At the beginning of the 19th Century, the United States, a young democratic republic, and the Russian Empire, an autocratic empire. established surprisingly friendly relations. This distant friendship waxed and waned over the century before it transformed into an intense rivalry.

Join us on February 24, 2022 at 4:30 for a conversation about 19th-Century Russian-American relations: we will hear from Ivan Kurilla, a Russian-born and trained historian of the United States and co-author of the recent Distant Friends and Intimate Enemies, and Willard Sunderland, Professor of Russian History at the University of Cincinnati and author of a forthcoming book about John Quincy Adams's journey to take up the post of Ambassador to Russia in 1807.

We will also mark the four-year anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022.