250 to 250: 63. Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section, Narrated by Patterson Hood

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: Trail of Tears, Narrated by Shana Bushyhead Condill

Patterson Hood is a writer and performer, best known as a co-founder and lead singer of the rock & roll band Drive-By Truckers. He is the son of musician David Hood, a founding member of the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. Here, Patterson celebrates the Swampers, the Muscle Shoals session musicians who crossed racial lines to create some of America's most iconic soul and rock records.

The Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section was called the Swampers.

• The group worked near Muscle Shoals, Alabama.
• Leon Russell gave them the nickname "the Swampers."
• They began making music in the 1960s.
• They played on many famous songs.
• The Swampers played with Black and White musicians.
• They helped make R&B, soul, rock, and country music.
• They recorded songs with Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Willie Nelson, Rod Stewart, and many others.
• The Rolling Stones also recorded music at their studio.
• The song "Sweet Home Alabama" mentions the Swampers.
• In 2013, a documentary film told the story of the Muscle Shoals music studio and its famous musicians.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 4:02. Is your current physical address also your current mailing address?
• USCIS 100:96 / 128:121. Why does the flag have 13 stripes?
• USCIS 100:97 / 128:122. Why does the flag have 50 stars?
• USCIS 100:98. / 128:123. What is the name of the national anthem?

Family Fun:

• Alabama Music Hall of Fame: Music From Muscle Shoals
• Country Music Hall of Fame: Muscle Shoals: Low Rhythm Rising: online exhibition |  playlist
• History Hunters: Muscle Shoals Sound Studio where Lynyrd Skynyrd & Others Recorded
• MSNHA: Roots of American Music Trail | Junior Ranger program: Music (bottom of the page) | Education (many resources)
• Musicians Hall of Fame & Museum: Swampers | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9

250 to 250: 62. Trail of Tears, Narrated by Shana Bushyhead Condill

 

 

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: Trail of Tears, Narrated by Shana Bushyhead Condill

Shana Bushyhead Condill is a citizen of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI), and Executive Director of the Museum of the Cherokee People in Cherokee, North Carolina. Shana Bushyhead Condill recounts the Trail of Tears, the brutal forced removal of Indigenous peoples whose survival remains a testament to Native resilience that endures today. ‪

In 1830, President Andrew Jackson signed the Indian Removal Act.

• The law forced many American Indian tribes to leave their homes.
• Many tribes lived in the southeastern United States.
• Soldiers forced families to travel to Indian Territory, now Oklahoma.
• The trip was long and very difficult.
• Many people became sick or died on the journey.
• This journey is called the Trail of Tears.
• The Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole were among the tribes that were forced to move.
• Some Native Americans stayed on their ancestral lands.
• Native American people kept their cultures and traditions alive.
• Today, Native American communities continue to honor their history and their ancestors.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 4:01b. What was your previous home address?
• USCIS 100:59. / 128:74.   Who lived in America before the Europeans arrived?
• USCIS 100:87. / 128:117. Name one American Indian tribe in the United States.

Family Fun:

• ARCGIS: Trail of Tears story maps
• Chickasaw Kids: Interactive games
• Choctaw Cultural Legacy: Activity Books
• Florida Museum: Seminole Patchwork
• Muscogee/Creek: Mvskoke Language Resources
• NMAI: Native Knowledge 360: American Indian Removal: What Does It Mean to Remove a People?
• NPS: Trail of Tears | maps | documentary | Junior Ranger Activity Book
• PBS Learning Media: Trail of Tears (lesson plans and resources)
• ReadWorks: The Louisiana Purchase and the Trail of Tears (login required)
• The Cherokee Holiday: Activity Books
• Urban Iskwew: Coloring Pages many pages in different tribal languages by Hawlii Pichette (Mushkego Cree)

250 to 250: 61. Miss America Pageant, Narrated by Katie Boyd

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: Miss America Pageant, Narrated by Katie Boyd

Katie Boyd is a world-renowned media personality, fitness and spiritual lifestyle coach, and founder of Katie Boyd’s Miss Fit Club. Boyd examines the Miss America pageant, whose century-long history reflects America's slow reckoning with women's rights and racial equality.

The Miss America Pageant began in 1921.

• It started in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
• The pageant helped bring visitors to the city.
• Women competed for prizes and scholarships.
• Many people liked the pageant.
• Other people said it was unfair to women.
• In 1968, women's rights activists protested the pageant.
• They wanted equal rights and respect for women.
• For many years, women of color could not compete fairly.
• In 1984, Vanessa Williams became the first Black Miss America.
• The pageant changed over time as American society changed.
• Today, the history of the Miss America Pageant shows the long fight for women's rights and equality.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 2:05. What is your sex?
• USCIS 100:77. What did Susan B. Anthony do?
• USCIS 128:99.   Name one leader of the women’s rights movement in the 1800s.
• USCIS 128:102. When did all women get the right to vote? 

Family Fun:

• JWA: Protest Social Media's Beauty Standards in the Name of the Freedom Trash Can
• Miss America: History
• Smithsonian Magagzine: Fifty Years Ago, Protesters Took on the Miss America Pageant and Electrified the Feminist Movement
• Valery Evangelin: 50 Years Apart: The Reconstruction of Freedom Trash Can in the 1968 Miss America Protest
• Note: Toss things into a freedom trash can that oppress you.
• Zyppy: Up Against the Wall Miss America (1968) - FULL SHORT DOCUMENTARY

250 to 250: 60. The Banjo, Narrated by Alison Brown

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: The Banjo, Narrated by Alison Brown

Alison Brown is a Grammy-award winning banjoist, co-founder of Compass Records and recovering investment banker. Brown traces the history of the banjo, from its roots in enslaved Africans' musical traditions to its lasting influence on American music.

Enslaved Africans brought music to the United States.

• They made instruments from gourds and wood.
• One of these instruments became the banjo.
• Many enslaved people played the banjo in the South.
• Music helped people remember their culture.
• In the 1800s, more Americans learned about the banjo.
• Soon, the banjo became a popular instrument.
• The banjo became important in jazz, folk, and bluegrass music.
• Many musicians still play the banjo today.
• Singer Pete Seager famously said about the banjo, "This instrument surrounds hate and forces it to surrender."
• The banjo is an important part of American music and history.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 3:02. What is your race?
• USCIS 100:60. / 128:75. What group of people was taken to America and sold as slaves?
• USCIS 100:84.  What movement tried to end racial discrimination?
• USCIS 128:112. What did the civil rights movement do?

Family Fun:

• African American Folklorist: Reclaiming the Banjo: Joe Zavaan Johnson and the Work of Black Musical Recovery
• BBRP: Black Banjo Reclamation Project
• Ballad of America: The Banjo: A History of America’s African Instrument - Folk+ 2025
• Black Music Project: The Roots of the Banjo
• NPS: The Banjo
• PBS In the Making: Hannah Mayree: Songs of Reclamation: Reclaiming the Banjo's Hidden Black History
• PBS and Reel South: Boil that Cabbage Down
• Rhiannon Giddens: What Did the Blackbird Say to the Crow | releases | Great Courses presentation
• Smithsonian Folkways: Black Banjo Songsters of North Carolina and Virginia playlist | buy
• Teach Rock: The Banjo, Slavery, and the Abolition Debate
• Vox: Why this instrument explains Black American folk music
• Woody Guthrie Center: Inside the WGC: Pete Seeger's Banjo | education
• Woody Guthrie famously scrawled "This Machine Kills Fascists" on some of his guitars and instrument, a message that the communal act of making music can stop those who seek to tear us apart. Woody's friend Pete Seeger had a similar message for what his banjo "machine" did: "This Machine Surrounds Hate and Forces it to Surrender."
1. Give students cardboard cutouts (or coloring pages) of guitars or banjos (or any instrument or machine).
2. Write your own: 'This machine phrase:' 
3. What's your machine/instrument and what it's going what's it going to fight for or against? 

250 to 250: 59. Fourteenth Amendment, Narrated by Sherrilyn Ifill

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: Fourteenth Amendment, Narrated by Sherrilyn Ifill

Dr. Sherrilyn Ifill is a nationally recognized civil rights attorney, expert, and scholar. Ifill is the former president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the founder and director of the 14th Amendment Center for Law & Democracy at Howard University School of Law. Ifill shows us the significance of the Fourteenth Amendment, which established that anyone born in the United States was automatically a citizen.

After the Civil War, the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution became part of the Constitution (1868).

• People born in the United States are U.S. citizens.
• States must follow the Constitution.
• States must treat people fairly.
• States must follow the law.
• States must protect people's rights.
• Congress can make laws to protect these rights.
• The Fourteenth Amendment helps protect freedom and equality.
• Today, the Fourteenth Amendment is an important part of the U.S. Constitution.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• USCIS Part 2:08. What is your country of birth?
• USCIS 100:12.  / 128:13. What is the “rule of law”?
• USCIS 128:97. What amendment says all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are U.S. citizens?

Family Fun:

• 14th Amendment Center: Resources
• ACLU of Illinois: ACLU Activity Book
• iCivics: Defining Citizenship - Teaching the Fourteenth Amendment
• Center for Civic Education: The 14th Amendment
• LOC: 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Primary Documents in American History
• National Archives: 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Civil Rights (1868)
• National Civil War Museum: The Civil War Amendments: The 14th Amendment and Birthright Citizenship
• NCC: What is the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment?
• NCC: How did the 14th Amendment and the process of incorporation transform the Bill of Rights?
• NMAAHC: Reconstructing Citizenship

250 to 250: 58. Carnegie Libraries, Narrated by Mayor Corey O’Connor

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: Carnegie Libraries, Narrated by Mayor Corey O’Connor

Corey O’Connor is the 62nd mayor of Pittsburgh with a highly-regarded political lineage. Mayor O’Connor and his wife, Katie, serve as official ambassadors for the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh’s summer reading program. Mayor O’Connor tells us how “robber baron” Andrew Carnegie gave much of his fortune to building almost 2,000 libraries across the United States.

Andrew Carnegie was born in Scotland.

• He came to the United States as a young boy.
• He left school and started working.
• He worked in a factory and as a telegraph boy.
• Later, he became very rich in the steel business.
• Carnegie gave money to build free public libraries.
• He helped build more than 1,600 libraries in the United States.
• He believed rich people should help others.
• He wanted more people to read and learn.
• Today, many people remember Andrew Carnegie for his libraries and his gifts to education.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 7:01. List where and when you have worked or attended school full- time or part- time during the last 5 years.
• USCIS 100:11. / 128:12.  What is the economic system in the United States?*
• USCIS 128:118. Name one example of an American innovation

Family Fun:

• ALA: Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence
• Andrew Carnegie Foundation: Great Immigrants, Great Americans: The Comic Series | video playlist | Democracy playlist
• Carmel Clay Public Library: Carnegie Funded-Library coloring page
• NPS: Carnegie Libraries: The Future Made Bright (Teaching with Historic Places)
• PBS: American Experience: Andrew Carnegie
• Wikipedia: List of Carnegie libraries in the United States

250 to 250: 57. Gettysburg Address, Narrated by Governor JB Pritzker

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: Gettysburg Address, Narrated by Governor JB Pritzker

Governor JB Pritzker is Illinois’ 43rd Governor, elected in 2018 and reelected in 2022 with the highest vote share for any Democratic governor in more than 60 years. During his tenure, he has overcome years of fiscal mismanagement and made historic investments in education, healthcare, and economic opportunity while working to ensure Illinois remains a beacon of civil rights and freedom for the nation.

The American Civil War was fought between the Union and the Confederacy.

• On November 19, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln gave a speech at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
• The speech is called the Gettysburg Address.
• Lincoln spoke to about 15,000 people.
• The speech honored the soldiers who died in the Battle of Gettysburg.
• Lincoln said the nation must continue their work.
• He reminded Americans that all people are created equal.
• He hoped the country would have "a new birth of freedom."
• He said the government should be "of the people, by the people, for the people."
• Lincoln wanted the United States to stay united and free.
• Today, the Gettysburg Address is one of the most famous speeches in American history.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 9:34. Are you willing to take the full Oath of Allegiance to the United States?
• USCIS 100:75. What was one important thing that Abraham Lincoln did?*
• USCIS 128:94. Abraham Lincoln is famous for many things. Name one. *

Family Fun:

• Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum: The Gettysburg Address playlist
• American Battlefield Trust: The Gettysburg Address: The Two-Minute Speech That Saved America | Augmented Reality
• Coloring Book Fun: Lincoln and the Gettysburg Address coloring page
• Illinois: Lincoln Historical Preservation Sites
• LOC: Gettysburg Address Online Exhibition
• NMAH: Gettysburg Address interactive exhibit
• NPS: Gettysburg National Military Park | Junior Ranger Activity Guide
• PBS: The Address by Ken Burns (The Address follows a group of students with special needs, such as dyslexia and ADHD as they prepare to recite the Gettysburg Address--very inspirational!) (stream or borrow the DVDs from your library)
• PBS: The Civil War by Ken Burns (10 part series--stream or borrow the DVDs from your library)
• USCIS: A More Perfect Union series: The Civics Test Guide to the Lincoln Memorial
• VOA News: 150th Anniversary of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address Marked at Battlefield

250 to 250: 56. “The Star-Spangled Banner,” Narrated by Sarah Longwell

Heather Cox Richardson and 250 to 250: “The Star-Spangled Banner,” Narrated by Sarah Longwell

Sarah Longwell is publisher of The Bulwark, host of The Focus Group podcast, and bestselling author of "How to Eat an Elephant: One Voter at a Time," releasing this fall. Longwell tells us how the British bombardment of Baltimore’s Fort McHenry in 1814 inspired our national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

The War of 1812 was fought between the United States and Great Britain.

• On September 13, 1814, the British attacked Fort McHenry.
• The fort protected the port of Baltimore.
• The attack lasted through the night.
• Francis Scott Key watched the battle.
• The next morning, he saw the American flag still flying over the fort.
• He was happy that the United States had defended the fort.
• He wrote a poem called "The Star-Spangled Banner."
• Later, the poem was set to music.
• Many Americans liked the song.
• In 1931, Congress made "The Star-Spangled Banner" the national anthem of the United States.
• Today, Americans sing the national anthem at many public events.

POP Interview and Civics Quiz:

• N-400 Part 9:35. If the law requires it, are you willing to bear arms (carry weapons) on behalf of the United States?
• USCIS 100:53. What is one promise you make when you become a United States citizen?
• USCIS 128:67. Name two promises that new citizens make in the Oath of Allegiance. 
• USCIS 100:98. /128:123. What is the name of the national anthem?

Family Fun:

• Ben's Guide: Star-Spangled Banner: 1814
• LOC: Star Spangled Banner | resources
• NPS: Fort McHenry | Junior Ranger Activity Booklet
• NMAH: Star-Spangled Banner
• uscitizenpod: Happy National Anthem Day! | USCIS 128:123. What is the name of the national anthem? | A Citizenship Quiz for Flag Day
• Visit the Capitol: H.R. 14, An Act To make The Star-Spangled Banner the national anthem of the United States of America, April 21, 1930