Kali White VanBaale is the author of three novels, most recently The Monsters We Make, as well as short stories, essays, and articles. She’s the recipient of an American Book Award, an Eric Hoffer Book Award, and two State of Iowa major artist grants among others. She’s the managing editor of the essay journal The Past Ten, and volunteers for the PEN America Prison & Justice Writing program. Kali is a core faculty member of the Lindenwood University MFA in Creative Writing Program where she was named adjunct professor of the year in 2022. She lives outside Des Moines with her family.

Vietnam veteran David T. Zabecki retired from the U.S. Army in 2007 as a Major General. He holds a PhD in military history from Britain’s Royal Military College of Science. In 2012 he was a visiting professor at the U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis.

Annie Zaleski is a New York Times best-selling author and journalist who's written books about Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Duran Duran and Christmas songs.

John J. Edwards III is a journalist based in Brooklyn, N.Y. He was a longtime senior editor at Bloomberg News and the Wall Street Journal. You can follow him at @johnjedwards3.

Becky Little is a journalist based in Washington, D.C. Follow her on Bluesky.

Ana Lucia Araujo, is a historian of slavery and the Atlantic slave trade. Dr. Araujo is currently Professor of History at Howard University in Washington, D.C., and member of the International Scientific Committee of the UNESCO Routes of Enslaved Peoples Projects. Her three more recent books are Reparations for Slavery and the Slave Trade: A Transnational and Comparative History, The Gift: How Objects of Prestige Shaped the Atlantic Slave Trade and Colonialism, and Humans in Shackles: An Atlantic History of Slavery.

Kirby Pábalan-Táyag Aráullo is a Filipino American historian and content creator. He is currently the National Coordinator for Culture and Heritage for the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON).

Raymond Arsenault, the John Hope Franklin Professor of Southern History at the University of South Florida, St. Petersburg, is the author of Arthur Ashe: A Life.

John Avlon is senior political analyst at CNN. Previously, he was the editor-in-chief and managing director of The Daily Beast. He is the author of such books as Independent Nation: How Centrists Can Change American Politics, Wingnuts: How the Lunatic Fringe is Hijacking America, and Washington’s Farewell: The Founding Father’s Warning to Future Generations. Follow him on Twitter at @JohnAvlon.

A longtime journalist, Banks was a senior editor for ESPN.com and The Dallas Morning News. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Civil War Times, Civil War Monitor, Civil War News, America's Civil War and Military Images, among other publications.

Craig P. Bauer, a professor of mathematics at York College of Pennsylvania, is editor in chief of the journal Cryptologia. He has served as a scholar in residence at the NSA’s Center for Cryptologic History and is the author of Unsolved!: The History and Mystery of the World’s Greatest Ciphers from Ancient Egypt to Online Secret Societies.