Ken Burns: How To 250 [Teaser]
This Day (An America 250 History Show)
Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia
4.5 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 5 April 2026
⏱️ 12 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
We’re kicking off a series of chats that (until we find a better name) we’re calling “How to 250.” This is our chance to check in with some friends of the show - historians, writers, podcast folks - about how they are marking America 250, and what it means to do the work of history in this moment. And what better way to kick it off than with filmmaker Ken Burns! We get into his work, the idea of American history as a “series of revolutions,” and how to counter simplistic narratives.
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| 0:00.0 | Hey everyone, Jody Avergan here. Welcome to our Some Sunday context series where we are bringing you conversations new and from the archives that try to give you a little context for what we were up to here in 2026. |
| 0:16.5 | A short intro here just to let you know that we recently got a chance to sit down with the great Ken Burns to talk about his films, his work in history, and how he is approaching the semi-Quincennial. |
| 0:27.4 | So after the break, the first 10 minutes or so of that conversation, if you want to hear the full |
| 0:32.0 | thing, that is for paying subscribers to our newsletter. This is the first in a series of conversations |
| 0:36.8 | that we're going to do |
| 0:37.5 | like this throughout the year. So go ahead and sign up for the newsletter at thisdaypod.com, |
| 0:43.5 | thisdaypod.com. Hey, it's Christopher Kimball from Mill Street Radio. Sounds like I'm bragging, |
| 0:50.9 | and I am, we're the number one most downloaded food podcast in America. |
| 0:55.1 | You know, Milsterior Radio travels the world in search of the very best food stories. |
| 0:59.6 | You'll hear about smuggling eels on the black market, the secret intelligence of plants, and insider |
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| 1:10.6 | Discover a world of food stories by searching your podcast app for Milk Street Radio. |
| 1:19.8 | Hello and welcome to This Day, a history show from Radiotopia. |
| 1:23.6 | My name is Jody Avergan. |
| 1:27.8 | And this is the first episode in a series of special conversations that we are going to have this year called How to 250, which is a working title. |
| 1:36.2 | I'm sure there are better titles out there. |
| 1:38.0 | But we are going to talk about how America 250 is playing out and talk with some special guests about doing the work of history |
| 1:45.1 | here in 2026, how they plan to mark this moment and so on. And what better way to kick |
| 1:50.8 | off this series than with the great Ken Burns documentary filmmaker. If I listed all of his |
| 1:55.8 | work right now, then the episode would just be over. So I'll say Civil War, Baseball, Vietnam, |
| 2:00.0 | jazz. And of course, |
| 2:06.3 | the latest film, which came out this winter, is about the American Revolution. And today we're going to discuss not just the Revolution 250 years ago, but whether it is possible to tell the story |
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