Lord Dunmore and the Proclamation That Ignited Revolution (with Bob Crawford of The Avett Brothers)
episodePreviously titled “Bob Crawford and Lord Dunmore's Folly” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 5, 2026
Transcript
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
No, Virginia, they'll be like, oh, you dissolved our Burgesses. Exactly. Can we discuss this? Not in Boston. No, you're so right. The vibe was so different. Sam Adams, of course, he's part of all this. Sure. You know, he's just brewing beer and they're drinking it and they're getting pissed off and, you know, they're ready to go. Yeah, they're riled up.
This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.
Welcome to Snafu, your favorite podcast about history's greatest screw-ups, or more precisely a show about what our failures and foibles say about humanity as a whole. And spoiler alert, it's mostly not very good. I'm your host, Ed Helms, and my guest today is the definition of a multi-hyphenate. He is the bassist and a founding member of one of my all-time favorite bands, the Avett Brothers. He also is an historian. I love this. He hosts American History Hotline for iHeart Podcasts and The Road to Now on Sirius XM. And now his first book is coming out. It's called America's Founding Son, John Quincy Adams, From President to Political Maverick. I'm super excited to have him on Snafu this week. Welcome, Bob Crawford.
Thank you, Ed. It's a joy to be here. Heck, yeah. I mean, I have to say, I don't even remember when we met long, long time ago, but I have only very recently learned of your history nerdiness, and this might be my new favorite thing about you.
It's one of the better things about me. So yes, pick that one and go with it. Yeah, and it kind of comes out of the band. We've been together for 25 years, maybe going on 26. And all those years driving around in a 15-passenger van... for eight hours a day, read, read, read. You know, it was the perfect time to read. And I got really curious about American history around the time of the Iraq War. How did we get here? Sure. From 1776 to Abu Ghraib, if you remember.
What historical context surrounds Lord Dunmore's role in the American Revolution?
Okay, yeah. Iraqi prison. Boy, that's a... That's a crooked line. It is a crooked line. And so I started with the David McCullough books. This is 2004, 2005. Oh, great. The John Adams 1776 led me to Sean Wilentz, The Rise of American Democracy from Jefferson to Lincoln. Highly recommend it. And that I was kind of on and on from there.
Very cool. Now, are you a heavy paper book guy? Are you a Kindle guy? Audiobooks? What's your book game?
My book game is all and everything. It is. Seriously. Because for... Roads Now or American History Hotline, you're trying to absorb someone's book, sometimes in two weeks. So I'll be reading the book and listening if it's on the audio. I do that too. You know, I wrote this book on the road. Much of it I wrote on the road. Wow. Because again, you've got sound check at two, stage at eight, sometimes later. So a lot of hours to write a book. Wow. And then a lot of this research, you can read the congressional record going back to the first Congress. It's all online. So cool. Yeah.
Oh, man. You are a giant nerd.
I love this. The biggest, yeah.
Now, I can't help but connect these dots because I know it's true for me. I don't know exactly how, but I know that my interest in history is connected to my love of more traditional music forms. So like I'm very into, uh, folk music and, um, and obviously I'm a banjo player for bluegrass music. And to me, I, I feel like those, uh, those music forms have, have been a, uh, like a vessel or a connection to history in a way, almost in a subconscious way. I love the music, like very sort of on a superficial level. It just makes me feel good. But there's also something about it that feels connected to an earlier time and to like a deeper sort of historical meaning. And I wonder if that's true for you because the Avett Brothers sound is so rooted in so many of these great old music traditions.
Right. Well, for the Avets, it's Charlie Poole or it's, you know, the songs that Doc Watson popularized in the 60s that really are turn of the century, if not before. And the short answer is yes. And I'm always trying to I'm always amazed by some American songs and how far they go back. Wow. Yes. Music connects us to the past, and sometimes it connects us more directly than we previously imagined.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:01–2:22
2
What historical context surrounds Lord Dunmore's role in the American Revolution?
2:22–20:46
3
How did Lord Dunmore's proclamation impact the revolutionary fervor?
20:46–22:11
4
What actions did Lord Dunmore take that escalated tensions in Virginia?
22:11–29:47
5
How did Dunmore's War affect relations between colonists and Native Americans?
29:47–46:31