• The American Countryside is truly a slice of Americana. It might be a well-known music or TV star or just someone with an interesting story that lives down the street. From Iditarod sled dog mushers, to NASA scientists... from the Rooster Crowing Championships to NFL greats...The American Countryside is sure to be of interest. Click the button above to listen to the latest show, or visit the American Countryside archives.
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Accidental Family Farm History in Cordell, Oklahoma

Wayne Booth resides in Cordell, Oklahoma thanks to a snowstorm over a century ago. The story of that storm and the farm that made him national news is today’s edition of The American Countryside…

Pawnee Bill’s Wild West Show

It may have seemed this famous western showman had married the wrong woman. After all, his bride was a city girl who didn’t grow up around horses and cowboy life. It turned out that she might have been the better cowboy of the pair…

A Cowboy Named Gordon Lillie

Many of us had childhood heroes, and for Gordon it was the famous showman Buffalo Bill. What he might never have imagined was how he would eclipse the fame of the legend…

Jim Thorpe

In 1912 he was proclaimed the world’s greatest athlete and some of his Olympic records from that year still stood two decades later. He was a well rounded athlete that even won the Dancing with the Stars competition of his day…

A Star Athlete

When you think of historically great collegiate football programs, names like Notre Dame, Penn State and Alabama might come to mind. Most people don’t name the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in that list, but with this star athlete on the team, they beat the top programs of their day.

Sequoia

His work helped teach almost an entire nation to read and write within a matter of just a few years. We introduce you to one of the most famous native Americans…

Blue and Gold Sausage

bluegoldsausageThis FFA advisor found a fund raiser that was so successful, he had to quit teaching just to operate the new business…

Cowboy King of Marriage

TomMix2Tom Mix was known as the King of the Cowboys, starring in over 300 films from 1910 to 1935. He might also be the king of marriage…having tied the knot five times…

Cowboy Moviestar Tom Mix

TomMix1He was king of the cowboys, a real-life ranch hand that won the hearts of the nation with his amazing feats on Tony the Wonder Horse. In fact, he was such a daredevil, movie companies pleaded with him to stop doing his own stunts so they could insure he would stay healthy and keep his starring role…

The Oklahoma Land Rush

Imagine a train chugging south out of Kansas with people jumping from the cars all along its route. The reason they jumped and mass chaos took place that September day is this edition of The American Countryside….cherokeestrip2

The Cherokee Strip

cherokeestripIt’s called the Cherokee Strip; a stretch of land in north central Oklahoma originally given to the Cherokee and later opened to settlement by the U.S. government. The story of that area and the land rush that resulted is today’s edition of the American Countryside…

Oklahoma’s First Gusher

oilrig2George Keeler noticed his horses wouldn’t drink from this spot on the river. The location today is an important spot that draws visitors from around world…

Black Gold in Oklahoma

oilrig1William Johnstone and George Keeler were looking for a way to attract the railroad to their new town. Who knew their method to lure them would impact Oklahoma still today….

Getting to FFA Contest

ralphdreesenAn FFA advisor was driving his students to a competition when the bus broke down with twenty eight students and the teacher stranded on the roadside. What happened next worked well in the 1940s, but today it would probably land you in trouble…