Scott here with another episode of the History Unplugged Podcast.

For nearly two centuries, the beating heart of American electoral politics was on the back of a train.

Candidates began touring small towns on railway lines, beginning with Andrew Jackson and

William Henry Harris on the 1830s.

The greatest whistle stop tour in American history was the 1896 presidential campaign of

William Jennings Bryant who spoke 600 times to 5 million people from a train car.

This method helped politicians connect with as many voters as possible in the country's largest cities

and smallest towns, when for many places the most important building was a train depot.

Campaign trains were also the site of Machia Valian scheming.

There would be the candidate and a staff on one car, and the

scheme. There would be the candidate and the staff on one car, with the campaign trying to get its message through the press,

and the press trying to divulge as much juicy information

from the campaign as possible.

Whistle-stop tours were the cornerstone of campaigns for Franklin D Roosevelt, Harry Truman,

Dwight Eisenhower, and willing to the 20th century.

But with an increase in utilization of air travel for campaigns, Whistle Stop Tours largely represent a

lost age in American politics. Today's guest is Edward Seagull, author of

Whistle Stop Politics, Campaign Trains in the reporters who covered them, and we

look at what was once the dominant form of campaigning

how it affected American politics and what we've lost by no longer having this.

Hope enjoy this discussion.

And one more thing before we get started with this episode, a quick break for word from our sponsors.

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