Red Dead History

Red Dead Redemption 2 is one of the best-selling video games of all time, but what is the history behind the game? Dr. Tore C. Olsson joins us to talk about the game itself, how video games are teaching American history, and what historians can learn from engaging with popular culture. Essential Reading: Tore Olsson, Red Dead's History: A Video Game, an Obsession, and America's Violent Past (2024). Recommended Reading: Patricia Nelson Limerick, The Legacy of Conquest: The Unbroken Past of the American West (1987). Ari Kelman, A Misplaced Massacre: Struggling over the Memory of Sand Creek (2013). Richard White, Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America (2011). William Cronon, Nature’s Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West (1991). S. Paul O’Hara, Inventing the Pinkertons, or Spires, Sleuths, Mercenaries, and Thugs: Being Story of the Nation’s Most Famous (and Infamous) Detective Agency (2016). William Link, Southern Crucible: The Making of an American Region (2015).