Stories That Live In Us

Latest Episodes:

Texas: Christmas Card Culture Connections (with Sylvia Hernandez) | Episode 91 Dec 25, 2025

Show notes

When Sylvia Hernandez discovered vintage Christmas cards in a university archive, her coworkers didn't understand their significance. But for her, they represented everything familiar about growing up Mexican-American in Waco, Texas.

Sylvia Hernandez, outreach and instruction librarian at Baylor University's Texas Collection and a seventh generation Wacoan, traces both sides of her family back to the Mexican Revolution. She has great-great-grandfathers, one on each side of her family tree, who crossed paths in remarkable ways long before their great-grandchildren ever met and fell in love.

Through her work preserving Texas history, Sylvia has discovered her own family's story woven into the archives. From the Latin American Methodist church her ancestors helped found to the kindergarten they established for migrant children, her roots run deep in Texas. Her unique perspective as both archivist and descendant reveals how cultural traditions like Las Posadas, midnight Mass, and yes, even mysterious pots of mashed potatoes, create bridges between generations and preserve identity and connection across centuries.

Discover how family stories, whether preserved in vintage Christmas cards or passed down at holiday gatherings, strengthen the connections that truly matter.

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🎧 Ready to discover more stories that could transform your family connections? Subscribe to 'Stories That Live In Us' wherever you get your podcasts, and leave a review to help other families find their path to deeper connection through family history. Together, we're building a community of families committed to preserving and sharing the stories that matter most.
🖼️ Ready to get your family tree out of your computer and onto your wall? Visit FamilyChartmasters.com to create a family tree chart that will help your family share stories for generations.
♥ Want more family history tips and inspiration? Follow me @CristaCowan on Instagram where I share behind-the-scenes looks at my own family discoveries and practical ways to uncover yours!

Iowa: A Love of Food and Family (with Rosie Grant) | Episode 90 Dec 18, 2025

Show notes

When archivist Rosie Grant stumbled upon a gravestone with a spritz cookie recipe carved into it, she had no idea it would change her life. What began as a TikTok curiosity during her cemetery internship became a viral phenomenon and, eventually, a groundbreaking cookbook celebrating 50 recipes from gravestones across America.

Rosie shares her remarkable project "To Die For: A Cookbook of Gravestone Recipes." We discover how her library science background and passion for community archives led her to document not just recipes, but the rich stories of the people behind them. From Maxine's Christmas cookies in Iowa, and the German tradition of hanging cookies on the tree, to intimate oral history interviews with dozens of families, Rosie reveals how food connects us across generations.

You'll hear about Rosie's journey from cemetery intern to bestselling author, her dedication to both grandmothers who shaped her understanding of food and family, and the surprising ways these gravestone recipes are inspiring living families to preserve their own food traditions. Whether it's Iowa's community-minded spirit or the universal power of recipes to keep memories alive, this conversation reminds us that the stories we share around the table are the ones that truly live in us.

Guest Bio:
Rosie Grant is a writer, researcher, and archivist whose work explores the intersections of archives, folklore, and family storytelling. She is the creator of @GhostlyArchive, where her exploration of gravestone recipes and the histories behind them has reached hundreds of thousands of followers across social media. TO DIE FOR is her first book.

Wisconsin: Great Grandmothers and the Great Migration (with Dani Allen) | Episode 89 Dec 11, 2025

Show notes

When Dani was in eighth grade, she watched her grandmother wash and braid her own mother’s hair. In that moment, she was witness to a ritual passed on through generations of Black women.

Join me as Dani Allen, Senior Director of Talent Acquisition at Ancestry, shares her family's journey from the Deep South to Wisconsin during the 1930s and 40s as part of The Great Migration. Together we explore how her grandfather's search for work in the auto industry led their family north, the tumultuous marriage that nearly ended in tragedy, and the newspaper clipping that finally confirmed whispered family stories.

From her great-grandmother's striking blue eyes and the meaning behind hair care rituals, to her weekly Zoom calls with her 90-year-old grandmother filled with freshly discovered stories, Dani reveals how intergenerational connections shape identity and preserve legacy. She shares how these discoveries help her two-year-old granddaughter understand the resilient women whose strength flows through her veins. Dani’s story reminds us that family history isn't just about the past. It's about the bonds we nurture today that will live on in generations to come.

California: Stars Shooting Out of Silence (with Candace Dixon Horne) | Episode 88 Dec 04, 2025

Show notes

When Candace Dixon-Horne's husband bought AncestryDNA kits in 2018, she hesitated before sending hers in. Raised by a single mom in Arkansas, Candace spent her entire life with her mom as the only blood relative she knew.

One DNA match changed everything. A simple Google search led to names she recognized, faces that looked hauntingly familiar, and a connection to California's golden age of cinema that seemed too extraordinary to be real. I talk with Candace about the moment she realized the story she'd found was actually her story, and how meeting her biological father's family for the first time revealed generations of Hollywood history, creative passion, and family connections spanning from the silent film era to today.

This episode explores how DNA can unlock not just names and dates, but entire worlds of family legacy and how discovering where you come from can transform your understanding of who you are.

Minnesota: Santa Claus, a Corn Cob Pipe, and Nellie Oleson (with Lisa Elzey) | Episode 87 Nov 27, 2025

Show notes

What if your family's pioneer past looked exactly like your favorite childhood TV show? When Lisa Elzey discovered her great-great-grandfather's story, she realized she'd been watching his life every Monday night on Little House on the Prairie. Complete with homesteading, hand-hewn cabins, and a white beard down to his belly.

In this episode, Lisa shares how a purple-inked memoir written by her great-grandmother's half-sister unlocked the story of Johann Heinrich Seba, a German immigrant who arrived alone at 18, hacked through Minnesota wilderness for a mile and a half in a single day, and became so beloved his community lowered flags to half-staff when he died. For decades, Lisa and her mother searched for his origins in Germany, writing letters to archives and scrolling through endless microfilm reels. Then in 2016, a single search on Ancestry revealed not just where he was from, but a family secret hidden in Lutheran christening records that changed everything they thought they knew.

Discover how one ancestor's story can bridge four generations of women, why a steeple clock matters more than any antique collection, and what happens when patience meets the right record at exactly the right time.

Oregon: Trail of the Unclaimed | Episode 86 Nov 20, 2025

Show notes

When Phyllis Zegers discovered her cousin died alone in Oregon State Hospital in the 1890s, she never imagined it would lead to reconnecting hundreds of families with their forgotten ancestors. In this episode, Phyllis shares how her genealogy research uncovered 3,500 unclaimed cremains at the hospital—and how she's worked tirelessly to honor each person by researching their stories and finding their living relatives. From sending surprise letters that reveal family secrets to sprinkling ashes at a beloved fishing hole, Phyllis demonstrates the profound impact one genealogist can have. Her work reminds us that every name in a record represents a real person whose story deserves to be told, and that sometimes the most meaningful family history work happens when we look beyond our own family tree to honor the forgotten.

Kansas: A Calling From the Ancestors (with Calvin Osborne) | Episode 85 Nov 13, 2025

Show notes

Calvin Osborne, a Washington D.C. attorney and Civil War reenactor, spent nearly three decades studying African American military history before Ancestry researchers revealed a stunning discovery: his great-great-grandfather, William Lacey, was a soldier in the First Kansas Colored Troops, the very first Black men to fight in the Civil War. In this powerful conversation, Calvin shares how a 1989 viewing of the movie Glory sparked an unstoppable passion that led him from battlefield reenactments to uncovering a love story that began in slavery, survived the chaos of border wars, and created a legacy that would span generations. His book, Contraband Hearts, tells the story of William and Lucinda. These two teenagers escaped enslavement together, fought for freedom in Kansas, and built a family that would eventually reach back across time to inspire their descendants. Sometimes our ancestors don't just leave us stories. They call us to find them.

West Virginia: Fame or Infamy in the Mountain State (with Mallory Peterson) | Episode 84 Nov 06, 2025

Show notes

When Mallory Peterson discovered she had Scottish ancestry instead of Cherokee heritage, she uncovered something intriguing that has captured her imagination. In the little town of Martinsburg, West Virginia she found a spy. And not just any spy but 17 year old Belle Boyd, the infamous Confederate spy known as "Cleopatra of the Secession."

In this episode, I sit down with Mallory, a young genealogist whose complicated family story—raised by grandparents, not meeting her biological father until 14—fueled her passion for discovering the ancestors she never knew. Her journey into her family tree uncovered the migration patterns of her Scottish forebears, those rebellious, storytelling souls who settled in the Appalachian Mountains and brought their fierce independence with them.

Together, we explore how Belle Boyd's story reveals the Scottish tendency toward stubborn conviction, the complicated legacy of being on the wrong side of history, and why some ancestors capture our imagination despite their flaws. From Civil War espionage to stage performances reliving her "glory days," Belle's life demonstrates that family history isn't always comfortable but it's always worth discovering.

What stories of courage, rebellion, or notoriety might be hiding in your family tree?

Nevada: The Well-Worn Path | Episode 83 Oct 30, 2025

Show notes

Nebraska: Connecting to the Land Through Stories (with Greg Wagner) Oct 23, 2025

Show notes

When Greg Wagner's great-great-grandmother made her dying wish to be buried not in a cemetery but beneath an oak tree on their Nebraska homestead, she planted more than roots in the soil. Greg is a sixth-generation Nebraskan whose family has maintained the same land for 158 years through blizzards, armed robberies, and economic crashes. As someone who's spent 46 years caring for Nebraska's natural resources through the Game and Parks Commission, Greg brings a unique perspective on how place shapes family identity. We explore how his grandmother's death in 2005 launched his genealogical journey, uncover the resilience required to keep land in a family for over a century and a half, and discover why every single Wagner descendant has chosen to remain in Nebraska. This conversation reveals how the stories we inherit from our ancestors become the compass that guides future generations home.

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