Every Episode Has 4

TRACING THE PATH PODCAST

This podcast episode delves into the behind-the-scenes process of creating an episode for “Tracing the Path,” emphasizing the inspiration drawn from Paul Harvey’s “The Rest of the Story” and its signature “wow” factor.

The host, Dan R. Morris, explains his four crucial criteria for selecting a story: a tangible tie to the 20th century, famous subjects, a rarely referenced connection between them, and, most importantly, the ability to evoke that “holy moly, I had no idea” feeling.

Throughout the episode, he provides numerous examples of past and potential stories, like the surprising origins of the Oregon Trail game’s impact on Apple or the unknown connections surrounding the Star-Spangled Banner, all while seeking to replicate the engaging, unexpected revelations that made Paul Harvey’s broadcasts so captivating.

The Rest of the Story

In the origin story of this podcast, you heard about the stories I fell in love with as a kid, like Kon Tiki, Star Wars, my Eskimo fourth grade teacher, and Casey Kasem’s Banter Between Songs. 

Today, I thought we’d discuss what turns an idea into an episode of Tracing the Path. Because I have a spreadsheet with 1,721 ideas, but so far only 60 stories. 

I didn’t get to hear him every day.

In fact, if I wasn’t in the car, I didn’t hear him at all. That’s because my favorite storyteller, Paul Harvey, only had a radio show.

And while I listened to talk radio religiously while I was driving and then music on my digital clock radio next to my bed at night, his show was on at noon, so if I wasn’t in the car, I didn’t hear it.

More than anything, it was the feeling I got at the end of Paul Harvey’s stories that I wanted to duplicate in Tracing The Path and share with others. I actually think there isn’t a word to describe the feeling. The word “wow” comes to mind.

But what if you just feel the “wow” without saying it?

What’s the word for that? In fact, what is the name of the feeling you experience when wow comes out of your mouth? I don’t actually know how they created the first one, but I do know his son Paul Harvey Jr. wrote them all for him to share in his iconic voice.

Of course, they must been inspired by murder mystery shows or Scooby-Doo episodes where the villain isn’t revealed until the end because that is what they made.

Paul Harvey’s show was called “The Rest of Rhe Story” with the idea that an interesting, insightful, funny or mysterious story would be told. And while you were wrapped up in the details, you wouldn’t find out until the very last second that the story was about someone you knew, like a movie star. Or the president. Or Elvis.

And every time you’d get that wow feeling.

If you aren’t familiar, let me attempt to regail you in my very best Paul Harvey voice. One of Paul Harvey Jr.’s actual scripts.

“Hello Americans. This is Paul Harvey, in part brought to you by the First Federal Savings and Loan Association of Lima. Stand by for news. Now, the rest of the story.

Bill goes up to the distinguished-looking gentleman. He says, “Look, I’ve got to get out of here.” With an aire of condescending sympathy, the man asks, “Why?” Agitated, Bill explains,

“Because I’m not crazy.” His own words, of course. Anyway, Bill is forced to concede that he admitted himself to this, this Meadow Brook Hospital. It was his own idea to be here in the first place. But “What gave him such an idea?” The gentleman calmly queries.

Bill looks down despondently past his institutional smock to his institutional slippers. He says quietly, “I tried to kill myself.” And that is so.

Everything was going wrong for Bill. His girlfriend had left him. His professional prospects had collapsed. He was broke. So broke he could no longer pay rent, wound up sleeping in an all night laundromat.

The city was sub freezing that winter, and laundromats were the warmest place to sleep.

In any event, Bill was 21. He could go home to mother, but he hated the thought. She’d be glad to see him, of course, but then she’d realize what a failure her son was. That was the hard part.

Mom knowing.

But the temperature dropped further. Now, even the Manhattan Mats were getting chilly, so Bill swallowed what was left of his prize and went home to Hicksville.

Oh, really? Hicksville, Long Island, New York.

Mom was not home. Just as well, Bill thought. He let himself in. And feeling lower than ever before in his life, he went to the hall closet and looked for something with which to poison himself.

There was some chlorine bleach and some furniture polish.

Based on how bad the rocks would probably taste. Bill took the pledge, literally. No, it didn’t kill him. Gave him gas.

Bill’s reflective gaze returned to the distinguished gentleman to whom he was pouring out his heart. You see, he said, “I’m not crazy. I was just feeling sorry for myself. I don’t belong in a mental hospital.”

And the gentleman, smiling, agreed. “By the way,” said Bill, “I didn’t get your name.” The man stiffened slightly.

“Why?” He said, “I am Kaiser Wilhelm.”

And then slowly imperiously, he strolled away. But you know what? Right then and there, Bill decided if he ever got out of Meadowbrook Hospital, and if he ever felt depressed again, he would recall all of the people he’d met during those dreadful weeks.

The incurable schizophrenics, the chronic heroin addicts, the sedated serial rapists, the hopeless alcoholics and yes, Kaiser Wilhelm, the people with real problems.

And wherever Bill stood at that moment, he vowed he would leap for thankful joy, for Bill was eventually released from Meadowbrook, and he kept that promise to himself.

And now, whenever you hear his music, and that music makes you happy, you will remember that it was written and performed by a very happy man. 

The world of popular music populated by a multitude of pretenders and only a handful of heroes.

But you’ve always placed among the latter the heroes a gifted songwriter and performer named Billy Joel. Billy Joel. And now you know the rest of the story.

It’s that moment when all the information rushes in. Insane Asylum. Suicide. Billy Joel.

Sometimes the name was JFK or Ben Franklin or Charles Dickens, but it was always a name you knew.

And because the person he was talking about was going to be someone you were familiar with, you didn’t turn off the radio. You had to listen to the very last second. That’s the feeling I wanted to create with Tracing the Path.

The Four Things

I am in no sense of the word the same league as Paul Harvey and his son, but I definitely try hard to make each episode in some way surprise you and give you that feeling.

For me, I wanted the “wow” to be in the connection, not necessarily the reveal, and sometimes in the undoing of what you thought you knew, like what the musical Wicked does for The Wizard of Oz.

The story that launched this whole thing was about the Oregon Trail.

I’d done some research and learned something I thought everyone should know. It was too amazing. It should be common knowledge. If you don’t know, back in fourth grade 1983, or so.

My fourth grade teacher, Mr. Hearin, who is listening to this, had an Apple 2C in the back of the classroom. I am sure it was there for us to do math flashcard type games, but for us kids and for him too after school, it was there to play the Oregon Trail, Karateka, and Conan.

The wow moment from that game wouldn’t dawn on me for years.

The only wow I had was playing The Oregon Trail.

But back in 2018, I was researching it for one reason or another, and then this miraculous puzzle started to come together. That’s when I realized Steve Jobs wouldn’t have sold more than a 100 computers if he hadn’t come across MECC, the group that owned the Oregon Trail game.

The idea that Apple wouldn’t even exist without the game, was that eye-opening jaw-dropping moment.

And after I published that episode, my phone rang and the man on the other end was none other than Dale LaFrenz, one of the three students who wrote the original Oregon Trail game.

I imagine there are multitude of YouTube videos, forum posts, blogs, and magazine articles about the game.

But he called me.

That’s when I knew the “wow” factor was real.

And now at 60 episodes, the phone calls and letters have been astounding. Now, I thrive on finding stories. Listeners send ideas all the time, and I research everyone, but not every idea becomes an episode for sure.

There have been some times after I spend hours and hours researching that I actually have to give up and move on.

That’s because every story has to have four critical pieces to make it on Tracing the Path. Without all four, I leave the idea on the spreadsheet, hoping some factoid pops up that completes the equation.

The four critical elements are:

1.  The story has to have some tangible tie to the 20th century. Just being able to say that this company still exists today isn’t enough. It has to have played a part staked a claim in the 1900s.
2. All of the subjects have to be famous. Maybe not Tom Cruise famous, but at least Mount Vesuvius, Hershey’s Kisses, or Barnum & Bailey famous.
3. There has to be a connection between the two, three, or four famous things that no one has figured out or that is rarely referenced. For instance, do you remember the connection between Martin Luther King and Julia Roberts because that was nuts.
4. And four, the most important, the story has to give you that wow feeling or “Holy moly, I had no idea.” Something like that. If I don’t get that feeling doing the research, it doesn’t become an episode.

Applying all the rules. Just think about the Oregon Trail episode.

On one hand, you have Steve Jobs who’s created the most important tool of the 20th century, but really he has no idea how to make people want it.

On the other hand, you have the school system in Minneapolis where teachers and students have made these great programs, but they don’t have enough computers for teachers to use. And then they meet.

Minnesota walks away with computers.

And Steve Jobs bundles the software with his computer, giving every school in the country a reason to get one.

Totally crazy.

And on top of that, one of the trainers Steve Jobs sends to Minnesota ends up being the guy who created PowerPoint.

And on top of that, Kevin O’Reilly, the Shark Tank guy, ends up owning the Oregon Trail.

Now, that’s an episode with all four requirements.

Michael Caine

But that is not always the case. Sometimes a lead comes in. We were recently tipped off to Marjorie Merriweather Post, the richest woman in America at one point, and she did amazing things like run Post Cereal.

She helped revolutionize frozen food, ushering in the fridge freezer combo into our homes. She saw potential in Maxwell House and Jello-O, buying them and making them household names.

She had the most important collection of Russian Fabragé eggs, and she married EF Hutton. 

But somehow I never got that wow feeling. Impressive for sure, but never that special “Holy moly, you have to know this.”

But I did have a cutting room floor story that is almost good enough by itself.

“The actor Michael Caine, while living in London, saw a Maxwell House commercial when he was young and fell in love with the actress in the commercial.

He fell so hard he packed up and was ready to fly to Brazil or Manila or wherever she lived. Luckily, some friends in the business knew who she was and knew she too lived in London. Through friends, they met and now 51 years later, they still walk the red carpet together. All because of Maxwell House and Marjory Merriweather Post.

There are actually two columns of the episode spreadsheet. One is the list of fresh ideas that were never explored and the other is topics that were briefly introduced in an episode. For instance, if we did the Marjory Post episode and mentioned she bought Maxwell House coffee, Maxwell House would go in the second column as a possible full episode idea, keeping all of the episodes as interconnected as possible.

If you’re a longtime listener, you know that some names just seem to pop up regularly and not just for the sake of mentioning them but because they had their hands in so many pots.

Charles Lindbergh, Alfred Hitchcock, The Great Chicago Fire, HG Wells, and Mark Twain are examples.

That is not an episode requirement, though, more of a fringe benefit.

(We’re actually using the software Obsidian and Google’s Notebook LM to create a website that shows you all the interconnected posts. Look for that later this year.)

Disney+

Now, one thing that’s really rare is when an episode connects to something that is happening right now. I love those episodes.

It happened with the Chinese spy balloon and the Baltimore Bridge disaster.

But my favorite one of those was the Pink Panther episode that connected to the creation of Disney Plus. That goes all the way back to 1948 when the US Government decided that the big companies like MGM and Warner Brothers were violating the Sherman Antitrust Act.

They were violating the Sherman Antitrust Act because they were not only producing the movies, but they owned the theaters to distribute them and then they weren’t letting independent films play their movies.

That breakup is what allowed movies like Pink Panther to exist.

The story is cool because it involves so many famous names like Disney, Marvel, Owens Corning, Gimbals Toy Store, Alice in Wonderland, and Henry Mancini. Names we all know and love, of course.

But the wow moment for me happened when the streaming like Red Box, Netflix, and Prime offered became the norm. Disney had to go back to the Supreme Court to have them void out that 1948 ruling so that Disney, HBO, and MGM could once again play movies.

Thus became Disney Plus and HBO Max.

That kind of thing gives me that wow feeling every every time.

Star Spangled Banner

Think about the Star Spangled Banner episode. 

Think back to your high school and college US history courses.

How many of them had a chapter about the cartoonist who made the national anthem possible?

How about none? None of them mention it ever.

But if it weren’t for Robert Ripley, the guy who created “Ripley’s Believe It or Not” and had a panel in just about every comic section of the newspaper back in the 20s and 30s. If it weren’t for him, we might not have a national anthem.

Back on November 3rd, 1929, just 5 days after the biggest stock market crash in history, Robert Riffley’s Believe It or Not panel featured a man singing the song Anacreon in Heaven. That’s the song that the Star Spangled Banner tune originated.

The panel accused America after all these years of independence of still not having a national anthem. And it was that comic strip panel that fired up the Daughters of the American Revolution, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, all to start petitions demanding a national anthem.

It was Robert Ripley who started that.

Who would ever think a Sunday cartoon would change the world?

But that was just a small wow moment. The bigger one has to do with Francis Scott Key himself.

It is widely known that the third verse of the national anthem is a bit racist. That that is a known quantity. But what everyone fails to mention is that Francis Scott Key got married to the family that owned Frederick Douglas, the most famous abolitionist slave ever.

They don’t teach you that.

Nor do they tell you that Oliver Wendell Holmes, unhappy with the lyrics of the national anthem, wrote a fifth verse for the song. These are things that just make me go, “Wow, I want to learn more about that.”

And that knowledge of Francis Scott Key goes hand in hand with what we learned about Roald Dahl in the last episode.

Roald Dahl

You remember Roald Dahl is a famous author whose name you might not recognize, but you would definitely know some of his books like the BFG, The Big Friendly Giant, Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, and of course, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. 

Roald Dahl had a shady past as well.

In World War II, he was an actual British spy in America, spying on America and sending the details directly back to Churchill.

 And then another one of the wow moments is finding out that one of his best friends was Ian Fleming, the creator of James Bond. Ian and is one of the names that shows up in other episodes.

He was in the Con Man episode as he helped coordinate some actual James Bond type deception in World War II.

Ian Fleming not only created James Bond, but during World War II, he was actually James Bond.

Another wow was learning he didn’t just write spy novels.

Ian Fleming also wrote Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

And speaking of World War II, one of the stories that is yet yet to be an episode is about the weather phenomenon called the jetream.

Defined the jetream is a narrow band of strong wind that flows around the earth in the upper atmosphere.

Well, during World War II, when Japanese scientists were studying it, they postulated it might be possible to release a balloon and have it fly around the world in the jetream. In 1944, the Japanese military decided to see if that would is even partially true.

They launched thousands of hydrogen balloons armed with bombs into the jetream, hoping the balloons would fly over the Pacific and detonate in America.

And while most landed in the ocean, one fell in Oregon and killed six people.

The only mainland USA attack during World War II.

It’s not an episode yet because it lacks rule three. There isn’t a tangible connection between two famous things.

Of course, if the bombs in Oregon had killed Robert Block’s mother and that’s why Robert Block wrote the movie Psycho about Norman Bates, I mean, then we’d have something.

Then it would instantly be an episode.

William Marston

Another topic that remains on the list is about William Marston.

Marston was a psychologist in the 20th century who went to Harvard. He was very much an authority on psychology and education in 1940 when he was interviewed for Family Circle magazine where in that interview he suggested comic books might be an overlooked educational tool.

Well, that story caught the attention of Max Gaines, the comic book publisher at the company that would become DC Comics.

Max connected with Marson to learn more about his comic book idea and then hired him. And not too long after that, William Molton Marston created Wonder Woman.

That’s cool by itself, but the story really gains traction when you find out Marston was really fascinated by finding the truth. That’s why he gave Wonder Woman the lasso of truth.

And it’s also the reason he invented the lie detector polygraph machine you see police using in movies.

William Molton Marston creat created Wonder Woman and the polygraph machine.

The Marson story has everything except for that deep wow feeling I’m always trying to find.

One side note to that story which might push it over the edge is it was Marston’s wife who suggested he make a female superhero.

If you recall in the Wizard of Oz episode, L. Frank Baum’s wife was heavily involved in the suffragist movement. They were good friends with Elizabeth Katie Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.

Their passion for the suffragist movement is why Baum made the hero of Oz a female Dorothy.

The Wizard of Oz episode had all four characteristics needed for retracing the path.

Over 70% of the nation had seen the Wizard of Oz because for 30 years it was an annual tradition on TV. In most households it was a large family event with popcorn and parents letting the kids stay up late.

Part of the wow in that was finding out L. Frank Baum and Frank Lloyd Wright had offices in the same building.

Neither would have known it at the time, but they eventually both created famous Hollywood women.

In 1939, Judy Garland would find fame in Oz. In 1956, Anne Baxter, Frank Lloyd Wright’s great-grand daughter, would star in the Ten Commandments.

Surprisingly to me, the suffragists have actually created some of the biggest wow moments in Tracing the Path history. 

In terms of the four elements, think about the suffragists and the bombing of President Wilson.

That story took place in 1916 when the suffragist movement was in full swing and it involved President Wilson, women pilots, and the Statue of Liberty. All amazing things at the time.

On December 2nd, 1916, the Statue of Liberty was officially scheduled to be lit for the first time in the harbor, and President Wilson was attending on a yacht out in the water. That was an opportunity the suffragists didn’t want to miss.

So, a female pilot and companion flew directly over Wilson’s yacht and bombed him with women’s rights pamphlets, which silently is a testimony that the ocean cleanup movement hadn’t quite started yet.

From an idea standpoint, the notion that we haven’t learned a ton about early female pilots means there are probably stories to be found.

Katharine Wright

From the Wright brothers episode, I think there was a life lesson involved outside of the WOW. 

On the surface, the story was about the Wright brothers invention of the airplane, but looking deeper, I felt like the WOW was more like that’s not what I knew about the Wright brothers.

The undoing of what we knew. Katharine Wright, a suffragist herself, the sister of Orville and Wilbur Wright, is the true hero of that story.

She financed the operation.
She made all the deals.
She did all the publicity. 
She found all the buyers for the planes. 

And then seemingly Wilbur was the engineer, leaving Orville as the older brother.

But when Katharine and Wilbur pass away first, Orville is left to write the history books and then somehow Orville Wright is the name everyone remembers.

Wow.

Someone needs to write a book called The Wright Siblings in hopes of eternally forgetting the name The Wright Brothers.

Curious George

Escape is a common theme in suspense in horror movies. 

The whole notion of can they get out in time gives you the feeling suspense and horror movie directors want you to have. But when the escape is real and the people involved are famous, then we have a Tracing the Path episode. 

On June 14th, 1940, German tanks reach the outskirts of Paris and 8 million people flee on foot by horse and in cars.

Two of those people were HA and Margaret Ray.

They didn’t have a car, so HA went to a local bike shop, which was empty and abandoned, and he built two bicycles from the parts that were left in the back room.

Then he and Margaret bike to Madrid, Spain from Paris.

Besides some clothes, the only thing they brought with them was the manuscript of a book they had just finished writing.

Curious George.

Another escape story involved Pearl Harbor.

Jackie was playing football for a paid league in Hawaii, and Paul was a journalist living in Hawaii on a hunch there would be a big military action happening there.

Jackie had been playing a few months, but wanted to be closer to his family, and Paul and his wife, after 6 months of research, couldn’t find any story to support his hunch.

His company back home didn’t want to continue to sponsor the journalistic mission to Hawaii. So, they had to return to the mainland.

So, on December 5th, 1941, both Jackie and Paul boarded the SS Lurline for the 4-day cruise back to California.

Then, 2 days later, in the middle of the ocean, they heard the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor and were instructed that German submarines could be in the area to attack them.

For two harrowing days, they zigzagged their way to California.

That’s when they knew they were safe.

Paul Harvey and Jackie Robinson were safe.

They had been on the boat together, both having left Hawaii 2 days before Pearl Harbor.

Finally, it was 2019 when we produced our first episode of Tracing the Path. At that time, I had on the list an idea for our second episode, but I couldn’t make it all work. I couldn’t get all four characteristics involved with the story. And so, for the last 6 years, that topic has been on the top of my list looking for the fourth critical element.

Well, I’m proud to say that, we will finally get to hear that story. It is coming soon!