This week on History Happy Hour: Chris and Rick are back live and celebrating five years as Hosts of HHH. And it’s a History Happy First - for the first time in five years they will be in the same place with their guest!

Podcasting from Lexington, Massachusetts, on the day after the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Lexington, Chris and Rick will talk to Joel Bohy, author of Bullet Strikes from the First Day of the American Revolution. Joe’s book tells the story of investigators who used forensic techniques straight out of CSI to create a new picture of the battle. Plus – we’ll share images from the 250th Anniversary battle re-enactment.

This Week on History Happy Hour: No Guest – Just Us! Due to a scheduling issue, we will be sans guest on Sunday! What would you like us to talk about. FDR’s leadership? Our favorite WWI books? Who should have won the War for Independence?

Send an email to info@historyhappyhour.net with your questions / topics / suggestions. Get us going! And when you tune in, we’ll have some questions for you as well. A free-flow, interactive, fun time on HHH. Just make sure you have your cocktail in hand – we sure will!

This Week on History Happy Hour: The story of a National Guard unit at the forefront in the Pacific during World War II. The 32nd Division came out of the Midwest and played a crucial role in the Pacific, eventually logging more combat hours than any other U.S. Army division during the war.

Chris and Rick explore the history of this unit from mobilization in 1940 until the occupation of Japan, with Professor Mark D. Van Ells, author of Red Arrow Across the Pacific.

Mark D. Van Ells is a professor of history at Queensborough Community College of the City University of New York. He received his Ph.D. in history from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and is a native of the Badger State. Mark writes scholarly works as well as books and articles for general audiences on history and travel. His books include To Hear Only Thunder Again: America’s World War II Veterans Come Home, and America and World War I: A Traveler’s Guide. He also served as Archivist/Historian at the Wisconsin Veterans Museum in Madison.

This Week on History Happy Hour: In 1881, the first Buffalo Soldiers arrived in Arizona, serving in both the cavalry and infantry to pursue the elusive Apaches. For more than six decades, through border battles with Mexico to WWI and WWII, Black soldiers served with honor in Arizona, all the while facing an ever-present, persistent enemy: racism.

Fellow Ambrose Historian John P. Langellier returns to HHH to talk with Chris and Rick about his book Buffalo Soldiers in Arizona.

John Langellier, Ph.D., spent 12 years with the U.S. Army, and another four with the U.S. Navy in various assignments. He has written scores of articles and dozens of books, including Fighting for Uncle Sam: Buffalo Soldiers in the Frontier Army; The “Trapdoor” Springfield: From the Little Bighorn to San Juan Hill; and Scouting with the Buffalo Soldiers. He leads tours in the Southwest for Stephen Ambrose Historical Tours. He appeared on HHH in 2020.

This Week on History Happy Hour: In 1915 Winston Churchill resigned as Lord of the Admiralty in the wake of the Dardanelles disaster. Struggling to deal with the fallout, he accepted a commission and headed for the front lines – where he began the most extraordinary comeback in political history.

Chris and Rick will discuss this pivotal year in Churchill’s life with J. Furman Daniel, author of Blood, Mud, and Oil Paint: The Remarkable Year that Made Winston Churchill.

Dr. John Furman Daniel III is an associate professor of political science at Concordia University in Chicago. He is the author of 21st Century Patton: Strategic Insights for the Modern Era, The First Space War: How Patterns of History and Principles of STEM Will Shape Its Form, and Patton: Battling with History.

This Week on History Happy Hour: Two women in Nazi-occupied Paris create a daring escape line that rescues dozens of Allied servicemen. With one still in a German prison camp, the other returns to America and writes a bestselling book about it that also became a sensational movie. But there is far more to the story.

Our guest, Matthew Goodman, author of the book Paris Undercover, has dug up military records and personal testimonies that reveal, for the first time, the shocking truth behind the memoir and the unexpected, far-reaching consequences of its publication

Matthew Goodman is a New York Times-bestselling author of five books. They include The City Game: The City Game: Triumph, Scandal, and a Legendary Basketball Team and Eighty Days: Nellie Bly and Elizabeth Bisland’s History-Making Race Around the World. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, The American Scholar, the Harvard Review, Salon, Tablet, the Forward, Bon Appetit, and many other publications. He lives with his family in Brooklyn, NY.

This Week on History Happy Hour: One day in World War II. One day, around the globe. That’s what author Rona Simmons has written about in her new book No Average Day. The day she picked was October 24, 1944, when more than 2,600 Americans perished—more than on any other single day of the conflict.

Chris and Rick will talk with Rona about the vastness of World War II as seen through the events of a single day – one that was, for members of the US Armed Forces, its deadliest day.

Rona Simmons is an award-winning author of historical fiction and nonfiction. For the last several years, she has focused on untold and often overlooked stories from World War II. Her nonfiction books include Images from World War II: The Art of Jack Smith and The Other Veterans of World War II: Stories from Behind the Front Lines.is an award-winning author of historical fiction and nonfiction. For the last several years, she has focused on untold and often overlooked stories from World War II. Her nonfiction books include Images from World War II: The Art of Jack Smith and The Other Veterans of World War II: Stories from Behind the Front Lines.

This Week on History Happy Hour: Why did Axis countries go to war against America? Given America’s industrial base, what was the rationale that underpinned their decision? And when did they realize they couldn’t win?

Chris and Rick will dive into this topic with historian Harry Yeide, who drew on his experience as an intelligence analyst to write the book Betting Against America: The Axis Powers' Views of the United States.

Harry Yeide is a foreign affairs analyst who writes primarily in the field of military history. He has written a number of books, mostly about WWII tanks. He worked as a political, terrorism, and economic analyst on the Soviet Bloc, the Balkans, the Aegean, East Asia, South Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and he has served in numerous assignments overseas.