Benjamin A. Railton's Blog, page 13

July 2, 2025: Models of Critical Patriotism: Standing Bear

[As theauthor of a book onthe contested history of American patriotism, every day of 2025 feels strikinglyrelevant. So for this year’s July 4th series, I wanted to share& expand on excerpts from that book that feature models of criticalpatriotism from across our history, leading up to a weekend request for furtherconversations!]

On two 2025takeaways from one of our most important and inspiring court rulings.

The book excerpt:“[HelenHunt] Jackson experienced her own version of that shift in understandingtoward justice for Native Americans, as she was brought into the cause afterhearing a speech by the Ponca chief turned civil rights activist Standing Bear (Mantcunanjin;c. 1829–1908). Standing Bear’s Ponca tribe had been removed from their Nebraskahomeland to “Indian Territory” (modern-day Oklahoma) in 1877, after decades ofconflicts with white settlers and the U.S. army; when Standing Bear attemptedto return to that homeland in order to bury his son, who had passed away fromstarvation in that hostile new setting, he was arrested by General George Crookfor having left the reservation. With the help of SusetteLaFlesche, an Omaha Native American interpreter, and her husband ThomasTibbles, a journalist and reformer, Standing Bear sued for a writ of habeascorpus. The StandingBear v. Crook trial (1879) represented the first time a Native Americanwas allowed to advocate for his rights in a court of law, and Standing Beartook advantage of the opportunity, delivering a critical patriotic final speechin which he both defined himself as part of a national community and appealeddirectly to the judge’s commitment to American ideals: “[My] hand is not thecolor of yours, but if I prick it, the blood will flow, and I shall feel pain.The blood is of the same color as yours. God made me, and I am a man…I see thelight of the world and of liberty just ahead…But in the center of the paththere stands a man…If that man gives me the permission, I may pass on to lifeand liberty. If he refuses, I must go back and sink beneath the flood…You arethat man.” JudgeElmer Dundy ruled in Standing Bear’s favor, establishing as precedent thatNative Americans were entitled to full legal personhood and thus civil rightsunder the law; in his decision the judge also symbolically and crucially linkedNative Americans to founding American ideals, writing that they “have theinalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It was acrucial victory, and one that, like Standing Bear’s voice and advocacy, wouldfor years to come shiftAmerican conversations as well as influence activists like Jackson.”

In his 1776pamphlet Common Sense, Tom Paine wrote that “in America the law isking. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries thelaw ought to be King; and there ought to be no other.” In this firstyear of the second Trump administration, we’ve seen a president and his supporters(and, perhaps worst of all, his Congressional enablers) push, far further thanin any prior moment in post-Revolutionary American history, toward a genuinelyand horrifyingly monarchical chief executive—which has meant and will continueto mean that one of the central means of resistance to those forces has to beprecisely what Paine identified, the law. And that, in turn, means that we mustdepend on judges to make decisions that both follow and enforce the law and atthe same time embody our ideals—not an easy combination, as of course too oftenour laws have fallen far short of our ideals; but still a crucial goal, and onethat Judge Dundy’s 1879 ruling exemplifies as well as any judicial figure anddecision ever have.

Butimportant and inspiring as Judge Dundy was in that moment, he was nonetheless thesecond most important and inspiring voice at that trial (a point with which Iknow he would fully agree). StandingBear’s statement, including but not limited to the above quoted section, isnot just one of the most eloquent ever expressed in a courtroom; it’s also a reminderthat one of the reasons our founding and Constitutionalright to a trial by jury is so crucial is that it gives every American thechance to express their own voice and perspective, to advocate for themselvesand their equality under the law. Which is why one of the most monarchical andhorrifying policies of the 2nd Trump administration has been thekidnapping and human trafficking of Americans without allowing them this rightand opportunity—and for anyone who would respond that the right and opportunityis afforded only to citizens, I would note that Standing Bear was not a U.S.citizen, and thank Law he still got the chance to share his voice and make hiscase.

Nextpatriotic model tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Models of patriotism you’d share?

July 1, 2025: Models of Critical Patriotism: David Walker

[As theauthor of abook on the contested history of American patriotism, every day of 2025feels strikingly relevant. So for this year’s July 4th series, Iwanted to share & expand on excerpts from that book that feature models ofcritical patriotism from across our history, leading up to a weekend request forfurther conversations!]

On a fierywork and voice that exemplify the “critical” in critical patriotism.

The bookexcerpt: “In the same year that [William] Apesspublished his autobiography, another young Bostonian firebrand launched hisown critical patriotic broadside against American myths and exclusions. DavidWalker (1796–1830) was born in Wilmington, North Carolina to an enslavedfather (who died before his birth) and a free mother, making him legally freebut deeply tied to and affected by the system of slavery. As an adult he movedto Charleston, South Carolina and then Philadelphia, joining the groundbreakingAfrican Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in both cities, before settling in themid-1820s in Boston’s BeaconHill neighborhood, a haven for free African Americans. He became over thenext few years a leading voice, in that Bostonian community and throughout theNorth, for abolitionism, civil rights, and the development of a thrivingcommercial and social scene for the African American community, such as in hisrole as a contributor to the nation’s first black-owned newspaper, Freedom’sJournal. And in September 1829 he published a book, Walker’sAppeal, in Four Articles; Together with a Preamble, to the Colored Citizens ofthe World, but in Particular, and Very Expressly, to Those of the United Statesof America.

As thatlong title indicates, Walker directly modeled his Appeal upon theU.S. Constitution, beginning with a Preamble and moving through four Articles.In many ways the book embodies the critical side of critical patriotism, layingout the case for Walker’s opening assertion, offered to his “Dearly belovedBrethren and Fellow Citizens,” that “we (colored people of the United States)are the most degraded, wretched, and abject set of beings that ever lived sincethe world began.” The Articles trace four root causes of that state, fourinterconnected forms of oppression and exclusion that Walker demands that allAmericans face head on; he does so in a style that combines passion,exemplified by his frequent capitalizations, italics, and exclamation points, withnuanced logic and argumentation. But the very creation of his text, as well asits direct parallels to the Constitution, embodies a critical patrioticchallenge to the nation’s celebratory and mythic ideals. And in his conclusionWalker takes that work one step further, quoting at length the opening of theDeclaration of Independence and then exclaiming, “See your DeclarationAmericans!!! Do you understand your own language?”

As thosebrief quotations from Walker’s book illustrate, his is one of the most extreme (if,as I hope would go without saying, entirely justified and righteous) voices Iinclude in the book and in my category of critical patriotism. While thecritical patriotism of a contemporary and fellow firebrand like WilliamApess leaned a bit more into unity and love, that is (not surprisinglygiven Apess’s work as atraveling Christian minister), David Walker’s variety most definitelyemphasized the “critical.” Such voices and perspectives can be harder foraudiences to hear, especially our frustratingly fragile white American audiences(then and now), leading all too easily to dismissals of “angryBlack men” and the like. But an important goal of my book’s tracing of thehistory of critical patriotism is to push us past such knee-jerk reactions andtoward a collective conversation about what these voices can help us to see andengage in our shared histories—and if we can’t hear hard truths about ournation, past and present, then we can’t say we truly love it either.

Nextpatriotic model tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Models of patriotism you’d share?

June 30, 2025: Models of Critical Patriotism: Hannah Griffitts

[As theauthor of abook on the contested history of American patriotism, every day of 2025feels strikingly relevant. So for this year’s July 4th series, Iwanted to share & expand on excerpts from that book that feature models ofcritical patriotism from across our history, leading up to a weekend request forfurther conversations!]

On aRevolutionary poem that models multiple patriotic perspectives.

First, thebook excerpt: “[Annis Boudinot] Stockton’s Mid-AtlanticWriting Circle colleague HannahGriffitts (1727– 1817), a Philadelphia Quaker who contributed dozens ofpoems to her cousin MilcahMartha Moore’s voluminous commonplace book, linked feminism to incipientrevolutionary patriotism even more clearly in her 1768 poem “The Female Patriots.”Griffitts opens with a complaint about the lack of patriotic activism from hercommunity’s men, who, “supinely asleep, & deprived of their Sight/Arestripped of their Freedom, and robbed of their Right.” She then argues for theneed for her titular female patriots to take up that cause: “If the Sons (sodegenerate) the Blessing despise,/Let the Daughters of Liberty, nobly arise.”She admits that in traditional political terms “we’ve no Voice,” but makes thecase for the boycotting of English goods as a key way these female patriots cannonetheless take action: “As American Patriots, our Taste we deny”; and so “ratherthan Freedom, we’ll part with our Tea.” And she ends by highlighting thebroader revolutionary effects of not only such boycotts, but also her own poemand writing: “a motive more worthy our patriot Pen,/Thus acting—we point outtheir Duty to Men.” By expressing and enacting their female patriotism, then,Griffitts and her peers likewise offer a feminist critical patrioticperspective on the frustrating, counter-productive absence of women from thesepublic debates.”

That lastpoint is without doubt my favorite thing about Griffitts’s unique and engagingpoem. I’ve written a good bit, inthis space and elsewhere, aboutAbigailAdams’s request to her husband John that he and his fellow Framers “Rememberthe Ladies,” lest those ladies “foment a Rebellion” of their own. I like Adams’sletter a lot, and especially love that idea of a potential further revolutionfrom American women (something I focus on a good bit in the section of my bookfrom which the above excerpt is drawn). But in truth, Adams kept herperspective more or less private, and so it’s really published, public writers fromthe period like Griffitts, Annis Stockton, and others (including one of myfavorite Americans, JudithSargent Murray) who modeled female patriotism in both their words and deeds.One of the most important effects of broadening our definition of Americanpatriotism—perhaps my book’s most central goal—is that it can allow us to betterremember impressive and inspiring figures, texts, communities, and events beyondthe familiar refrains, and I don’t think that’s more true of any Americanmoment than these Revolutionary women writers.

Griffitts’spoem also models a second form of American patriotism from my book’s fourcategories: active patriotism. I define active patriotism as service andsacrifice in order to push the nation closer to its ideals, and I don’t know ofany single line that sums up that concept better than Griffitts’s “rather thanFreedom, we’ll part with our tea.” I know the line, like the poem overall, is abit tongue-in-cheek (and delightfully so); but at the same time, there’s nodoubt that giving up comforts is one of the more challenging sacrifices we canmake, especially during difficult times when we need those comforts more thanever. I’ve been inspired by many such collective sacrifices during this fraughtfirst half of 2025, illustrated nicely by theTarget boycott (in which my wife and I took part) among many others. Thisform of active patriotism can be easily overlooked but is one of the mostgenuinely collective things we can do as a community, and one potently modeledby Hannah Griffitts’s “The Female Patriots.”

Nextpatriotic model tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Models of patriotism you’d share?

June 28-29, 2025: June 2025 Recap

[A Recapof the month that was in AmericanStudying.]

June2: GraduationStudying: George Moses Horton’s Poem: A series inspired by myyounger son Kyle’s high school graduation kicks off with the layers behind adeceptively simple poem.

June3: GraduationStudying: Crummell and Douglass’s Debate: The series continueswith an impromptu graduation day debate that exemplifies one of our mostcomplex and crucial questions.

June4: GraduationStudying: Du Bois’s Speech: Two lessons from one of myfavorite speeches by my favorite American, as the series commences on.

June5: GraduationStudying: The Graduate: One aspect of the iconic 1967 filmthat hasn’t aged well, and two that still feel very relevant.

June6: GraduationStudying: That Suncreen Speech: The series concludes withthree stand-out quotes from Mary Schmich’s famous 1997 advice for graduates.

June7-8: What’s Next for Kyle: And a follow-up update on what’s next for myfavorite recent graduate!

June9: Revolutionary War Figures: Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys: Inhonor of the Continental Army’s 250th birthday, a Revolutionary Warseries kicks off with the less than noble side to a folk hero.

June10: Revolutionary War Figures: Molly Pitcher: The series continues with whythe iconic hero who might not have existed still matters.

June11: Revolutionary War Figures: The “Black Regiment”: Three telling detailsabout the Continental Army’s longstanding African American regiment, as theseries fights on.

June12: Revolutionary War Figures: Benedict Arnold: The benefits andlimitations to remembering our most infamous traitor the way that we do.

June13: Revolutionary War Figures: YA Novels: The series concludes with three groundbreakinghistorical novels that reflect the evolution of YA literature as well as ourRevolutionary memories.

June14-15: Revolutionary War Figures: The Continental Army: For the ContinentalArmy’s 250th, a special post featuring three details about itsformation and evolution.

June16: American Nazis: Madison Square Garden: For the 80thanniversary of Operation Paperclip, a series on Nazis in America kicks off withan infamous 1939 event.

June17: American Nazis: Ford, Lindbergh, and Coughlin: The series continueswith three famous figures who reflect the breadth and depth of American Nazism.

June18: American Nazis: The Plot Against America: Three telling and compellinglayers to Philip Roth’s 2004 novel, as the series marches on.

June19: American Nazis: Wernher von Braun: Three striking lines from Tom Lehrer’ssatirical song about the Nazi turned American scientist.

June20: American Nazis: Neo-Nazis and Charlottesville: The series concludeswith how we can respond to a resurgent Neo-Nazi movement.

June21-22: American Nazis: Project Paperclip and Hunters: A special weekendpost on one of our best cultural representations of Operation Paperclip andNazis in America.

June23: Sound in Film: Vitaphone’s Anniversary: A series on the 100thanniversary of a groundbreaking cinematic technology kicks off with contextsfor that pioneering moment.

June24: Sound in Film: Al Jolson: The series continues with how the firstspoken dialogue in an American film reflects some of our worst and best.

June25: Sound in Film: Mid-Century Evolutions: How two films and one genre reflectthe changing landscape of film sounds, as the series talks on.

June26: Sound in Film: Dialogue Dubbing: Revealing one of film’s hiddenhistories through three characters whose dialogue was dubbed by a differentperformer.

June27: Sound in Film: Meaningful Music: The series concludes with a link to awonderful piece from FilmStudier Vaughn Joy on how one iconic film uses music.

Nextseries starts Monday,

Ben

PS. Topicsyou’d like to see covered in this space? Guest Posts you’d like to contribute? Lemme know!

June 27, 2025: Sound in Film: Meaningful Music

[100 yearsago this week, the brothersHarry and Sam Warner struck a deal with Bell Labs to use theirinnovative Vitaphonetechnology in the production of the first sound films for Warner Brothers.So this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of contexts for talking pictures!]

I’m goingto hand off this last post in my sound in film series to my favorite currentFilmStudier, the awesome VaughnJoy. Earlier this year for her weekly Review Roulette newsletter, Vaughnfocused her reviewof White Men Can’t Jump (1992) on the film’s unique and vital use ofboth soundtrack and score. I couldn’t say it any better about the role of theseelements of sound in film, so I hope you’ll check out Vaughn’s review to roundoff the week’s series!

June Recapthis weekend,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Examples of sound in film you’d highlight?

June 26, 2025: Sound in Film: Dialogue Dubbing

[100 yearsago this week, the brothersHarry and Sam Warner struck a deal with Bell Labs to use theirinnovative Vitaphonetechnology in the production of the first sound films for Warner Brothers.So this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of contexts for talking pictures!]

On three characterswhose dialogue was dubbed by a different actor than the on-screen performer, reflectingone of cinema’s more hiddenhistories.

1)     Goldfinger: Dialogue dubbing was apparentlymore or less ubiquitous in the early (ie, Sean Connery’s 1960s) Bond films—for example,the same German actress, Monica “Nikki” vander Zyl, dubbed atleast 15 women across those early films, including Bond’s leading ladies inmost of them. But it still feels pretty strange when a Bond film’s principalvillain, a character who is on screen almost as much as Bond himself, is voicedby someone other than the actor we’re watching. And that was the case withAuric Goldfinger from the 1964 film of that name—he is played by German actor GertFröbe, but voiced by Englishman MichaelCollins. I can’t lie, when I found out that it wasn’t the actor onscreensaying “No Mr. Bond, I expectyou to die!,” I was both shaken and stirred.

2)     Darth Vader: This example of dialogue dubbing isobviously much, much more widely known than Goldfinger’s. But while of course GeorgeLucas was happy to have James Earl Jones’s iconic and booming voice for his firsttrilogy’s iconic villain (turnedsympathetic Dad), it also seems, from the behind-the-scenes footagethat has since been released, that the actor walking around in Vader’s outfit (DavidProwse) had a voice that quite simply would not have worked for the characterno matter what. Prowse still got to wear the black suit and visit all those setsand act opposite the films’ other main performers, but it’s fair to say that Jonesprovided the performance most fully associated with the character—which ofcourse reveals something about both the importance of dialogue and the complicatedsituation in play whenever dialogue is dubbed.

3)     Trish in Exit Wounds: And if thatsituation is always complicated to start with, I can only imagine how painful itfeels for an actor to only find out that they’ve been dubbed when they watchthe completed film for the first time. Apparently that was the case for EvaMendes in the 2001 Steven Seagal and DMX action film Exit Wounds—Mendesfilmed the entire role, producers were unhappy with her performance (believingshe didn’t sound “intelligentenough”), the part was dubbed by an unidentified actress, and Mendes onlydiscovered the change when she watched the film at the theater. Of coursesome toxic combination of sexism and racism had to be in play for them to feelthat way about Mendes but not, y’know, Steven Seagal—a reminder that dialogue dubbingis always connected to other issues as well as sound in cinema.

Last filmsound studying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Examples of sound in film you’d highlight?

June 25, 2025: Sound in Film: Mid-Century Evolutions

[100 yearsago this week, the brothersHarry and Sam Warner struck a deal with Bell Labs to use theirinnovative Vitaphonetechnology in the production of the first sound films for Warner Brothers.So this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of contexts for talking pictures!]

On two specificfilms and one genre that reflect the changing mid-century landscape ofcinematic sounds.

1)     King Kong (1933): Just a half-dozen years afterthose first true “talkies” about which I wrote in yesterday’s post, pioneering percussionistand sound designer Murray Spivackwas faced with a more significant challenge: producingthe noises for the titular monster, along with his fellow prehistoriccreatures, in King Kong. As that second hyperlinked article traces, Spivackwent to great lengths to record various animal noises and other sound effects,and the results were truly groundbreaking; much of Kong looks and feels asdated as you’d expect nearly a century later, but the sound effects remain impressiveto this day. And when we remember that Warner Brothers had purchased Vitaphoneless than a decade before, Spivack’s successes become even more impressivestill.

2)     WorldWar II Newsreels: I’m not going to pretend I have a lot more to add to thatexcellent hyperlinked 2014 European Journal of Media Studies articlefrom (then-) PhD candidate Masha Shpolberg. Nor do I want to suggest (no morethan Shpolberg does) that we should emphasize a topic like film sounds when itcomes to the era and the horrors of the Second World War. But the question ofhow the evolving cultural medium of film brought those horrors to audiences farfrom combat is a really interesting one, and Shpolberg makes a great case thatnewsreels did so through a particularly striking set of sound elements.

3)     Singing in the Rain (1952): Idon’t know exactly when the first films that we could call truly nostalgic forthe early days of Hollywood began to be released, but I like the symbolism ofthe very reflectiveand metatextual Singing in the Rain coming out exactly 25 yearsafter the release of The Jazz Singer. But while Singing representedHollywood’s earlier days in its content, I agree with thispost from film studies student Gordon Taylor that this early 1950s filmuses sound in “incredible” ways that reflect how far the industry had come inthat quarter-century since Al Jolson’s famous line. Indeed, while of coursethere have been further evolutions in the 75 years since Singing, Iwould venture to argue that much of the modern age of cinematic sound can befound by the 1950s.  

Next filmsound studying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Examples of sound in film you’d highlight?

June 24, 2025: Sound in Film: Al Jolson

[100 yearsago this week, the brothersHarry and Sam Warner struck a deal with Bell Labs to use theirinnovative Vitaphonetechnology in the production of the first sound films for Warner Brothers.So this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of contexts for talking pictures!]

On twocontradictory yet interconnected AmericanStudies layers to an iconic “talkie.”

Aboutseventeen and a half minutes into The Jazz Singer (1927),the popular singer and vaudevillian Al Jolson, having just performed alive-recorded version of the song “Dirty Hands, Dirty Face,”speaks directly to the audience (the folks listening to him perform in the film’snightclub setting; but also, clearly, the audience watching the film intheaters) the first recordedwords of dialogue in an American film: “Wait a minute, wait a minute, youain’t heard nothin’ yet.” As yesterday’s post hopefully made clear, thedevelopment of sound technology in film was a multi-stage process, and it’simportant not to over-emphasize a single moment or film (at least not at the expenseof a nuanced sense of how such things evolve over time). But nonetheless, it’sdifficult to overstate how much of animpact this audible line of dialogue (part of about two minutes’ worth ofrecorded dialogue across The Jazz Singer) would have made on filmaudience used to reading dialogue on caption cards inserted amidst filmedscenes (a technique which Jazz Singer still uses for much of itsdialogue).

In this February2019 Saturday Evening Post Considering History column on the historyand influence of Blackface, I noted that for much of The Jazz Singer,including its triumphant finale, Jolson’s character Jack Robin (the stage nameof Jacob Rabinowitz) performsin Blackface. While he isn’t in Blackface for that iconic line of recorded dialogue,Blackface minstrelsy overall is a defining feature of the film and its legaciesin American culture and society. So I’d ask you to check out that column if youwould and then come on back for a second AmericanStudying layer.

Welcomeback! If as I argue in that column one significant feature of much of 20thcentury American popular culture (from Vaudeville to film to cartoons to TVvariety shows and more) was thus Blackface performance, another was the strikingnumber of JewishAmerican artists who helped shapethat culture. High on that list was Al Jolson, who had been born Asa Yoelson inLithuania and who would become one of the first openly Jewish performers to becomestars in the United States. And to my mind it's no coincidence that the film rolewhich truly cemented Jolson’s cultural significance was that of Jacob Rabinowitz,a character who is destined to take over his father’s role as cantor in a LowerEast Side synagogue before he rebels, runs away from home, and finds his wayinstead to the titular role of jazz singer. I love the fact that it’s a JewishAmerican performer who speaks the first recorded words of dialogue in anAmerican film—exactly as much as I loathe how much of that film said performerspends in Blackface.

Next filmsound studying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Examples of sound in film you’d highlight?

June 23, 2025: Sound in Film: Vitaphone’s Anniversary

[100 yearsago this week, the brothersHarry and Sam Warner struck a deal with Bell Labs to use theirinnovative Vitaphonetechnology in the production of the first sound films for Warner Brothers.So this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of contexts for talking pictures!]

On three otherhistoric moments that help contextualize the one we’re commemorating this week.

1)     De Forest’s Alternative: I first learned aboutthe groundbreaking scientist and inventor Lee deForest when I made him the Memory DayNominee for August 26th (his birthday, in 1873). De Forest’sinventions (and one in particular, theaudion) helped shape virtually every significant 20th century communicationsand media technology, from the telephone to radio to television to, yes, sound films.But while the audion did play an important role in the development ofVitaphone, over those same years de Forest would also create his ownsound-on-film system, Phonofilm,which he debuted in April 1923. Unfortunately for him, its sound quality was apparentlynot the greatest, and so the brothers Warner decided to make their June 1925deal with Western Electric’s Bell Laboratories instead.

2)     DonJuan (1926): Just over a year after they signed that deal, Warner Brothersformally introduced the new technology with the August 5th, 1926premiere of their silentfilm Don Juan, starring John Barrymore as the Latin lothario. Therewas no spoken dialogue (that would come about a year later, with the famousmoment I’ll discuss in tomorrow’s post), but the film did feature both a symphonicscore and sound effects. Perhaps even more important as a demonstration of thetechnology were the seriesof shorts that preceded the film, most of which featured live-recordedmusic and one of which also qualified as a “talkie,” as it included an “Introduction of VitaphoneSound Pictures” from studio spokesperson Will Hays. Don Juan made asubstantial haul at the box office (nearly $1.7 million), yet not enough torecoup the new technology’s costs—both telling details, I’d say.

3)     CarnivalNight in Paris (1927): For the first year (and beyond), bothshorts and feature film scores utilizing Vitaphone were filmed in New YorkCity, where the technology had been invented and where a sizeable number of musiciansand recording studios could be found. But it was inevitable that the technology,like every aspect of the filmindustry in the 1920s, would migrate to Hollywood, and Vitaphone did sofirst with the 1927 short Carnival Night in Paris. Filmed in Hollywoodand featuring the HenryHalstead Orchestra and hundreds of background dancers, this short was onits own terms eminently inconsequential—yet, as with every significant momentin the development of this technology, it helped change everything for film andAmerica in the years to come.

Next filmsound studying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Examples of sound in film you’d highlight?

June 21-22, 2025: American Nazis: Project Paperclip and Hunters

[In the summerof 1945, Nazi scientists began arriving in the United States, recruited towork in the US government and eventuallyits space program as part of OperationPaperclip. But they weren’t the first nor the only American Nazis by anymeans, and this week I’ve AmericanStudied a handful of others, leading up to thisweekend post on an interesting and fraught recent cultural representation ofPaperclip.]

[NB.Serious SPOILERS for the first season of AmazonPrime’s Hunters in this post’sfinal paragraph; I haven’t seen season two.]

On a morehistorical and a more fictional side to a recent TV show’s depiction of Nazisin America.

Like allthe histories about which I’ve written in this week’s series, the USgovernment’s ProjectPaperclip program needs a great deal more of a place in ourcollective memories. The program’s very name reflects the idea that the Nazipasts of the scientists brought to the United States in the months after thewar’s end would be excised from their files, these personal and collectivehistories elided so that the US could advance its Cold War and (eventually) Space Racegoals and deny the Soviet Union the same opportunities. We can debatewhether bringing the scientists over and employing them was the right or wrongdecision (I’d side with “wrong,” but I understand the other arguments), but tomy mind the purposeful erasure of their Nazi histories was unequivocally wrong,and frankly an implicit recognition that there was a shameful side to thisprogram that was always intended to be withheld from the American people. Soany means by which we can better remember Paperclip and those fraught decisionsand questions is a very good thing indeed.

One suchmeans, and I’ll freely admit the one through which I initially learned aboutProject Paperclip (I had already written inthis space about von Braun, but I don’t think I had known about thatoverall/official frame for the operation until watching the show earlier thisyear), is Amazon Prime’s controversialalternate history show Hunters. Iunderstand and largely agree with that hyperlinked article’s critiques of theshow’s depiction of the Holocaust, but would say that when it comes to thehistories of Paperclip and Nazis in America, Hunters get a couple of seemingly contradictory, equally accurate thingsimpressively right. On the one hand, the show depicts the ways in which themajority of the ex-Nazis disappeared into everyday American life, many of them in Huntsville,Alabama (site of the U.S. Space& Rocket Center). And at the same time, the show recognizesthat some ex-Nazis (like von Braun) ended up instead in far more prominentpublic positions—while the show’s choice to make the first ex-Nazi we meet the USSecretary of State is as exaggerated as everything else about Hunters, I’d argue that exaggeration(and perhaps especially the fact that his Nazi past has been kept secret) isnot all that far from the truth of von Braun’s influence on the US governmentfor decades.

The lastex-Nazi we meet in Season 1 of Huntersis also a prominent figure who has been hiding his Nazi past—but in this case,I would argue that in service of a “twist” the show does a significantinjustice to its historical subjects. [Again, SPOILERS from here on out.] Throughoutthe show’s arc, AlPacino’s Meyer Offerman serves as a mentor and father-figure to LoganLerman’s Jonah Heidelbaum, bringing Jonah into the team of Nazi hunters who aretracking down these hidden figures and delivering vigilante justice to them. Butin the finalepisode’s final minutes, Jonah learns that Meyer is himself anex-Nazi, none other than “The Wolf” who terrorized Jonah’s grandparents duringtheir time in a concentration camp. The revelation allows Jonah the chance tomake his own final decision about vigilante justice and murder (something he’sbeen struggling with throughout the show), but it doesn’t quite work within theshow’s plot—and much more importantly, to my mind it doesn’t work at all withinthe show’s historical and cultural themes. After all, this twist literally collapsesthe distinctions between Nazis and Jews, Holocaust perpetrators andvictims/survivors—and that’s an injustice not only to the Holocaust itself, butalso to better remembering the histories of those Nazis who found their way tothe United States in the decades after committing those horrors.

Nextseries starts Monday,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think? Other histories or stories you’d highlight?