Podcast
All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories
Hosted by Joe Lex · EN
Brief biographies of permanent residents of Laurel Hill East in Philadelphia and Laurel Hill West in Bala Cywnyd, Pennsylvania. Often educational, always entertaining.
49episodes
Episodes
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The 1851 Christiana Riots and Laurel Hill
3w ago00:27:57Tap to summarizeABC:LHS 089-5 Early Release for Juneteenth Research and script by Marty Foley; narrated by Joe Lex
Transcribe →Jeff Lee Johnson: Never "Just a Session Man"
3w ago00:14:05Tap to summarizeBBB:LHWS #057-3 Jef Lee Johnson... ...played with everyone from Aretha Franklin to McCoy Tyner, primarily because he sounded like no one - except for the comparisons to Lonnie Johnson and Jimi Hendrix.
Transcribe →Winston Samuels: Israelites
3w ago00:25:42Tap to summarizeBBB:LHWS #057-2 Winston Samuels McGinnis... ...was a Jamaican singer with a moderately successful career until he backed Desmond Dekker on the worldwide hit "Israelites." He became an accountant in New York City while the reggae that he had helped create took over the music world.
Transcribe →Rudolph Hennig: There's Always Room for Cello
3w ago00:18:42Tap to summarizeBBB:LHWS #057-1 Rudolph Hennig... ...was a German born master of the cello who was the Philaldelphia Orchestra's first cello soloist after he had already been painted by Thomas Eakins. A century after his death, his portrait was again in the news.
Transcribe →Three More Musicians from Laurel Hill West
3w ago01:07:14Tap to summarizeBBB:LHWS #057 Three More LHW Musicians Rudolph Hennig was the first cello soloist for the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1901; a few years earlier, Philadelphia artist Thomas Eakins had represented him in oils as The Cello Player, which was used as a bargaining chip more than a century later. Winston Samuels McGinnis was a moderately successful Jamaican ska and rocksteady performer who sang backup in one of reggae's first worldwide hits "Israelites" by Desmond Dekker. Jeffrey Lee Johnson, or simply JEF was the session guitarist who could apparently sound like anyone but was at his best when he sounded like Jef Johnson. The two usual comparisons are Lonnie Johnson ... and Jimi Hendrix.
Transcribe →Rev William Smith: Penn's Forgotten Founder
Jun 600:27:42Tap to summarizeABC:LHS #087-5 Rev. William Smith... ...was a Scottish-born Anglican who impressed Benjamin Franklin with his ideas about higher education and set up the skeleton and backbone of what became the University of Pennsylvania today, but he made few friends and is little remembered today
Transcribe →Hilery Baker: Philadelphia's First "Officer Down"
Jun 500:26:11Tap to summarizeABC:LHS #087-4 Hilery Baker... ...was a German immigrant who became two-term mayor during the time when the city was also the nation's capital. He established the first city police force and was the first "Officer Down" in the city's history.
Transcribe →Alexander Murray: A Forgotten Commodore
Jun 400:21:49Tap to summarizeABC:LHS #087-3 Alexander Murray... ... came from a family that was part of the Scottish diaspora to the New World after the Jacobite Rebellion in the early 1700s. Born in Maryland, he was a ship's captain before he was out of his teens and rose to become a Commodore in the Navy. By the time he retired, he was a battle-hardened veteran with years at sea.
Transcribe →Thomas Godfrey: A New Way to See the Horizon
Jun 300:24:54Tap to summarizeABC:LHS #087-2 Thomas Godfrey... ...was one of the New World's first native inventors. While working as a glazier, he was intrigued by the reflection and refraction of light through a shard of glass. This led to his invention that made life on the seas easier and safer, and saved thousands of lives in the process.
Transcribe →Invitation to an Exhumation
Jun 200:18:52Tap to summarizeABC:LHS #087-1 The concept of "celebrity corpses" to attract customers to a cemetery was nothing new. People had been digging up other people for years for legal, political, religious, scientific, and other reasons, so why not for commerce? Many transportable cadavers have made interesting journeys to their final resting places.
Transcribe →