Beyond Texas with W.F. Strong

Often listed as one of the top ten best short stories ever written in America, The Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, by Ambrose Bierce remains, even today, a particularly haunting story for everyone who has ever read it, or seen the Twilight Zone episode based on the story which Rod Serling aired in 1961. Support the show

Excerpts from the extraordinarily poignant book by Nobel Prize winning Spanish author, Juan Ramón Jiménez. I call it a children´s book for adults, but children can certainly enjoy it, too. Like all great literature, it works on many levels. Support the show

Jack London's To Build a Fire is often listed among the top 100 of best short stories ever written. Now that North America and Europe are in the deep freeze of winter, it seemed to me a great time, given the natural ambiance, to share London's masterpiece. wfstrongpodcast@gmail.com Support the show

An interview with best-selling author Daniel Brown concerning his book, now a movie, The Boys in the Boat. This interview is ten years old but has fresh relevance given that the book is once again a best-seller, thanks to Clooney's film. In this interview Daniel shares the story of how this inspiring saga found him and how he was deeply moved by the then old men who told him, in intimate interviews, about their magical win at the 1936 Olympics, and the incredible bonds that took them there. Support the show

Part Two of our conversation with Lindsay Powell, an expert on classical Roman history and co-author of a book about Julius Caesar, as well as a solo author of a book about his successor, Caesar Augustus. In this episode we talk about the events that led up to the assassination of Caesar and the general incompetence of the assassins in preparing for the power vacuum that would follow. They did not anticipate the chaos of Rome without Caesar, nor did they realize that the majority of Romans would not see them as liberators, but rather, as traitors Support the show

A reading and brief analysis of the one of the best short stories of all time, "The Yellow Wall Paper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Contact: wfstrongpodcast@gmail.com Support the show

Interview with Bill Steele, a man National Geographic has called one of the world's leading speleologists, tells all about his 30 years of exploring the deepest cave in the Western Hemisphere, Huautla, in the Mexican state of Oaxaca. To great photos of Huautla check out peshcaving.org Support the show

Adam Shepherd arrived by bus at midnight in Charleston , SC, with only $25.00 in his pocket. He gave himself one year to pull himself up by his bootstraps. Relying only on his high school diploma and with no skilled labor background to claim, he had to rise up out of homelessness, get himself an apartment, furnish it, buy a car and put 2500 dollars in savings as a safety net, all within one year. This the story of how he tried to do this. Support the show

A good long informative chat about Julius Caesar with author, Lindsay Powell, who is an expert on Julius Caesar and who has just released a new book on the life of the great politician and military leader. Support the show

This is a beautiful very short story for the holidays. The author is anonymous. Support the show

Sharing a wonderful, now iconic short story, by Jorge Luis Borges, It is representative of the sort of mesmerizing short-stories that he regularly produced in the middle of the last century. Support the show

A conversation with Senior Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research, Elad Yom-Tov, about big data and what we are learning from it that can improve our lives in many ways. Support the show

Part II of my interview with the incomparable Paul Craddock, author of Spare Parts: the story of the history of transplant surgery. Support the show

An interview with Paul Craddock, PhD, concerning his page-turner of a best-selling book about the fascinating history of transplant surgery. Support the show

This is Alyona's story of surviving the Russian bombing and shelling of her beloved Mariupol and her harrowing escape to safer territory. You can write to her here: alenarromanovaa@gmail.com wfstrongpodcast@gmail.com Support the show

The second half of Saint-Exupéry and Prevot's struggle to survive the brutal challenges of the Libyan desert after they're plane crashed there. Support the show

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, along with his co-pilot and mechanic, Andre Prevot, crashed in the North African Desert in 1935 while trying to set an air speed record between Paris and Saigon. They survived the crash, but barely survived the desert. They walked 120 miles and came within hours of dying of thirst and exposure to the unrelenting sun. This is the story, in his words, of how they survived. Support the show

An interview with former NPR reporter, Pam Fessler concerning her captivating book, Carville's Cure: Leprosy, Stigma, and the Fight for Justice. To comment write to: wfstrongpodcast@gmail.com Support the show

This is Hemingways' famous Switzerland Christmas post which he wrote for the Toronto Star in 1923 when he was 24 years old. He was on a skiing holiday with his first wife Hadley and his best friend, Chink. I posted it an earlier version a last Christmas, but before it was remastered with appropriate sounds by my buddy Daryl Missen, audio guru down under in Melbourne, Australia. I think it's truly worthy of the Christmas season, now. Enjoy. To comment write to: wfstrongpodcast@gmail.com Support the show

An interview with the gifted memoirist, Cherly Strayed, about her now classic nonfiction work, WILD, which has been a decade long bestseller and popular movie starring Reese Witherspoon. To comment write to: wfstrongpodcast@gmail.com Support the show