Club Eisenhower Podcast

May 2025

Korean War Records

Host Dr. Todd Arrington welcomes Dr. Randy Sowell, Archivist at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library, to talk about the Korean War collection at the Truman.

Related content

Lunch & Learn program:
Korean War Records Lunch & Learn

Research Subject Guide: (Eisenhower Library)
Korean Armistice
Korean War / U.S.- Korean Relations

Online Documents:
Korean War (Eisenhower Library)
Prelude to Conflict: United States Policy Toward Korea, 1945-1950 (Truman Library)

April 2025

Eisenhower and the Holocaust

 Eisenhower Presidential Library Director Todd Arrington welcomes Dr. Jason Lantzer to discuss his new book Dwight Eisenhower and the Holocaust: a History.

General Eisenhower’s experience with the Holocaust altered his understanding of World War II. It spurred his belief that totalitarianism in all its forms needed to be confronted. This conviction shaped his presidency and solidified American engagement in the postwar world. This book is the first to blend scholarship on Eisenhower, World War II, and the Holocaust together. This narrative offers new insights into all three, while uncovering the story of how Ike became among the first to vow that such atrocities would never again be allowed to happen.

Dr. Lantzer serves as the Assistant Director of the Butler University Honors Program. He is the author of eight books, including Dwight Eisenhower & the Holocaust (DeGruyter, 2023), Mainline Christianity: The Past and Future of America’s Majority Faith (NYU 2012), Dis-History: Uses of the Past at Walt Disney’s Worlds (TPP, 2017), and Rebel Bulldog: The Story of One Family, Two States, and the Civil War (Indiana Historical Society Press, 2017), numerous book chapters and articles. He is a three-time graduate of Indiana University (BA, MA, PhD).

Episode participants:

• Dr. Todd Arrington, Eisenhower Presidential Library Director
• Dr. Jason Lantzer, Author 

March 2025

Project Recover: Bringing our MIAs Home

Project Recover is a non-profit organization and Department of Defense partner that has been in existence for three decades. Their mission is to locate and repatriate Americans missing in action (MIA) from our previous wars. There are more than 81,000 American MIAs and five million Gold Star MIA family members waiting for answers to what happened to their loved ones so that they can find healing and some sort of closure. Project Recover is the only non-governmental organization (NGO) with full vertical capabilities in the POW/MIA recovery space, which includes operational missions in both underwater and land environments. 

Derek Abbey, Ph.D. is Project Recover’s President and CEO. He served for 23 years in the United States Marine Corps. His academic research and his post-military career have focused on connecting veterans with college opportunities. Abbey began as a Project Recover team member in 2004 and spent five years on the Board of Directors before being appointed as President/CEO.

February 2025

Atomic Veterans

Keith Kiefer from the National Association of Atomic Veterans joins Dr. Todd Arrington to discuss Atomic Veterans. Atomic Veterans are American soldiers and sailors who were exposed to atmospheric and underwater nuclear weapons tests from 1945 until 1962. For over 50 years, the experiences of these soldiers were only known by the soldiers and those in charge, as the soldiers were required to take an oath of secrecy. Breaking that oath was considered treason. This oath was relieved in 1994 by the Clinton administration, which has allowed for the stories of these special veterans to be finally told.

Episode participants:

• Dr. Todd Arrington, Eisenhower Presidential Library Director
• Keith Kiefer, National Association of Atomic Veterans

January 2025

Native American Code Talkers

Dr. Todd Arrington is joined by Dr. William Meadows of Missouri State University to discuss Native American Code Talkers from WWI and WWII.

Episode participants:

• Dr. Todd Arrington, Eisenhower Presidential Library Director
• Dr. William Meadows, Professor of Anthropology and Native American Studies at Missouri State University

February 2024

Refugee Relief

At the end of World War II, there were 6.2 million displaced persons in Europe. In 1948, President Truman signed the Displaced Persons Act to assist Europeans who were unsettled after WWII. This act helped over 350,000 displaced persons relocate to the United States and helped pave the way for the Refugee Relief Act of 1953 signed by President Eisenhower.  This new act primarily helped refugees and escapees from communist countries immigrate to the U.S. by using non-quota visas. The Refugee Relief Act issued over 200,000 visas and was one of the many ways Eisenhower sought global peace. Join us as we discuss both the past and present impact of refugee relief.

January 2024

Food for Peace

On July 10, 1954, President Eisenhower signed a bill creating the program known today as Food For Peace. This program, built on the foundations of the Marshall Plan, provided significant aid to rebuilding efforts in Europe after World War II.  Eisenhower expanded American food and economic aid beyond Europe. American crop surpluses were made available to countries in need through the Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act of 1954. American farmers benefited from the sale of their surplus crops while these countries were able to purchase needed goods established under this act. Through this program, as President Eisenhower explained, America was able “…to sell surplus food to friendly countries for foreign currencies, which we then used for ... defense, economic development, and international educational exchange.”

Join us as we discuss the impact of the Food For Peace program, its evolution, and how food insecurity looks in an increasingly global economy and food system.