pplpod Episode 60 tracks Rutherford B. Hayes from Ohio reformer and Civil War brevet major general to the razor-thin 1876 election and a presidency that reset the postwar order. We unpack the Hayes–Tilden deadlock, the Electoral Commission, and the Compromise of 1877 that delivered the White House and ended federal Reconstruction—opening a new Gilded Age while leaving Black civil rights exposed to state power. In office, Hayes pushed merit-based civil service, battled the spoils system, faced the Great Railroad Strike of 1877, and took a hard fiscal line (vetoing the Bland–Allison silver bill before Congress overrode). We also hit the domestic firsts—telephone installed in the White House, the Easter Egg Roll tradition—plus the partnership with Lucy “Lemonade Lucy” Hayes and his post-presidency crusade for education and good government. Contested ...