The Last Archive

At the height of the secession movement, the Wu-Tang Clan forms on Staten Island. We take a tour of early 1990s hip-hop and reveal the hidden history of the group.
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A group on Staten Island tries to stop secession, squaring off against the secessionists in a heated set of debates and meetings recorded on never-before-seen archival tapes. A set of debates best understood via a detour into the history of a remote Polynesian island.
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After the Supreme Court takes a close look at New York City government, Staten Island comes out the loser. A local artist begins organizing for secession. We take a deep dive into the psychology of the island, which has a lot to do with the largest garbage dump in the world.
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Ben Naddaff-Hafrey has a new show out! On the 250th anniversary of the United States, he investigates the story of what was, at the time, the biggest secession movement in the U.S. since the Civil War. From Revisionist History, The Staten Island Problem reconstructs the battle for New York City amidst the turbulent early 1990s — the rise of Rudy Giuliani, the peak of the homicide rate, the Wu-Tang Clan, young Donald Trump, and the first Black mayor of New York — all through the prism of the city’s Forgotten Borough.
Staten Island’s secession movement is an early example of the politics of resentment that dominates America today and asks: what do you do when a democracy looks like it’s falling apart?
We'll be sharing all episodes of the series right here on The Last Archive. Here’s episode 1. David Dinkins, the first Black mayor of New York City, faces off with the borough president of Staten Island, and tries to hold his city together. Find more episodes of Revisionist History: The Staten Island Problem wherever you get podcasts. If you want to hear the full series right now, you can binge it with a Pushkin+ subscription. Sign up on the Revisionist History show page on Apple Podcasts or at pushkin.fm/plus and use the code RH25 to save 25%.
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We have been told the Revolution was fought over taxation and representation. But what the founders were most angry about in our country’s most famous document was Indian affairs. How did generations of Americans miss this?
Hosted and reported by Indigenous author Rebecca Nagle and featuring leading Native historians, First America shares the true story of how the United States came to be, and how our current political moment was 250 years in the making.
Here's the first episode. Rebecca sits down with historian Ned Blackhawk (Western Shoshone) to talk about how hunger for Indigenous land drove the Revolution.
Find more episodes of First America wherever you get podcasts. Get episodes early and ad-free with a Pushkin+ subscription. Sign up on the First America show page on Apple Podcasts or at pushkin.fm/plus.
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