Books, TV

Tandy Culpepper Talks with Historian Donald L. Miller About His Book Masters of the Air and the TV Miniseries Adaptation of It

To say that Donald L. Miller is a brilliant academic is the under-statement of all understatements. The John Henry McCracken Professor emeritus at Pennsylvania’s Lafayette College has authored seven notable books, among them Supreme City: How Jazz Age Manhattan Gave Rise to Modern America. The book chronicles the events and people who shaped the New York City Manhattan enclave’s growth in the twenties.

Aside from his work at Lafayette College, the University of Maryland alum has taught at the City University of New York, Cornell University, and Oxford University.

Perhaps Miller’s most commercial work is his historical tome Masters of the Air: America’s Bomber Boys Who Fought the Air War Against Nazi Germany. The 2007 best-seller has become a best-seller once again thanks to its Apple TV+ adaptation brought to the small screen by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg. The Hollywood power duo also gave audiences Band of Brothers and The Pacific.

In this episode, Tandy Culpepper talks with Miller about his exhaustive research hehind the book as well as his first-person interviews with people who were  part of the air war, the heroes who took the fight to Nazi Germany. We also discuss his work as a consultant on the set of the streaming miniseries.

 

Published by Tandy Culpepper

I am a veteran broadcast journalist. I was an Army brat before my father retired and moved us to the deep South. I'm talkin' Lower Alabama and Northwest Florida, I graduated from Tate High School and got botha Bachelor's degree and Master's in Teaching English from the University of West Florida, I taught English at Escambia County High School for two years before getting my m's in Speech Pathology and Audiology from Auburn University. Following graduation, I did a 180 degree turn and moved to Birmingham where I began ny broadcasting career at WBIQ, Channel 10. There I was host of a weekly primetime half-hour TV program called Alabama Lifestyles. A year later, I began a stint as a television weathercaster and public affairs host. A year later, I moved to West Palm Beach, Florida and became bureau chief at WPTV, the CBS affiliate. Two years later, I moved to Greensboro, North Carolina where I became co-host of a morng show called AM Carolina. The next year, I moved cross-country and became co-host and story producer at KTVN-TV in Reno, Nevada. I also became the medical reporter for the news department. Three years later, I moved to Louisville, Kentucky and became host and producer of a morning show called today in WAVE Country at WAVE-TV, Channel 3, the NBC affiliate. Following three years there, I moved to Los Angeles and became senior correspondent at the Turner Entertainment Reportn, an internationally-syndicated entertainment entertainment news service owned by CNN. I went back to school afterwards and got an MFA in Creative Nonfiction at Goucher College in Towson, Maryland, a suburb of Baltimore. Oh, yes. I won a hundred thousand dollars on the 100 Thousand Dollar Pyramid, then hosted by Dick Clark.

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