The War of 1812 isn’t an event most of us get excited about. The conflict between the US and Great Britain lasted almost 3 years, but like a lot of sequels, it didn’t live up to the original. When the war was over, little had changed for either country’s place in the world, and most of the grievances that began the war remained unsettled. So aside from the burning of the White House and Congress, the rise of Andrew Jackson as an American icon, the writing of the national anthem, and the demise of the first American political party system, not a lot happened. In this episode, Bob and Ben speak with Don Hickey of Wayne State College to talk about the war of 1812, its impact on the US, and why so few people today remember such a significant moment in American history.

Dr. Don Hickey is Professor of History at Wayne State College. Called “the Dean of 1812 scholarship” by The New Yorker, he has written 10 books and over a hundred articles on the War of 1812, including The War of 1812: A Forgotten Conflict, Bicentennial Edition (University of Illinois Press, 2012).