Rick Atkinson on What We Get Wrong About the Founding
June 30, 2026
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52:08Now PlayingRick Atkinson on What We Get Wrong About the Founding
YouTube Description
as posted by the channelWe grew up with the founders embalmed in reverence — a bloodless revolution, marble men, and stupid lobster-backs lined up to be shot. Rick Atkinson, two volumes into his Revolution Trilogy, is here to complicate all of it. We talked with him about the violent civil war at the heart of the founding, why the most powerful empire on earth lost, and how a historian decides who in the archive is telling the truth.
Topics discussed:
• The Revolution as America's first civil war
• Why Britain — with the world's greatest navy — couldn't win
• Reliable narrators, frauds, and how history actually gets written
• The human cost of war, from Valley Forge to "remember the ladies"
• American exceptionalism at 250, and why Atkinson stays optimistic
Resources mentioned:
The Fate of the Day by Rick Atkinson
The British Are Coming by Rick Atkinson
John Adams by David McCullough
The American Revolution (Ken Burns, PBS)
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=== COVER PHRASE OPTIONS (thumbnail only — do NOT publish in description) ===
- This Nation Was Born Bickering
- The Revolution We Misremember
- "America Is Beyond Your Reach"
- It Was a Civil War
- Born Bickering
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