A Pulitzer Prize-nominated historian of the American West was the guest on a recent edition of the “MTSU On the Record” radio program.

Host Gina Logue’s interview with Dr. Anne Hyde first aired Oct. 17 on WMOT-FM Roots Radio 89.5 and www.wmot.org. You can listen to their conversation above.

Dr. Anne Hyde

Hyde delivered MTSU’s first Strickland Visiting Scholar in History Lecture for the 2017-18 academic year Oct. 24.

In it, she addressed the topic of so-called “half-breeds” and their role in the settlement of the West, examining the intermarriage of white descendants of Europeans and Native Americans in terms of family, commerce and their impact on both white and Native American societies.

“Early on, the fur trade required native expertise, and it brought huge numbers of young, single, available white men into Indian country,” Hyde said. “They took up with native women, but it was encouraged by native groups as a way to make new alliances with these new white arrivals.”

Hyde, a professor of history at the University of Oklahoma, also serves as editor-in-chief of the Western History Association’s “Western Historical Quarterly” and specializes in the American West of the 1800s. Her book “Empires, Nations, and Families: A New History of the North American West, 1800-1860” earned the 2011 Bancroft Prize in American History and Diplomacy and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

You can find more information on Hyde’s Oct. 24 lecture here.

To hear previous “MTSU On the Record” programs, visit the searchable “Audio Clips” archives at www.mtsunews.com.

For more information about “MTSU On the Record,” contact Logue at 615-898-5081 or WMOT-FM at 615-898-2800.