I feel exact the same as the last comment! I can’t find anything comparable to the great quality of this podcast!

Good podcast with good content. The episodes featuring the original hosting trio were the best.

Great loss…no current substitute for the format or quality. James

U in e tus du

You are so missed 😭

On basic things. They intentionally leave out historical context

Wonderful little-known stories behind the main story. A variety of topics told from various viewpoints including participants, historians, and journalists. And told in a conversational style that draws the listener in. Sometimes serious, other times funny, and always interesting. Really sad to see this podcast go. But the good news is that there are lots of past episodes for listeners. Recommended for the curious, the history buff, the student.

Thank you for all this years of learning !

There have been many instances over the last several years when this podcast helped temper anxiety, my own and that of friends and family, by providing context for events which otherwise seemed to suggest a world spinning off it's axis. Just knowing that we’ve collectively survived similar situations provides comfort and clarity and yet, thanks to the skill and dedication of these folks, without instilling complacency or disinterestedness. If ever there was a time for us to know and understand our history, 2020 fairly demands it of us. We have to recognize, even internalize, the true foundational values, traditions, and precedents from which the freedom we enjoy, or aspire to, arises. Facts have seldom been more important or more at risk of dilution, or even obliteration. Shows like Backstory. - trusted, trustworthy sources of information are so important, and so scarce, that watching as one succumbs is genuinely painful. Please allow me to express my most sincere gratitude to all involved with Backstory. Thank you. You have made a difference.

I absolutely love the podcast. As a person of interest regarding US history, your in depth knowledge, choice of topics and timeliness has been the best. Meeting currents events with an eye on history has made the show so relevant to me. Thank You all!! You will be missed

It gives you a perspective on history that most textbooks leave out and is relevant to current events

Wow already subscribed. From this little taste I can see this will be a powerful podcast about something badly lacking; the reconstruction. I know also it will trace the path from freedman to as close as today’s cruel world allows full citizenship. Can’t wait.

I tried this show because I wanted to learn more about the Branch Davidians. #168 was about them. It became hard to follow because of how much goofing around there was between friends, which I understand but I was here for information. Also, no one likes talking about poop and outhouses that frequently. It became excessive. I appreciate your research and explanation, but I truly hard a hard time following it due to how often it seemed the conversation became side tracked.

Great show. Will miss it when they go dark later this year.

Eat it.

This was once my favorite podcast, but no longer. This last year it seems like it is less historic fact and more political commentary. Sadly it has developed a theme of oppression history in lieu any positive or progressive facts. I will be dropping it for now.

Absolutely fantastic. All of the hosts are eloquent, knowledgeable, really think deeply and do their research! And are open minded and humane - really a humanist podcast with a lot of integrity and heart!

Backstory is the gold standard of history podcasts - smart, engaging, well-produced. I’ve directed students to it for years - very sad it’s going away! I’ll miss it!

What a great way to gain perspective on current events - looking back to similar events or earlier events. We need more programs like this!

I’m saddened by the ending of this always enjoyable program. I’ve learned a great deal and I’m grateful for the professional and considerate tone the presenters always display. These are people I would like to have as next door neighbors!

I am very sad that this podcast is ending. The episodes only vary in excellence depending on the subject. My favorite is the episode on Ida B. Wells. I want to comment on the Pauli Murray segment. Fascinating subject and I am extraordinarily happy that Back Story addressed this incredibly impressive person before the podcast closes. I do not use Facebook or Twitter so I am never sure how to give feedback (maybe I should take up Twitter - I refuse to engage with FB and I wish all Americans would take action before our democracy is ruined). Sorry for digression. One of the scholars used the pronoun “they” instead of she or he. I think “they” is awkward and gives the impression that the individual is a Siamese twin. (apology for racist terminology) I recommend that everyone read “Woman on the Edge of Time” by Marge Piercy. It’s a pretty good speculative novel in which Piercy uses the term “per” (for person) as the inclusive pronoun. It works surprisingly well and it is markedly less awkward than “they”.

Backstory has been one of my favorite podcasts. Thank for the superb work.

I am saddened for the end of Backstory-I recommended it to my high school students-but I am so thankful for the great work you have done. I wish you the best and will read your books.

I feel so sad. I just learned about Back Story several weeks ago and I always learn something worth knowing. Quite often I’ll look further into the days subject. Today you made the announcement that you will be saying good bye. I look forward to listening to all your back shows. Good luck in all that you do. I’m sure it will be interesting.

Some of the hosts and guests are scarily out of touch to be historians, particularly when discussing race issues. In an episode where the n- word is used, they mention “sensitive language” as if it’s not blatantly racist. Also some phrasing and tones one sensitive topics are one side...white.

Back Story is a great podcast! I was introduced to it by one of my professors at college, and have enjoyed it ever since! I’ve shared it with friends and family, too. I’m always grateful for their diverse group of contributors. It also sounds great unlike some history podcasts out there. 5 stars, y’all! Give it a listen!

This podcast is awesome. The reviews from the recent changes reflect just how real white fragility is. I don’t care if you are gay and liberal (as stated in a few reviews ) racism is alive & well in both categories. People want history, well you can’t have history without all the warts (so to say). The whiney reviews should be ignored. Show is great.

Interesting and eye-opening topic. It makes a lot of sense of what and how white women upheld the behavior of slavery.

Relevant topics, well-researched, expert guests and hosts.

Why happened? I used to like this podcast.... now it is just revisionist propaganda

Need to have recording equipment that filters out the gross saliva sounds of speakers. Or give them water to wash it down...

Dear other reviewers: your white fragility is showing. This podcast is slowly doing a better job of incorporating non-white, non-male voices. (They were originally called “The American History Guys,” and the older episodes reflect a more narrow understanding of history as belonging to white men). Thank you to the producers, editors, researchers, etc, who are contributing to holistic public history.

I’m a long time listener, and I used to LOVE this podcast. One day, I turn on the latest episode and hear that things are changing, some new folks coming on, and I take it with stride giving my then fave pod the benefit of the doubt. I’m sad to say the entire tone of the podcast has ultimately changed dramatically to nearly every single episode now being nauseatingly preachy, and look, I get it. There’s no arguing against it. HOWEVER, that doesn’t mean that every.single.episode. needs to sound preachy and eventually alienating. What happened to dozens of episodes you’ve done in the past where the dark corners of history were covered extremely well while also not becoming absurdly repetitive. The evidence should be clear - look at how many 1-2 star reviews there now are and read the reasons why. There are a lot of other sides of history that can be covered alongside the topics of the post-original crew’s episodes. But if this is the path you want to take, you should change the name of the podcast altogether because there is to cover in America’s “backstory” than solely social justice issues.

I miss the days of content that wasn’t so focused on pushing their political point of view. The change of format came off as tired, rehashed and lame. They seem OBSESSED with race. It’s a shame to give up on them.

Well done, yet why did we forget the origin of 13’s fear, thirteen moons every year. Thirteen months for women to have their periods, gather herbs in the moonlight, go into labor depending on where they live (sea level, etc.) with the moon hanging low in the sky. Therefore promoting the fear of midwives and herbalists who became ‘witches’ to burn. Millions of women were killed by men who did not like the lunar/mooning/(blood!!)birthing power women have. The patriarchy feared 13 since the Middle Ages or before. It is an inherent female powered number.

This was my favorite podcast for years! I’m a gay liberal east coast educated elite etc and yet I can’t take the focus on “white people bad” that this show has turned into. I’ll stay subscribed hoping the pendulum swings back to history and out of the lunacy of intersectional identity politics. And I’ll re download the older episodes and take another listen!

Unfortunately, each podcast is presented with a liberal bias- all events and individual actions are seen through a skewed lens insistent upon creating perceptions of racism, sexism, etc. Most listeners are presumably intelligent enough to draw their own conclusions. Please stick to objective presentation of facts and trust that each person can make up their own mind.

I love this podcast & always learn something new from it. I wondered if you would do something on the Great Migration & consider a guest like Isabel Wilkerson. This is a part of our history that dramatically transformed our country yet netted no more than a paragraph in my high school history book.

Amazing podcast. Wonderful knowledge, analysis and interviews. I look forward to listening each week!

It’s hard to listen to a history podcast that is quite so one-sided. I used to love this podcast - but by presenting only their favorite political side of the issues, historical or current, they are leaving out half of the history. I’m unsubscribing.

It is with a heavy heart that I am Unsubscribing from Back Story. I have listened from the begining and unll recently realy found it interesting. Thanks for that Back Story. The last season has become dissapointing and somewhat insulting. The Back Story editorial staff has decided history told with a preconcived bias is just great.The constant interjection of racism, sexism and social injustice into almost every topic is misguided at best and dishonest at worst. I am an unapologetic liberal. I am not an Alt Right white guy who fears immigration or laments my loss of status in a changing culture. I have worked for and with LGBT, Women, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Natives and people from many other backgrounds. I have allways viewed themas equal partners. I have always worked to judge each person on their merit. We are a great culture. We are a culture with a great deal to learn and change. We can only do that when we approach subjects like histoiry honestly withou bias. This important fact is no longer consodered important at Back Story. I know propaganda when I see it. I do not look to Joseph Goebbels and Rush Limbaugh for history because they are biased. Sadly I now must put Back Story into the same bucket. This kind of yellow journalism is in my considered opinion is weak minded, dishonest and divisive. The editors at back story are doing more harm than good for the causes the seem to support. Saddly I Say Good Bye, Randy

I loved this show for about five years. I always wished US history had been taught this way in school. I listened to it during my commute, and I always felt like it made me understand how we came to be the way we are. But lately, the topics have turned far more liberally political with emphasis on how white people oppress black people. Yes, I understand slavery and reconstruction were terrible times for blacks, but US history has a much wider story than that, which is why I stopped subscribing. Sorry, American History Guys. You had a great thing going, but you lost it.

I have been listening to this podcast since I first heard it on our local NPR station. It just gets better and better. This season has been especially good. The subjects have not been traditionally historical. Instead, they are more inclined to be on Social Justice. The podcast is delivered by well educated and thoughtful historians and they give me material to think about. They stretch my horizons as any good class should.

Be advised all the hosts of this podcast are shrieking liberals. If you can get beyond that, the actual historical content is normally interesting and informative.

I’ve been listening to Backstory for about 2 1/2 years, and eagerly await every episode. I have replayed some of the episodes from archive also and really enjoy a multi century perspective on history. I especially enjoyed the episode about the Charlottesville neo nazi March, with a lot of local Charlottesville history as a big part of the story.

I love history and was super excited when I found this podcast and the extensive episode list. Unfortunately, this show is Heavily liberal and opinionated in the worst way. History is a subject where strong political bias is not welcome because you want to consider the past objectively. History is not a tool to push a political narrative. If you’re politically brainwashed this may just be the show for you. For the freethinkers of the world, this is a big thumbs down.

I appreciate the historical perspective the hosts bring to current events. Surprised to see criticism of their “liberal” views given fairly innocuous comments about what our founders, and historical figures would think of current trends.

I enjoyed this podcast until the liberal views and obvious bias host interject there opinions. Just stick to the facts and keep you political views out of the subjects.

Approaching American history with humor and respect, the Backstory hosts do a fantastic job of combining interesting narrative history and style with a hard and well researched take on the facts. Fills a rare niche in history podcasts in that it neither goes for “shocking/hardcore” narrative content that is ultimately familiar to most history readers, nor is it a bone dry series of lectures. Fantastic show.

The hosts can’t seem to separate their personal (liberal) opinions from facts. Why not try something crazy and add a conservative as a host? Oh right, you don’t know any. Unsubscribing