Many people (well the 2 people who read this site not named Aryn or Greg) might have figured out by now that I work for as a production assistant for NPR…specifically podcasting. One of the myriad projects I work on is an original to podcast show called NPR Playback. This concept was pitched to our podcasting illuminati to come up with a way to curate a podcast that looks into the NPR archives.
I came up with the idea to look back a quarter century after determining that the connective spine would have to give the listener a logical timeline so they were not alienated by strange time jumps or unmeaningful anniversaries. There is something simple and clean about that 25 year mark: a quarter century has in some ways a special ring to it in a way that is much more meaningful than those 18th year rememberances.
Every month looks back 25 years on sort of rolling calendar (in this month’s case February 2007 equated to February 1982) so that whatever month it was, we would have some new story to tell. What has been interesting is hearing the ebb and flow of news, politics and social trends and how they all interlock and evolve over time.
Today we finally published the February 1982 episode. Now in our sixth month we have started to get a bit of traction on the potential this podcast can have in showcasing weird and offbeat stories from the past. Think of it like “NPR Loves the 80’s!”
Take a listen here…or for all the past episodes, subscribe by pasting this link here into iTunes. Hope you enjoy.