Amanda Bellows is a U.S. historian who teaches at The New School, a university in New York City. She is the author of American Slavery and Russian Serfdom in the Post-Emancipation Imagination, and a new book that is the subject of this interview, The Explorers: A New History of America in Ten Expeditions. Amanda received her Ph.D. in History from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The Explorers is a series of biographical essays of people most of you have heard of – Sacagawea, John Muir, and Amelia Earhart – and people most of you haven’t heard of – James Beckwourth, Matthew Henson and William Sheppard – sewn together with the common theme of exploration. The book had come recommended to me by a couple of fans of the podcast so I jumped at the chance to have Amanda on.  I learned a lot from The Explorers, and of course have a link in the show notes on the website if you want to buy it after hearing our conversation.

Books mentioned in the episode (Commission earned)

Amanda Bellows, The Explorers: A New History of America in Ten Expeditions

Roderick Frazier Nash, Wilderness and the American Mind

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Errata: Jean Nicolet went to Green Bay in 1634, not 1624 as I said toward the end of the episode.