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Rockie & Riley Podcasts

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American Hysteria

chelsey weber-smith

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American Hysteria explores how fantastical thinking has shaped our culture – moral panics, urban legends, hoaxes, crazes, fringe beliefs, and national misunderstandings. Poet-turned-podcaster Chelsey Weber-Smith tells the strangest stories from American history and examines the forces that create the reality we share, and sometimes, the reality we don't.
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Men Can't Drive

Rockie and Riley

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Best friends Rockie and Riley gather to discuss everything you didn’t know you needed to know. Their comedic approach to conversations on relationships, past trauma, and everything high and low makes it easier to forget that natural disasters exist. This podcast has nothing to do with men driving. Or does it?
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Working LIke Dogs features pet podcasts about working animals. In this working animal podcast, we cover everything from how to get started as a trainer of working animals or how to acquire a working animal to how to take care of your animal companion. In these podcasts, you will learn what it means to work side by side with an animal. We cover working animals such as service dogs, guide dogs, hearing dogs, police dogs, search and rescue dogs, drug dogs, seizure dogs, military dogs, etc. In a ...
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Join journalist, Kizzy Cox, and comedian, Onika McLean, the hosts of What’s The 411, as they do a quick take on people and events from hip-hop and pop culture; and a fresh take on the activities of people and subjects in the news or, just because they want to. Check us out for comedy and hilarity, and seriousness, especially if you get called on the carpet. An Ebony #1 pick by someone named Ebony, What’s The 411 has interviews with celebrities and wannabe celebs, as well as, authors and info ...
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Ross Benes is the author of the book 1999: The Year Low Culture Conquered America and Kickstarted Our Bizarre Times. Together we revisit what popular culture was like at the turn of the millennium and how things like Juggalos, professional wrestling, boy band rivalries, nü-metal, Jerry Springer, teen movies, the tech bubble, and the fear of the end…
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In part two of our two-part series, I show Sarah a more radical side of the American Mall Santa. I tell her stories of how, in some cases, the character transformed into a symbol of societal change and guerrilla protest, from the ladies who had to take his bearded place during WWII, to the Black Santa revolutionaries of the Civil Rights Movement, t…
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For this two-part holiday special, I tell Sarah Marshall all about the history of the American mall Santa Claus from the 1800s into the present day. For part one, we will learn about the eccentric men who created the look and vibe of the department store Kris Kringle, mass producing a jolly army of Santa proxies to whom kids could disclose their he…
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Actor, writer, and advocate Aria Mia Loberti joins Marcie and Fenway to share the magic behind her new children's book, I Am Ingrid—a heartfelt story that speaks to both kids and adults about the meaningful path to becoming a guide dog. Aria invites us into "Ingrid's world," where courage, identity, and a pair of beloved plastic pearls shine at the…
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Jelani Cobb is the Dean of Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism and the author of the new book Three or More Is a Riot: Notes on How We Got Here: 2012-2025 which he is here to talk with me about today. Since the beginning of the Black Lives Matter movement over a decade ago, Jelani has been reporting on the most consequential events from the fr…
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In honor of my favorite movie's 50th anniversary, I wanted to share an episode about The Rocky Horror Picture Show with all of you unconventional conventionalists, one that I recently recorded with my friends BJ and Harmony Colangelo for their fantastic coming-of-age film podcast, This Ends at Prom. Subscribe to This Ends At Prom wherever you get y…
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On May 5, 1993, three 8-year-old boys were brutally murdered in West Memphis, Arkansas. The tiny local police department launches an investigation but finds little physical evidence to lead them to a suspect. Eventually, outside pressure pushes them to charge someone with the killings, whether or not the evidence supports their conclusions. America…
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Brace yourselves, we are marching along with the Macy's Parade to learn about the chaos energy that has always animated this cultural institution, from its explosive balloon disasters to its surprisingly unruly origins. Become a Patron⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus content Or subscribe to American Hysteria on ⁠⁠…
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Sarah Marshall of You're Wrong About joins me to wade back into the tall tales that devil-spawned the friendship we have today. In honor of her brand new podcast miniseries from the CBC called The Devil You Know about the past, present and future of the Satanic Panic, we 'll check out some never-before-heard satanic cult source material from ⁠newsp…
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Kyle Kittleson brings the wow! In this fantastic, fun interview, Kyle shares wild and wonderful animal-training stories (yes, dolphins!) and how those lessons power his work as host of MedCircle—where he translates expert mental-health insights for everyday life—and creator of Baba Blast, a kids’ series that builds empathy and resilience. We dive i…
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Our associate producer (and my brother) Riley Swedelius-Smith is here to tell our producer Miranda Zickler and me about the chaotic opening day of The Happiest Place on Earth way back in 1955. We’ll learn about the many quirks of Walt Disney, the events that unfolded as he tried to build his ludicrous dream, and how everything went down when it was…
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Get ready for an incredible episode of Working Like Dogs! I’m joined by Sharon Gattas and Peter Sellas, two extraordinary handlers who know firsthand the life-saving power of canines in times of crisis. Fresh from their recent deployment to the Texas flood recovery, they’ll be sharing what it’s really like to work side by side with their remarkable…
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Have you ever wondered if the person you are arguing with in a social media comment section is really a person at all? Perry Carpenter is a cybersecurity expert, author of FAIK: A Practical Guide to Living in a World of Deepfakes, Disinformation, and AI-Generated Deceptions, and host of The Faik Files podcast. I asked Perry to explain the phenomeno…
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Bloody Mary...Bloody Mary...Bloody Mary...For our Halloween special, we are going to trace the history of the slumber party ritual known as Bloody Mary in which a young summoner stands in the dark in front of a mirror to call up a dangerous, blood-soaked witch-woman. By looking at the Victorian era occult divination games of girls, the many cemeter…
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If you work with (or just adore) canine partners, don’t miss this conversation with veterinary behaviorist Dr. Simone Sidel and researcher Jaci Gandenberger from the University of Denver’s Institute for Human–Animal Connection (IHAC). We dig into their new open-access paper, “Recognizing and Mitigating Canine Stress in Human–Canine Interaction Rese…
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Sarah Marshall is here to teach me about the confounding phenomenon of Spontaneous Human Combustion in which a person is found almost totally incinerated with no explanation, seeming to have burst into flames from within. From the Victorian era to the modern day, we will look at historical cases and modern explanations to try to separate fact from …
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This is a rerelease of our 2023 Halloween special about the 12 Ft Skeleton Halloween craze and the strange history of our relationship to skeletons, both real and fake, stretching back hundreds of years. On 10/14 you can hear me on You're Wrong About covering Midnight Ghost Shows! I am doing a new series over on Patreon and Apple+ called Dispatches…
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What Went Wrong hosts Chris Winterbauer and Lizzie Bassett join me to tell the stories of three allegedly cursed horror movies and the unexplained events that befell the cast, crew, and sometimes even audiences. Were these films really possessed by dangerous, otherworldly energy? Or are we dealing with social conditions, marketing gimmicks, and saf…
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For this episode, I get schooled on the history of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, the children's horror book series that terrified 80s and 90s kids with its repurposed urban legends and folklore as well as genuinely terrifying illustrations. Liz Gotauco (AKA Cosbrarian), the creator of the F*cked Up Fairytales series, talks with me about how th…
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George Civeris is the host of the comedy podcast Straightiolab as well as a new podcast called United States of Kennedy that explores our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty and the ways that this family has continued to shape American life for decades. For this episode, George lays out the tale of the Kennedy Curse through a handful of t…
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Tim Harford is the host of the podcast Cautionary Tales which recently put out a series on the most famous magician of all time, Harry Houdini. For this episode, Sarah Marshall of You’re Wrong About joins me as co-host to discuss with Tim the Victorian religion-turned-public spectacle known as Spiritualism, the wonderfully gullible Sir Arthur Conan…
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In this thought-provoking episode of Working Like Dogs, we’re joined by Kara Milotte, Manager of Client Services at the nationally recognized nonprofit NEADS and James “Chip” Harrington from the Massachusetts Department of Correction. Together, they offer a powerful look into the transformative partnership between NEADS and correctional facilities—…
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This is a rerelease of our 2021 episode. In 2017, YouTube Kids was embroiled in a major scandal when it was discovered that a dark underbelly of inappropriate cartoons, computer animations, and live action videos were lurking just under the surface of the supposedly safeguarded app. With themes of injections, sexuality, violence, scatology, and muc…
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From Jonestown to Heaven’s Gate, to the Octopus Murders and the Waco Siege, the world is full of deception, manipulation, and destruction. Listen to Conspiracy Theories, Cults, and Crimes every Wednesday as we explore the real people at the center of the world’s most shocking secrets and nefarious organizations. Conspiracy Theories, Cults, and Crim…
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