Discussion Topics
Steven Baughman Jensen is available for podcast interviews, media appearances, and press inquiries. Below you'll find three ready-to-pitch story angles, a seasonal calendar of tie-in dates, and a podcast pitch written for hosts.
A white descendant travels back to 1872 Texas to confront his slave-trading ancestor at a table where that ancestor once planned deals in human beings — and asks him to defend those choices. He does, using the Bible, the Constitution, economics, and 19th-century science.
What Steve brings to your interview or piece:
The full confrontation — and how it was imagined from the historical record. The name of the ancestor. The name of the toddler he purchased. The Bible verse he used to justify it. Steve can walk your audience through the entire exchange, answer questions about how he found the records, and speak to what it felt like to sit across from that history and refuse to look away.
Sample interview questions:
• You found your ancestor in a scrapbook of photos and documents gathered by your grandmother. What was in it — and what did it feel like to discover that he was a slave trader?
• Charles Arden Russell justified slavery using the Bible, the Constitution, and 19th-century science. Which of those defenses surprised you most?
• You're a trial attorney. When you sat down across from your ancestor in that great room — even in your imagination — did it feel like a cross-examination?
• What did you do with what you found? What does repair look like after a discovery like that?
A tenth-great-grandson asks his Puritan ancestors what really happened after the First Thanksgiving — and their careful phrase "at that point" exposes the gap between the story white Americans tell and the history Native people lived.
What Steve brings to your interview or piece:
The specific moment in the conversation where the phrase "at that point" surfaces — what it reveals about how white families have historically processed their role in Native dispossession, and why that evasion still matters today. Steve can speak to the Wampanoag history behind the story, the specific ancestors involved, and how any white American with New England roots can begin to investigate their own family's connection to that history.
Sample interview questions:
• Your family landed in New England ten generations ago. What did you expect to find when you started researching — and what did you actually find?
• The phrase "at that point" has a prominent place in your Puritan ancestor conversations. What is that phrase doing — and what does it tell us about today?
• What is the difference between the story white Americans tell about the First Thanksgiving and what the historical record actually shows?
• What would it mean for a white family with New England roots to tell the Thanksgiving story honestly — including their own family's role in it?
Beyond confession, the forthcoming book offers a simple, teachable method — using time-travel conversations with ancestors — to help white readers face their family's role in slavery, Native dispossession, and the whitewashing of the Confederacy, and then take specific steps toward repair.
What Steve brings to your interview or piece:
The full seven-step method, explained in plain language and illustrated with examples from his own family's history. Steve can walk your audience through the method in real time, demonstrate how it works with a specific ancestor, and speak to why this approach — grounded in historical record rather than imagination or guilt — produces something genealogists, racial justice workers, and spiritual seekers all find immediately useful.
Sample interview questions:
• What is a time-travel conversation — and how is it different from just imagining what your ancestors might have said?
• You call this a method, not a memoir. What's the distinction — and why does it matter?
• Your background is in trial law. How does cross-examining a hostile witness prepare you for confronting a slave-trading ancestor?
• You talk about repair, not just reckoning. What does repair actually look like — practically, spiritually — for a white American who has done this work?
• What do you say to white people who feel this history has nothing to do with them personally?
Sample Interview Questions
A selection of pre-prepared interview questions for Steve.
• You retired expecting to write a tribute to your grandmother. What did you find instead — and when did you realize the book you were writing had changed completely?
• You found your ancestor Charles Arden Russell in a biography written by his son. What was in it — and what did it feel like to understand that he was not just an enslaver, but also a slave trader?
• What does a slave schedule look like? Walk us through what you actually saw on the page.• What is a time-travel conversation — and how is it different from just imagining what your ancestors might have said?
• You call this a method and a framework, not just a memoir. What's the distinction — and why does it matter to you?
• You spent 22 years cross-examining hostile witnesses. How does that prepare you for sitting across from a slave-trading ancestor?
• Charles Arden Russell defended slavery using the Bible, the Constitution, and 19th-century science. Which of those defenses was hardest to take apart — and why?• You talk about repair, not just reckoning. What does repair actually look like — practically, spiritually — for a white American who has done this work?
• This project speaks to genealogists, racial justice workers, and people doing ancestral healing and spiritual work. How does the same method serve all three?
• What do you say to white people who feel this history has nothing to do with them personally?
• What has this work cost you — inside your family, inside yourself?
• The Healing White History Substack has a growing readership. What do people write to you about — what are they finding in their own family histories?
• Who is this book for — and who do you most hope picks it up?
• What do you want a reader to be able to do after reading this that they couldn't do before?
• What comes after the confrontation? Where does the work go from there?
Seasonal Pitch Calendar
A selection of subject specific topics for different seasons and notable dates.
Topic: "What my Puritan ancestors told me about the First Thanksgiving." Key content: Puritan ancestor dialogues, Wampanoag history, the gap between the story and the record.
Topic: "What my Confederate-glorifying ancestors said when I asked them about Jim Crow." Key content: Dialogues with relatives who rewrote Confederate history, postwar Texas, the white stories that buried Black history.
Topic: "How white families can add our own chapters to Black History Month — by telling the truth about who our people were." Key content: Charles Arden Russell, the slave trade, the documented slave schedule.
Topic: "What happened when I confronted my slave-trading ancestor." Key content: The 1872 Texas great room. The names. The conversation.
Topic: "The missing pages in my white family's story of 'settling' America." Key content: Dutch and Puritan colonists, Wampanoag, Lenape, the Manhattan land deal.
Topic: "A practical method for white Americans to move from guilt to responsibility." Key content: The Method page, discussion guides, speaking inquiry, church and group resources.
Podcast Guest
Steven Baughman Jensen is a trial attorney from Dallas — 22 years at the plaintiffs’ bar, a 2006 Trial Lawyer of the Year Award, cases argued before federal and state appellate courts. He spent his career demanding the truth from people who didn't want to give it. A few years ago he turned that same method on his own family's history.
What he found was a slave trader, a Puritan colonizer, and relatives who spent their lives glorifying the Confederacy. What he developed was a method for confronting them — and healing what they left behind.
The result is Healing White History, a forthcoming book and a growing Substack community with a dedicated readership. Steve speaks to genealogists, racial justice communities, faith congregations, and spiritual seekers doing ancestral healing work. He brings all three threads — the historical record, the personal confrontation, and the path toward repair — into every conversation.
For your listeners he offers specificity, story, and 22 years of courtroom experience that shapes every word of how he presents both. He knows how to make a case. This one is worth hearing.
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