The Slater / Slant by Bob Slater:
History is fascinating! A skillful interviewer chatting with experts can make it stimulating.
History is more than just memorizing dates and events. It's the key to a full understanding of the human condition -- the successes and the failures, the triumphs and the tragedies, the heroes and the scoundrels.
At its best it can shed light on what led us to today and provide insights into what to use in the future.
And it's important to separate fact from fiction, reality from legends.
St. Joseph is at the epicenter of regional history -- the gateway to Western expansion. Its story ranges from the tragedies of the Civil War to the Gilded Age of the late 19th century, from the days when hardware and drygoods merchandising created millionaires, when nearly a hundred passenger trains a day came to the city.
It's the story of a city in contrast, a city once so desperate for money that it printed its own, then years later had the vision to develop a 26-mile boulevard system that would be the envy of any city.
But our regional history expands beyond the city. In a carefully researched series of podcasts, historian Bob Ford visits with experts to relate stories on wide-ranging topics. The podcasts range from everything as charming as Walt Disney and as vicious as Order No.11 of the Civil War. Bob lets the experts tell the stories in their own words, bringing to light details of the past that have influenced our today.
This is not simply a repeat of laudatory quotes lifted from biographies of these giants. In his low-key probing manner, Bob visits with experts to offer an in-depth understanding of the men, women and events. We learn some of the background of what inspired the pathway to legend.
Did you know Atchison's Amelia Earhart built her own roller-coaster before becoming the first woman to fly across the Atlantic?
What about Evel Knievel? How did Robert get that nickname? And how did a museum highlighting the Butte, Montana, daredevil wind up in Topeka, Kansas.
Where are the repercussions even today of Civil War Order No. 11? How much wasteland did it create in western Missouri? Why?
What about massacres in Lawrence, KS, and Osceola, MO?
Where is the "genius highway" and who are the men who earned that designation?'
Bob's interviews -- perhaps conversing is a more accurate word -- will separate fact from fiction in the legend of Jesse James and will explore the impact Marceline's Walt Disney had on the world.
Experts conversing with Bob will discuss matters big and small, always with accuracy and depth.
Some 50 podcasts have already been created. Others will follow -- insights from the Midlands and beyond, all designed to offer us a better understanding of our past, a separation of fact and fiction, an examination of the lore of years long gone. It's a ride through history you don't want to miss.
Gary Chilcote, J. C. Penney
