Podcast
Tracing The Path: The Connected 20th Century
Hosted by Dan R. Morris - 20th Century Historian · EN
Tracing The Path explores how ordinary people, products, ideas, and moments unexpectedly shaped the modern world.
Every episode begins with something familiar—a word, a company, a song, an invention, a historical event, or a cultural phenomenon—and follows the surprising chain of connections that made it matter.
Why did a grocery store change the course of the Cold War?
How did a simple greeting become part of everyday life?
What do advertising agencies, world leaders, musicians, inventors, and soft drink companies have in common?
More than you might think.
Hosted by award-winning storyteller Dan R. Morris, Tracing The Path uncovers the forgotten figures, unexpected decisions, and hidden connections behind the people, products, places, and ideas that shaped the 20th Century—and continue to influence our lives today.
Inspired by the storytelling traditions of Paul Harvey, Charles Kuralt, Charles Osgood, and Garrison Keillor, each episode is crafted to leave you with that rare feeling:
"I had no idea."
Whether we're exploring world-changing inventions, iconic brands, cultural turning points, political upheavals, or everyday objects hiding extraordinary histories, you'll discover that history is far more connected than it first appears.
Because the modern world didn't appear overnight.
Someone built it.
Something changed it.
Every path has a beginning.
New episodes monthly, plus bonus Addendum episodes featuring the stories that didn't make the final cut.
Visit TracingThePath.com for episode transcripts, discussion questions, trivia, and additional resources.
24episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Episode 73: The Gilded Age: First March on Washington D.C.
Jan 3000:36:26Tap to summarizeIn 1894 Jacob Coxey decided to take thousands of unemployed and March on Washington. Well, that was just the prequel to 1964 March for Civil Rights. But it's how A. Philip Randolph was indoctrinated to the idea. And crazily this store involves both Mark Twain and Jack London, in addition to Pullman Porters, the Ferris Wheel, Eugene V Debs, the May Day Riots, Frederick Douglass, and even the Statue of Liberty.
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Episode 72: The Invention of Hello
Dec 2800:28:05Tap to summarizeThe word Hello showed up just as the world was changing . . . in the absolute biggest ways ever. Nothing was the same after "Hello". In this episode we cross paths with Michigan J Frog, Tin Pan Alley, the Phonograph, Western Union, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Alexander Graham Bell, Scott Joplin, the telephone operator, Thomas Edison and J. N. Pattison.
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Episode 71: The Amana Utopia and Patriot Missile
Nov 2400:27:11Tap to summarizeCan you imagine a group running on perfect communism, flourishing in the capitalist market and then eventually spawning the Patriot Missile - to fight actual Communists. And it happened twice. In this episode we cross paths with Quaker Oatmeal, microwave popcorn, Vennevar Bush, the Amana Colonies, Oneida Silverware, Bob Hope and Raytheon.
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Episode 70: Who Knows The Truth? Does A.I.?
Oct 2400:31:23Tap to summarizeSomewhere along the way, we lost the truth. The questions we ask about the truth haven't been the same since Orson Welles' War of the World's Broadcast in 1938, but that doesn't mean we haven't stopped trying. In this episode we cross paths with William Moulton Marston, Alice Guy-Blache, Frye Vs The United States, John Houseman, Alan Turing, The Shadow, Wonder Woman, Artificial Intelligence, FDR, IBM and Orson Welles.
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Episode 69: Status Symbol for Rent
Sep 2900:33:59Tap to summarizeIn today’s episode we’re discussing three of the history's most amazing "status symbol" stories. The story involves the Silk Road, Sulieman the Magnificent, Tulipomania, Carolus Clusius, Chuck Berry, Christopher Columbus, Henry Ford, James Dole, Madame C.J. Walker, and Mahalia Jackson.
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Episode 68: Hello Darkness My New Friend - The Story of The Family Who Created Sonar and Braille
Aug 2200:29:26Tap to summarizeIn this episode we explore Simon & Garfunkel, Louis Braille, Charles Barbier, Valentin Haüy and René-Jus Haüy, Marvel Comics, Popular Science Magazine, Plato and even George Washington. How the world has fought Darkness has been pretty amazing . . . and crazily it's all because of one family
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Episode 67: How a Coffee Shop Changed the World: The Origin Story of Lloyds of London
Jul 28, 202500:28:21Tap to summarizeThis is the story of Edward Lloyd and his London Coffee Shop . . . and how they were able to change the world. Amazingly this story touches on the New York Stock Exchange, Bruce Springsteen, George Lucas, Lorenzo de Tonti, the Origin of the Tontine, Robert Louis Stevenson, Lloyds of London and Rosa Parks. Be prepared to be amazed.
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Episode 66: The America of Tarzan and Buck vs Bell
Jun 27, 202500:36:03Tap to summarizeThe 1890 closing of the Frontier by the US Census Bureau is a major milestone in the history of the United States. The outcome of that change affected the mindset of the Americans. . . and from that comes some of our most loved fiction. But on the flip side, also the darkest stain on the United States. In this episode we cross paths with Thomas Jefferson, Johnny Weissmuller, Edgar Rice Burroughs, H.G. Wells, Frank Munsey, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., the Great Chicago Fire, and Davy Crockett
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Episode 65: When Osama Bin Laden Wrinkled FDR's Plans: The 100 Year Fight Against Polio
May 27, 202500:35:28Tap to summarizeThis is the story of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Henrietta Lacks, Jonas Salk, the March of Dimes, the Tuskegee Institute and their collective effort to eradicate polio from the earth. But the story also touches on Booker T. Washington, George Washington Carver, Lewis Adams, the Hampton School, Basil O'Connor, Elvis Presley, Eddie Cantor, Paul Alexander and Osama Bin Laden.
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Episode 64: How did Bob Hope's USO become a thing? And who performed?
Apr 25, 202500:37:25Tap to summarizeIn today's episode we look at all the people and plans it took to create the United Service Organization (USO). While there was enormous planning and smart people, it wouldn't be what it is without a trumpet player from Chicago. We cross paths with General Pershing, Glenn Miller, m&ms, Thomas Dewey, Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and little guy from England named Lesley Townes Hope.
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