This Week on History Happy Hour: In 1915 Winston Churchill resigned as Lord of the Admiralty in the wake of the Dardanelles disaster. Struggling to deal with the fallout, he accepted a commission and headed for the front lines – where he began the most extraordinary comeback in political history.

In this encore episode, Chris and Rick discuss this pivotal year in Churchill’s life with J. Furman Daniel, author of Blood, Mud, and Oil Paint: The Remarkable Year that Made Winston Churchill.

Dr. John Furman Daniel III is an associate professor of political science at Concordia University in Chicago. He is the author of 21st Century Patton: Strategic Insights for the Modern Era, The First Space War: How Patterns of History and Principles of STEM Will Shape Its Form, and Patton: Battling with History.

This Week on History Happy Hour: What drove the thinking of Hitler and his followers? How did ordinary Germans come to embrace an ideology of hate and destruction?

Chris and Rick welcome Laurence Rees, award-winning historian and author of the new book The Nazi Mind: Twelve Warnings from History. Drawing on decades of research and previously unpublished interviews, Rees examines the twisted ideas at the heart of the Third Reich and what they reveal about human behavior.

Laurence Rees is an acclaimed historian, documentary filmmaker, and bestselling author specializing in Nazi Germany and World War II. Former head of BBC TV History, he has written and produced award-winning series such as Auschwitz: The Nazis and the “Final Solution” and The Nazis: A Warning from History. His books, translated worldwide, include Hitler and Stalin: The Tyrants and the Second World War and The Holocaust: A New History. His latest work, The Nazi Mind, explores the beliefs that drove the Third Reich.

This Week on History Happy Hour: In January 1945, as the Battle of the Bulge was coming to an end, the 29th Division readied itself to be at the point of the fourth Allied offensive in eight months. There, along the banks of the Roer River, is where volume five of Joe Balkoski’s epic series on the 29th gets under way.

In this encore episode, Joe joins us for his sixth History Happy Hour to talk about that book, The Last Roll Call: The 29th Intantry Division Victorious, 1945, and the many decades he has spent telling the story of the 29th.

Joe Balkoski is a renowned American military historian who has authored eight books on American involvement in the ETO during World War II. This includes a five-volume series on the history of the 29th Infantry Division in World War II and a two-volume set on American participation in the D-Day invasion. He has appeared as a D-Day expert on MSNBC, and his work has been praised by Joe Scarborough, the New York Post, World War II Magazine, and others.