In this episode of How the Hell Did We Get Here?, John explains both the "discovery" of the New World and the way it was colonized by various European peoples in the 16th century. Beginning with how Europeans started to explore more of the Atlantic world in the 1400s and concluding with some brief consideration of English and French involvement in the New world toward the end of the 1500s, John will go through the most impactful events, the primary motivations and the most important circumstances of how colonization unfolded.

By the end of the episode, listeners should have a firm grasp on why the Portuguese took the early lead in exploration, why the Spanish came to dominate colonization of the Western Hemisphere in the 16th century and how European presence in the Americas permanently altered Native American civilization. This is all vital context for anyone who wants to understand how the 13 original American colonies became what they were, and consequently, how the United States was launched along its historical trajectory.

In this episode, John examines the regions of the world that will intertwine with one another to create what will be the United States, well before those regions were even aware of one another. What was North America like before Europeans arrived? How did North and West African civilization function before Europeans began to trade with those areas regularly? And what was going on in Western Europe before Europeans began to look outward and imagine themselves as part of a much larger world?

This series is all about context and this show will explore the backgrounds of the most important places to have an influence on what will eventually be the United States. John will explain what they all looked like before they regularly interacted with one another and how their existing conditions would affect the ways in which they would behave when they finally did meet and start to coexist.

In this episode, host John Miller introduces himself to the audience and explains his motivation for starting the podcast, How the Hell Did We Get Here? John gives a little background about himself, why he is so interested in history, what he hopes to accomplish with the show and why he thinks history is so important.

John also delves briefly into some examples of how historical thinking works, how historical understanding can contextualize current events and why examining history is kind of weird.