PODCAST · history
MacArthur Memorial Podcast
by MacArthur Memorial; Amanda Williams
The MacArthur Memorial Podcast covers a variety of topics related to the life and times of General Douglas MacArthur (1880-1964). From the triumphs and controversies of MacArthur's career to the latest scholarship on the Spanish-American War, the Philippine-American War, the World Wars, the Occupation of Japan, and the Korean War, the MacArthur Memorial Podcast is constantly exploring fascinating history. The MacArthur Memorial is located in Norfolk, VA and is dedicated to preserving and presenting the legacy of General MacArthur and the millions of men and women who served with him.
Episodes
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MacArthur and the National Football Foundation
Founded in 1947, the National Football Foundation (NFF) has spent more than 75 years promoting leadership, scholarship, and athletic excellence through football. In this latest episode, the MacArthur Memorial Podcast hosted Mattew Sign, Chief Operating Officer of the NFF to discuss General…
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MacArthur Q&A: Part VI
In this latest episode, MacArthur Memorial historians Jim Zobel and Amanda Williams answer some of the more popular and/or unique questions about General MacArthur we have received from MacArthur Memorial Podcast listeners and on social media. This series includes: The current Palawan Massacre…
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UNC Commanders' Forum - 2025 Incheon Symposium
In September 2025, the MacArthur Memorial and the Korea Defense Veterans Association (KDVA) hosted a free public event to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Incheon Landings. Risking it All: The Incheon Landings at 75 and the Legacy of the Korean War was a dynamic two-part event featuring a...
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Unit 731
In 1936, five years after occupying Manchuria, the Empire of Japan created the Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department—publicly presented as a hygiene agency but secretly responsible for developing biological weapons. In this episode, Jenny Chan, founder of Pacific Atrocities...
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5000 to 1 Gamble - James Zobel - 2025 Incheon Symposium
In September 2025, the MacArthur Memoria and the Korea Defense Veterans Association (KDVA) hosted a free public event to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Incheon Landings. Risking it All: The Incheon Landings at 75 and the Legacy of the Korean War was a dynamic two-part event featuring a...
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Strategic Aspects of the Korean War - Dr. Bruce Bennett - 2025 Incheon Symposium
In September 2025, the MacArthur Memoria and the Korea Defense Veterans Association (KDVA) hosted a free public event to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Incheon Landings. Risking it All: The Incheon Landings at 75 and the Legacy of the Korean War was a dynamic two-part event featuring a...
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Philippine-American Heritage in Washington, D.C.
On Tuesday, August 25, 2026, the MacArthur Memorial hosted a free virtual lecture by Professor Erwin Tiongson about Philippine-American heritage and history in Washington, DC. An audience Q&A will followed his presentation. Watch the presentation on YouTube. Have a comment about this episode?…
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Halsey's Typhoon
In December 1944, as General Douglas MacArthur continued the invasion of the Philippines, Admiral William “Bull” Halsey’s Third Fleet was caught in a violent typhoon that capsized ships, resulted in the loss of hundreds of sailors, and set in motion extraordinary acts of courage and survival....
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Q&A - Beyond the Rumor: Douglas MacArthur and Isabel Cooper
Thank you for your questions! In this episode, MacArthur Memorial historians Jim Zobel and Amanda Williams answer listener questions about the controversial relationship between General Douglas MacArthur and Isabel Cooper. Prior to this Q&A session, the historians discussed the known documentary...
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Beyond the Rumor: Douglas MacArthur and Isabel Cooper
The relationship between Douglas MacArthur and Isabel Cooper generates a lot of interest, speculation, and confusion. It certainly was not a masterclass in dating - and there are questions about Cooper's age at the time of the relationshp. What does the documentary evidence say about their...
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Myth or Fact - Mass Sexual Violence and the Allied Occupation of Japan
On July 23, 2026, the MacArthur Memorial hosted a virtual lecture by Dr. Brian Walsh, author of The "Rape" of Japan: The Myth of Mass Sexual Violence During the Allied Occupation (2024). An audience Q&A followed the presentation. View the presentation on YouTube MacArthur Committee Information:...
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MacArthur's Relief at 75 - Perspectives on Civilian Control of the Military
On April 11, 2026, the MacArthur Memorial marked the 75th anniversary of President Truman’s relief of General MacArthur with a half‑day symposium examining the event from both leaders’ perspectives and its broader significance in American history. The program featured scholars from the MacArthur...
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MacArthur's Perspective: MacArthur's Relief at 75
On April 11, 2026, the MacArthur Memorial marked the 75th anniversary of President Truman’s relief of General MacArthur with a half‑day symposium examining the event from both leaders’ perspectives and its broader significance in American history. The program featured scholars from the MacArthur...
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Finding Peace at Potsdam
Just weeks after World War II ended in Europe, Allied leaders President Harry S. Truman, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Premier Joseph Stalin met in Potsdam, Germany, to negotiate peace and shape the post‑war world. Despite deep political differences, one unexpected force helped bridge the...
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Truman's Perspective: MacArthur's Relief at 75
On April 11, 2026, the MacArthur Memorial marked the 75th anniversary of President Truman’s relief of General MacArthur with a half‑day symposium examining the event from both leaders’ perspectives and its broader significance in American history. The program featured scholars from the MacArthur...
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Rose Valland and The Art Front
Many listeners are familiar with the Monuments Men and Women - the Allied military personnel who protected cultural treasures during World War II and then aided in post-war restitution. Rose Valland, a French art historian at Paris's Jeu de Paume museum, was not officially a Monuments officer…
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The Last Titans: How Churchill and de Gaulle Saved Their Nations and Transformed the World
In the darkest days of World War II, two towering figures stood as the living embodiments of national defiance: Winston Churchill, the aristocratic bulldog of Great Britain, and Charles de Gaulle, the tall, austere French general. Both refused to surrender to Nazi Germany. Thrown together by fate...
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The Chronicle of the 34th Naval Construction Battalion
On Friday, February 19, 2026, the MacArthur Memorial hosted a virtual event featuring Dr. Frank Blazich Jr., Curator of Military History at the Smithsonian National Museum of American. Dr. Blazich shared the story of the 34th Naval Construction Battalion, the first African American Seabee…
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MacArthur Q&A: Part IV
In this latest episode, MacArthur Memorial historians Jim Zobel and Amanda Williams answer some of the more popular and/or unique questions about General MacArthur we have received from MacArthur Memorial Podcast listeners and on social media. This series includes: MacArthur's WWI injuries...
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Nagasaki's Urakami Cathedral Bells
On August 9, 1945, a second atomic bomb detonated over the Japanese city of Nagasaki, roughly 1600 feet away from the original Urakami Cathedral. The blast killed dozens inside the cathedral, and over 70,000 in the city. The cathedral and its smaller bell were destroyed in the blast. The larger...
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MacArthur and the Corps of Engineers + Bonus Q&A
Douglas MacArthur was in the Corps of Engineers from 1903 to 1917. D. Clayton James, a MacArthur biographer, titled a chapter and a sub-chapter about this period of MacArthur's career: "The Travels and Tribulations of a Young Engineer," and "The Brink of Oblivion." In this latest episode…
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MacArthur and West Point
MacArthur had a deep, lifelong connection to West Point. In this episode, Sherman Fleek, author of MacArthur and West Point: How the General and the Academy Shaped Each Other, joined the MacArthur Memorial Podcast to discuss this important part of MacArthur's life and legacy. Have a comment about...
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Operation Olympic + Bonus Q&A
Operation Olympic was the first phase of Operation Downfall—the Allied plan to invade Japan and end World War II. Set for November 1, 1945, this massive amphibious assault on Kyushu was canceled after Japan surrendered following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Soviet Union’s...
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"Pilots who still want to shoot the hell out of them" - Finale in the Pacific Symposium - 2025
On August 23, 2025, the MacArthur Memorial hosted Finale in the Pacific, a half day exploration of the end of the Pacific War. The event was a partnership between the MacArthur Memorial, the Hampton Roads Naval Museum, and the Military Aviation Museum. One of the presenters, Dr. Timothy Orr...
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Truman and the Decision to Use the Bomb - Finale in the Pacific Symposium 2025
On August 23, 2025, the MacArthur Memorial hosted Finale in the Pacific, a half day exploration of the end of the Pacific War. The event was a partnership between the MacArthur Memorial, the Hampton Roads Naval Museum, and the Military Aviation Museum. One of the presenters, historian Dennis M....
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The Conservation of General MacArthur's Cap
In March 2025, General Douglas MacArthur’s iconic cap won the Virginia Association of Museums People’s Choice Award as an important artifact deserving conservation. Inspired by this designation, the General Douglas MacArthur Foundation, a 501(c)(3) dedicated to supporting the MacArthur Memorial,...
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Fate of the Generals: MacArthur and Wainwright
General Douglas MacArthur and General Jonathan Wainwright were very different men. Despite their differences, they shared notable similarities: both came from military families, graduated from West Point, and were decorated World War I veterans. They were also deeply devoted to the Army and…
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MacArthur's Initial Response to the Korean War + Bonus Q&A
The Korean War began on June 25, 1950, when North Korean forces invaded South Korea, aiming to unify the peninsula under communist control. The conflict rapidly escalated, prompting a United Nations response led by the United States. When the war started, MacArthur, then Supreme Commander for the...
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Bearing Witness: A Holocaust Survivor Speaks
On May 8, 2025, the MM in partnership with the Holocaust Commission of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater and the Virginia Holocaust Museum, hosted Dr. Roger Loria, a holocaust survivor. The event was particularly poignant – it was held on the 80th anniversary of V-E Day – the day the…
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Relieved of Duty: MacArthur Reacts + Bonus Q&A
On April 11, 1951, at 1:00AM ET, President Harry S. Truman announced General Douglas MacArthur was relieved of command. Millions of people heard the news on the radio before MacArthur himself heard. How did he find out? MacArthur Memorial historians Jim Zobel and Amanda Williams discuss this and...
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MacArthur's Heroes + Bonus Q & A
Douglas MacArthur drew inspiration from mentors, role models, and a personal "pantheon" of historical figures throughout his life. On March 7, 2025, MacArthur Memorial historians Jim Zobel and Amanda Williams discussed who was included in this "pantheon" and solicited questions from the audience...
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General MacArthur's Iconic Cap
General Douglas MacArthur’s iconic cap, one of the most amazing artifacts in our museum, is a finalist for a conservation prize from VAM – the Virginia Association of Museums (VAM). Currently the cap is on VAM’s Virginia Top 10 Endangered List. The list helps raise public awareness of amazing...
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The 1945 Battle of Manila + Bonus Q&A
To date, the 1945 Battle of Manila remains the US military's largest and most intense experience of urban warfare. It resulted in 6500 American military casualties, 16000 Japanese military KIA, and a staggering number of civilians were killed and wounded. Manila, the Pearl of the Orient was...
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MacArthur's Birthplace: The Little Rock Barracks
The MacArthur Memorial is in Norfolk, VA, the hometown of General MacArthur’s mother, but General MacArthur was not born in Norfolk. He was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, at the Little Rock Barracks. Today that building houses the MacArthur Museum of Arkansas Military History. To discuss...
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Hellship: The Oryoku Maru
By 1944, as the Americans got closer to the Philippines, the Japanese accelerated their efforts to ship POWs held in the Philippines to other parts of their empire to work as forced laborers. POWs would be packed by the hundreds in the dark holds of transport ships. With little to no food or…
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The Land Battle on Leyte
On October 26, 2024, the MacArthur Memorial and the Hampton Roads Naval Museum commemorated the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Leyte Gulf with a series of presentations. Dr. Peter Mansoor, a retired US Army officer and the General Raymond E. Mason Jr. Chair in Military History at Ohio State...
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The Naval Battle of Leyte Gulf
On October 26, 2024, the MacArthur Memorial and the Hampton Roads Naval Museum commemorated the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Leyte Gulf with a series of presentations. Thomas Cutler, a retired USN officer and a preeminent naval historian, presented a lecture entitled The Naval Battle of…
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The 1944 Leyte Invasion
General Douglas MacArthur’s forces began landing at Leyte on October 20, 1944. That’s the day MacArthur took the famous picture wading ashore at Leyte, but there was a lot more to the operation than that. Why was Leyte chosen over Mindanao? How prepared were Japanese commanders for the invasion?...
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Undefeated: Army's 1944 Basketball Team
During World War II, as many young men joined the military, many college basketball programs in the United States were suspended. The US Military Academy at West Point was one of the schools that continued its basketball program. Army’s 1943 season was not a great season – but the 1944 season was...
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Battle of Morotai
When most people think about the battles in the Pacific during World War II, they probably think of Guadalcanal, Okinawa, the Philippines, Iwo Jima, Leyte Gulf, Midway, etc. It was a very long and difficult war though, and there were dozens of other battles. One of the lesser-known battles is the...
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MacArthur and the CCC
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was one of the most popular and successful relief programs during the Great Depression. Between 1933-1942, it put 3 million men to work throughout the United States. These young men worked on conservation and transportation projects on Federal, State, and…
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Jack Downey's Cold War
On November 29, 1952, a 22-year-old CIA operative named Jack Downey was shot down over China while taking part in an air drop. Four successive Administrations refused to acknowledge his connection to the CIA. Without this acknowledgement, Downey spent 21 years as a POW - the longest-held POW in...
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The Pearl Harbor Conference
In late July 1944, President Roosevelt met with General Douglas MacArthur and Admiral Chester Nimitz at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The future of the war in the Pacific was discussed at this Pearl Harbor Conference, or Pacific Strategy Conference as it is also called. It was not a "real" conference in...
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MacArthur Q&A: Part III
In this latest episode, MacArthur Memorial historians Jim Zobel and Amanda Williams answer some of the more popular and/or unique questions about General MacArthur we have received from MacArthur Memorial Podcast listeners and on social media. Have a comment about this episode? Send us a text...
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Tenth Army Commander
On June 18, 1945, one month shy of his 59th birthday, Lieutenant General Simon Bolivar Buckner Jr. became the most senior US military officer to be killed by enemy fire in World War II. At the time, he was leading the Tenth Army on Okinawa. Buckner kept a diary from January 1, 1944, to June 17,...
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PT Boat Commander John D. Bulkeley and D-Day
In 1942, John D. Bulkeley, commander of Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 3 and skipper of PT-41, spirited MacArthur and his family off Corregidor. Bulkeley received a Silver Star for his role in MacArthur's escape and was later awarded the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry above and beyond the...
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Beate Sirota Gordon and the Japanese Constitution
The Occupation of Japan after World War II is often considered a masterclass in civil affairs. It was not perfect, but it was successful. General Douglas MacArthur’s primary mission was to demilitarize Japan. Before he even arrived in Japan however, he was convinced that a sustainable peace would...
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The SS Quanza
On September 11, 1940, the SS Quanza arrived in Norfolk, VA. She was carrying a number of Jewish refugees who were fleeing the Nazi war machine. While they would ultimately find safety through the efforts of the Jewish community in Hampton Roads, this small humanitarian victory would be the...
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The Hollandia-Aitape Invasions
In April 1944, General Douglas MacArthur’s forces made a 580-mile amphibious leap to seize airfields at Hollandia and Aitape in New Guinea. It was a bold plan that meant making two simultaneous amphibious landings deep in enemy territory and it was the first time Admiral Chester Nimitz’s aircraft...
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Ernie Pyle: Part II
Part II of a two part interview. From 1942-1945, Ernie Pyle was the most famous American war correspondent. In 1942, his columns were featured in 42 newspapers. By 1945, they were featured in 400 daily and 300 weekly newspapers. He covered the war from the Blitz to North Africa, to Italy, to...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
The MacArthur Memorial Podcast covers a variety of topics related to the life and times of General Douglas MacArthur (1880-1964). From the triumphs and controversies of MacArthur's career to the latest scholarship on the Spanish-American War, the Philippine-American War, the World Wars, the Occupation of Japan, and the Korean War, the MacArthur Memorial Podcast is constantly exploring fascinating history. The MacArthur Memorial is located in Norfolk, VA and is dedicated to preserving and presenting the legacy of General MacArthur and the millions of men and women who served with him.
HOSTED BY
MacArthur Memorial; Amanda Williams
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How many episodes does MacArthur Memorial Podcast have?
MacArthur Memorial Podcast currently has 206 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is MacArthur Memorial Podcast about?
The MacArthur Memorial Podcast covers a variety of topics related to the life and times of General Douglas MacArthur (1880-1964). From the triumphs and controversies of MacArthur's career to the latest scholarship on the Spanish-American War, the Philippine-American War, the World Wars, the...
How often does MacArthur Memorial Podcast release new episodes?
MacArthur Memorial Podcast publishes regularly with 206 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
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Who hosts MacArthur Memorial Podcast?
MacArthur Memorial Podcast is created and hosted by MacArthur Memorial; Amanda Williams.
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