schoolchildren, and every American is familiar with the idea of fugitive slaves escaping to Canada and the North with the help of determined abolitionists and even former escaped slaves like Harriet Tubman. The secrecy involved in the Underground Railroad made it one of the most mysterious aspects of the mid-19th century in America, to the extent that claims spread that 100,000 slaves had escaped via the Underground Railroad. Of course, from a practical standpoint, the Underground Railroad had to remain covert not only for the sake of thousands of slaves, but for a small army of men and women of every race, religion and economic class who put themselves in peril on an ongoing basis throughout the first half of the 19th century, and in the years leading up to the war. Over 150 years later, that same secrecy has helped the Underground Railroad become so romanticized and mythologized that people often visualize it in ways that were far different from reality. Before the American Civil War eliminated slavery, it was a fixture in North America for over 200 years, and by 1850 a trained slave was worth approximately $2,500, around 10 times the sum of a typical annual salary in that day. As a result, the economic dependence on slavery in the South was an extreme one, and in the wake of the Fugitive Slave Act, black people in the North were under constant pressure to defend their “credentials” to bounty hunters and owners. Between the value of slaves in America, rising abolitionist sentiment at home and overseas, and political debates promoting or hindering the movement toward equality, the era in which the Underground Railroad operated cannot be easily fit into a concise body of principles, actions or geography.

Charles River Editors (Author), Mary Rossman (Narrator)

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The Dead Sea and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The History of the Unique Lake and Its Ancient Jewish Manuscr

If the world had a navel, it would be the Dead Sea, the lowest point on Earth where one can still stand on dry land. The photographs of this unique lake seem to be taken from a science fiction movie, or a land devastated after a nuclear holocaust. To others, the fluffy shores could remind them of Antarctica although it is in one of the warmest spots on the planet. Its white, creamy masses, scattered along golden beaches, are not ice floes or frozen water, but effervescent salt formations. The famous Jordan River, where the Hebrew people entered the Promised Land and Jesus was baptized, flows into the lake, but the basin is so deeply sunk into the face of the planet that the waters never leave, as if they had fallen into a small black hole where nothing can escape. The Dead Sea is also an archaeological site loaded with history. Known among the first civilizations in the region as 'Sea of Asphalt' and “Salt Sea,” innumerable myths and legends lend it an air of mystery, as if it attracted sterility and misfortune while eradicating all life from its waters. It was perhaps the inhospitable feel of the place, the almost total desolation surrounding it, which led the writer of the Pentateuch to imagine that many years ago, a cataclysm sent to annihilate perverted people had taken place there. In the mid-20th century, one of the most important religious discoveries of all time was made in a series of caves near the Dead Sea, which had hidden remnants of nearly 1,000 texts, some of which were included in the Hebrew Bible and others which were extra-biblical. In addition to being the oldest surviving copies of such documents, the mixture of languages and different kinds of papers helped shed light on the people in the region at the time, making the Dead Sea Scrolls vitally important to the world’s major religions.

Charles River Editors (Author), Victoria Woodson (Narrator)

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The Aftermath of World War II: The Political, Legal, and Technological Ramifications of History’s De

At the end of World War II, the world was faced with some sobering statistics. With over 50,000,000 deaths when both military and civilian losses had been accounted for, the death toll was devastating, and for many of those who lived in countries that had been ravaged by war, hunger and financial strain had become parts of daily life. Furthermore, beyond the physical damage was the growing knowledge of the atrocities that had been committed both before and during the war. In fact, the Allies were discussing how to dole out justice for Axis war crimes as early as 1943, and once the war was over, it was time for the nations to turn their attention towards determining the proper punishments. In the wake of the war, the European continent was devastated, and the conflict left the Soviet Union and the United States as uncontested superpowers. This ushered in over 45 years of Cold War, and a political alignment of Western democracies against the Communist Soviet bloc that produced conflicts pitting allies on each sides fighting, even as the American and Soviet militaries never engaged each other. Though it never truly got “hot” between the two superpowers directly, the Cold War was a tense era until the dissolution of the USSR, and nothing symbolized the split more than the division of Berlin. If anyone wondered whether the Cold War would dominate geopolitics, any hopes that it wouldn’t were dashed by the Soviets’ blockade of West Berlin in April 1948, ostensibly to protest the currency being used in West Berlin but unquestionably aiming to extend their control over Germany’s capital. By cutting off all access via roads, rail, and water, the Soviets hoped to force the Allies out, and at the same time, Stalin’s action would force a tense showdown that would test their mettle.

Charles River Editors (Author), Bill Caufield (Narrator)

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Rome’s Conquest of Western Europe: The History of the Campaigns that Expanded the Roman Empire acros

The Roman army is one of the most famous fighting forces in history. Through its power and prowess, a once obscure Italian city forged an empire that encircled the Mediterranean and covered half of Europe. The physical remains of its presence can be traced from the mountainous borders of Scotland to the arid deserts of Egypt, but its legacy is far greater and more enduring, as Rome's influence continues to shape the political, legal, and cultural landscape of Europe to this very day. Quite simply, in terms of scale, the Gallic Wars were unmatched by anything the Roman Republic had witnessed since the Punic Wars. By the end of the campaigns, ancient historians estimated that more than a million people had died, and still more displaced or enslaved. Even by the more conservative estimates of modern historians, a casualty count in the hundreds of thousands appears possible. Either way, the war was a cataclysm, involving tens of thousands of combatants, and it also marked the greatest displays of skill by one of the greatest generals history has ever known. Despite all the accomplishments and widespread victories and conquests throughout Rome’s long history, the Romans seemingly failed in one crucial conquest: the subjugation of Germany. Indeed, historians have singled out this one failure as central to the ultimate downfall of the entire empire, as the constant wars against the Germanic tribes, and the need to defend the frontier on the Rhine at great expense against those tribes, helped bring the empire to its knees. There are elements of truth in such a conclusion, but the reality was far more fluid than is often realized. In fact, from the 1st century B.C. until the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century A.D., the relationships between the wider empire and those living in what is now modern Germany were extremely complicated, involving much more than simple warfare.

Charles River Editors (Author), Bill Caufield (Narrator)

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The Formation of the United Nations: The History of the Negotiations that Brought About the World’s

On November 29, 1943, as the Allies’ primary leaders met in Tehran, Roosevelt described to Stalin his idea for the organization that would become the United Nations. The American president suggested that the active arm of the organization be “the Four Policemen”: the U.S., USSR, UK, and China. Stalin agreed with much of the framework in principle, but asserted that China likely would not possess the strength after the war to assist. He also noted that the “Policemen” must hold a series of strong points, putting Germany and Japan at too much of a disadvantage to attempt military adventurism again. Roosevelt, eager to please his “friend,” agreed with everything Stalin said. That exchange might be considered the origin of the United Nations, one of the most famous bodies in the world, but the concept was already in existence in the form of its predecessor, the League of Nations. At the end of World War I, President Woodrow Wilson's pleas at the Paris Peace Conference relied on his Fourteen Points, which included the establishment of a League of Nations, but while his points were mostly popular amongst Americans and Europeans alike, leaders at the conference largely discarded them and favored different approaches. British leaders saw their singular aim as the maintenance of British colonial possessions. France, meanwhile, only wanted to ensure that Germany was weakened and unable to wage war again, and it too had colonial interests abroad that it hoped to maintain. Britain and France thus saw eye-to-eye, with both wanting a weaker Germany and both wanting to maintain their colonies. Wilson, however, wanted both countries to rid themselves of their colonies, and he wanted Germany to maintain its self-determination and right to self-defense. Wilson totally opposed the “war guilt” clause, which blamed the war on Germany.

Charles River Editors (Author), KC Wayman (Narrator)

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Skylab: The History and Legacy of America’s First Space Station

During the Space Race, many people envisioned a future in which space travel would be a common undertaking for ordinary citizens. Just as riding in an airplane was once a daring endeavor, travel by rocket could be refined and made safer over time. That collective aspiration to someday take part in dreams NASA brought to life was integral to inspiring public interest in the space program. However, in the years following Apollo 11 in 1969, popular enthusiasm for space travel waned, and dreams of vacationing like the Jetsons gave way to more grounded goals. The level of interest NASA enjoyed would never again be comparable to the culturally defining moments of the agency’s most celebrated missions during the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo Programs. Nonetheless, in 1972 and 1973, NASA sent nine astronauts to spend extended periods of time living in a craft named Skylab, the very first experimental American space station. Though Skylab would not last long, and the International Space Station remains far more famous, Skylab’s history is one of ingenuity and challenge, as well as how NASA found itself without a mission after the triumph of the Apollo Program.

Charles River Editors (Author), Steve Knupp (Narrator)

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America’s Worst Maritime Disasters: The History of the Deadliest Shipwrecks in American History

There have been countless numbers of shipwrecks over the course of history, but few have had as great an impact as the sinking of the SS Central America in a hurricane in September 1857. The California Gold Rush was in full swing, state of the art steamer ships were used to transport the discovered gold back east, and the Central America was one of them. On its fateful voyage, the ship was carrying nearly 600 passengers and a huge haul of up to 20 tons of gold worth an estimated $2 million at the time. The loss of life was a big enough calamity, but the Central America had gone down with so much gold that it scared the American public, which was already beginning to deal with a financial downturn that culminated in the Panic of 1857. While it might have generated the type of publicity and reaction of the Johnstown Flood of 1889 or the Galveston Hurricane of 1900 under normal circumstances, the explosion and sinking of the Sultana on April 27, 1865 has become something of a historical footnote. Perhaps the cruelest irony of the disaster is that the Sultana was packed full of men who had survived every conceivable trial and tribulation of the war, from wounds and sicknesses to being prisoners. Having lost hundreds of thousands, America was almost numb to the loss of a couple of thousand more, especially when many of the dead were soldiers themselves, and in a sense, it was left for future generations to try to unravel what went wrong and to pay tribute to the men who died on that dark night. On June 15, 1904, an annual gala in New York City was held on the passenger ship General Slocum as it steamed up the East River, with about 1,400 people from St. Mark’s Evangelical Lutheran Church. Consisting mostly of German immigrants, the boat was packed with women and children, and when a small fire started on the ship shortly after the trip began, faulty equipment was unable to put it out.

Charles River Editors (Author), Mary Rossman (Narrator)

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