Tecumseh and William Henry Harrison's Struggle for a Nation w/ Peter Stark
The Road to Now
Benjamin Sawyer
4.8 • 628 Ratings
🗓️ 11 August 2025
⏱️ 66 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
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 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 Outsidemagazine. 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 is a rebroadcast of episode #383, which originally aired on August 28, 2023. This rebroadcast was edited by Ben Sawyer.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I'm Ben Sawyer and this is the road to now. |
| 0:08.8 | This week on the show, we look back on a pivotal moment in American history. |
| 0:14.4 | This being the war between the U.S. Army and the Confederation of tribes that came together |
| 0:20.3 | under DeKumseh during the war of 1812 and before |
| 0:23.5 | that this moment that uh you know we know how it ended so we just kind of go well i guess it ended |
| 0:30.2 | that way but this was pivotal it could have gone either way and uh the the battle itself and the |
| 0:36.3 | relationship between these two generational leaders on the one side being the Shawnee Chief Tacomsa, and on the other side, General William Henry Harrison, a guy mostly known as the first president to die in office, but a guy who was once known as Mr. Jefferson's hammer, a giant of a figure at this point in history. |
| 0:57.5 | The relationship between these two characters is fascinating, as is the moment itself, as I said before. |
| 1:04.7 | So I hope you guys enjoy this. |
| 1:06.2 | We're re-sharing this. |
| 1:07.4 | It was previously recorded about two years ago. |
| 1:10.4 | The guest was Peter Stark. |
| 1:12.6 | Fantastic book. Fantastic conversation. So we hope you guys enjoy this episode. Bob and I are, |
| 1:20.7 | I was like thinking about this before I recorded this and I was like, do I say we have an |
| 1:25.5 | overwhelming number of conversations lined up to record? |
| 1:29.2 | That would be honest. It's incredible. We have so many great guests lined up. And right now, |
| 1:35.2 | we have new stuff to air coming up. But I've never had so many conversations where people |
| 1:40.2 | ask, can we air this two weeks later or three weeks later when the book comes out? |
| 1:44.2 | It's fantastic because it means we're interviewing some people who are doing cutting-edge research, |
| 1:48.6 | but at the same time, it's a lot of work up front, and I'm excited to share those conversations |
| 1:53.4 | with you coming up. As always, thanks to the patrons. You support the show. You keep it going. |
| 1:59.7 | Thank you to all of you, patreon.com slash |
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