@davidswanson.bsky.social
New Yorker, Scotsman, editor, writer, map and archive nerd Politics, culture, and sandwiches at https://buttondown.com/theswordandthesandwich
It's Friday! Sandwich day!
Today I answer your burning question: who are the poor boys po'boy sandwiches are named after?
The answer: Streetcar workers from the great New Orleans strike of 1929!
Two brothers stepped up to feed them:
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Here it is!!!! The Sandwich Fact!!!! Near guaranteed to make you go "huh I didn't know that" unless you did!
buttondown.com/theswordandt...
02.02.2026 19:02 — 👍 555 🔁 66 💬 6 📌 2
i like my pb&j with a dense helping of historical facts about peanut butter and jelly sandwiches
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TODAY: the myth
the icon
the legend
the peanut butter and jelly sandwich
on the making of a myth, and how it became ubiquitous
(alas, george washington carver did not invent peanut butter)
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I wrote this yesterday about the hero city of Minneapolis
www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKOW...
I wrote about the patty melt, about not fitting into molds, and about the pain & joy of a life that doesn't fit a predetermined menu: buttondown.com/theswordandt...
23.01.2026 18:47 — 👍 505 🔁 71 💬 25 📌 28
Thanks for the new sandwich column @swordsjew.bsky.social I needed that. Though, now I'm hungry. buttondown.com/theswordandt...
23.01.2026 18:21 — 👍 50 🔁 6 💬 2 📌 3
“The Grateful Dead, more than most, is a band of eras. Each year has a distinct sound to it,” Nick Paumgarten wrote in 2012. More on the lore of the rock band.
www.newyorker.com/magazine/201...
me, thinking to myself: boy i had kind of a breakdown and read 400 romance novels instead of writing about the news for most of the last year
me, writing about this phenomenon: I built myself an inner Elba, and exiled myself to an isle of love
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for new years you should become a paid subscriber to my newsletter so i can write about romance and gender and sandwiches and as much politics as i can handle at erratic intervals and you'll love it
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YES and we have an amazing entry today feat. @swordsjew.bsky.social, Jack Pendarvis, and Misha Angrist
Anchors aweigh!!
flaminghydra.com/issue-471/
A menorah in a window across the street from a building displaying a Nazi flag.
Happy Hanukkah to our friends who celebrate. Rachel Posner, a rabbi’s wife in Kiel, Germany, took this photograph in 1931 -- a potent reminder that fascism must be fought in every generation, even if it's wrapped in an American flag and a red hat.
08.12.2023 01:50 — 👍 2283 🔁 684 💬 13 📌 27
A digital atlas of ancient Rome’s highways and byways reveals a road network that was more extensive than thought, according to a study published last month.
09.12.2025 13:25 — 👍 122 🔁 33 💬 5 📌 9
Where the Original ‘America First’ Leader Went to Die
@stephenrodrick.bsky.social visits Charles Lindbergh’s gravesite, recalling parallels with the man who picked up Lindbergh’s nativist scepter, Donald Trump.
Dispatch: www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...
The sandwich newsletter is back!!! Prepare to learn more than you ever thought you would about pastrami! Origin myths! Disputes! An outstanding historical mystery! Yiddish ballads! Unlikely lyricism! The Armenian Church takes a stand! buttondown.com/theswordandt...
05.12.2025 17:03 — 👍 518 🔁 89 💬 46 📌 46
this week the sandwich newsletter is coming BACK
hold on to your butts
Prepare for an onslaught of pastrami facts by subscribing: buttondown.com/theswordandt...
evangelicals love jews like a hungry man loves a chicken wing
21.11.2025 16:13 — 👍 272 🔁 31 💬 2 📌 0
No prizes for guessing who grok chose sorry
I asked grok who was the better role model for humanity, Jesus Christ or Elon Musk. GUESS WHAT.
20.11.2025 20:34 — 👍 2138 🔁 574 💬 222 📌 220[BBC Scotland] reaction to [4]-2 K. McLean 90+7
18.11.2025 22:12 — 👍 110 🔁 24 💬 1 📌 20every british sandwich is just like "we put carbs between other carbs" it is impressive
18.11.2025 21:40 — 👍 505 🔁 28 💬 42 📌 7Editors have a really hard job, and the good ones can make something unreadable readable, and the great ones can make something unreadable into something good. But they're basically invisible, until someone tries to write without one.
17.11.2025 15:35 — 👍 3501 🔁 517 💬 75 📌 86
"If you had to pick a sandwich to throw at a fascist, what sandwich are you picking and why?" defector.com/big-words-ar...
15.11.2025 21:22 — 👍 26 🔁 2 💬 10 📌 3
I got to talk to @akilahhughes.com alongside amazing people like @profgabriele.com and Heather Weaver of the ACLU about Christian authoritarianism and the plot to force it on this country. Check it out: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/h...
11.11.2025 13:51 — 👍 127 🔁 23 💬 2 📌 0the fact that Sandwich Guy is facing this 'wich trial at all is evidence of subpar justice. he is a hero being put through the judicial grinder. i hope the jury wraps up a not guilty verdict without delay or loafing around
06.11.2025 19:55 — 👍 2346 🔁 281 💬 77 📌 23twelve hungry men
06.11.2025 19:31 — 👍 2988 🔁 403 💬 29 📌 0
reposting this in honor of World Sandwich Day
buttondown.com/theswordandt...
A man in 18th-century attire stands beside a column, holding a scroll, with domed buildings behind him. Text says: Does the modern sandwich exist because of one man's love for gambling? Probably not. But this popular myth helped make John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich and namesake of the sandwich, a legendary figure.
Celebrate World Sandwich Day by exploring the origin of this convenient meal 🥪
Legend says the Fourth Earl of Sandwich asked for meat between slices of bread so he could continue playing cards or working without greasy hands. 🧵⬇️ (1/2)
