Covering every hamlet and precinct in America, big and small, the stories span arts and sports, business and history, innovation and adventure, generosity and courage, resilience and redemption, faith and love, past and present. In short, Our American Stories tells the story of America to Americans.
About Lee Habeeb
Lee Habeeb co-founded Laura Ingraham’s national radio show in 2001, moved to Salem Media Group in 2008 as Vice President of Content overseeing their nationally syndicated lineup, and launched Our American Stories in 2016. He is a University of Virginia School of Law graduate, and writes a weekly column for Newsweek.
For more information, please visit ouramericanstories.com.
A Gold Star Father on Loss, Service, and His Son’s Legacy
My Family Spent 4 Months Playing Battleship in a Cornfield
On this episode of Our American Stories, in 1856, the steamboat Steamboat Arabia struck a snag and slipped beneath the Missouri River, taking with it cargo bound for stores and towns across the frontier. The Arabia did not stay buried forever. As the river changed course over time, the wreck was left behind beneath layers of earth.
More than a century later, a group of Kansas City men set out to uncover the long-buried treasure. Matt Hawley tells the story of his family’s quest to dig up the steamboat Arabia from the middle of a cornfield.
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The Plan Was Simple. The Road Trip Was Not
On this episode of Our American Stories, volunteering seemed simple enough. Then the plan fell apart. What started as a group effort quickly turned into a one-man road trip across state lines.
Robert Frohlich, an Our American Stories listener from Wisconsin, shares the story of a road trip gone wrong while volunteering to deliver trucks to impoverished communities in Appalachia.
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Orson Welles and the Night “War of the Worlds” Terrified America
On this episode of Our American Stories, in 1938, radio was the voice Americans trusted. News from Europe was growing more serious, and listeners relied on those broadcasts to understand what was happening in the world. When regular programming was interrupted, people paid attention and assumed what they were hearing was real.
So when urgent bulletins broke in with reports of an alien attack on American soil, many believed it. There were no extraterrestrial invasions, only an intricately crafted radio drama directed and narrated by the then-unknown Orson Welles, based on The War of the Worlds. The broadcast and the panic that followed changed the way news and media could be presented.
A. Brad Schwartz, author of Broadcast Hysteria: Orson Welles’s War of the Worlds and the Art of Fake News, shares the story.
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Dan Fogelberg and the Father Behind “Leader of the Band”
On this episode of Our American Stories, in the canon of personal songs, “Leader of the Band” is one of the most treasured. The song is Dan Fogelberg’s heartfelt tribute to his father, Lawrence, a high school band director who shaped both his life and his music.
As part of our Story of a Song series, Dan Fogelberg himself, along with our own Greg Hengler, share the story behind the song and the man who inspired it.
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Why Tyrone Power Left Hollywood to Fight in World War II
On this episode of Our American Stories, Tyrone Power was one of Hollywood’s biggest stars in the late 1930s and early 1940s, known for films like The Mark of Zorro and Blood and Sand. But at the height of his career, he stepped away from the screen and joined the Marines.
Power trained as a pilot and served in the Pacific during World War II, flying transport missions into some of the war’s most dangerous territory. For our ongoing Hollywood Goes to War series, Roger McGrath shares how one of the great actors of Hollywood’s Golden Age became a Marine aviator.
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A Marine’s Final Conversation with His Father
On this episode of Our American Stories, a Marine sits beside his dying father, a tough, no-nonsense veteran who refuses treatment and faces death on his own terms. Wanting one last moment of connection, the son asks for something simple: to hear the words “I love you.” What followed was not what he expected.
Our regular contributor, Bob McClellan, shares the story of his father’s final days and the realization that love is not always spoken, but shown.
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Ponzi's Scheme: The True Story of the Legendary Scam Artist
On this episode of Our American Stories, in the early 1900s, Charles Ponzi arrived in the United States chasing opportunity but struggling to find steady work. After years of false starts, he began promoting an investment idea that promised unusually high returns in a short amount of time. But the model depended on a steady stream of new money, and once that slowed, the foundation began to crack.
Jonathan Small of the Write About Now podcast shares the story of how Ponzi built his operation, how it ultimately collapsed, and how it paved the way for later figures like Bernard Madoff to carry on similar schemes.
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JC Newman and America’s Oldest Family-Owned Cigar Company
On this episode of Our American Stories, when Julius Caesar Newman came to America, he was a teenager trying to make a living by learning a trade that allowed him to work with his hands and support his family. When the chance came to go out on his own, he took it and built a business that would grow into a lasting enterprise.
Today, the J.C. Newman Cigar Company is still run by his family. As part of our American Dreamers series, Drew Newman shares how his family’s company managed to endure when so many others disappeared.
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Abraham Lincoln’s Son: The Forgotten Story of Robert Todd Lincoln
On this episode of Our American Stories, as the eldest son of Abraham Lincoln, Robert Todd Lincoln spent much of his life in the shadow of one of the most revered figures in American history. By the end of the Civil War, he had joined the Union Army despite his father’s reservations and was present near the front during its final days, including the period surrounding General Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Court House.
In the years that followed, he charted his own course, serving as U.S. Secretary of War and later as Ambassador to Great Britain. Our regular contributor, The History Guy, shares the often-overlooked story of a man who built a legacy beyond his father’s name.
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