Stories That Live In Us

Latest Episodes:

Colorado: Braving the Wild Frontier (with Chris Trainor) | Episode 81 Oct 16, 2025

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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!

North Dakota: Creating Community (with Sarah Walker) | Episode 80 Oct 09, 2025

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When Sarah Walker's grandfather checked his mail one last day before leaving for World War I, he discovered a neighbor had intervened to keep him home—a bachelor farmer needed on the home front. That single act of community support changed everything.

Sarah Walker, Head of Reference Services at the North Dakota State Archives, shares her grandfather's journey immigrating at age 10 from Germany through Russia to North Dakota's farmland. We explore how tight-knit immigrant communities preserved their language and customs across generations, and why Sarah's career as an oral historian feels like the natural continuation of her family's story-keeping tradition.

South Dakota: Finding the Girl in the Middle (with Marni Sandweiss) Oct 02, 2025

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When historian Marni Sandweiss discovered an 1868 photograph of six prominent Civil War generals standing around an unnamed Indigenous girl, she couldn't let go of one haunting question: Who was she? In this episode, Princeton University Professor Emerita Martha "Marni" Sandweiss shares how she identified the child as Sophie Mousseau and uncovered a remarkable story of survival, identity, and resilience spanning generations on the Northern Plains. Through meticulous research combining written records, oral histories, and collaboration with Sophie's descendants, Marni reveals how one photograph connects to broader themes of mixed-race identity, territorial boundaries, and the power of naming the unnamed in history. Discover how this truffle-hunting historian transformed an anonymous face into a fully realized person whose story matters—and why every name in your family photographs deserves to be remembered.

Montana: Love, Loss, and Everything In-Between (with Mary Anne Mercer) | Episode 78 Sep 25, 2025

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💕 When Mary Anne Mercer discovered her great-grandmother's diary in a trunk that had sat untouched since 1915, she knew she had found something extraordinary.

Mary Anne, an accomplished author and former international health expert who worked in Nepal and Africa, returned to her Montana ranching roots to uncover a remarkable love story. Through a combination of family interviews, a preserved diary, and treasures from a century-old trunk, she pieced together the journey of Florrie—a young nurse from London whose path led to the isolated Montana plains. Working alongside the stories of her grandfather Andy, a former Wyoming cowboy turned rancher, Mary Anne discovered how family artifacts can reveal not just facts and dates, but the beating hearts of people who lived extraordinary lives. As she shares her process of turning fragments into a full family narrative, you'll understand why some stories demand to be written down and preserved for future generations.

💭 Have you ever wondered what stories might be waiting in your own family's forgotten treasures?

Washington: Replanted Roots Now Evergreen (with Cyndi Ingle) | Episode 77 Sep 18, 2025

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Idaho: Unboxing Gems of the Past (with Jen Iverson) | Episode 76 Sep 11, 2025

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🎵 When Jen Iverson said "What I wouldn't give to hear Grandpa's music again," she had no idea what she was about to discover just two days later. Join me as Jen Iverson, a Gen X mom and passionate family historian, shares an incredible story of musical discovery that transformed her family's connection to their Idaho heritage. We explore her great-grandfather Arnold Steed's forgotten legacy in Pocatello and how one unexpected find in a nursing home room became the bridge connecting four generations of her family. From migratory beekeeping adventures to multi-generational traditions at Island Park, Jen reveals how music became a powerful time machine to her ancestors' hearts. You'll hear why sometimes our most precious family treasures are hiding in the most unexpected places, just waiting to remind us of the voices we thought we'd lost forever.

Wyoming: Tumbleweed Ties That Bind (with Lindy Nielsen) | Episode 75 Sep 04, 2025

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Utah: Walking Where They Walked (with Michelle Ercanbrack) | Episode 74 Aug 28, 2025

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When Michelle Ercanbrack volunteered for a Mormon pioneer trek, she thought she'd be helping teenagers learn history. What she discovered instead was a missing piece of her own family story that had been hiding in plain sight for decades.

Michelle, a BYU family history program graduate and former Ancestry researcher who worked on television shows like "Who Do You Think You Are," joins me to share how sometimes the most meaningful genealogical discoveries happen not behind a computer screen, but when you physically stand where your ancestors once stood. Her emotional experience retracing her ancestor’s journey through the Wyoming wilderness to Utah reveals why knowing the facts of a story and truly understanding its impact are two completely different things.

Her ancestor, Mary Ann Malley, was a widowed single mother facing impossible choices and learning more about her life led Michelle to understand that even professional genealogists can overlook the most meaningful connections in their own family trees. Her story challenges every family historian to ask a simple but powerful question: What happens when you stop researching your ancestors’ lives and start walking where they walked?

This episode will leave you questioning whether you truly know your family's stories or if you're ready to discover what you've been missing.

Oklahoma: Two Genealogists and a DNA Match (with Nicka Sewell-Smith) | Episode 73 Aug 21, 2025

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New Mexico: Centuries of Stories (with Stephen Torres) | Episode 72 Aug 14, 2025

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When Stephen Torres's grandfather told him "one of your forefathers was the first European to set foot on New World soil," young Stephen was skeptical—until his college history research revealed a truth that changed everything.

Stephen shares what it means to have 400 years of unbroken family history in New Mexico's Taos Valley. From growing up with 50+ cousins to living with his storytelling grandfather, Stephen's family represents something rare: deep, unshakeable roots in one place. When genealogical research through Catholic Church records revealed remarkable connections to pivotal moments in American history, Stephen discovered his grandfather's stories held more truth than he'd ever imagined.

This is a story about the power of place, cultural continuity, and what happens when family roots run so deep they become inseparable from the very soil of home.

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