#64: Weirdo Capital of the West
How much do you know about Oklahoma City? Probably you know about the bombing, the Dust Bowl, and the Trail of Tears. Maybe, if you\u2019re a basketball fan, you know about the drama of their basketball team, the Thunder. A feeble history, then, of a flyover city in the public imagination. Sam Anderson wants to change all that. As a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine, he was sent off to O.K.C. a few years ago to write about a stolen basketball team, and fell so hard for what he calls \u201cone of the great weirdo cities of the world\u201d that he wrote a whole book about it.
Go beyond the episode:
- Sam Anderson\u2019s Boom Town
- Read his original reporting on the Oklahoma City Thunder, \u201cA Basketball Fairy Tale in Middle America\u201d
- And his Summer 2004 essay for us, \u201cRe: Re: Re: Re: Re: Joyce,\u201d as strange a travelogue of Dublin as you\u2019ll ever read
- Peruse the Oklahoma Historical Society\u2019s materials on the Land Run of 1889
- Read the original coverage of the Land Run in the May 18, 1889 edition of Harper\u2019s Weekly (click here for a more legible text-only version) or in The New York Times
Tune in every week to catch interviews with the liveliest voices from literature, the arts, sciences, history, and public affairs; reports on cutting-edge works in progress; long-form narratives; and compelling excerpts from new books. Hosted by Stephanie Bastek.
Subscribe: iTunes \u2022 Feedburner \u2022 Stitcher \u2022 Google Play \u2022 Acast
Have suggestions for projects you\u2019d like us to catch up on, or writers you want to hear from? Send us a note: podcast [at] theamericanscholar [dot] org. And rate us on iTunes! Our theme music was composed by Nathan Prillaman.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.