All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories

By Joe LexSociety & Culture Documentary Education History

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All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories episodes

February 01, 2021 ABC #023: Hy Lit, Billy Paul, Grover Washington Jr., Teddy Pendergrass - The Philadelphia Sound
One of the highwater marks of Philadelphia music was in the 1970s when Gamble and Huff started Philadelphia International Music and stole thunder from both Motown and Memphis. Two of their biggest stars were Billy Paul and Teddy Pendergrass.
Another Philadelphian, Grover Washington Jr., became one of the top-selling jazz artists in history and is credited with laying the groundwork for what became known as “smooth jazz.”
And where did you hear the latest sounds? On the radio, of course, where Hy Lit was one of the top names on-the-air for five decades.
All four of these music pioneers are buried at Laurel Hill West in Bala Cynwyd.

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1 hr 12 min
January 01, 2021ABC #022: John Cassin, Titian Ramsay Peale, Sophonisba Angusciola (Peale) Sellers, Joseph Parker Norris Sr & Jr, Dr. John L. LaConte, & Dr. Thomas B. Wilson - The Birds and the Bees
East coast birdwatchers probably can tell you famed Philadelphians involved in birding.
John Cassin described 194 new species of birds in his lifetime and has five species of North American birds named in his honor
Titian Ramsay Peale, son of Charles Willson Peale was a meticulous illustrator of wildlife whose artworks are as highly sought as those of John James Audubon
Titian’s older and less-well-known half-sister Sophonisba Angusciola (Peale) Sellers was America’s first woman ornithologist.
Witmer Stone worked for more than 50 years in the Ornithology Department at the Academy of Natural Sciences.
But even birdwatchers may not know about the father and son oölogists Joseph Parker Norris Sr. and Jr., who had the largest collection of bird eggs in the United States.
And since the show is called The Birds and the Bees, I’ll talk about Dr. John Lawrence LeConte, who was responsible for naming and describing approximately half of the insect taxa known in the United States during his lifetime, and his younger partner Dr. George Henry Horn.
And physician / naturalist and entomologist Thomas Bellerby Wilson, who spent his personal fortune buying collections from around the world for the Academy of Sciences.
Even if you’ve never lusted after a pair of Vortex Diamondback HD binoculars, you’ll enjoy this episode of “All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories – The Birds and the Bees.”

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1 hr 15 min
December 01, 2020ABC #021: Joseph Ripka, Seville Schofield, and Samuel Winpenny - Textile Barons, Part 1
While the textile business in the United States started in New England, it did not take Philadelphia long to catch up and pass our northern neighbors. Three people who immigrated to Manayunk helped build what had been a small village into one of the major manufacturing centers of the country.
Joseph Ripka was a draft dodger from Silesia who at his peak employed 2000 men, women, and children in his mills, but went out of business at the start of the Civil War.
Seville Schofield came from England and took advantage of the Civil War to manufacture 365,000 blankets for the Union Army.
Samuel Winpenny was also from England and declared bankruptcy before his 35th birthday. Several of his sons and grandsons were far more successful, but others were not and still have interesting stories to tell.
Even if you know nothing about the textile business, I promise you will be informed and entertained.
1 hr 30 min
November 01, 2020ABC #020: MAJ Levi Twiggs, BG Jacob Zeilin, and SGT Richard Binder - Send the Marines!
The United States Marine Corps was born in Philadelphia on November 10, 1775 and the city is the burial site for many famed members of the Corps.
Major Levi Twiggs was born in Georgia in a military family; he joined the Marines when he was 19 and made the Marine Barracks at Philadelphia Naval Yards his home for many years before heading off to fight in the Mexican-American War.
Brigadier General Jacob Zeilin was born in Philadelphia and spent 45 years as a Marine Corps officer, culminating in being their first General-level officer.
Sergeant Richard Binder was a German immigrant who joined the Marines at the beginning of the Civil War and was awarded the Medal of Honor for bravery at the Battle of Fort Fisher; he returned to Philadelphia after the war and opened a series of very successful barber shops and hair parlors.
59 min
October 01, 2020ABC #019: Monsignor Sigourney Fay, Hobey Baker, and the F. Scott Fitzgerald Connection
You might think that F. Scott Fitzgerald, a Midwesterner who made his name in New York City, would have no Philadelphia connections. You would be wrong.
Sigourney Webster Fay was born in Philadelphia to an old-line Episcopalian family, but left that religion to become a Catholic priest; he was the most important influence in the life of the schoolboy F. Scott Fitzgerald and the inspiration for one of his most widely-loved characters in This Side of Paradise.
While Fitzgerald matriculated at Princeton, he was three years behind the Golden Boy Hobart Amory Hare “Hobey” Baker, who not only showed up as a minor character in This Side of Paradise, but gave one of his family names to the character Fitzgerald identified as himself, Amory Blaine. I interview Baker buff Paul Sookiasian for this segment.
Get ready for a literary exploration of two amazing Philadelphians in this October edition of All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories – The Other Side of Paradise.
1 hr 9 min
September 01, 2020ABC #018: Alexander Milne Calder & Alexander Stirling Calder, The William Warner Plot, and Henry Charles Lea - The Calder Connections
Alexander Milne Calder was a Scottish-born sculptor who came to Philadelphia and was given the commission for statuary for the City Hall. He managed to squeeze in a monument for the Warner Family at Laurel Hill Cemetery that is probably the most photographed grave site on the property.
His son Alexander Stirling Calder is best remembered for Swann Fountain on Logan Circle, but he was also commissioned to do the statue for the grave of famed historian Henry Charles Lea, also at Laurel Hill.
The Calders are interred at Laurel Hill West under a large Celtic cross.
1 hr 6 min
August 01, 2020ABC #017: Robley Dunglison, Constantine Hering, Malcolm MacFarlan, and Oscar Allis - Fathers of American Medicine, Part 1
Robley Dunglison was born and educated in England but recruited to be the first Professor of Medicine at Thomas Jefferson’s University of Virginia, where he also became Jefferson’s private physician. Later he moved to Philadelphia and was recognized as the Father of American Physiology.
Constantine Hering was born and educated in Germany and learned the homeopathic methods of fellow countryman Samuel Hahnemann; he brought these beliefs with him to Philadelphia and is considered the Father of Homeopathic Medicine in the United States.
Malcolm Macfarlan was born in Scotland but educated in the United States where he served in the Civil War; upon returning to Philadelphia, he worked under Hering as Chief of Surgery and became the Father of Homeopathic Surgery.
Oscar Allis was US born and educated; he became the Father of Orthopedic Surgery at Jefferson Medical College and invented a surgical instrument which is still used thousands of times daily around the world.
56 min
July 22, 2020 Curtis Publishing Company and The Saturday Evening Post
Before the internet, before television, before radio, there were magazines. Philadelphia was the place you wanted to be if you were in the magazine business. It had the best presses, the best print machines, and had railroads to get them where they needed to go. Cyrus H.K. Curtis was the king of magazine publishing, but could only do it with the help of two amazing editors – his wife, Louisa Knapp Curtis, and his hire from Boston, George Horace Lorimer. Lorimer needed the help of another Philadelphian, Adelaide Walbaum Neall, to make the Post a success. And while everyone thinks of Norman Rockwell as the painted of Saturday Evening Post covers, Katharine Richardson Wireman was painting covers for the Post and the Journal long before Rockwell. And when Curtis built his headquarters Building on 6th and Walnut, he hired a local architect Edgar Viguers Seeler. All six of these people are buried at Laurel Hill Cemetery or West Laurel Hill Cemetery.
49 min
July 01, 2020ABC #016: Curtis Publishing Company and The Saturday Evening Post
Before the internet, before television, before radio, there were magazines. Philadelphia was the place you wanted to be if you were in the magazine business. It had the best presses, the best printers, and the railroads to get them where they needed to go. Two of the best - Saturday Evening Post and Ladies' Home Journal - came out of Curtis Publishing Company.
Cyrus H.K. Curtis was the king of magazine publishing but could only do it with the help of two amazing editors – his wife, Louisa Knapp Curtis, and his hire from Boston, George Horace Lorimer. Lorimer needed the help of another Philadelphian, Adelaide Walbaum Neall, to make the Post a success. And while everyone thinks of Norman Rockwell as the painter of Saturday Evening Post covers, Katharine Richardson Wireman painted covers for the Post and the Journal long before Rockwell. And when Curtis built his headquarters Building on 6th and Walnut, he hired a local architect Edgar Viguers Seeler. All six of these people are buried at Laurel Hill Cemetery.
49 min
June 15, 2020ABC #015: Florence Leontine Lowe (“Pancho” Barnes), Ethel Huhn “Bobo” Bailey, and Princess Olga Demidoff Troubetzskoy Stoever - She's Not There
Ethel Huhn "Bobo" Bailey was the spoiled daughter of the spoiled second wife of Philadelphia multimillionaire George Arthur Huhn, who is buried on Millionaire’s Row.
Florence Leontine Lowe was the granddaughter of Philadelphia builder and architect Richard Dobbins; under her nickname and married name of Pancho Barnes, she became a stunt pilot and opened a popular drinking spot for test pilots near Muroc Air Field.
Princess Olga Demidoff Troubetzskoy Stoever was briefly the wife of Germantown-born and raised archeologist and businessman Edward Royal Stoever; her life is the thing of legends.
None of these women are buried at Laurel Hill, but they have great stories that deserve to be shared
51 min

About All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories

From the publisher's feed

Hundreds of brief biographies of permanent residents of Laurel Hill East in Philadelphia and Laurel Hill West in Bala Cywnyd, Pennsylvania. Often educational, always entertaining.