Our American Stories

On this episode of Our American Stories, in the 1840s, America stretched west at a breathtaking pace. Texas joined the Union, the Mexican-American War added vast new territory, the California Gold Rush transformed the West, and the dream of a nation from sea to shining sea became reality. For our ongoing  Story of Us—Story of America  series , Dr. Bill McClay, author of  Land...

On this episode of Our American Stories, on April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln looked forward to peace for the first time in four years. By the following morning, the president lay dead after John Wilkes Booth's assassination at Ford's Theatre. What followed became one of the largest public displays of mourning in American history. Over the next 20 days, Lincoln's funeral train carried him 1,700 mile...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in late 1939, thousands of Jewish refugees poured into Vilna, Lithuania, hoping to escape Nazi Germany and Soviet-occupied Poland. Moses Beckelman, a young American social worker with the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, organized food, housing, and relief while searching for a way to get as many people out as possible before the borders closed...

On this episode of Our American Stories, Lawrence Tureaud grew up as the youngest of 12 children in Chicago's public housing, where his mother taught him to work hard, trust God, and treat others with respect. After serving in the U.S. Army, working as a nightclub bouncer, and winning a national competition, he caught Sylvester Stallone's attention and landed the role that introduced the world to...

On this episode of Our American Stories, on December 4, 1956, Elvis Presley walked into Sun Records in Memphis, Tennessee, where Carl Perkins was recording with Jerry Lee Lewis at the piano. Johnny Cash stopped by soon afterward. The four young musicians spent the afternoon singing together, and much of what they sang wasn't rock 'n' roll. It was gospel. Greg Hengler shares the story behind one of...

On this episode of Our American Stories, on Kodiak Island, Alaska, Leslie Leyland Fields discovered a young bald eagle wandering outside its nest just days before her own son and daughter were due to leave for a dangerous commercial salmon fishing season in Bristol Bay. Her instinct was to protect the eaglet, just as every mother's instinct is to protect her children. But the encounter with the yo...

On this episode of Our American Stories, when gold prices collapsed in September 1869, it triggered one of the earliest financial panics in American history. Jay Gould and Jim Fisk had spent months driving prices higher in an attempt to corner the market, working back channels in Washington to shield their plan from regulation. But the scheme unraveled quickly, and when it did, the damage rippled...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in December 1944, during the Battle of the Bulge, Brigadier General Anthony McAuliffe and the 101st Airborne Division were surrounded by German forces in Bastogne, Belgium. Outnumbered, freezing, and running low on food and ammunition, they received a demand to surrender. McAuliffe's answer became one of the most famous one-word replies in American military...

On this episode of Our American Stories, Wayne Gretzky didn't have the size or speed most scouts looked for. But what he did have couldn't be measured. With unmatched vision, timing, and instinct, he rewrote what was possible on the ice. He holds more than 60 NHL records and remains the only player to score over 200 points in a season, a feat he accomplished four times. We take a look at the life...

On this episode of Our American Stories, The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution can both be read in just a few minutes, but together they transformed the course of history. Dr. Larry P. Arnn explains why America's founding documents were unlike anything the world had ever seen and why they still matter today. Dr. Arnn, president of Hillsdale College and author of  The Founders'...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in the 1950s, the Soviet Union seemed to have an insurmountable lead in the Space Race. American rockets exploded, astronauts lost their lives, and many doubted the United States would ever reach the Moon. Yet less than 12 years after Sputnik, Neil Armstrong took humanity's first steps onto another world. Space historian Steve Kates, better known as Dr. Sky...

On this episode of Our American Stories, during the American Revolution, the British converted the  HMS Jersey  into a floating prison off Brooklyn, New York. Disease, starvation, contaminated water, and deliberate cruelty turned the ship into what its prisoners called “Hell Afloat,” where more Americans died than in all the war’s battles combined. Historian Robert P. W...

On this episode of Our American Stories, Ken Kendrick grew up in Princeton, West Virginia, where lifelong friendships, youth baseball, and small-town values shaped the course of his life. Long before he became the principal owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks and won a World Series, he learned lessons about leadership, failure, perseverance, and character that never left him. Ken shares remarkable s...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in the late 1970s, the NBA was struggling to capture America's attention. The league was failing to make money, the talent wasn't great, and storylines were hard to come by. Then two young superstars from remarkably different worlds entered the league and transformed professional basketball forever. Larry Bird grew up in the tiny town of French Lick, Indian...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in 1943, the U.S. government transformed farmland outside Oak Ridge, Tennessee, into a top-secret city of 75,000 people racing to build the atomic bomb before Nazi Germany. Cameras were forbidden, except for one. Richard Cook, author of  Ignored Heroes of World War II: The Manhattan Project Workers of Oak Ridge, Tennessee , shares the remarkable story...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in 1971, Apollo 14 astronaut Alan Shepard famously hit two golf balls on the Moon. For decades, NASA never revealed their brand, and Shepard never publicly told the story. Then an estate sale in Rogers, Arkansas, uncovered a signed photograph that led Joe Murfin to an extraordinary discovery involving Daisy Outdoor Products, a longtime public relations exec...

On this episode of Our American Stories, picture a crowded parlor in the 1800s. The air is heavy, the fire is roaring, and the women are laced into corsets that leave little room to breathe. In moments like these, fainting became common, so common that homes often had special couches set aside for recovery. What we now think of as a Victorian cliché was, for many women, an ordinary interrup...

On this episode of Our American Stories, during the Great Depression, Joy Neal Kidney's family didn't eat strange food for fun. They ate what they could find. Sometimes that meant possum. Other times, it meant even less. But in the middle of the hardship, they found ways to stay connected, to laugh when they could, and to keep going. Joy reflects on the meals that got them through and what they ta...

On this episode of Our American Stories, Abraham Lincoln's presidency began long before he took the oath of office. During a 13-day journey from Springfield, Illinois, to Washington, D.C., he faced secession, death threats, and a nation already coming apart. Ted Widmer, author of  Lincoln on the Verge: Thirteen Days to Washington , shares the gripping story of the journey that tested America'...

On this episode of Our American Stories, most Americans know the story of Irish immigrants arriving during the Great Famine. Far fewer know about an earlier chapter, when thousands of Irish men, women, and children were forcibly removed from their homeland and sent across the Atlantic under English rule. Their story stretches from Viking raids to Cromwell's conquest and the earliest English coloni...

On this episode of Our American Stories, why did America's founders and most important men keep turning to King David? From the Revolution to Abraham Lincoln's efforts to reunite the nation after the Civil War, the biblical king and his family helped generations of Americans understand courage, rebellion, leadership, and reconciliation. For our ongoing series, Rabbi Stuart Halpern, co-author of&nb...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in the summer of 1833, Lexington, Kentucky, was brought to its knees by a cholera outbreak. Entire families were lost in a matter of days, and fear spread faster than the disease itself. When the dead outnumbered the living willing to bury them, one man stepped forward. His name was Solomon. Most people in town dismissed him as a drunk gravedigger. But in t...

On this episode of Our American Stories, George Valdes fled Cuba with his family in 1966 believing the American Dream would give his life meaning. By age 21, he was helping run one of the largest cocaine operations in North America, earning millions of dollars each month, yet he had never felt more empty. George Valdes, author of  Coming Clean: The True Story of a Cocaine Drug Lord and His Un...

On this episode of Our American Stories, addiction kept Ryan Stewart at a distance from nearly everyone around him. For years, he tried to manage it alone, convinced that asking for help meant losing control. But when things began to fall apart, the people around him stayed. Friends, counselors, and even strangers showed up in ways he never expected. Recovery came slowly, marked by setbacks and qu...

On this episode of Our American Stories, in February 1861, Assistant Surgeon Bernard John Dowling Irwin volunteered to lead just 11 soldiers on a dangerous mission to rescue troops surrounded by Apache warriors in what became known as the Bascom Affair. The History Guy shares how Irwin earned the first Medal of Honor by date of action and how one misunderstood confrontation helped spark the Apache...