American History Tellers - Presidential Inaugurations: Traditions, Crisis, and Unity | 1

Episode Date: January 20, 2021

As America prepares to swear in a new president, we’ll look back to the inaugurations of the past. Jim Bendat, author of Democracy's Big Day: The Inauguration of Our President, 1789-2013, joins us as we cover the friction between the outgoing and incoming president, the Capitol Hill breach on January 6th, and how inaugurations have served as a powerful reminder of the strength of American democracy, even in times of crisis.For more on Jim Bendat: https://www.inaugurationbook.com/.Listen to new episodes 1 week early and to all episodes ad free with Wondery+. Join Wondery+ for exclusives, binges, early access, and ad free listening. Available in the Wondery App https://wondery.app.link/historytellers.Support us by supporting our sponsors!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge new seasons of American History Tellers early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Imagine it's March 4th, 1801, a dark, cold, early morning in Washington, D.C. At noon today, Thomas Jefferson will take the oath of office and become the third president of the United States. But right now, it's just past four in the morning. You're a stagecoach driver, packing the last of the luggage into your carriage. And John Adams, still president for eight more hours, is your passenger. His servant, Mr. Breesler, hovers around you. Make sure those straps are secured. Can't have

the president's belongings scattered all over the road. Yeah, the buckles will hold fast, they always have. Don't you worry. Mr. Breesler booked your coach in advance for this early morning trip to Baltimore. It's a 10-hour trek on muddy dirt roads, and by the time he arrives, Adams will be president no longer. From there, he'll travel onward to his home in Massachusetts. God knows how long that journey will take. Just down the street, you can see the man himself, 65 years old, stooped and portly, stamping his feet in the cold. Sir, President Adams could perhaps warm himself in the carriage. We're almost ready to depart. There's no getting him to do anything

he doesn't want to. I imagine he's taking one last look around. You're not sure at what, though. Washington at four in the morning is not much to see. Most of the new capital city is still under construction. You suddenly realize that you're at a crossroads in history, a new capital and an old president. You've never had a president in your stagecoach before, and you're momentarily at a loss for words. Well, I was sorry to hear for his loss to the Democratic Republicans. I cast my vote in his direction. Ah, then you will not be the only sorry person on the coach. If I may, why doesn't he stay for the inauguration ceremony? Mr. Briesler lowers his voice. To tell you the truth, I do not know his reason.

It is said by some that his presence at the ceremony might provoke violence, although I don't believe that. You nod your head quickly. Well, if it were me, I wouldn't stick around just to meet my replacement, no matter who he was. I keep right on moving, onto bigger and better things. Well, regardless, please don't broach the topic on this trip. Well, you've both broached it loudly enough already. Suddenly, President Adams is standing right in front of you. Oh, my

humblest apologies, sir. Oh, stop bowing. I'm not a king. Your vote was enough, and I thank you for it. I meant no disrespect. No, no, no, no disrespect was taken. But you asked a reasonable question, and I will give you an answer. What does a president do when his time is up? Well, the people have spoken, and their choice was for someone else. So, shall I throw a tantrum? No, I shall simply take myself out of the equation and go home. You close the door to the carriage

and hurry up into the driver's box. The horses are eager to get moving, and so are you. You think about John Adams, spending his last hours as president inside your coach. How both you and he still have a long journey ahead. With Audible, there's more to imagine when you listen. Whether you listen to stories, motivation, expert advice, any genre you love, you can be inspired to imagine new worlds, new possibilities, new ways of thinking. And Audible makes it easy to be inspired and entertained as a part of your everyday routine

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Visit audible.ca to sign up. I'm Sachi Cole. And I'm Sarah Hagee. And we're the hosts of Scamfluencers, a weekly podcast from Wondery that takes you along the twists and turns of the most infamous scams of all time, the impact on victims, and what's left once the facade falls away. Follow Scamfluencers on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. From Wondery, I'm Lindsey Graham, and this is American History Tellers.

Our history, your story. Last week, on January 6, 2021, we saw the first attempt in the nation's history to disrupt a peaceful transfer of power between presidents. A violent mob marched on and then attacked the U.S. Capitol to disrupt Congress as they counted electoral votes. Meanwhile, inside, over 100 elected congressmen planned to object to some of the state's certification of President-elect Joe Biden's election victory. This dark day disrupted a precedent that the United States established over 200 years ago in 1801. Before the sun rose on the day of Thomas Jefferson's inauguration, outgoing President John Adams left the Capitol on a public stagecoach in what became

known as the morning flight. It was the first time a sitting president had been voted out of office, and in the contentious aftermath of the 1800 election, no one knew whether the transfer of power from Federalists to Jefferson's Democratic Republicans would take place peacefully, as nothing like this had ever happened before in history. Later, some would scoff that it was cowardice for the defeated Adams to leave town under the cover of night, but others saw Adams' morning flight as a wise move to diffuse a tense political moment. Rather than remaining as a distraction, Adams chose to step aside and let someone else chart the course for the young country.

In doing so, he helped establish the American tradition of a peaceful transfer of power between presidents, even when those presidents were bitter rivals. Throughout American history, presidential inaugurations have served as a powerful reminder every four years of the strength and stability of our democracy. But they've also undergone many changes since the days of Adams and Jefferson. And though they've generally been peaceful, they haven't always been smooth. But in difficult times, like what we've all witnessed during the 2020 election, it's important to look back at what history can teach us. Here to talk with me is Jim Bendat, one of the nation's leading experts on presidential inauguration history. He has worked as a television correspondent at the last three presidential inaugurations, and he's the author of Democracy's Big Day, the Inauguration of Our President, 1789-2013.

Jim and I spoke on January 8, 2021, two days after the Capitol siege. Here's our conversation. Jim Bendat, welcome to American History Tellers. Thank you for having me, Lindsay. Great to talk with you. So in just a few days, on January 20, we will witness Joe Biden become inaugurated as the Thank you for having me, Lindsay. This year will be different for a variety of reasons, but it's also been different in the past. So let's start this conversation with just a quick discussion of how presidential inaugurations have evolved since 1789. They've definitely evolved over the years. For the first one in 1789 with George Washington, there was no inaugural parade. There was no official inaugural ball. There was no official inaugural ball.

There was a ball, but it took place a week later. So those events didn't actually begin until 20 years later in 1809. But we have the ceremony in 1789. It took place in New York City, which was the capital of our country at that time. And then his second one took place in Philadelphia, which was the new capital. John Adams in 1797 was also in Philadelphia. The first one in Washington, D.C. was Thomas Jefferson's in 1801. And how did the trappings that we understand today,

the speeches and the balls and the processions, how did they evolve to? Well, there's always been a speech. Sometimes the speech is really long, like William Henry Harrison's in 1841. And sometimes it's short. The shortest one was George Washington's second inauguration in 1793, just 135 words. So he just got through that one very quickly.

There's always a speech. There's always an oath. That's in the Constitution. It's a 35-word oath. And those are the main things that we know are required. Everything else has just become extra over the years, the luncheon, the inaugural parade, the inaugural balls at night. Another important thing that's evolved over the years has been what takes place even before the ceremony itself. And that's the tradition of the new incoming president coming to the White House and being greeted by the outgoing president. They go in to the White House. They have coffee and pastries for about a half hour or so. And then they have a procession to the Capitol.

Those are important traditions, but we're not going to see that this year. Yeah, this year is a bit different. What do you expect we will see this year? We already now know that Donald Trump will not participate in the inauguration of Joe Biden. It's going to be the first time in 152 years that an outgoing president fails to show up at the inauguration of his successor. The last one was Andrew Johnson in 1869. It's only happened three times in our history, but Donald Trump has indicated that he's going to be the fourth one. That's sort of a sad commentary. That's not a good look for democracy, but that's what we're going to have here in 2021. Of course, the contentious election, the breach of Capitol Hill, and also the pandemic have changed inaugural plans. What else will be different?

We know that there isn't going to be a luncheon inside of Statuary Hall. That's a traditional event that takes place right after the ceremony itself. That's not going to take place this year. We know that there isn't going to be an inaugural parade that we're used to with military bands and other marching bands and so on. That's not going to take place. There's going to be some sort of a virtual parade, possibly via Zoom, to be taking place across the country. But that's not what we're used to. I haven't heard anything yet about inaugural balls. I doubt if there will be that either. So it's going to be a very, very quiet affair, very solemn affair. But still, it'll be

an effort for the new president to try to bring our country together, which is the tradition of Inauguration Day. When we think about past inaugurals, have there been any examples of them being affected by other global circumstances like pandemics or weather or anything? Well, certainly not pandemics. I guess we were lucky in terms of what happened more than 100 years ago. The pandemic took place in between two inaugurations. So neither the inauguration of Woodrow Wilson in 1917 nor the one for Warren Harding in 1921 were affected by the pandemic. But as you mentioned, weather, that has played a role.

Inaugurations have been planned to be outdoors for every inauguration from 1829 to the present. There were a couple of earlier ones that were outdoors, such as George Washington's in New York in 1789, and then James Monroe's in 1817. Those were outdoors. But the first real planned one was in 1829 with Andrew Jackson. Well, three times since then, because of bad weather, the inauguration has been moved indoors. And those were Andrew Jackson II in 1833, William Howard Tafts in 1909,

and Ronald Reagan's second inauguration in 1985. That's the one many of us remember. The weather was so bad, they moved it inside into the Capitol Rotunda, and that's where he was sworn in on January the 21st, 1985, January 20th, having fallen on a Sunday that year. You just mentioned Jackson's inauguration. That one didn't go to plan quite. Tell us what happened then. Back in the old days, the president would often invite his supporters to come to the White House for a reception in the afternoon after the ceremony. And that's what took place for Andrew Jackson in 1829. Now, that particular inauguration year also represented a big change in Washington because Jackson was a true Washington

outsider. He wasn't from the nobility and his supporters were certainly not the most well-dressed and the most refined of individuals. People were coming from Tennessee and places like that to come to celebrate the inauguration of their hero, Jackson. And when they were invited to the White House, they showed up in their muddy boots, and it turned out to be a fiasco. They really trampled the place. The curtains were ripped. The rugs were muddied, as I indicated. So it was quite an impossible scene. And finally, somebody got the brilliant idea of putting a couple of big tubs of whiskey

out onto the White House lawn. Slowly but surely, everybody left the White House to go celebrate outside instead. Thankfully, that hasn't become a tradition of inaugurations. But traditions are important, and they've evolved and changed over the years. We mentioned before that the oath is constitutionally mandated, and a speech is almost always expected. One thing that we expect is that it happens on January 20th, but that prescription is rather new. How did it change? Yes, most of the inaugurations in our history took place on March the 4th.

Now, Washington was inaugurated on April the 30th of 1789, but after that, March 4th became the official date for the inauguration, and that's the way it was all the way through 1933. So, many of the famous inaugurations in history took place on March the 4th. But then right around that time, right around the time of FDR's first inauguration, it was decided, well, you know, the lame duck period, the time between the election and the inauguration, it's four months, and that might be a little bit too long. Originally, they needed that extra time to travel to Washington to deliver the electoral votes and that kind of thing.

But by 1933, it was realized, no, this is too long. So a new amendment was created to the Constitution, and it changed the date to January the 20th. That's the way it's been since then, since 1937. We're also quite accustomed to seeing the incoming president raise their right hand and place their left on a Bible and recite the oath of office. The oath is required by the Constitution. What about the Bible? The Bible is definitely not required, not at all. A Bible was, you know, suddenly obtained for George Washington's in 1789. I believe somebody went across the street to get one. Not everyone has used a Bible.

For example, John Quincy Adams in 1825 used a book of laws instead. As recently as 2009, you might recall, when Barack Obama was sworn in by John Roberts, the Chief Justice botched the oath on January 20th, 2009. Obama did use a Bible, but the words were just really butchered, both by the Chief Justice and when Obama repeated the words, he made some of the same mistakes. It was decided then to, just as out of an abundance of caution, they said, to have a redo, a second ceremony.

And so the very next evening, January the 21st of 2009, the Chief Justice came over to the White House and administered the oath again to Obama, this time without a Bible. So it's not required, and there's been a few other times also, particularly after sudden inaugurations after the death of a president where Bibles have not been used. So, it's not required. And on that same note, Lindsay, I'd mention the words, so help me God. There's a myth that George Washington added the words, so help me God, after he was sworn in in 1789. And it really is just a myth because no one reported at the time that Washington had added those words. It wasn't until 65 years later in 1854 that anyone ever suggested that George Washington had added those four words.

There was a writer named Washington Irving who claimed that he had heard Washington add, so help me God, back in 1789. But Washington Irving was only six years old at the time that he attended that inauguration in New York City. He was apparently very far away from the area where George Washington took the oath. There were no loudspeakers at the time. It's doubtful he really added those words. Now, we do know that Chester Arthur added the words, so help me God, in 1881. But the record is silent on whether most presidents added those words.

And in fact, we know from sound footage that Herbert Hoover did not say, so help me God, in 1929. But we do know also that every president, beginning with Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933, has added the words, so help me God, at the end of the oath. Richard Bandler revolutionized the world of self-help all thanks to an approach he developed called neuro-linguistic programming. Even though NLP worked for some, its methods have been criticized for being dangerous in the wrong hands. Throw in Richard's dark past as a cocaine addict and murder suspect, and you can't help but wonder what his true intentions were. I'm Sachi Cole. And I'm Sarah Hagee. And we're the hosts of Scamfluencers, a weekly podcast from Wondery that takes you along the twists and turns of the most infamous scams of all time, the impact on victims, and what's left once the facade falls away. We recently dove into the story of the godfather of modern mental manipulation,

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Nintendo never fires anyone, ever. Follow The Best Idea Yet on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to The Best Idea Yet early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. Those are some of the many traditions we expect from the president on his inauguration day. But, you know, it's not just him being inaugurated. His vice president is, too. And they used to give inaugural addresses as well.

Why did that stop? Yes, the vice president used to give a speech. And that was when the vice president was sworn in inside the Senate chamber. The vice president is, after all, the president of the Senate. And the way the ceremony used to take place was that the senators would gather inside the Senate chamber for a session prior to the presidential inauguration ceremony at the Capitol. So the vice president would be sworn in in front of the other senators and would give a speech. And usually it wasn't much. Usually it was words of procedure. But sometimes it went on for a bit much. And sometimes the new vice president would rail on about something and create a scene.

And the most famous one was Andrew Johnson, probably in 1865, who wasn't feeling well on the date of his vice presidential swearing in. And somebody had suggested that he drink some alcohol for his ailment. And by the time he got up there to give his speech, he was rip-roaring drunk. Nobody could understand a word he was saying. He was rambling incoherently. People were holding their head in embarrassment. And that was quite a scene. Well, finally, in 1937, the decision was made to have the vice presidential swearing in take place outside the Capitol along with the presidential swearing in. So it would take place just before. And the decision was also made when the vice president is sworn in outside, that's it.

He takes the oath of office, or in this case, she takes the oath of office, and that's it. No speech from the vice president. You indicated earlier that inauguration days usually begin with the incoming and outgoing president meeting at the White House and then heading over to the Capitol together. Andrew Johnson was the third to not do that, and Trump has indicated he would be the fourth. Have there been other instances of friction between the outgoing and incoming presidents on Inauguration Day? Yes, there have been. There are few and far between, but there have been a few examples. And the two most recent examples, I'd have to point to 1933 with Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt. If you just go on the computer and check out some images from the 1933 procession to the Capitol, you'll see Hoover and Roosevelt driving together in the car to the Capitol, the procession.

And in some of those pictures, Franklin D. Roosevelt is seen leaning over to Hoover as if to engage him in conversation. Sometimes he's waving to the conversation. Sometimes he's waving to the crowd. Sometimes he's smiling. But in just about every picture, Hoover just stares straight ahead, ignoring Roosevelt. Some of those photos are pretty funny to look at. But then in 1953, it was a little more contentious. That was the inauguration in which Dwight D. Eisenhower succeeded Harry Truman. And they had had some differences, a lot of differences about the Korean War. And it really spilled over into Inauguration Day when Eisenhower was very upset that his son, John, had been brought back from Korea to attend the inauguration. Eisenhower wrote and he felt that it was showing

favoritism towards him. It made him look bad that his son was getting special treatment and he wanted to know, who ordered my son to be brought back to Washington? To which Truman replied, it was the president of the United States who ordered your son to come back here. It was the president who felt that it would be a good idea for John Eisenhower to get to see his father sworn in as president. These are times in which there's friction not just between the two men that occupy the post, but clearly across the country. We're in the midst of such a time now. One of the most spectacular divisions of the country is obviously the Civil War.

Can you talk about Abraham Lincoln and his two inaugurations? When Abraham Lincoln was sworn in, both in 1861 and in 1865, Washington was an armed camp. I mean, we have a lot of security now. We've had a lot of security at inaugurations since 9-11, but there was also very, very heavy security for Lincoln's inaugurations. For his first one, we were about to engage in a civil war, and for his second one, the Civil War was about to end. And Lincoln saw his role as trying to be a peacemaker, trying to keep the country together. And so he spoke to that. And his second inaugural address is really the most famous one of

the two, because then when he can see that the war is winding down, he wants to again bring the country together. And he says, with malice toward none, with charity for all, that's how we're going to look upon this nation as we go forward. Another disputed election of that era has been in the news recently, the election of 1876, Samuel Tilden versus Rutherford Hayes. It was settled in what came to be known as the Compromise of 1877. What were the circumstances there, and how did they affect Hayes' inauguration? That was quite a year. You had 20 electoral votes that were in dispute in the election of 1876. There were the states of Florida, South Carolina, Louisiana, and Oregon, which totaled 20 electoral votes. And the vote at that point, not counting those

votes that were in dispute, the electoral count was 184 for Samuel Tilden and 165 for Rutherford B. Hayes. So Tilden was one electoral vote short of winning the presidency. And there were words being thrown across the aisle, back and forth, everybody accusing everybody of fraud. And they decided to set up a special commission, a commission of 15 people, five senators, five members of the House of Representatives, and five members of the U.S. Supreme Court, which is actually identical to what Senator Ted Cruz just proposed for this year to try to settle what he considered to be a dispute in the election, as emphasized by Donald Trump. Well, of course, that was shot down. There was no commission set up here in 2021, but there was a commission back in 1877. And the commission decided to award all 20 of

those disputed electoral votes to Rutherford B. Hayes. And he thereby won the presidency by one electoral vote, 185 to 184. And of course, Tilden's people weren't happy about that. They thought that the election had been stolen. And there were even fears on the Hayes side that Childon might try to have himself sworn in as an alternate type president. There were major fears along those lines. Now, the outgoing president was Ulysses S. Grant, and he was a Republican just like the new president, Rutherford B. Hayes. And because of these fears of what Childon and his people might do, on March the 3rd, 1877, Grant invited Hayes to come to the White House. And he invited the chief justice as well. And we actually had the situation where the chief justice swore in Rutherford B. Hayes as president on March the 3rd, a day before the prescribed date. And that's the only time in history anything like that has ever happened.

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And perhaps concerns of more violence. Have there been protests or even violence at inaugurations in the past? There have been protests. Most of the time, inaugurations have been totally peaceful. But we have had some instances of protests. The ones I would point to, the first one that I'm aware of is back in 1853, just had some unemployed people, unemployed workers staging a counter march. It was very small. 1913 was much bigger.

1913 actually was the day before Woodrow Wilson's inauguration, and that went on. A large, large number of women, of suffragists, marched along Pennsylvania Avenue. They wanted the right to vote. They were treated well by some of the onlookers and not so well by others, but they got their point across, and by 1920, all women did have the right to vote. In more recent times, Richard Nixon's two inaugurations and also George W. Bush's inauguration in 2001 had lots of protesters. Nixon's was largely because of the Vietnam War that was going on at the time. And then in 2001, when George W. Bush was sworn in, that was right after another disputed election. Many will recall that that election against Al Gore was very close. Al Gore won the popular vote, but the state of Florida was in dispute, and it went all the way to the

United States Supreme Court, and so we didn't even have a result of the election until mid-December, about six weeks after the election itself. And many of the protesters who showed up in 2001 felt that George W. Bush was an illegitimate president, and they held up signs such as, Hail to the Thief and Selected Not Elected, Gore by 500,000, Bush by one, referring to the number of popular votes that Gore had won by, as opposed to the one vote in the Supreme Court that had given Bush the election. So those are the protests that really stand out. Throughout our conversation here, we've been talking largely about friction and division, but we've also noted that most of the tone of most of the inaugurations tries to hint at a feeling of bringing a country together, so much so that it's almost expected. I'm wondering,

though, were there inaugurations in which that tone translated into some sort of success, where the country was actually brought together. The first one I think of along those lines would be Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933. We were in the middle of a Great Depression then. Roosevelt had just defeated Herbert Hoover. In fact, Herbert Hoover is now joined by Donald Trump in terms of losing the presidency, the Senate, and the House of Representatives within a four-year period. But meanwhile, Roosevelt wanted to soothe the nation,

which really needed some soothing during the Depression. And he did so with his early words in his inaugural address, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. That's one line from many great inaugural speeches. These addresses have become the keystones to what many presidents hope for their agendas and the tone of their presidencies. What other key themes or great speeches should we remember? Thomas Jefferson's in 1801 was very important. It was important because that year marked the first change of political power in Washington. Our first two presidents, George Washington and John Adams,

and they were from the Federalist Party. And now Thomas Jefferson represented a new party, the Democratic Republicans. And the theme of his inaugural address was to try to bring the country together. And he did so when he said, we are all Federalists, we are all Republicans. So he really wanted everybody to unite as one. Another very famous inaugural address was that of John F. Kennedy in 1961. So many memorable phrases

from that address. It's hard to believe that his speech was only about 15 minutes in length, which is pretty much the standard length for an inaugural address. They're never more than 15 or 20 minutes long. But in that speech, he just was doing everything he could to bring the country together and to really try to generate enthusiasm for the idea of working together and to making our country a better place. And his most famous words, of course, are, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. Let's see, you are obviously interested in and knowledgeable of inaugurations. What is the first inauguration that you personally remember? The first one I personally remember is John F. Kennedy. I was 12 years old, and I was very interested in what was going on at that time.

In fact, the Democratic Convention of 1960 took place in my hometown of Los Angeles. And the day before the convention began, my grandfather took me downtown to the Biltmore Hotel, which was serving as the headquarters for the Democratic Party for that convention week. And we went in there, and that's when I collected all sorts of political buttons from all the different candidates, and I got a lot of written materials. And there were a couple of candidates who were actually there to meet and greet people, shake hands. So I met Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri, and I also met Senator John F. Kennedy that day. So my grandfather and I saw a huge line of people waiting to meet John F. Kennedy. They wanted to shake his hands and wish him well.

He was the favorite, so he was very popular already. Well, my grandfather was a rather pushy guy and not one to want to wait in a long line. I don't know if he was setting a good example for a 12-year-old, but the fact is the fact that he said, Jimmy, let's go. And he went right past the big line. We went all the way up to the front. When we got to the front, we stopped for a brief second where we could hear everybody saying, Mr. Senator, Mr. Senator, as they would talk to Kennedy. Again, my grandfather says, takes my hand, goes right up to the front and says, Mr. President. Immediately, Kennedy turned away from everybody else and said, yes, and was happy to shake our hands. So that's how I met John F. Kennedy.

That's the first presidential year that I remember and the first inauguration that I remember six months later in January. So, Jim Bendat, thank you so much for talking with me today. Lindsay, it's been a pleasure. Always fun to talk inaugural history. That was my conversation with Jim Bendat. Jim is one of the nation's leading experts on presidential inauguration history. He has worked as a television correspondent at the last three presidential inaugurations, and is the author of Democracy's Big Day, the inauguration of our president, 1789 to 2013. If you'd like to learn more about the disputed election of 1876 and its similarities to and

important differences from today, listen to episode 23, Tilden vs. Hayes, Faustian Bargain, from one of my other podcasts, American Elections, Wicked Game. Next on American History Tellers. In 1871, Chicago was the fastest growing city in the world. Then, in one of the hottest, driest Octobers on record, a fire broke out. For the next 30 hours, high winds drove a relentless inferno through the heart of the city, killing hundreds and stretching firefighters to their breaking point. But out of the ashes would come an extraordinary rebirth, a new kind of American metropolis. From Wondery, this is Presidential Inaugurations from American History Tellers. In our next series, in 1871, Chicago was the fastest-growing city in the world.

Then, in one of the hottest, driest Octobers on record, a fire broke out. For 30 hours, high winds drove a relentless inferno through the city, killing hundreds and stretching firefighters to their limit. But out of the ashes would come an extraordinary rebirth, a new kind of American metropolis. If you like American history tellers, you can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music.

And before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. American History Tellers is hosted, edited, and produced by me, Lindsey Graham, for Airship. This episode was produced by Morgan Jaffe. Our executive producers are Jenny Lauer-Beckman and Marsha Louis, created by Hernán López for Wondery. In November 1991, media tycoon Robert Maxwell mysteriously vanished from his luxury yacht in the Canary Islands. But it wasn't just his body that would come to the surface in the days that followed. It soon emerged that Robert's business was on the brink of collapse, and behind his facade

of wealth and success was a litany of bad investments, mounting debt, and multi-million dollar fraud. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show Business Movers. We tell the true stories of business leaders who risked it all, the critical moments that define their journey, and the ideas that transform the way we live our lives. In our latest series, a young refugee fleeing the Nazis arrives in Britain determined to make something of his life. Taking the name Robert Maxwell, he builds a publishing and newspaper empire that spans the globe. But ambition eventually curdles into desperation. And Robert's determination to succeed turns into a willingness to do anything to get ahead. Follow Business Movers wherever you get your podcasts.

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