Our American Stories

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Latest Episodes:

"The First Guy Cannot Fail": The Jackie Robinson Story Jan 31, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, Bob Kendrick, President of the Negro Baseball Leagues Museum, tells the story of a man who started in Kansas City, made his way to Brooklyn, and swept across the nation.

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Josephine Earp: The Woman Who Shaped the Story of Her Beloved Husband—the Most Famous Lawman of the Old West Jan 31, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, for nearly fifty years, Josephine Earp was married to the most famous lawman of the Old West, Wyatt Earp. Ann Kirschner, author of Lady at the O.K Corral: The True Story of Josephine Marcus Earp, is here to tell her story.

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On Fire: John O'Leary Shares His Story of Survival Against All Odds After Being Burnt on Nearly 100 Percent of His Body Jan 31, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, John O'Leary is the bestselling author of On Fire. Today he shares the story of how after being burnt on nearly 100% of his body, faith, family, and a hall-of-fame radio broadcaster named Jack Buck got him through some of the darkest times in his life when he was only nine years old.

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Lesson Learned: Clean Hog Manure Off Boots Before Going to School Jan 31, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, Scott Jones, author of Growing Up Rural, shares the story of one of the most embarrassing moments of his time in elementary school, and the lessons he learned from it.

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A Grave Escape? Jan 30, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, ...as if spending the night in a funeral parlor wasn't scary enough! Our American Stories listener Tom Ryan brings us a chilling tale from the family funeral parlor.

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How a Group of Daring Bootleggers Created NASCAR Jan 30, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, long before NASCAR’s rampant commercialism lurks a not-so-distant history that has been carefully hidden from view—until now. Here to tell the true story behind NASCAR’s hardscrabble, moonshine-fueled origins is Neal Thompson, author of Driving with the Devil: Southern Moonshine, Detroit Wheels, and the Birth of NASCAR.

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Danny Elfman Had "No Propensity for Music" Yet Became One of Film's Greatest Composers Jan 30, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, Danny Elfman came to prominence as the lead vocalist and songwriter for the new wave band Oingo Boingo in the early 1980s —as seen in the Rodney Dangerfield comedy, Back to School. Since scoring his first studio film in 1985, Elfman has composed over 100 feature film scores like Batman, Beetlejuice, Men in Black, The Nightmare Before Christmas, and Good Will Hunting—to name just a few, as well as compositions for television like The Simpsons, stage productions, and concert halls. Here to share his story is the man himself, Danny Elfman.

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Trapped Inside a Tube: The Story of The Iron Lung Jan 30, 2025

Show notes

On this episode of Our American Stories, Daryn Glassbrook of the Mobile Medical Museum in Mobile, Alabama tells the story of the iron lung, an antiquated device used to keep people with advanced polio alive in the first half of the 20th century.

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A President, a Preacher, and a Giant Block of Cheese Jan 29, 2025

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On this episode of Our American Stories, Thomas Jefferson was known for championing religious freedom in our nation's infancy—but not many people know the story of how a preacher thanked him for this in the most unusual way...gifting him a giant block of cheese.

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Life Before Digital Photos: The Last Days of Kodachrome Jan 29, 2025

Show notes

On this episode of Our American Stories, Dwayne's Photo in Parson's, Kansas is truly a family affair, and for a while, it was an extraordinarily rare family affair...so rare that people from across the globe rushed there to get their Kodachrome photos processed before the last chemicals in the world required to do it ran out. Here's the family with the story.

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