Recent Posts
Mark Twain’s Hannibal
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/23Apr21-Mark-Twain-Drug-Store-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)The events we experience as a child can have a big impact on our future. That was the case for…
The Famous Man Above the Drug Store
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/22Apr21-Mark-Twain-Drug-Store-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)The second story of an old drug store may not seem to be a place of historical significance, and in…
The $175,000 Banjo
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/21Apr21-American-Banjo-Museum-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)When I was in fifth grade I wanted to play the trumpet. My parents scratched together $300 for a used…
Dueling Banjos
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/20Apr21-American-Banjo-Museum-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)You’ve heard of dueling banjos…now multiply it times several hundred. It’s a unique convention of sights and sounds that entertains…
The Monopoly Patent
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/19Apr21-Macomb-Illinois-Monopoly-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Charles Darrow had a great new board game he sold to Parker Brothers – Monopoly. The only problem was, Charles…
The Game Board Patent
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/16Apr21-Macomb-Illinois-Monopoly-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)If you invented something you might get a patent. That’s what Lizzie did, but her patent was quite a story…
Preparing for Abe’s Debate
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/15Apr21-Macomb-Illinois-Lincoln-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)It’s probably the most famous debate in American history – the Lincoln Douglas debates. While the two where vying for…
Picture of a Rugged Abe
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/14Apr21-Macomb-Illinois-Lincoln-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)These days it’s not a bid deal at all to take a picture. The bigger problem is figuring out what…
Selling More Than Windmills
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/12Apr21-Windmill-Museum-3.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Good salesman can sell you an item you need. Great salesman find a way to sell you many items you…
The Biggest Buyer of Windmills
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/09Apr21-Windmill-Museum-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Many farmers purchased windmills to pump water for their livestock. But there was someone else buying windmills for another purpose,…
Farm Technology 900 Years in the Making
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/08Apr21-Windmill-Museum-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Just about every farmstead had one at one time – many remain, although few still perform the task they were…
Bigger Than Life – Ethan Allen
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/07Apr21-Fort-Ticonderoga-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Sometimes history makes people seem bigger than life. That’s certainly true for a man named Ethan Allen and his band…
We Need Cannons
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/04/06Apr21-Fort-Ticonderoga-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)It was one of the most important forts of the late 1700s and interestingly, it changed hands twice without a…
The Bishop who Persuaded Lincoln
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/03/05Apr21-Fairbault-Minnesota-4.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)The situation was bad, for all involved. But what was about to take place in Minnesota was an injustice to…
A New Bishop For a New State
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/03/02Apr21-Fairbault-Minnesota-3.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Henry Whipple perhaps had no plans to move west as a young man. But when he married, his wife encouraged…
Where the Straight Cannon Rivers Unite
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/03/01Apr21-Fairbault-Minnesota-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Today the meeting of the Straight and Cannon Rivers is probably not as important as it was 200 years ago,…
The Founder of Faribault
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/03/31Mar21-Fairbault-Minnesota-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)He was born on the frontier, and the frontier life is perhaps all he ever knew. So it should be…
Cemeteries without Headstones
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/03/30Mar21-Hopewell-Mounds-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)Cemeteries usually have headstones to make the spot of loved ones who have passed. But this civilization used something far…
Long Before Columbus…
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/03/29Mar21-Hopewell-Mounds-1.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)History on this continent is young when compared to places like Europe…but that mentality is to forget about the centuries…
The Non-Electric Shopping Mall
http://americancountryside.com/wp-content/gems/2021/03/26Mar21-Lehmans-Amish-Store-2.mp3Podcast: Download (Duration: 3:00 — 2.1MB)If you lived without electricity…either by choice or simply because of the location you lived…where would you go to find…