All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories

By Joe LexSociety & Culture Documentary Education History

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Typical duration
35 min
per episode

Based on Podcast App listening data

All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories episodes

March 03 Tillie May Forney: Getting the Scoop from the Woman’s Perspective
ABC:LHS #084-2 Matilda "Tillie May" Forney...
...gained newspaper experience as her publisher father’s secretary and became a writer known for her “Fashionable Luncheon and Tea Toilets” column, which focused on high society fashion and etiquette. She catered to an affluent audience and discussed topics like French fabrics and social customs.
35 min
March 02 Emily Elizabeth Holman: Philadelphia's Leading Woman Architect
ABC:LHS #084-1 Emily Elizabeth "E.E." Holman...
...started as a desk clerk in an architect's office but quickly showed her talent in design. She blossomed into a sought-after architect who practiced independently and designed homes, theaters, and institutional buildings over a career of about twenty years.
34 min
February 23Women's History Month 2026
ABC:LHS #084 Women's History Month 2026
Emily Elizabeth Holman was an accomplished architect who preferred using her initials so as not to disclose her gender.
Matilda “Tillie May” Forney followed in the steps of her newspaper publisher father John Forney. She made newspaper work her career at a time when women were barely tolerated in the newsroom.
Florence Cowanova was the ballet teacher all the little girls loved. Among her famed students: Zelda Fitzgerald, Imogene Coca, and Princess Grace.
While Harris Wofford became one of JFK’s “Best and Brightest,” his wife Clare Wofford became a lynchpin in the successful formation of the Peace Corps.
2 hr 33 min
February 15 Walter R. Livingston, Jr.: Building with a Black Esthetic
BBB:LHWS #053 Walter Livingston, Jr. ...
...is considered Philadelphia's top Black Post-War architect; his masterwork is the Zion Baptist Church on North Broad Street.
A Black architect not buried at Laurel Hil is Julian Abele, whose boss Horace Trumbauer (ABC:LHS 005) employed him as his firm's primary designer.
47 min
February 05 Mpozi Tolbert: Mpozitivity in Naptown
ABC:LHS #083-4 Mpozi Mshale Tolbert...
...was a West Philadelphia native who became a beloved photojournalist and DJ in Indianapolis. Despite his 6'6" frame and waist-length dreadlocks, he was described by all who knew him as a gentle giant. Two murals of Mpozi exist in Indianapolis’s Broad Ripple and Fountain Square neighborhoods to celebrate his life and work.
36 min
February 04 Julia Komai: Freedom for Liberia
ABC:LHS #083-3 Julia Komai
...and her husband Reverend John Komai, son of a Krahn chief, fled their homeland of Liberia during the 1989 coup. John became a community leader for Liberian refugees in the U.S. Julia was a political activist who had been jailed in 1979 for her opposition to human rights abuses; she later served as Assistant Director of the African Unity Conference Center.

38 min
February 03 Rev. Leonard Smalls: A Parish of Prisoners
ABC:LHS #083-2 Reverend Leonard Leland Smalls...
...was a Baptist minister who dedicated much of his life to prison ministry and community development. In 1956, he became the first Black minister certified as a prison chaplain in Pennsylvania. His political activism included a 1967 mayoral candidacy focused on consumer fraud issues.
32 min
February 02 Frances "Mom" Williams: "Get Off Your Rocker and Vote!"
ABC:LHS #083-1 Frances “Mom” Williams...
...was a dedicated neighborhood leader and advocate for seniors and the disabled in Philadelphia. Despite an unsuccessful run for City Council in 1979, her influence extended through her family and her activism, and she left a lasting impact on her city and community.
21 min
February 01 Black History 2026
ABC:LHS #083-0 Black History 2026
Frances “Mom” Williams was a dedicated Philadelphia community leader and activist who ran for City Council in 1979 with a focus on seniors and neighborhood safety. Her son Hardy and grandson Anthony both became State Senators.

Rev. Leonard Leland Smalls became the first Black minister certified as a prison chaplain in Pennsylvania. Smalls associated with Martin Luther King Jr. and local activists, though he described himself as not nonviolent. Released as separate podcast on February 3rd.

Liberian native Julia Komai was a political activist who became an outspoken advocate for human rights and had been imprisoned before escaping to the United States. She died in a car crash, along with a former Vice President of her native land. Separate podcast on February 4th.

Mpozi Mshade Tolbert was deeply admired in two cities: in Philadelphia, he captured iconic images of the hip-hop scene, while in Indianapolis he became a beloved photojournalist and DJ, known for his genial spirit, generosity, and influence on the arts community. Separate podcast on February 5th.

2 hr 22 min
January 12 Mary S. Costanza: Finding a Glimmer of Light in the Darkness
BBB:LHWS #052 Mary Scarpone Costanza...
...was raised Roman Catholic and claimed she never met a Jew until she went to Temple University. She developed an interest in art that had been produced by victims of the Nazi Holocaust. It turned into her life work.
1 hr 12 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.