The Founding Fathers of the US

Ned Kelly, the leader of the infamous Kelly gang, has been described as Australia's only truly national hero. During a short but intense crime spree at the end of the 1870s, he led a gang of notorious outlaws who rampaged through the Australian bush, robbing banks and stealing ho ...  Show more

It was once one of the great unsolved problems of the early modern world: the calculation of exactly how far east or west a given point was on the surface of the Earth. Longitude was a challenge that sat at the intersection of science, navigation, empire and time itself. For cent ...  Show more

“O ye that love mankind! Ye that dare oppose, not only the tyranny, but the tyrant, stand forth!” The U.S. Congress votes for independence on the 2nd of July 1776, and George Washington reads the Declaration of Independence to his troops a few days later, after which they pull do ...  Show more

The British have surrendered, they’ll be leaving soon. Now the Americans have a new and arguably harder task than before. They have to meld those 13 states, each with their own sense of independence and unique characteristics, into a country. Taking inspiration from Rome, the Enl ...  Show more

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay's essays written in 1787/8 in support of the new US Constitution. They published these anonymously in New York as 'Publius' but, when it became known that Hamilton and Madison were the main authors, th ...  Show more

In this week's Pop Quiz, Joe asked about what the Founding Fathers were reading as they shaped the course and construction of American government and how these ideas influenced their decisions.Join us each Thursday for Pop Quizzes or Sketches in History, and comment below with yo ...  Show more