Garrison Keillor's Podcast

It was on this day in 1635 that Roger Williams was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for spreading "newe and dangerous opinions." He left and founded Providence, Rhode Island.

It's the birthday of the science fiction author Frank Herbert (1920), who wrote the Dune series.

It's the birthday of Diane Ackerman, whose books blend science, history, and literature. She even has a molecule named after her: dianeackerone.

On this date in 1927, the release of The Jazz Singer marked the beginning of the end for silent movies. It wasn't the first movie with sound, but it was the first to include talking along with the musical numbers.

It was on this day in 1970 that the Public Broadcasting Service was founded in America "for instructional, educational, and cultural purposes."

Today is the birthday of Edward L. Stratemeyer, one of the first American writers to capitalize on universal primary education by writing children's adventure series such as the Hardy Boys.

On this date in 1849, Edgar Allan Poe was found unkempt and delirious outside a pub in Baltimore. No one knows what had happened to him, and he died four days later.

On this day in 1950, Charles M. Schulz's comic strip Peanuts was first published. Schulz began every morning with a jelly doughnut, sitting down to think of an idea that might come after minutes or hours.

It's the birthday of novelist Tim O'Brien, author of The Things They Carried, who said, "A true war story is never moral."

On this day in 1949, the Berlin Airlift ended after more than a year of delivering food to West Berliners.