Edward Miller on A Conspiratorial Life

Leonard Lopate at Large on WBAI Radio in New York

{7/27/22) Though you may not know his name, Robert Welch (1899-1985)—founder of the John Birch Society—is easily one of the most significant architects of our current political moment. In A Conspiratorial Life, the first full-scale biography of Welch, Edward H. Miller delves deep into the life of an overlooked figure whose ideas nevertheless reshaped the American right. Welch became an unlikely candy magnate, founding the company that created Sugar Daddies, Junior Mints, and other famed confections. In 1958, he funneled his wealth into establishing the organization that would define his legacy and change the face of American politics: the John Birch Society. Join us when Edward H. Miller an associate teaching professor at Northeastern University and the author of A Conspiratorial Life: Robert Welch, connects the accusatory conservatism of the midcentury John Birch Society to the inflammatory rhetoric of the Tea Party, the Trump administration, Q, and more on this installment of Leonard Lopate at Large.