Oh What A Time... - #36 Presidents (Part 2)

Episode Date: April 8, 2024

This is Part 2! For Part 1, check the feed from yesterday! This week we’re taking a look at a whole host of US Presidents; Theodore Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, Andrew Jackson and the Full Timers will this week get America’s second (and basically forgotten) president John Adams. And can you imagine playing drum and bass to a medieval peasant? What other tunes would you like to play to a medieval peasant?! To get in touch about that or anything else, drop us an email to: [e-mail] If you're impatient and want both parts in one lovely go next time plus a whole lot more(!), why not treat yourself and become an Oh What A Time: FULL TIMER? In exchange for your £4.99 per month to support the show, you'll get: - the 4th part of every episode and ad-free listening - episodes a week ahead of everyone else - a bonus episode every month - And first dibs on any live show tickets Subscriptions are available via AnotherSlice, Apple and Spotify. For all the links head to: ohwhatatime.com You can follow us on:  X (formerly Twitter) at @ohwhatatimepod And Instagram at @ohwhatatimepod Aaannnd if you like it, why not drop us a review in your podcast app of choice? Thank you to Dan Evans for the artwork (idrawforfood.co.uk). We'll see you next week! Chris, Elis and Tom x Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Eligibility and member terms apply. Looking for a collaborator for your career? A strong ally to support your next level success? You will find it at York University School of Continuing Studies, where we offer career programs purpose-built for you. Visit continue.yorku.ca. Hi, guys, and welcome to the second part of our Oh What A Time American Presidents episode. Later in the section we'll be talking about Lyndon Johnson who is a president who

achieved incredible things but is also hated by a lot of people to this day. First of all though Ellis is going to be telling us all about a fascinating guy called Andrew Jackson. Now, I'm going to discuss Andrew Jackson, President Andrew Jackson, the seventh president. Now, if you've ever heard of him, especially if you're maybe from the UK and you haven't studied American politics, and you have heard of him, it might be thanks to an episode of The West Wing when Leo McGarry says,

in the main foyer of his White House, he had a big block of cheese. The block of cheese was huge, over two tonnes. I was there for any and all who might be hungry. That's a great party, by the way. That's amazing. Yeah. Obviously, the research is written for us by our brilliant historian,

Dr. Darren Leaworthy. So I looked this up. This is true. Is it? Yeah. Two early presidents, so Andrew Jackson and Thomas Jefferson, received gifts of enormous blocks of cheese.

So both gigantic cheeses were intended to convey a symbolic message. The one was celebratory, while the other sort of reflected political and religious squabbling in early America. Difficult to do with cheese, but they managed it. So Andrew Jackson's is the better-known enormous White House cheese.

It was presented to him on New Year's Day 1836, and it had been created by a prosperous dairy farmer from New York State, Colonel Thomas Meacham. New Year's Day, by the way, is a bit annoying. You need that over Christmas, really, don't you? Yeah, absolutely. It's the wrong time to get a massive bit of cheese. Yeah.

Where were you? We could have done with this on Boxing Day. They're like two weeks out. Yeah, exactly. It would have been really useful a fortnight ago. When the cheese was served, there arose an exceedingly strong smell, Yeah, exactly. It would have been really useful a fortnight ago. Jackson left office two weeks later and the new occupant of the White House, Martin Van Buren, banned the serving of food at White House receptions because crumbs from Jackson's mammoth cheese had fallen into the carpet and had been trampled by the crowd. Which is exactly the kind of thing that used to really annoy my dad about people eating in the living room. He was like, it will just get trampled.

Crumbs will get trampled into the carpet. You know that situation now, by the way. You exchange keys on a place and you move in and the person you've either renting from or you've just bought the place from,

they haven't moved their stuff out. Yeah. There's like a bike in the corridor or stuff in the shed. Yeah, yeah. The idea of going

into the front room and there's a massive block of cheese that you can't get through the door. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That weighs over two tonnes. Van Buren's time

in the White House was plagued by lots of problems and it got off to an awful start because the mansion smelled of cheese for months, right? But Andrew Jackson's a very complicated person. He's got a very stained reputation now, which has been used to justify everything, oddly, from the New Deal

to the more sort of make America great again populism of Donald Trump. Because, for instance, I think he's most known now, certainly by kids going through the American education system at the moment, for the last 50 years or so, he's known as the person who, it was during his presidency that Native Americans were forcibly displaced from their lands and forced west.

Oh, right. It was an act of ethnic cleansing now known as the Trail of Tears. So he obviously, he really polarises opinion. Now, he was born in the Carolinas in 1767, during the last years of British colonial rule. His own family came from Scotland by the north of Ireland. Now, even as a young man, Andrew Jackson had a temper. And I was reading about this and I thought to myself,

if your temper is being written about by historians 250 years later, it must have been a bad temper. Yeah, absolutely. If your temper is making Wikipedia pages two and a half centuries later. Do you think he was warned about that? Yeah. When he was losing his rag. Just be aware that people will be podcasting about this in 250 years' time.

So do. Things stick around. You get a rep. It's like telling people to chill out. Never works, is it? No one ever... When you say, oh, come on, chill out, no one ever goes, do I? I am chilled, actually.

It kept him away from the ministry, which was sort of the job intended for him by his parents. So he took up arms. He served in the Continental Army against the British, which suited him, ruled through the ranks, became a major general. With the war over, an American now independent, he settled into civilian life, began legal studies.

That's what you want out of your solicitor, isn't it? Temper. Yeah. A livid solicitor. Yeah. And that was convenient because he was prone to invoking duels whenever he felt his character had been impugned.

Amazing. Most were not in any way life-threatening because often the pistols were fired into the air as if figuratively letting off steam. But they did occasionally take on a more serious character. But in 1806, he came face to face with death. So his opponent on that occasion was Charles Dickinson,

a fellow lawyer from Tennessee. And the duel was called when Dickinson insulted Jackson's wife, Rachel. So the two met with their pistols on the 30th of May 1806, just across the border in Kentucky, because dueling was illegal in tennessee wow imagine that you think just our dueling's illegal in i don't know command and

chelsea then we'll just we'll just go to keratogion just cross the border do you think you have to accept a duel what's what's the rules on it i suppose it's just considered to be completely emasculating whatever yeah and honor all the sort of stuff i think i don't have any honor so someone said, do you want to do me? I would go, no. And they'd say, what about your honour?

I'd be like, I'm fine with that. It doesn't bother me, mate. So they stepped across the border. Yeah. Andrew Jackson had concocted a strategy. He thought,

I'll allow Dickinson to fire the first shot, hopefully in a confused state, and then that would enable him to get a mortal blow off and impeded. Because it was risky because Dickinson was an expert marksman and an accomplished duelist. hopefully in a confused state, and then that would enable him to get a mortal blow-off and impede it. Because it was risky, because Dickinson was an expert marksman and an accomplished duelist.

That feels risky. So just to be clear, so he's saying, I'm going to let the first guy shoot and hope he misses, and then in the calm that follows that, I'll just pick him off. So the bullet he fired lodged into Jackson's chest after breaking several ribs, settled close to his heart, missed the organ, vital organ, but in a position that made an operation to remove the bullet impossible.

Oh, God. So Jackson carried it inside him for the rest of his life. So with Dickinson's shot fired, Jackson was now able to take his own. He too hit his opponent in the chest, and Dickinson bled to death in the dueling field. No! And it left Jackson's reputation in tatters. That's incredible.

Because they were like, you've murdered him, mate. That's not on. And this was prior to him becoming president. Yeah. Imagine the idea of it coming out in the press that Rishi Sunak once killed someone in a duel. That would be big on the socials, wouldn't it? Now, his reputation did recover during the War of 1812,

which saw the US in another round of conflict with Britain, the old enemy. So he led the American invasion of Florida and was appointed the first American administrator of the territory in 1821. Now, by 1823, he was a member of the US Senate representing Tennessee and was thought of as a potential candidate for the presidency. So in 1824, he ran against John Quincy Adams

for that office, winning both the popular vote and the Electoral College college but there was a problem no single candidate had won a majority so the House of Representatives held a contingent election early in 1825 with each state given one delegate and this result handed Adams

the presidency because he had secured 13 delegates and Jackson only 7 so Jackson complained of a stitch-up and thought, right, I'm going to make it my business to win next time around. So the 1828 general election, it was bitter and it was acrimonious. Yeah. Jackson undertook an awful lot of dodgy campaigning,

and he sort of aired it in public. It was aired in public by pamphleteers and propagandists. So he developed a system of professional campaigning with stump speeches, press junkets, and then public ceremonials. So he was kissing babies and he had a campaign song. Oh. So he pioneered the use of music in 1824.

He repeated it in 1828, both times using the Hunters of Kentucky, which was a very popular song during this period, as his musical identity. Tell you what that makes me think of is like Blair. Oh, yes. Or Labour in general, really, more than the Tories here now. It's just the idea of that soundtrack political campaign,

which is something very much here now. Yeah, because obviously it was D. Reams' Things Can Only Get Better. Things Can Only Get Better. Yeah, exactly. That's the one that sticks in my mind. And they made friends with, you know, Noel Gallagher and people like that.

Yeah, this is sort of in probably the 1997 election. That feels so much earlier than I would imagine that would happen. Yeah, the 1820s. The, this is sort of in probably the 1997 election. That feels so much earlier than I would imagine that would happen. Yeah, the 1820s. The optics of some kind of like, I suppose it's marketing around a campaign,

which is something I would imagine to be a far more modern trend in politics than then. The idea of having a song as part of your campaign and, you know, all these sorts,

that's fascinating. So Adams thought, all right then, well, if he's using songs, I'll use a song. So he tried his best with a song of his own called Little Know Ye Who's Coming. And the lyrics were basically a hatchet job of Jackson's personality and character.

Fires are coming, swords are coming, pistols, guns and knives are coming. But it didn't work. So Jackson won a landslide. Oh. 178 electoral college votes, 15 states, more than 55% of the ballots cast. Wow. But a few weeks later, his wife died. Rachel Jackson died.

It plunged him into this dark mood and he threatened revenge on all who'd cast aspersions on her during the election campaign. Yeah, he did have a temper, didn't he? Clearly. Yeah. This isn't ideal. So the 1828 election had ushered in this new era in American politics and led to the creation of the Democratic Party.

So the anti-Jacksonians temporarily organized into the National Republican Party, but not yet the Republican Party of today. They were lampooning their opponents as pack animals ridden by a jackass, which is a sort of play on Jackson. And that gave rise to the eventual emblem of the Democrats, a donkey. So in his two terms in office, rise to the eventual emblem of the Democrats, a donkey. So in his two terms in office, he gained the upper hand of Congress. He vetoed more legislation than any other incumbent. He expanded the electorate, a great thing,

although obviously it was only to white men over the age of 21. So there was a time when he was seen amongst the best of presidents, but now he's most famous for a horrific act of ethnic cleansing. Right. Which was true in his lifetime. Yeah.

But I mean, dueling. I just cannot imagine a time where your politicians would be doing that kind of, or had done that stuff. Maybe back then there was also a value to, even if it hadn't happened, claiming you'd once killed a man in a duel. Because if anything, he's going to make sure you get your motions through.

Yeah. That people are going to listen to you. Oh, he's going to make sure you get your motions through. Yeah. That people are going to listen to you. Oh, you're going to vote me? Whatever. I don't know. I haven't really thought about it, really. Probably the way... Just mention what are you...

Which way are you leaning? Oh, that's funnily... Yeah, funnily enough, me too. It's a new day. How can you make the most of it with your membership rewards points? Earn points on everyday purchases. Use them for that long-awaited vacation. You can earn points almost anywhere, and they never expire.

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baseball, whatever the moment, it's never ordinary at Bet365. Must be 19 or older, Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you or someone you know has concerns about gambling, visit connectsontario.ca. So I'm going to talk to you now about someone you mentioned you've studied before and one of the most divisive figures in American politics, Lyndon Johnson.

So you say you've studied him a bit at A-level, is that right? A little bit, a long time ago, yeah. Okay. How did you do in your A-levels? Let's just find out what sort of level of...

I got a B. Nice, that's good. It's good. But then you studied history at university, didn't you? I did, yeah. So. How did you do on your A-levels? Let's just find out what sort of level of... I got a B. Nice, that's good. It's good. But then you studied history at university, didn't you? I did, yeah. So obviously it must have been sort of... I imagine quite a high B. On the outskirts of an A.

Let's just go with that. Let's just say I'd done an exam and I had a very, very tempting offer from Cardiff University. So I sort of took my foot off the gas when it came to the AMI level. Exactly. When the big guns come calling. Yeah. Then you can just, you can relax.

And did I thank them for the faith they showed in me at the age of 17? No, of course I didn't. Because I went on the piss for three years. But let's not let that get in the way. It was a different time. So Lyndon Johnson, for those of you who don't way it was a different time so lyndon johnson for those who don't know was a democrat he was from texas and he went on to become president now of course the idea of a democrat candidate from texas who goes on to become president is quite a rare thing in fact

texas only ever had two presidents who've achieved that and he achieved incredible things. However, as you'll know, Al, his name will forever be tainted. So Johnson was born in 1908 on the family ranch near a small town called Stonewall. Now, when you imagine a family ranch in 1908, what are you imagining that sort of lifestyle is like? What are you thinking that is, Al? Lassoes. Yeah, this is what I'm thinking. Sitting on a veranda and shooting cans with a gun.

Doing that thing where you're chewing tobacco and then spitting into a bucket. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Maybe it's deflecting off something before going into the bucket. That's what normally happens in the movies, isn't it? Huge amounts of wheat. Yeah, exactly. Sounds quite nice, actually. It's rocking chairs and sort of sunrises.

That's what I'm imagining. Quite pleasant. Well, for Johnson, it wasn't pleasant. For Johnson, this life meant a life of serious deep poverty his home had no running water no electricity the soil was completely unsuited to scratching a living they couldn't basically basically struggle to make anything from the land it's fascinating thinking of life without those basics i mean which of those do you think you'd miss most so think about this kind of electric light running water central heating what do you

think you're struggling with most? Water. If you're a plunge, yeah, it is that, isn't it? Yeah. The simple thing of having to travel to get water, which probably wasn't even clean. At best, it's scoop from a well. Yeah. Not having that basic thing.

But his life, he grew up in a home where he had none of these things. But this difficult start to life would inform his political outlook. And it gave him quite a deep sensitivity to the plight of the poor. Now his interest in politics set in early. His father was a democratic member of the Texas House of Representatives and so from a young age Lyndon would help him campaign across the state of which Lyndon described he said sometimes I just wish the campaigning would go on forever and in fact at the age of 10 this is a 10-year-old, Lyndon even began accompanying his father to the capital in Austin to watch floor debates, listen to behind-the-scenes deal-making and collect political gossip.

Now, he was a dweeb. And he is who I'm basing the lead character on in my new sitcom, President Dweeb, where a dweeb finally takes office. Talk me through the story. So I'm imagining he looks like a normal president, but he's got a little bit of black sellotape in the middle of his glasses. Is that right? Oh, yeah.

And maybe a bow tie. And his shoes are on the wrong feet. And he's got a little dweeb voice. Yeah. And he's been pushed around, but he's not going to get pushed around in the White House. However, whenever he has to speak to a female member of the Senate, he completely crumples. He wets himself.

Oh my goodness, mate. Oh God, can you see that patch? By the way, absolutely would watch that. If Netflix made a film called President Dweeb, it would be the most successful movie ever put on Netflix. Of course it would. An hour and a half of a dweeb of a president who's unable to speak to people. It would follow the classic shape of a drama

aimed at, say, a 10 or 11-year-old in that he's a dweeb and he struggles because of his dweebiness. But then in the last three minutes, his dweebiness is the thing that means he wins. Oh, that's really nice. I like that. Maybe aliens come down.

Yeah, yeah. And they actually, they're about to start a war because of the sort of toxic masculinity that seems to be evident. And then they meet President Dweeb. He's actually quite a soothing, self-deprecating influence. And the aliens solve climate change on our behalf. And if there'd been an alpha in the White House,

we'd all burn to death. But because it's President Dweeb, it actually turns out all right in here. Genuinely, if Netflix or Amazon are listening, we're willing to do this. Yeah. You put up the money, Ellen and I will write it. President Dweeb.

And at the end, he's in the Oval Office and everyone's laughing and they're all slapping him on the back. And then they slap him on the back too hard and he goes, Ow! And that's the final... That's the final noise of the episode. No!

Ow! Roll credits. Love it. Absolutely backing that. So, President Dweeb, as you describe him, he loved politics from the age of 10. And his fascination with politics grew and grew. And in 1931, President Dweeb was made a legislative secretary for Richard Kleberg,

who was a Texan member of the House of Representatives. So this is his first proper job in politics. And just a year later, he found himself immersed in the electoral campaign, which saw Franklin D. Roosevelt enter the White House for the first time now this was a crucial period for him because it formed a relationship which would then lead to his first real seismic job and that was being appointed the head of the National Youth Administration for Texas in 1933 now this was a big job the N.Y.A. as it's called had been established by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, and it basically provided education and training for young people who would be paid between $10 and $25 to attend the scheme.

And by the end of it, just after the Second World War, four and a half million young people had been given new skills. And the N.Y.A. was notable for its racial inclusivity as well. So it was a really progressive thing. And such success meant that Johnson's name was immediately made. He became this person who was the face of something in Texas which had incredible value, incredible social value, so much so that in 1937 he resigned and ran for Congress. It all sort of picked up pace very, very quickly. As a member of Congress, first in the House and later in the Senate, Johnson proved himself to be a shrewd politician, ensuring that his stock continued to rise, so much so that in 1954, he was acknowledged as the majority leader of the Democratic Party in the US Senate, establishing himself as a possible presidential candidate one day so he's about 46 by this point yes i think that is about right yeah and he was incredibly effective as a senate leader in fact many people believe that he's basically the most

effective senate leader america has ever had because he knew when to support a measure when to flatter when to leak something to regain loyalty and this is my favorite thing i want to hear your views on this when to deliver something as he described it the treatment that's what he called it now would you like to guess what the treatment was this is one of his ways of getting things over the line and i'd like you to remember he's six foot four when when just in fact that information is physically intimidating members of congress because this obviously happens in parliament as well you know whips yeah physically intimidating well he really took it to a new level uh linden would lean into someone he'd square up with his face merely millimeters from there so he'd put

his nose like a millimeter from your nose okay i would and then he i would kiss him it's happened i can't believe it roll credits end of movie one movie two's the aliens okay we'll put this first with his nose one millimeter from your nose he would then mimic you he'd do impressions of your voice he would flatter you but in a sort of sarcastic way he'd more to the point he'd insult you but he would not move until your resolve collapsed so is this working on you a six foot four man who is the president with his nose a millimeter from yours just taking the piss out of you until you accept whatever he's going for that would destroy me yeah absolutely that would destroy me the mimicry more than anything not only would i back whatever he's going for the next day i would leave politics

yeah i go well i'm a teacher now that's all i'd say however there was a consequence to this his sort of full-on approach to interactions and his unwillingness to take time off coupled with and these are the crucial things i think really in this uh 60 a day cigarette habit and just a love of booze did take its toll on johnson as just one year into his job in the senate he suffered a heart attack age 46 once again i think if i had a heart attack after one year of a new job i think i just i'm gonna do something else yeah i might learn to paint or something obviously nowadays you have to leave your desk if you want a cigarette because you're unable, it's illegal to smoke indoors. Yeah. So you could not or it'd be very difficult

to sustain a 60 cigarette a day habit. Yes. Because you'd constantly be up and down, wouldn't you? I've never thought about that. But when you could smoke at your desk. They didn't have those sort of like weird bus shelter things outside the Oval Office that you could go out to. There's nothing to stop you just chain smoking at the typewriter, is there?

Yeah. So he had a heart attack at age 46, one year into the job, but he didn't quit. He went on to steer through Congress some truly landmark... Did he do a sort of a mocking high voice to the heart attack? Oh, you're making my chest hurt mimicking the ecg monitor and this is why he's so divisive as we'll cover he didn't leave and he did steer through congress some incredibly important legislation like incredibly important namely the civil rights

act of 1957 and 1960 which paved the way for more radical equal rights amendments of the 60s including the voting rights act of 1965 and the civil rights act of 1964 and 68 now these are these are massive things like levelers for society and taking out sort of things which were systemically awful inequalities in american society and just five years later he found himself in the running to be the Democratic nominee for the president. Now, he did lose that. He lost out to John F. Kennedy. But JFK shrewdly picked Lyndon Johnson to be his running mate after Lyndon had lost, chiefly to secure the support of Southern Democrats and more conservative elements of the Democratic vote.

And then in the general election kennedy johnson won a narrow victory against vice president richard nixon one that probably wouldn't have happened had johnson not appeared on the democratic ticket with jfk yeah and then in 1963 he becomes president now this occurs after jfk is assassinatedinated in Dallas where in the role of president although he championed reforms to education health care gun control he steered the American space program towards its goal putting a man on the moon he found himself with one poison chalice now do you know what that poison chalice is what's what's the thing that marks him and really has completely ruined his reputation Vietnam exactly the war in, which was a foreign policy decision

which was undertaken by his predecessors and won his reputation, basically struggled to outmanoeuvre. So much so that when he finally left the White House in 1969, Johnson was a completely broken man. He took up smoking again. He drank heavily. He let his hair grow long

and he began writing his memoir before dying of a heart attack, which was, this is staggering, his fourth heart attack since 1955. Bloody hell. On the 22nd of January, 1973. Because it started in 1955, didn't it, the Vietnam War? So they were sort of eight years in by the time he became president. Exactly. And it carried on until 1975.

It did. 20 years they were fighting in Vietnam. It's absolutely horrific. But it's the thing that marked him and his legacy, really. And so much of his sort of social policies forgotten because of that. And he died only age 64. So a young man after all that. It's incredible. He's kind of a complicated guy. He's a complicated guy. But coming from that point of absolute destitution, a life where there's no water, there's no electricity, your family can't farm the land to become president,

whatever you think is really quite an amazing achievement. So that is the end of our American Presidents episode. Unless, of course, you are an Oh What what a time full timer a subscriber to the show in which case there's a fourth part ready and waiting for you just now and if you want to listen to that part and you're not a subscriber it's so so easy for 4.99 a month you can get an extra episode every month you get a bonus part of history at the end of every single episode we release each week and you'll get those episodes a week early there are no adverts if you're a subscriber and also you'll get first dibs on live tickets for when we do live shows in the future and that is very much the plan if you want to do that you can look on your app scroll down and click be it

spotify apple whatever way you do it or you can go to owattatime.com and all the information on how to become a subscriber is there. This final part for subscribers is on John Adams. Ellis is going to be telling us all about this fascinating guy who is the second ever president of America, but has somehow been forgotten to history. Well worth a listen. In whatever way you support the show, we really appreciate it thank you so much for joining us again have a lovely week we'll see you guys soon bye Thank you.