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Posted
On 11/18/2025 at 11:59 AM, Hellraiser97 said:

Would it?  The UK effectively bought every slave in the empire and didn't pay the debt off for a 150 years.  Had they made the same offer to the US South, would there still have been so much desire to hang onto slavery?

i just did a dive in to the GNP of the 1861 CSA retconned to 1834 and did not find any solid numbers so your postulate stands

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Posted (edited)

I could listen to/watch a series just of Iris de Rode discussing whatever she wants to discuss.

Also, glad John Paul Jones getting a huge shoutout, but they didn't discuss how he got his brass balls all the way across the Atlantic.

Glad to see they are doing a Henry David Thoreau series next year.

Edit: Glad they brought the global/world war aspect into it, once France and Spain joined in.

Edited by atomheartbevo
Posted

quibbles from last night - stuff not covered at all:

- lee was court martialed for his conduct at monmouth

- the molly pitcher legend comes from monmouth

- jones commandeering of the serapis - his famous line 'i have not yet begin to fight' was not mentioned unless i missed it - he sailed to the dutch port of texel not france - serapis 'false' flag not shown or discussed - us not yet recognized by the dutch at this time made this a very tricky diplomatic situation - 2 of the commandeered ships were re-flagged as french and 1 was made 'american' and slipped out undetected in a pack of dutch vessels 2 days after xmas

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Posted
2 minutes ago, bluto said:

Washington Washington killing for fun 

He once held an opponent's wife's hand... in a jar of acid... at a party.

Finished it this morning- great series.

Posted (edited)
On 11/22/2025 at 7:29 PM, billfromlaketravis said:

I would suggest binging it. Just works better. Puts you fully in it. 

Couldn't have been improved on but definitely would have liked to have binged it the first time, or at least 3 episodes at a time.

Washington was definitely the real deal. He dealt with that mutiny, and he could have created a dictatorship of sorts, but he didn't.

Like that one historian said, I'm not a fan of the Great Man theory, but I feel like Washington is one of a select few that could fall into that category.  I don't think anybody else could have done what he did.  Gates obviously blew it. Benedict Arnold proved that some things cannot be defeated.

Edited by atomheartbevo
Posted
1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:

Couldn't have been improved on but definitely would have liked to have binged it the first time, or at least 3 episodes at a time.

Washington was definitely the real deal. He dealt with that mutiny, and he could have created a dictatorship of sorts, but he didn't.

Like that one historian said, I'm not a fan of the Great Man theory, but I feel like Washington is one of a select few that could fall into that category.  I don't think anybody else could have done what he did.  Gates obviously blew it. Benedict Arnold proved that some things cannot be defeated.

Thus proving the 'Great Man Theory.'

Posted (edited)
45 minutes ago, notre dame joe said:

Thus proving the 'Great Man Theory.'

My problem with it is that there always has to be a supporting cast of sorts, and even a situation where members of that supporting cast are at the same level - one could make the case for Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, etc.

Edited by atomheartbevo
Posted
52 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

My problem with it is that there always has to be a supporting cast of sorts, and even a situation where members of that supporting cast are at the same level - one could make the case for Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, etc.

This one is weak on the supporting cast.  We hear barely any mention of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin ...  Those men were doing things important to the Revolution.  But Ken Burns, maybe he assumes that we watched his other documentaries. 

Posted
5 hours ago, MissingInAction said:

You just know there were some crazy ass sex parties during those times. Probably hd the best cocaine and booze ever made.

Booze perhaps if a rat didn’t fall in the vat or if they didn’t use tobacco spit or something grosser than that for coloring. Granted everything would have been hand made, and without steel. A lot of theories out there that bourbon mash tastes better in a wooden vat because it’s going in and out of the wood. And well everything tastes better when it’s made by hand. 

I believe you need petroleum fuel to synthesize cocaine. I’d imagine they were chewing on coca leaves like crazy though. 

Posted
17 hours ago, notre dame joe said:

This one is weak on the supporting cast.  We hear barely any mention of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin ...  Those men were doing things important to the Revolution.  But Ken Burns, maybe he assumes that we watched his other documentaries. 

this series is about the war and the adjacent effects on society, not about politics or science or foreign diplomacy

the founding fathers were extremely important but this is not their story

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Posted
49 minutes ago, Hagbard Celine said:

this series is about the war and the adjacent effects on society, not about politics or science or foreign diplomacy

the founding fathers were extremely important but this is not their story

I'm not sure what you are getting at but a Revolution by definition applies to politics and diplomacy.

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Posted
1 hour ago, notre dame joe said:

I'm not sure what you are getting at but a Revolution by definition applies to politics and diplomacy.

I think the point he's trying to make is distinguishing kinetic conflict from otherwise. While that's true of the portrayal of the war part of the series, it doesn't hold for the earlier parts.

Well, on further reflection, the "conflict" itself is the topic, whether that be through boycotts, protests, etc., before the fighting war, or the fighting war itself.

I guess some might argue that politics/diplomacy is part of the conflict, but I'd respond by saying that politics/diplomacy is more about conflict resolution and compromise, not conflict itself.

In other words politics (negotiations & compromise) are opposed to war (conflict & destruction).

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Posted
7 hours ago, bolverk said:

I think the point he's trying to make is distinguishing kinetic conflict from otherwise. While that's true of the portrayal of the war part of the series, it doesn't hold for the earlier parts.

Well, on further reflection, the "conflict" itself is the topic, whether that be through boycotts, protests, etc., before the fighting war, or the fighting war itself.

I guess some might argue that politics/diplomacy is part of the conflict, but I'd respond by saying that politics/diplomacy is more about conflict resolution and compromise, not conflict itself.

In other words politics (negotiations & compromise) are opposed to war (conflict & destruction).

Burns is always going to leave some stuff out because he’s a) bound by time and b) trying to make something palatable for the everyday person. If he were to make one that was truly comprehensive, it would easily be three or four times as long and no one but us uber history nerds would watch the whole thing. 12 hours is his bread and butter. I’m sure there is a podcast somewhere that is 96 hours long that gives the full history. 

Posted
8 hours ago, Biff Tannen said:

Burns is always going to leave some stuff out because he’s a) bound by time and b) trying to make something palatable for the everyday person. If he were to make one that was truly comprehensive, it would easily be three or four times as long and no one but us uber history nerds would watch the whole thing. 12 hours is his bread and butter. I’m sure there is a podcast somewhere that is 96 hours long that gives the full history. 

What Franklin and Adams were doing was essential to getting France to join the war for the Revolution so succeed.  I suspect Burns want everyone to watch his doc on Franklin.

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Posted (edited)

I think it’d be cool if Ken directed a documentary on the Grinnell 14 in which Peter Coyote was a part of. It would be a nice tribute to his narrator who is getting up there in age. 

image.thumb.png.ebb2cb4e2dd67c88fd4fb32d5aa2cc64.png

Edited by billfromlaketravis
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Posted
On 11/24/2025 at 2:48 AM, notre dame joe said:

Thus proving the 'Great Man Theory.'

 

On 11/24/2025 at 3:33 AM, atomheartbevo said:

My problem with it is that there always has to be a supporting cast of sorts, and even a situation where members of that supporting cast are at the same level - one could make the case for Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, etc.

You left out Ethan Allen and a whole buncha lower leaders.  Israel Putnam.  Google him.

I heard a historian once say the only way SO many great men were put in one place, at the same time, with the say goal was because of divine intervention.  You don't accumulate that much talent by chance.

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Posted
3 hours ago, Parliament said:

 

You left out Ethan Allen and a whole buncha lower leaders.  Israel Putnam.  Google him.

I heard a historian once say the only way SO many great men were put in one place, at the same time, with the say goal was because of divine intervention.  You don't accumulate that much talent by chance.

You obviously aren't familiar with the Hayden Frey coaching tree, though anyone I know that encountered Hayden would say other forces were involved in building that staff. 

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Posted
On 11/20/2025 at 11:31 AM, Biff Tannen said:

Slavery was on its way to abolition prior to the invention of the cotton gin and then it ramped up like crazy. Thanks Eli. 

Just finished, and the treatment of slavery (other than no mention of my largely insignificant ancestors who fought) is probably my biggest complaint. We all are hopefully in pretty much unanimous agreement that slavery was abhorrent and is one of many blights that was rightfully exposed in this documentary. I want to be clear on that point because reactionary Surly can be reactionary, but most of the southern slave holding founding fathers where in a serious pickle when it came to slavery. Slaves represented a significant capital investment, and were often leveraged. Even if they were serious about ending the practice, and few were dedicated enough to jeopardize their lifestyle for the cause, most of them didn't have the financial means. They were cash poor and land rich. It'd be like a modern farmer just deciding that he should buy out the bank for all of his tractors, outbuildings, and other equipment.

 

Slavery was not particularly economical at the time. You had to feed, house, and clothe a labor force that remained idle for significant portions of the year. It seemed like it was an institution that would die a natural death and hopefully not ruin them financially to most of the founding fathers who were slaveholders. They were happy to kick the can of horrific human subjugation down the line. La Fayette was one of the few who put his money where his mouth was and actually purchased a plantation with slaves with the intent to free them. 

 

But then came along Eli fucking Whitney with his fancy cotton gin and made slavery economical again...

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