Podcast
Family Plot
Hosted by Family Plot Podcast · EN
An odd dad and his 11 year old daughter exploring the strange and unusual in a peculiar world. Discussions will be kept PG-13. Hosted by Dean Boese and Krysta Williams.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
22episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Episode 308 - Tune In, Turn On, Drop Out - The Amazing Life of Doctor Timothy Leary
1w ago01:24:58Tap to summarizeTW: Suicide and Drug Use - What an episode! This episode we flashback to the 20's to attend the birth of Timothy Leary, a man who would get a doctorate in psychology and go on to become a respected psychologist before a trip to Mexico introduced him to psilocybin mushromms. We cover how psilocybin shaped and changed who he became, how he went on to be a central figure of the counterculture, his arrests, his ten year prison sentence for two, count them two marijuana roaches, how he escaped prison with the help of the Brotherhood of Love, became an international fugitive with help from the Weather Underground, how he was recaptured, finished out his sentence and then emerged and reinvented himself again and again challenging both traditional roles of psychology and spirituality as well as becoming fascinated by digital technology, virtual reality and internet culture in this man this guy was fascinating, Tune in, Turn On and Drop Out epissode of the Family Plot Podcast!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 307 - Charity Adams Earley and the Legacy of the 6888
2w ago00:59:21Tap to summarizeAnother fun episode filled with learning and family banter. Today we examine the life of Charity Adams Earley. One of four children, she was raised by parents who loved her and insisted on education, so much so that when school started, she was jumped to the second grade. She eventually graduated college at 19 with a triple major and a minor in history. We dig deep into this lady who became famous as the leader of the 6888 Central Postal Batallion that cleared three warehouses full of backlogged mail getting letters to troops who desperately needed a connection to home during World War II. She was a girl power rock star far before the terms even existed. So join us in this wholesome bit of American History!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 306 - Barbara Gittings - The Librarian Who Shelved Shame
3w ago00:56:45Tap to summarizeSo, as June 2026 draws to a close, we present the life and times of Barbara Gittings, a woman who refused to let the world define her as insane or a degenerate just because she was a lesbian. She set out to change things, curating museum collections so not everything about the LGBT+ was written by doctors, moralists or police. She made libraries a safe space for queer people trying to discover who they were. She lobbied the American Psychiatric Association and the DSM to remove the mental health stigma from a judgement of homosexuality and to get homosexuality removed from the DSM. She, and her longtime partner Kay Lahusen engaged in activist protests right up until her eventuaal death. We celebrate her life, accomplishemnts and death in this episode and Arthur covers Artfight and Empire Records in his corner.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 305 The History of Juneteenth - Let's Celebrate
4w ago01:19:14Tap to summarizeThere is a lot in this show. Arthur discusses some of Dad's health problems in his corner leading to discussions about movies he's been watching with Dad, including most recently Big Fish. (It's arguably Tim Burton's best movie) then we get into talking about the celebration that is Jineteenth which leads us to discussing how Abraham Lincoln wound up in the Wrestling Hall of Fame as the inventor of the choke slam and how a guy with a variety store sold souvenir fake confederate bills that helped crash the southern economy. After that we talk about Juneteenth, how it was the celebration of the moment that General George Granger and the Union troops arrived in Galveston on June 19th, 1865; the most remote part of America at that point and announced among other things General Order number 3 which told the people of color in Galveston that they were free. That they had been free since the Emancipation Proclamation. It became a celebrated holiday in Texas and from there grew out to the rest of the country where it was made a national holiday in 2021. . And we cover it all in this episode.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 304 Pride Month 2026 - The Curious Case of the Gay Ghost Hunters
Jun 1100:59:12Tap to summarizeIn this episode, we celebrate the diversity and inclusion of pride month with an examination of the world of the paranormal, the world of spiritualism and even the world of the Horror space, and how these dark, liminal spaces are not only super inclusive, but also are currently being used to expore and reveal more LGBTQ+ history. This week we go deep into the cultural phenomenon of gay Ghost Hunters, and LGBTQ+ representation in Haunted Tours. All this and more in this special Pride Month episode of the Family Plot Podcast!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 303 Pride Month 2026 - The Lavender Scare
Jun 401:07:01Tap to summarizeHave you heard of 'Tail-Gunner Joe' McCarthy and the Red Scare? What about Roy Cohn? These two not only kicked off the Red Scare where they pursued supposed communists in Government and later the military, but also went aafter gays under the theory that they were 'moral perverts susceptible to blackmail.'. Despite no evidence appearing that even one of these people were blackmailed outside the movie Clue (which is complete fiction), thousands of employees were fired between 1953 and the 90's when gay employees were forced out of government positions or fotced to live lives undercover simply because of who they loved. We cover the history of the lavender scare, people who were targeted because of it, a similar case in England where Alan Turing, the father of Artificial Intelligence was convicted of gross perversion for his relationship with another man and was chemically castrated which led to the unraveling of his brilliant mind. All this and more in this, this is why we celebrate PRIDE because we need to remind ourselves just how bad it's been for the LGBTQ during our lifetimes episode of the Family Plot Podcast.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 302 It's Mostly Fiction - The Mythology of the Odyssey
May 2801:20:35Tap to summarizeWe have a heck of an episode for you. Arthur is turning 17 and our episode is inspired by the right wing pushback against Christopher Nolan's 'The Odyssey'. We dig into the origin of the work, what we know of it's 'author' Homer, the real, the mythical, the things that are somewhere in between. We say goodbye to a family friend and gget downright hostile about people judging movies based on trailers in this deep dive into the origins of the Odyssey and all it's attendant mythology in this little bit of history, whole lotta weird imagined horrors episode of the Family Plot Podcast!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 301 Jane Stanford - Polished, Poised and Poisoned - The Death of a Child and the Birth of a University
May 2101:17:20Tap to summarizeSuch An Episode! On Deck we have Jane Stanford, born Jane Lathrop out of Albany New York, she married her lawyer husband who lost everything in a fire, went west to seek his fortune in the Gold Rush and found it selling supplies to miners and settlers. When his wife joined him in San Francisco, he had become a railroad baron. Eventually they had a child and Jane doted on the boy. We won't tell you more here, but there's a death, a poisoning, a university being founded and not necessarily in that order in this powerful episode of the Family Plot Podcast!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 300 - Audie Murphy - An American Tale
May 1401:16:50Tap to summarizeThis episode, we go deep into the life, heroism and spectacle that was Audie Murphy. Audie Murphy was a sharecropper's son from Hunt County Texas, small, skinny, barely fed and full of work. When his dad would disappear, he worked, when his mom died, he worked. When his family came apart, he tried military service. He was rejected by the marines, the paratroopers, only the Army would eventually accept the skinny kid from Texas because in the 1940's they needed manpower. We discuss Audie's training and how he went from being an unlikely soldier to the most decorated Combat Infantryman of World War II. He had over twenty medals and barely enough chest to pin them on. He would come home suffering from what we would today call PTSD and tried to build a life. He was invited to LA by actor James Cagney where he worked Westerns and military pictures before being chosen to play himself in the movie To Hell And Back.based on Audie's memoirs. He would marry twice, and become a songwriter with hits like Shutters and Boards. All this and more in this special, All American Episode of the Family Plot Podcast.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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Episode 299 Bird Lives - The Musical Life of Charlie 'Bird' Parker
May 701:16:54Tap to summarizeWell, in this episode we dig into our Kansas City Roots. We go to Kansas City in the 1920's where under 'Boss' Pendergast the city was a machine that kept clubs open all night and the liquor flowing. It was a town famous for being a little naive, jazz, good barbecue and something called the Kansas City Stomp. Kansas City had heard rumors of Prohibition and wanted no truck with it. It was into this world that a young man named Charlie Parker, a man who would be nicknamed 'Bird' began to play an alto sax and he would get humiliated and come back stronger. He became a good musician, and then he was in a car accident that broke his ribs and twisted his spine. He was given morphine for the pain and this would start a second addiction, the first was to music. He studied and practiced all he could in recovery and when he emerged he was a different player, he took the town by storm and he would go on to become one of the greats of Jazz and he'd become a big part of a muisc called bebop. So come listen to a local tale of Kansas City and learn how a man became a myth and musical legend in this magical, mythical and musical episode of the Family Plot PodcastBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/family-plot--4670465/support.
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