#282 Tecumseh & William Henry Harrison's Struggle for a Nation w/ Peter Stark
The Road to Now
Benjamin Sawyer
4.8 • 628 Ratings
🗓️ 28 August 2023
⏱️ 52 minutes
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Summary
The war between the US Army and the Native American confederation during the war of 1812 is a buried story in an often-overlooked event, yet its impact on the history of North America is profound. The leading figures on both sides of the war, Shawnee Chief Tecumseh and US Army General William Henry Harrison, had come of age in the struggles over what is today called the Midwest United States, and both understood that losing the war would mean losing the future they imagined for their people. In this episode, Ben & Bob do a deep dive on the story behind that war with Peter Stark, author of the incredibly accessible new book, Gallop Toward The Sun: Tecumseh and William Henry Harrison's Struggle for the Destiny of a Nation (Random House, 2023).
Peter Stark is an adventure and exploration writer and historian who was previously a correspondent for Outside magazine. His previous book, Young Washington: How Wilderness and War Forged America's Founding Father, was named a finalist for the George Washington Book Prize in 2019. You can follow him on Instagram at @peterstark_adventure_historian.
This episode was edited by Gary Fletcher.
We're excited to announce that Ben & Bob will be recording a live episode of RTN on the history of Americana music in Nashville on September 18, 2023 w/ guests Emmy Lou Harris, Rodney Crowell and Jefferson Cowie! Click here for tickets. Hope to see you there!
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Good people. Before we get into this episode, just a quick announcement, we are very excited to share with you all that on September 18th, 2023, Bob and I will be recording a live podcast in Nashville, Tennessee, on the History of Americana Music. Our guests are Jefferson |
| 0:23.8 | Cowley, our good friend who just won the Pulitzer Prize, Emmy Lou Harris, and Rodney Crowell. |
| 0:29.2 | This is going to be so much fun. It's a small venue called Riverside Revival right in East Nashville. |
| 0:34.4 | We've got some tickets available. If you're interested in coming, you can just look |
| 0:37.9 | at the episode description. There's a link right there. And if you're not near whatever you're |
| 0:41.6 | listening to this on, you can just write this down. RTnpod.m.m.m.org |
| 0:45.7 | slash 91823, the date of the show. That's RTnpod.m.m.m.m.mm. slash 91823. We hope you can make it. We're so excited about this show. |
| 0:59.3 | Now we hope you enjoy this episode. Thanks for listening. |
| 1:03.9 | I'm Bob Crawford. And I'm Ben Sawyer and this is the road to now. And Bob, we have a guest on today. We've been excited about this for |
| 1:14.1 | months. And such a great book. Bob, why don't you do the proper introduction? Our guest today is |
| 1:20.6 | author Peter Stark. His new book is Gallop toward the sun, Tecumsa and William Henry Harrison's struggle for the destiny of a nation. |
| 1:29.9 | This will come out the week that this episode is released, and Ben and I are really excited to talk to Peter about this book. |
| 1:40.3 | Now, notice the subtitle. |
| 1:43.0 | Now, it's Gallop Toward the Sun. The subtitle here is Tecumseh and William Henry Harrison's |
| 1:48.9 | struggle for the destiny of a nation. If you're into presidential history and you hear the name William |
| 1:55.3 | Henry Harrison, you think, oh, that's the guy who didn't wear a coat to his two-hour inaugural dress. |
| 2:04.4 | He caught a cold. He was dead, you know, in a month, a couple weeks. And he gave us John Tyler, |
| 2:12.0 | that awful, awful man, John Tyler, the first accidental president. But I want you all to read this book, because there's a lot |
| 2:20.5 | more to William Henry Harrison than his presidential biography. I call him, he is a founding son, |
| 2:29.8 | right? He's part of, he is the son of that generation. And so, Peter, to begin, tell us a little |
| 2:37.6 | bit about young William Henry Harrison. Where did he come from? Yeah, you're so right about |
| 2:45.2 | the kind of the popular conception of William Henry Harrison. I say he's like a, his most known characteristic is a trivia |
... |
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