Weird Little Guys

Molly talks to Adam Becker about his book, More Everything Forever See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A final look at the Pioneer Fund's attempt to use racist pseudoscience to overturn the Brown v Board of Education Supreme Court decision. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. Jackson, John P. Jr (2005). Science for Segregation: Race, Law, and the Case Against Brown v. Board of Education. New York University Press. Sussman, Robert Wald (2014). The Myth of Race: The Troubling Persistence of an Unscientific Idea. Harvard University Press. Newby, IA (1967). Challenge to the Court: Social Scientists and the Defense of Segregation 1955-1966. Louisiana State University Press. Gabriel, Ricardo, "Somos Boricuas y Estamos Despertando: Decolonial Education, Collective Identity, and the Struggle for Puerto Rican Studies" (2023). CUNY Academic Works. https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/5583 Kenneth B. Clark, The Desegregation Cases: Criticism of the Social Scientist' s Role, 5 Vill. L. Rev. 224 (1959). Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/vlr/vol5/iss2/5 Ernest van den Haag, Social Science Testimony in the Desegregation Cases - A Reply to Professor Kenneth Clark, 6 Vill. L. Rev. 69 (1960). Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/vlr/vol6/iss1/3 https://www.naacpldf.org/brown-vs-board/significance-doll-test/ https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/charleston-church-shooting/dont-blame-us-church-shootings-council-conservative-citizens-says-n380126 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1968/02/03/south-africa-the-south-west https://x.com/socialistdogmom/status/1439283771237339139 https://time.com/archive/6873118/education-a-negro-in-ole-miss/ https://time.com/archive/6873165/the-south-the-intruder/ https://www.mississippifreepress.org/editors-note-the-lies-scientific-racists-told-about-jacksons-children/ https://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2017/nov/15/how-integration-failed-jacksons-public-schools-196/ https://www.nea.org/nea-today/all-news-articles/revisiting-brown-v-board-education-70-years-later https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal83-857-26237-1197399#_ https://www.nytimes.com/1982/09/07/us/desegregation-plans-in-peril.html https://www.nytimes.com/1963/09/10/archives/wallace-orders-guard-units-out-for-school-duty-they-replace-state.html Transcripts: https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/d965a6d8-9452-495b-84ad-0d5be465964a/stell-v-savannah-chatham-county-board-of-education-transcript-of-proceedings https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/209f0fe1-c065-4a37-b229-fc7b233ce2f3/evers-v-jackson-separate-municipal-school-district-transcript https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/df5c8b3d-e3fa-465d-a071-7c18dcbd1ce7/evers-v-jackson-separate-municipal-school-district-transcript-1 https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/3c162003-4708-41e2-83da-437c93f0394a/evers-v-jackson-separate-municipal-school-district-transcript-2 Other Court Documents: https://www.icj-cij.org/case/47 https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1748927/evers-v-jackson-municipal-separate-school-district/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/347/483/#F11 https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/220/667/1815159/ https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/255/88/1818366/ https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/724/1384/1468033/ https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/387/486/262018/ https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/333/55/14062/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Knowledge Fight Country is a platform where Dan Friesen and his guests can chew over the biggest and best ideas being disseminated in right wing media. Through a focus on Alex Jones and figures similar to him, this show will provide a humorous and fun layer on top of discussing the context on why liars lie and how they do it. Listen here and subscribe to Knowledge Fight Country on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts! See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We're revisiting two classic Weird Little Guys episodes from last year about a white nationalist political party's attempt to get their candidate on the ballot. Third Position Original air date: 8/21/25 In 2012, a newly formed white nationalist political party tried to get their candidate on the ballot. The American Third Position Party wanted Americans to vote for Merlin Miller, but how did the party end up picking him? Sources: https://www.fec.gov/resources/cms-content/documents/federalelections2012.pdf#page=11 https://irehr.org/2018/06/14/what-is-the-american-freedom-party/ https://www.ocregister.com/2009/09/04/two-time-felon-runs-pro-white-political-group/ https://rosecityantifa.org/articles/meet-the-oregon-chapter-of-the-american-freedom-party-part-one/ https://www.huffpost.com/entry/will-la-elect-a-ron-paul_b_104053 https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2013/08/two-american-freedom-party-leaders-speak-out-about-their-party/ https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v19/d284 https://www.history.navy.mil/browse-by-topic/wars-conflicts-and-operations/middle-east/six-day-war-liberty.html A Secret Third Thing Original air date: 8/28/25 After the 2012 election, the American Third Position Party rebranded. Not because their candidate lost, they expected that. But probably because their candidate didn't know what the party's name meant. Sources: https://www.fec.gov/resources/cms-content/documents/federalelections2012.pdf https://politicalresearch.org/2016/12/19/what-third-position https://www.splcenter.org/resources/reports/neofascism-european-style/ https://www.alternet.org/2008/07/surviving_a_weekend_with_americas_premiere_pro-white_activist_group# https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/news/2016/10/18/former-mpd-chief-drue-lackey-dead-90/92349168/ Winkler, Martin M. Arminius the Liberator: Myth and Ideology. Oxford University Press, 2016. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the first level of Knowledge Fight Country, Dan and his guest adventurer Molly Conger set out to understand the context around Tucker Carlson's interview with a welder who is mad about algebra. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A closer look at one of the men on the Pioneer Fund's team of scientists for segregation reveals that he wasn't a scientist at all. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. Jackson, John P. Jr (2005). Science for Segregation: Race, Law, and the Case Against Brown v. Board of Education. New York University Press. Sussman, Robert Wald (2014). The Myth of Race: The Troubling Persistence of an Unscientific Idea. Harvard University Press. Van den Haag, Ernest (1969). The Jewish Mystique. Stein and Day. Ernest van den Haag, Academic Freedom and Tenure, 15 Pace L. Rev. 5 (1994) DOI: https://doi.org/10.58948/2331-3528.1354 Available at: https://digitalcommons.pace.edu/plr/vol15/iss1/2 Chianese, Gloria (2006). Fascismo e lavoro a Napoli: Sindacato corporativo e antifascismo popolare (1930-1943). https://catalog.archives.gov/id/538438703?objectPage=3 https://ilmanifesto.it/melamerson-una-coppia-in-fuga-a-vietri https://oll.libertyfund.org/pages/the-intellectual-portrait-series-a-conversation-with-ernest-van-den-haag https://web.archive.org/web/20031010001427/http://home.comcast.net/~neoeugenics/pioneer.htm https://holidaycoast.it/en/Vietri-sul-Mare-and-Salerno%3A-highlights-on-designer-ceramics-with-Europe/ https://www.ilvescovado.it/it/storia-e-storie-19/verso-il-25-aprile-l-antifascismo-vietrese-105190/article https://www.nytimes.com/1969/11/23/archives/the-jewish-mystique-by-ernest-van-den-haag-252-pp-new-york-stein.html https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/27/nyregion/e-van-den-haag-87-educator-and-backer-of-death-penalty.html https://chroniclesmagazine.org/cultural-revolutions/ernest-van-den-haag-r-i-p/ https://vdare.com/articles/in-memoriam-ernest-van-den-haag https://kirkcenter.org/essays/ernest-van-den-haag-19142002/ https://sousamendesfoundation.org/family/melamerson https://archives.albany.edu/description/catalog/apap135 https://files.supersite.aruba.it/media/31058_cfca3f8a5fa8002f9ebf82670aba47c97078fb72.pdf See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Last week, the DOJ's Civil Rights division announced they were moving to dismiss more than 50 desegregation cases against school districts all over the country. Like the weird little guys trying to overturn the Brown v Board of Education decision in the 1960s, the Trump administration is trying to take us all back to a version of America they think was great. Sources & Further Reading: Reardon, Sean & Grewal, Elena & Kalogrides, Demetra & Greenberg, Erica. (2012). Brown Fades: The End of Court-Ordered School Desegregation and the Resegregation of American Public Schools. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. 31. 876-904. 10.2307/41653800. https://selc.wordpress.ncsu.edu/files/2013/03/Brown-Fades.pdf Wang G, White JS, Hamad R. The end of court-ordered desegregation and US children's health: quasi-experimental evidence. American Journal of Epidemiology. 2024 Nov 4;193(11):1530-1540. doi: 10.1093/aje/kwae082 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12096290/ U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. (2007). Becoming less separate? School desegregation, justice department enforcement, and the pursuit of unitary status. Washington, DC https://www.usccr.gov/files/pubs/docs/092707_BecomingLessSeparateReport.pdf https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-ends-over-50-half-century-old-desegregation-cases-throughout-united https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-dismisses-half-century-old-louisiana-consent-decree https://awpc.cattcenter.iastate.edu/communication/speech-march-washington-aug-28-1963 https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/freedom-black-women-speak-march-washington-jobs-and-freedom https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/jun/18 https://www.k-12legalinsights.com/2026/03/some-recent-motions-for-unitary-status-seem-to-be-facing-less-careful-scrutiny/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/doj-seeking-to-end-school-desegregation-cases/ https://www.naacpldf.org/case-issue/why-are-schools-still-segregated/ https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/24/us/politics/justice-department-desegregation-cases.html https://www.ed.gov/grants-and-programs/grants-birth-grade-12/school-and-community-improvement-grants/training-and-advisory-services-equity-assistance-centers https://www.regulations.gov/document/ED-2026-OESE-0958-0001 https://www.justice.gov/crt https://web.archive.org/web/20240301102317/https://www.justice.gov/crt https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/ex-employees-us-justice-department-blast-destruction-civil-rights-unit-2025-12-09/ https://redlinecivilrights.org/education/ https://www.jurist.org/news/2026/07/us-federal-court-ends-decades-long-school-desegregation-lawsuit-in-louisiana/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6105774/smith-v-concordia-parish/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/14791822/boudreaux-v-st-mary-parish/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/5295676/thomas-v-st-martin-parish/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72066767/navy-v-sch-bd-of-st-mary-prsh/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the decade after the Supreme Court's ruling in the Brown v Board of Education case, segregationists used every tool available to prevent integration. By the early 1960s, a group of Pioneer Fund-backed scientists had teamed up with the lawyer they hoped could get their pseudoscientific argument against Brown in front of a judge. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. Jackson, John P. Jr (2005). Science for Segregation: Race, Law, and the Case Against Brown v. Board of Education. New York University Press. Sussman, Robert Wald (2014). The Myth of Race: The Troubling Persistence of an Unscientific Idea. Harvard University Press. Gould, Stephen Jay (1996). The Mismeasure of a Man. Penguin Books. McMillen, Neil (1971). The Citizens’ Council: Organized Resistance to the Second Reconstruction, 1954-1964. University of Illinois Press Reardon, Sean & Grewal, Elena & Kalogrides, Demetra & Greenberg, Erica. (2012). Brown Fades: The End of Court-Ordered School Desegregation and the Resegregation of American Public Schools. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. 31. 876-904. 10.2307/41653800. https://selc.wordpress.ncsu.edu/files/2013/03/Brown-Fades.pdf Albert P . Blaustein & Andrew H. Field, "Overruling" Opinions in the Supreme Court , 57 MICH. L. REV. 151 (1958). Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol57/iss2/2 Amy M. Gardner, Comment, "An Attempt to Intervene in the Confusion: Standing Requirements for Rule 24 Intervenors," 69 University of Chicago Law Review 681 (2002). https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5684&context=journal_articles https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2026/04/08/how-often-does-the-supreme-court-overturn-its-own-decisions/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Wickliffe Draper's Pioneer Fund started out in 1937 by funding screenings of Nazi propaganda films in high schools. But like most American racists, the 1954 Supreme Court decision in the Brown v Board of Education case changed how he approached the fight for white supremacy. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. Jackson, John P. Jr (2005). Science for Segregation: Race, Law, and the Case Against Brown v. Board of Education. New York University Press. Sussman, Robert Wald (2014). The Myth of Race: The Troubling Persistence of an Unscientific Idea. Harvard University Press. McMillen, Neil (1971). The Citizens’ Council: Organized Resistance to the Second Reconstruction, 1954-1964. University of Illinois Press Kevin M. Kruse, The Paradox of Massive Resistance: Political Conformity and Chaos in the Aftermath of Brown v. Board of Education, 48 St. Louis U. L.J. (2004). Available at: https://scholarship.law.slu.edu/lj/vol48/iss3/13 Thompson, Susan C. "Racial Injustice: A History of the Segregated School System in Jackson, Mississippi." Georgia State University, 2018. https://doi.org/10.57709/12100172 Sadler, Cynthia Jones, "Standing in the Shadows: African American Informants and Allies of the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission" (2011). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 268. https://digitalcommons.memphis.edu/etd/268 https://www.mississippifreepress.org/how-integration-failed-in-jacksons-public-schools-from-1969-to-2017/ https://www.nytimes.com/1964/05/06/archives/antiintegrationad-seeks-teachers-aid.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1998/02/20/justice-department-lawyer-george-s-leonard-86-dies/238e9399-ef53-4983-9814-40b2250a2223/ https://ldfrecollection.org/content/archives/ba006941-a08b-4c85-b0d7-2f2e5ff00e85 https://www.nytimes.com/1964/08/21/archives/jackson-schools-end-segregation-43-negroes-sign-up-quietly-for.html https://www.mississippifreepress.org/meridian-schools-no-longer-under-federal-supervision-stemming-from-1965-desegregation-lawsuit/ https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB929056013324992946 https://www.nytimes.com/1964/03/19/archives/mississippi-agency-channels-260000-to-antirighits-drive.html https://da.mdah.ms.gov/sovcom/document/images/png/cd12/113717 https://mississippiencyclopedia.org/entries/coordinating-committee-for-fundamental-american-freedoms/ https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm https://www.splcenter.org/resources/reports/nativist-lobby-three-faces-intolerance/ https://www.splcenter.org/resources/hatewatch/eugenics-voter-id-laws-thomas-farrs-connections-pioneer-fund/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sometimes when a weird little guy gets shot, the guy who killed him is just a weirder little guy. Original Air Date: 9/18/2025 Sources: Schmaltz, William H. (2000). Hate: George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party. Washington, D.C.: Brassey's Schmaltz, William H. (2013). For Race And Nation: George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party. River's Bend Press Simonelli, Frederick J. (1999). American Fuehrer: George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Lee, Martin A. (1997). The Beast Reawakens. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. Rosenthal, A. M.; Gelb, Arthur (1967). One More Victim: The Life and Death of an American-Jewish Nazi. New York: New American Library See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1937, the heir to a textile manufacturing fortune established a charitable foundation to funnel money into disseminating propaganda produced in Nazi Germany. Since then, that fund has subsidized the overwhelming majority of research in the pseudoscientific field of 'race science.' Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. Saini, Angela (2019). Superior: The Return of Race Science. Beacon Press. Gould, Stephen Jay (1996). The Mismeasure of a Man. Penguin Books. Lusane, Clarence (2003). Hitler’s Black Victims: The Historical Experiences of Afro-Germans, European Blacks, Africans, and African Americans in the Nazi Era. Routledge. Kühl, Stefan (1994). The Nazi Connection: Eugenics, American Racism, and German National Socialism. Oxford University Press. Barry Mehler, “The New Eugenics,” Science for the People (May/June 1983) Lorimer, Frank, et al. “The Role of the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population.” The Milbank Memorial Fund Quarterly, vol. 49, no. 4, 1971, pp. 86–105. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3349466. “Current Topics.” The Economic Journal, vol. 45, no. 178, 1935, pp. 406–09. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2224670. “116. International Congress for the Scientific Investigation of Population Problems.” Man, vol. 35, 1935, pp. 109–109. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2790721. “Medical News.” The British Medical Journal, vol. 2, no. 3890, 1935, pp. 192–93. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25344986. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1994/12/01/the-tainted-sources-of-the-bell-curve/ 1994 publication of excerpt from The Bell Curve: https://newrepublic.com/article/120887/race-genes-and-iq-new-republics-bell-curve-excerpt Rebuttals published in the same issue: https://newrepublic.com/article/120890/responses-new-republics-bell-curve-excerpt Andrew Sullivan’s 2022 article https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/03/denying-genetics-isnt-shutting-down-racism-its-fueling-it.html https://investigations.hopenothate.org.uk/race-science-inc/ https://x.com/ndrew_lawrence/status/1050391663552671744 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/30/business/media/im-still-reading-andrew-sullivan-but-i-cant-defend-him.html https://www.ub.edu/personal/docencia/infocomp/bell.htm https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,748954-1,00.html https://www.nytimes.com/1956/06/17/archives/dr-cg-campbell-88-expert-on-eugenic.html https://www.nature.com/articles/136100c0 https://www.nytimes.com/1935/08/31/archives/berlin-congress-ends-in-dispute-international-and-scientific-nature.html https://newrepublic.com/article/147960/charles-murray-marketing-genius Herrnstein 1971 article in the atlantic https://gwern.net/doc/iq/1971-herrnstein.pdf https://www.nytimes.com/1994/09/16/obituaries/richard-herrnstein-64-dies-backed-nature-over-nurture.html https://web.archive.org/web/20170324145730/http://www.intelligence.martinsewell.com/Gottfredson1997.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20200608195813/http://www.psych.utoronto.ca/users/reingold/courses/intelligence/cache/eugenics2.html https://rethinkingschools.org/articles/the-bell-curve/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2757926/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Natural Causes is a podcast about the politics and practicalities of going outside in a world on fire, hosted by Dr. James Stout. It approaches the outdoors, conservation, agriculture, food sovereignty, and Indigenous land rights as interconnected issues. We want to combine unflinching journalism with unabashed advocacy for the land we all share, and welcome everyone into the outdoors and the fight for our public lands. Our shared wild spaces are under threat like never before, from climate change, the Trump administration, and extractive capitalism. Now, more than ever, we need serious journalism and serious solidarity that engages people with the struggle to protect these spaces for generations to come. New episodes weekly. Listen here and subscribe to Natural Causes on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts! See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1904, men who believed in 'race science' put hundreds of people in a human zoo at the St. Louis world's fair. Today, those same racist, pseudoscientific views persist, and the men who hold them demand to be taken seriously in the name of academic freedom. Sources & Further Reading: Newkirk, Pamela (2015). Spectacle: The Astonishing Life of Ota Benga. Amistad. Saini, Angela (2019). Superior: The Return of Race Science. Beacon Press. McCray, Carrie Allen (2012). Ota Benga Under My Mother’s Roof. University of South Carolina Press. Gould, Stephen Jay (1996). The Mismeasure of a Man. Penguin Books. Nathan Cofnas’ Doctoral Thesis: https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:bd78170f-1131-47ef-af8d-7a3bb2ef41d0 https://jannalangholz.wordpress.com/2022/12/26/17-worlds-fair-deaths/ https://thenewinquiry.com/blog/specimen-days-human-zoos-at-the-1904-worlds-fair/ https://web.archive.org/web/20070610034510/http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/Bontoc.html https://ashp.cuny.edu/documentaries-list/savage-acts-wars-fairs-and-empire-1898-1904/# https://www.wsj.com/opinion/free-expression/how-i-became-the-scapegoat-in-the-jason-arday-affair-dc134088 https://investigations.hopenothate.org.uk/race-science-inc/ https://www.brusselstimes.com/belgium/2007046/ghent-university-under-fire-for-appointing-us-philosopher-with-ties-to-scientific-racism https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-biosocial-science/article/abs/reptiles-with-a-conscience-the-coevolution-of-religious-and-moral-doctrine-by-nathan-cofnas-pp-523-ulster-institute-for-social-research-press-london-2012-3000-isbn-9780956881151-paperback/4005A8AD3C5B21AC0A82A38D5D97BBF8 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/03/the-man-who-was-caged-in-a-zoo https://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/06/nyregion/thecity/the-scandal-at-the-zoo.html https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cevmrjd9lj1o https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/jan/06/harvard-claudine-gay-plagiarism https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/largest-human-zoo-world-history See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1994, Byron de la Beckwith was finally convicted of murder for killing Medgar Evers in 1963. He died in prison, his story is over. But history repeats itself. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. DeLaughter, Bobby (2001). Never Too Late: A Prosecutor’s Story of Justice in the Medgar Evers Case. Scribner. Mitchell, Jerry (2020). Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era. Simon & Schuster. Vollers, Maryanne (1995). Ghosts of Mississippi. Little Brown & Company. Newton, Michael (2010). The Ku Klux Klan in Mississippi. McFarland & Company, Inc. Dittmer, John (1994). Local People: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Mississippi. University of Illinois Press. Ball, Howard (2004). Murder in Mississippi. University Press of Kansas. Snipe, Tracy (2021). The 5th Little Girl: Soul Survivor of the 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing, The Sarah Collins Rudolph Story. Africa World Press. Doyle, William (2001). An American Insurrection: The Battle of Oxford, Mississippi 1962. Doubleday. Nossiter, Adam (1994). Of Long Memory: Mississippi and the Murder of Medgar Evers. Addison-Wesley Publishing Company. https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/719/1345/1438234/ https://shadowproof.com/2018/03/07/documents-reveal-police-targeting-anti-racists-charlottesville/ https://embed.documentcloud.org/documents/4404359-DHS-Bulletin-Aug-9/ https://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2007/may/30/dredging-up-the-past-why-mississippians-must-tell/ https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/13/us-government-spied-anti-ice-protesters https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/13/us/politics/dhs-inquiry-immigration-protests-minnesota.html https://abc7chicago.com/post/ice-minneapolis-news-agents-claim-alberto-castaeda-mondragn-hit-wall-shattered-skull-triggers-tension-hospital/18514566/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72504545/ge-v-immigration-and-customs-enforcement/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

James talks with Molly Conger about the javelina and their installable appetite for golf courses. Sources: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65x0RvhJNa8 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2007/nov/05/conservation.sciencenews https://zoologicalbulletin.de/BzB_Volumes/Volume_56_1_2/049_054_BzB56_1_2_Moraves_Jiri_and_B%C3%B6hme_Wolfgang.pdf https://www.azgfd.com/wildlife-conservation/living-with-wildlife/living-with-javelina/ https://content.civicplus.com/api/assets/8e8abbf4-6775-4575-9a10-fedacb7cb2c1 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1964, crosses burned all over Mississippi, signaling a return of the Ku Klux Klan. Their big debut was perfectly timed as a show of support for Byron de la Beckwith. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. DeLaughter, Bobby (2001). Never Too Late: A Prosecutor’s Story of Justice in the Medgar Evers Case. Scribner. Mitchell, Jerry (2020). Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era. Simon & Schuster. Vollers, Maryanne (1995). Ghosts of Mississippi. Little Brown & Company. Sims, Patsy (1978). Stein & Day. Nelson, Stanley (2016). Devils Walking: Klan Murders Along the Mississippi in the 1960s. Louisiana State University Press. Dirks, Annelieke. “Between Threat and Reality: The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Emergence of Armed Self-Defense in Clarksdale and Natchez, Mississippi, 1960-1965.” Journal for the Study of Radicalism, vol. 1, no. 1, 2007, pp. 71–98. Ball, Howard (2004). Murder in Mississippi. University Press of Kansas. Hamm, Mark (2017). The Age of Lone Wolf Terrorism. Columbia University Press Biondi, K., and J. Curtis. 2018. “From Structural to Stochastic Violence.” Association for Political and Legal Anthropology. Newton, Michael (2010). The Ku Klux Klan in Mississippi. McFarland & Company, Inc. Dittmer, John (1994). Local People: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Mississippi. University of Illinois Press. Payne, Charles (1995). I’ve Got The Light of Freedom. University of California Press. https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/accused-in-1964-mississippi-race-slayings-wrote-hate-letter-1.668898 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Byron de la Beckwith was tried for the same murder three times. In 1964, it just wasn't generally considered illegal for a white man to kill a black man in Mississippi. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. DeLaughter, Bobby (2001). Never Too Late: A Prosecutor’s Story of Justice in the Medgar Evers Case. Scribner. Mitchell, Jerry (2020). Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era. Simon & Schuster. Evers, Myrlie (1967). For Us, The Living. Doubleday & Company. Tyson, Timothy (2017). The Blood of Emmett Till. Simon & Schuster Vollers, Maryanne (1995). Ghosts of Mississippi. Little Brown & Company. Martin, Ralph (1983). A Hero For Our Time. Bandwagon, Inc. Baden, Michael (2006). Exhumation. in Spitz & Fisher's Medicolegal Investigation of Death. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the months leading up to the murder of Medgar Evers, the man who killed him was watching his world crumble. Byron de la Beckwith had dedicated his life to the cause of segregation, but it was a losing battle. The governor of Mississippi had backed down, allowing a second black student to enter Ole Miss. Governor George Wallace in Alabama backed down, too. Integration was creeping in all over. That, and his wife left him. Sources & Further Reading: Doyle, William (2001). An American Insurrection: The Battle of Oxford, Mississippi 1962. Doubleday. Lambert, Frank (2010). The Battle of Ole Miss: Civil Rights vs States’ Rights. Oxford University Press. Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. Metzl, Jonathan (2009). The Protest Psychosis: How Schizophrenia Became A Black Disease. Beacon Press. Rolph, Stephanie (2018). Resisting Equality: The Citizens' Council, 1954-1989. Louisiana State University Press Smith, Frank (1964). Congressman From Mississippi. Capricorn Books. https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/national/race/100262race-ra.html https://egrove.olemiss.edu/citizens_news/index.3.html https://www.southernfoodways.org/the-greenwood-food-blockade/ https://snccdigital.org/events/leflore-county-cuts-off-surplus-commodities/ https://snccdigital.org/people/dick-gregory/ https://www.nytimes.com/2000/04/22/us/samuel-block-60-civil-rights-battler-dies.html https://www.crmvet.org/docs/src/6210_src_ns.pdf https://themilitant.com/1962/2633/MIL2633.pdf https://snccdigital.org/people/lawrence-guyot/ https://snccdigital.org/events/jimmy-travis-shot-greenwood/ https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/civil-rights-act/multimedia/medgar-evers-and-jackson-movement.html https://www.wlbt.com/video/2026/07/15/medgar-evers-historic-1963-wlbt-speech-missing-over-six-decades/ https://da.mdah.ms.gov/vault/projects/OHtranscripts/AU_MP198001_119_098611.pdf See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 1954, the Supreme Court ruled that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. Segregated schools didn't react right away, but segregationists did. Within months, the Citizens' Councils began to form in counties across Mississippi. And Byron de la Beckwith was one of the group's earliest and most enthusiastic members. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. Rolph, Stephanie (2018). Resisting Equality: The Citizens' Council, 1954-1989. Louisiana State University Press Silver, James W (1963). Mississippi: The Closed Society. Harcourt Brace & World Inc. Vollers, Maryanne (1995). Ghosts of Mississippi. Little Brown & Company. Williams, Michael Vinson (2011). Medgar Evers: Mississippi Martyr. The University of Arkansas Press Cook, James Graham (1962). The Segregationists. Appleton Century Crofts McMillen, Neil (1971). The Citizens’ Council: Organized Resistance to the Second Reconstruction, 1954-1964. University of Illinois Press Mendelsohn, Jack (1966). The Martyrs. Harper & Row https://www.mississippifreepress.org/buried-truth-unresolved-disregarded-lamar-smith-murder-haunts-lincoln-county/ Cashion, S. A. (2013). "And So We Moved Quietly": Southern Methodist University and Desegregation, 1950-1970. Graduate Theses and Dissertations Delao, Frank Delao, "Containing Communism in Texas: How the Right Interpreted the Cold War, 1945-1965" (2016).Open Access Theses & Dissertations. 633 Rich, Evelyn (1988). "Ku Klux Klan Ideology, 1954-1988" Graduate Theses and Dissertations https://supremecourthistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Volume-37-Number-3-2012.pdf https://usm.access.preservica.com/uncategorized/SO_eea548ac-a609-4b6f-be15-7ae300c2206b https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2017/7/27/al-aqsa-one-encroachment-too-many See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Byron de la Beckwith and Medgar Evers never met. Evers didn’t even see the man who killed him. But the man and his killer grew up a hundred miles apart, fought in the same war, worked similar jobs, and were both deeply invested in the outcome over the fight for integration. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. Mendelsohn, Jack. (1966) The martyrs : sixteen who gave their lives for racial justice. Harper & Row Vollers, Maryanne (1995). Ghosts of Mississippi. Little Brown & Company. Rolph, Stephanie (2018). Resisting Equality: The Citizens' Council, 1954-1989. Louisiana State University Press Williams, Michael Vinson (2011). Medgar Evers: Mississippi Martyr. The University of Arkansas Press Evers, Charles and Andrew Szanton (1997). Have No Fear: The Charles Evers Story. John Wiley & Sons Inc Tisale, John (1996). Medgar Evers (1925-1963) and the Mississippi Press. Doctoral Dissertation, University of North Texas Sheridan, Louis (2021) "Patriotism Betrayed: How the U.S. Military Resegregated From 1913-1939," Historical Perspectives: Santa Clara University Undergraduate Journal of History, Series II : Vol. 26, Article 11. Donaldson, Le'Trice, "A Legacy All Their Own: African American Soldiers Fight for Citizenship, Race, and Manhood, 1870-1920" (2015). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 1167. https://digitalcommons.memphis.edu/etd/1167 Hartgrove, W. B. “The Negro Soldier in the American Revolution.” The Journal of Negro History, vol. 1, no. 2, 1916, pp. 110–31. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3035634 . https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1963/07/06/where-is-the-voice-coming-from https://da.mdah.ms.gov/series/welty/welty-manuscripts/weltys08 https://press.bobmizer.org/releases/instant-gratification https://www.nytimes.com/1994/03/20/books/my-uncle-the-bigot.html https://www.history.com/articles/battle-of-tarawa https://dpaa-mil.sites.crmforce.mil/Tarawa/InvasionCasualties https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/marine-killed-battle-tarawa-laid-rest-80-years-later https://www.oyez.org/about-audio https://www.army.mil/article/97705/black_soldiers_in_the_revolutionary_war https://diaryofahistorian.com/2013/03/05/for-evers-his-is-a-story-that-must-be-told-and-retold-too-few-young-people-know-his-story-and-that-is-a-tragedy-greater-than-his-untimely-death/ https://rediscovering-black-history.blogs.archives.gov/2021/11/10/african-american-seamen-of-the-antebellum-era/ https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Portals/7/combat-studies-institute/csi-books/CombatMultipliers.pdf See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.