Drama! Characters! Conflict! History podcasts have them all, with American History Tellers' Lindsay Graham

This transcript was auto-generated from an audio recording. Please excuse any typos or grammatical errors. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

I was talking with a friend the other day, and I played a little bit of tape for her—without telling her whose voice it was. “That voice sounds so familiar,” she said. “American History Tellers?” I asked. “No….” “Have you heard American Scandal, maybe?” “That’s it!” she said. “American Scandal, of course!”

That voice is the voice of Lindsay Graham. You’ve probably heard it.  Lindsay’s voice is everywhere. He’s been hosting the Wondery hit shows American History Tellers and American Scandal for years. He also hosts Business Movers and History Daily. He voices ads for most of his shows and many other Wondery productions, like Business Wars. As if that’s not enough, he’s the CEO of Airship, the rapidly growing podcast production company involved in these programs and more. His shows are downloaded more than eight million times a month. And he’s hard to keep up with. Just one moment before I sat down to record this introduction, he announced yet another new show—American Criminal, a true crime podcast that tells the stories of the most infamous criminals in the history of the United States, revealing the men and women who cheated, lied, and murdered in their own twisted pursuit of the American dream."

You’d think he’d be completely confident about every single new thing he tries his hand at. You’d be wrong.

Clip of Lindsay Graham
And I had the idea, and I kept having the idea. I thought this would be good for that idea. This would be good for that idea. And that's all that ever happened for a year. I just continued to refine the good idea, making it a gooder idea, but it was never an actual thing until I got really sick of myself and I decided to to go ahead and do it.

Elaine Appleton Grant

I wanted to talk with Lindsay about the unique joys and challenges of making history—history podcasts, that is. Especially what it’s like to make a daily history show. But, for this season, on the theme of bravery, we also talked about the entrepreneurial side of podcasting…and how Lindsay finds the courage to get new ideas off the ground. Especially for someone who admits he’s not naturally confident.

This is Sound Judgment, where we investigate just what it takes to become a beloved audio storyteller by pulling apart one episode at a time, together. I’m Elaine Appleton Grant.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Most of Lindsay’s podcasts—American History Tellers, Business Movers and American Scandal—are longform series. But a couple of years ago, he debuted History Daily, a 15- to 20-minute show that tells a story from this day in history. A short-form, daily, narrative podcast poses unique problems. Before we launch in, it probably helps to know that a few years ago, I contributed to American Scandal and American History Tellers. 

What would you say is the most challenging part of producing History Daily? 

Lindsay Graham

Other than the relentless schedule—you know, daily is hard. So other than that audacious goal of putting out a daily, the real trick is nailing the narrative, as it is in any one of these shows. Because the format is shorter, because your resources are less, you have a temptation to just get the facts across, and that is the worst instinct, because no facts live or breathe. Instead, we deliberately try to keep our viewpoint a little higher up and rooted on characters. We do not need to explain, for instance, the entire history about this papal decree and what its context is. All we need to know is Pope Pius IX is really angry. And these are the human consequences—and the historical consequences, too. But the backstory of all the other conferences and schisms that led to this moment are not necessarily important. Not in this show. And so remembering that, remembering how to be human and not stuck in the minutia, is very difficult.

Elaine Appleton Grant

You know, you're reminding me of something that I learned when I was working on that series of American Scandal, which—the characters in that are characters we know and love today, like Trump and Elliott Spitzer and Roger Stone.

Lindsay Graham 

Oh yes. 

Elaine Appleton Grant 

Roger Stone. And, you know, I spent a large part of my career in print before I went into audio storytelling. And what I was told frequently is, Elaine, something has to happen every two minutes. You can't describe the Spitzer family walking up to the inauguration forever, even though you're sort of caught up in the glory of the moment, because no one will stick around. So it was really like a formula. Tell me about that in your work.

Lindsay Graham

So, especially in shows like American Scandal, in which the pace is set rather briskly, we need to keep it moving. And we do that by encapsulating things in scenes. We think in a very, almost television way. We have characters, they do things, there are consequences, there are stakes, there are, wants and needs and consequences if they don't—if these characters don't achieve or do achieve. Everything is just straight out of classical Greek storytelling principles, and we just do it in a very modern way.

Elaine Appleton Grant

So the episode that I want to look at today is episode number 575. It's called “Silent Spring Sparks the Modern Environmental Movement,” and it's about the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. So I want to start by playing a clip from the opening scene. It is the story of a woman farmer. In this particular episode, her name is Dottie. It's a hot Georgia day. It's June, 1948. And she's out feeding her chickens. 

Clip from History Daily

Lindsay Graham: …bag of chicken feed. As she fills the container with pellets, a telltale sound resounds across the fields. Dottie shields her eyes from the hot Georgia sun and looks up. As expected, a plane is on the horizon. As the aircraft descends closer to her neighbor's property, it begins releasing a billowing cloud behind it.

In a matter of minutes, a blanket of pesticides have covered the crops next door. But the chemical fog doesn't obey property lines. Soon, a slight breeze carries some of the pesticides over to Dottie's farm. As the chemicals float over, they catch in Dottie's throat. She coughs uncontrollably for a moment before regaining her breath.

Dottie clears her throat and then returns to her work, topping off…

Elaine Appleton Grant

So I have to ask you, was Dottie a real person?

Lindsay Graham 

Well, I don't know. And I started to look through our sources for this script. I would be really surprised if Dottie did not exist. Because that goes against the principles of this show. We give ourselves certain liberties, but making things up whole cloth is not one of them. And I bet that this story of Dottie was mentioned in relation to Rachel Carson and the writer thought, this is a perfect entrance into this story, because I can start to imagine the sound effects that would go along with it.

We have a plane, we have coughing, we have chickens. And this is the sort of creativity required to understand: How do we explain the problem, make it human, and make it interesting in audio. Because in History Daily, we only have this sound-designed cold open. There's no use of sound effects later.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Ah, okay.

Lindsay Graham 

So I highly suspect Dottie is a real person. This is a real complaint and it led to probably a real interaction with the true heroine of our story here, Rachel Carson. But it does a great job of being an entree to the rest of the topic.

Elaine Appleton Grant

This is the Wondery Immersive Storytelling Formula, in which you are narrating something that has its roots in truth. You’re pretty sure that Dottie was a real person, this story happened, but of course the writer is really sort of making up the scene so that we feel like we're inside of it.

It's always been a controversial formula, despite the fact that these shows are still—to this day—on the top of the charts. So millions of listeners love it, but the ones who don't love it really don't. How have you dealt with this particular controversy over the years?

Lindsay Graham Well, I think there are two controversies, frankly. There is the idea that any reenactment exists at all. There are many who prefer the strictest journalism only. And then there's the bizarre choice in several of my shows, in which I am the only voice in these reenactments, even though it could be a mother and child talking to each other in the scene. This was the formula that was handed down to me when History Tellers first started. And you don't say no to the boss.

Elaine Appleton Grant 

Uh huh. Uh huh.

Lindsay Graham

But as I grew comfortable with it, I realized that it's actually something that we are deeply familiar with. If we were around a campfire, or if our parents were tucking us into bed, then they would be the voice of all the characters.

This is a really deeply and old familiar version of how to communicate a story. You are correct. There are people who hate it. I can't do anything about it, ’cause that's this show. There's also no dancing. It's not a musical. And some people love that stuff. I just can't help those people who don't like it or want it to be something different than it is. And to the point of reenactments at all, it’s a choice, it's an artistic choice. You would not believe the amount of fact checking, hand wringing, legal review that goes into these things. I can promise you that we're not making shit up.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Actually, this has never happened to me before, where I'm interviewing someone whose show I actually worked on. I absolutely believe the amount of fact checking, because I was immersed in it, and the details that we're checking over and over and over again, and trying to make timelines out of things—you know, it was fascinating. Dottie had a farm, were there actually chickens on the farm or was she raising pigs?

Let me play another clip. It's just a little further along in this same story.

Clip from History Daily

Lindsay Graham: …questions about its health risks emerge. Everyday Americans like Dottie, as well as scientists, become concerned about the toxicity of DDT. More and more people are noticing its harmful effect on other living things and are starting to wonder if DDT could be dangerous to humans as well. But efforts to sound the alarm about the pesticide will be stymied for years. It will take more than a decade before a breakthrough will come in the form of Rachel Carson's book, Silent Spring, which will put forth a scathing criticism of the chemical industry and catalyze a movement for change upon its release on September 27, 1962.

Elaine Appleton Grant 

So there we have why this story about Dottie actually mattered. I found it interesting that despite History Daily being a super short show, you do wait almost four minutes before introducing us to the central theme of the episode. Why wait that long?

Lindsay Graham

I think a little bit of suspense is not a bad thing. Waiting three minutes is hardly any at all, especially when it's an enjoyable three minutes. Additionally, you have probably seen the title of the podcast, when it comes up in your podcast player. You know it's going to be about Rachel Carlson's Silent Spring. And even if you don't know what that is or who she is, you know that Dottie has no relationship to it. So you're anticipating what the connection will be. If you have any familiarity with the show at all, you also know that you're guaranteed to get the connection really soon, because we don't ever let you down. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

Which speaks in part to—you know, you have a baked-in structure for the show and you've created habits among your listeners.

Lindsay Graham 

That last piece of music, and Scandal as well, that's the end of the act music, and it's the same for every single time. And people grow excited when they hear that. It's a Pavlovian response that this is a cliffhanger, there's more to come. And habits is exactly what we are trying to enable.

Elaine Appleton Grant

I want to play one more clip from this particular episode, and this is when Rachel Carson makes a career change.

Clip from History Daily

Lindsay Graham: …for Rachel to turn her degree into income, and Rachel knows from watching Miss Skinker's own struggles as a female scientist, that biology would not be an easy path. But after months of indecision, Rachel goes to Miss Skinker in January of 1928 with an announcement. She's changing her major from English to biology. Miss Skinker is shocked, but also thrilled. She's always admired Rachel's studiousness, and she knows Rachel brings a unique sense of wonder and intelligence to her studies.

Elaine Appleton Grant 

One of the things that we don't always know is what the interior feelings are of a person who is gone. We never even find out her first name. She's always Miss Skinker. I assume, based on everything we just said, that there was a good solid account of who Miss Skinker was and what the relationship between them was like?

Lindsay Graham 

There was either a report from Rachel Carson herself, like, how did you get into biology? Well, I had this one teacher, and she was delighted when I told her I changed my major. Or there was another journalistic source in which it was a biography of Rachel Carson, and they went and found Miss Skinker and asked her her opinion. Somewhere, someone said, this event happened, and these were the emotions about them.

We would never presume an internal dialogue—unless it's obvious. Like, Mr. Smith was shot, and he cried out in pain, right? Because everyone's going to cry out in pain.

Elaine Appleton Grant 

Right.

Lindsay Graham

Right? So we make some basic human assumptions, and give ourselves that liberty. But most of the time, these human moments are really, really well grounded.

Elaine Appleton Grant 

When I first started working on—I think it was American Scandal, but it might have been the one series I did for you at American History Tellers, my Wondery editor gave me an editorial guide to writing this long form, immersive storytelling. And it was in the form of a podcast, which you voiced.

But one particular thing stood out to me that I still remember. And that was on it, you expressly said that—we were talking about American History Tellers—you were never part of the story, and you called out Malcolm Gladwell, whose podcast Revisionist History is very successful, for doing exactly that. Talk to me about the genesis of that stance and why you felt it was necessary to sort of put that out there to new and existing writers.

Lindsay Graham

You're correct. The voice in my shows is removed. There's no first-person personal pronouns. I did not walk down to the bagel store and think about the world economy. We did not do anything. None of that appears. And I will be frank: I think that editorial decision was made with my absolute terror in starting a podcast where I have no formal training in history, no formal training in voice acting, no formal training in any of this. I wanted to get me as far away from this thing as possible. But as a result, it becomes this removed narrator. Now, the trick there, then, is how do you still inject that feeling, that parasocial relationship that you do kind of want to enable in these podcasts? So that my listeners are not listening to the dronings on of the airport announcements. That they feel that I am a person, and that these stories have impact on me and them. It's a tightrope walk. I do adopt, very subtly, POVs of the character that we're talking about in the moment. So it's really an emoting experience in the narration, but it's never about me. And that, I really think, was just because I wanted to stick my head in the sand in the very beginning.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Oh, wow. I never once thought that. I just assumed that you just had a very different editorial perspective than—which is—they're both legitimate. They're very different kinds of ways of addressing stories, of taking the reporter's quest or not.

Do you still give out that editorial podcasting guide to writers and producers? And should all executive producers who work with teams do something like this?

Lindsay Graham 

I don't know if Wondery still sends out that recorded version of it. I do know that there are style guides for every single one of my shows. Each one of these documents is different, reflecting obviously the differences in the show. But they are long. They are involved. They are narratives in themselves. And, they try to convey a lot of information clearly and humanely to someone who is new to this thing and who we want to to succeed.

It does no one any good to onboard someone and just shove them in a boat and go. These documents are living documents. They continue to be edited and improved and always sent out to new members of the team.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Let's transition into American History Tellers, because I want to ask you about the first episode of Season 61. It's called “Salem Witch Trials: An Evil Hand.” And it's the first of a multi-part series on the Salem Witch Trials. And the clip that I want to play you…it's probably one of the most tense moments in this whole narrative. There is a minister, his last name is Paris, and he's in charge of the church, the Puritan church in the town of Salem. He's extraordinarily conservative. He's so conservative, in fact, that the church has lost membership. And so he is on the verge of being kicked out.

Clip from American History Tellers

Lindsay Graham: …skip Sunday services altogether. Then Paris only exacerbated tensions, with sermons reflecting on the distinctions between full church members, those who had been elected by God, and other residents. In response to his rigid ways and domineering personality, some villagers began to resent their new minister and organize against him.

Imagine it's October 1691 in Salem village. You're an artisan and a landowner and you've just been elected to the five man committee dedicated to overseeing church matters. You and your fellow committee members have gathered in the village meeting house where church services are held. Sitting at a worn oak table, you discuss the overly favorable contract your predecessors negotiated with Reverend Samuel Paris two years ago.

Elaine Appleton Grant

One of, perhaps, the criteria for choosing topics is whether they resonate with anything going on today. And this one resonated for me with what's going on today. We do seem to be at war with ourselves in some ways.

Lindsay Graham

Well, let me tell you a story that I heard from Ken Burns. And he is asked all the time whether he meant to bring out whatever particular documentary it is he brings out to shine a light on whatever particular thing is going on in America at the time. And he said, no, because it takes me 12,15 years to put together one of these documentaries. How could I know? What is instead happening is that there is always a historical precedent for anything going on, and so much is going on that there's always something to find in the past.

But no, the real trick here, the magic trick of any historian, is any story they're going to tell has pertinence to what's happening to anyone's life right now.

Elaine Appleton Grant 

And I love that about history podcasts, and history in general. I just have to ask: so have you met Ken Burns?

Lindsay Graham I have not, no. Nor have I interviewed him. I would love to.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Well, we're putting it out there. Ken Burns? Lindsay wants to meet you.

But I've got some business questions for you, which normally I do not do on this show. First off, you mentioned that you're going to stop voicing the shows. You released an audio message about that back in April and that you're sort of slowly moving in that direction. There's so much your voice to go around, right?

Lindsay Graham

Well, that's true, but you brought something up and I think you might've been taken in. So that message in April, would it have been on April 1st?

Elaine Appleton Grant

Ah, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. I didn't even look at the date.

Lindsay Graham 

That was in preparation for our most recent April Fool's episode of History Daily in which world-renowned Hollywood actor Ryan Reynolds narrated the show, pretending he was me. He apparently is a fan of the show, he contacted me on Twitter, and I somehow twisted his arm into narrating the April Fool's episode.

Clip from History Daily

Ryan Reynolds: Next on History Daily. March 33rd, 1766. Founding father George Washington is inducted into the Freemasons and learns a terrible truth about bricklaying. From Noiser and Airship, this is History Daily, hosted, edited, and executive produced by me, Lindsay Graham. Audio editing by me, Lindsay Graham. Sound design by me, Lindsay Graham. Music by me, Lindsay Graham. Decorative ice sculptures by me, Lindsay Graham. Catering by me, Lindsay Graham. Lindsay Graham's hair, makeup, and sequined lavender body stockings by me, Lindsay Graham.

Lindsay Graham

We had a ball doing it.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Oh, how fun. How fun. But you are starting to bring in other voices.

Lindsay Graham

Yeah, no. I have no—I'm certainly not hanging up my throat. But I am running out of room. You know, narrating is a very physical and emotional experience, and I can't do it eight hours a day. And if there were to be not just four podcasts but 14, then obviously 10 of those would have to be voiced by someone else. If we're looking at growth, then that's the direction it has to go.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Recently you started a history podcast subscription service. It includes History Daily and shows from some other podcasters. I loved the way you announced this on LinkedIn. You said you could have introduced the service a year earlier if it weren't for self doubt and perfectionism. You even said, I am a champion thinker, but an apprentice doer. So tell me more.

Lindsay Graham

Yeah, sure. So this is Into History. And something that I recognized two years ago, that the industry was moving to diversify their revenue streams, and subscription paywall revenue was growing more prominent. And I thought to myself, I should not be oblivious to this. And I had the idea and I kept having the idea. And that's all that ever happened for a year. I just continued to refine the good idea, and making it a gooder idea. But it was never an actual thing. Until I got really sick of myself and I decided to go ahead and do it. I assembled a great team of other history podcasters, and one that I hope will grow, and launched this July to not a lot of fanfare.

It wasn't hard, except that it was once again, one of these things that you have to get over yourself in order to do. It's also not easy. Maintaining this community, maintaining—just the work involved in any sort of organization like this, trying to grow it…But actually getting it off the ground and, and into the world? That was stupid easy, and I should have done it months and months and months prior.

Elaine Appleton Grant

So what was it that turned the corner for you?

Lindsay Graham

You know, probably like every other person listening, I am a human. And I do not understand myself sometimes. You know, you remind me. I have an MBA, and the only reason I applied for grad school was because I learned one of my coworkers did. And I didn't really think that she was MBA material. It was the pettiest reason of all. And so I got into grand school. This was no different. I just got sick of myself. Uh, thankfully it wasn't so petty. I was like, God dang it, Lindsay, just how hard is this?

And you do the simple things like, okay, what's the first step? The first step is this. What's the step out of that? In fact, let's make a list of steps. Oh, hey, look, I'm crossing off the steps. It's kindergarten stuff. And you don't need an MBA that you got for petty reasons to figure this out.

Elaine Appleton Grant 

I love your honesty too, Lindsay, that's great. Is it going well, the subscription service?

Lindsay Graham

Uh, no, it's not. Speaking of honestly. The content is amazing. The people that are contributing are great. I have some tangles that prevented me from properly promoting it on History Daily, for instance. And some other things that I thought would be a lot easier turned out not to be. So that just means that I have to adjust to what the reality is and continue iterating towards the future.

Elaine Appleton Grant

I wish you luck with it.

A couple of lightning round questions. You started out in this without any training, as you mentioned, in voice acting. What's something that you have learned along the way about becoming a voice actor that millions of people want to listen to?

Lindsay Graham

The reason I got into audio at all is for my love of music, and composing and playing and producing other people's music. Voice acting was not on the agenda. But the critical ear is the same. I will listen for my pace and my tone and my pitch, even as it's coming out of my mouth and into the air for the very first time, with a musician's ear. If you play an instrument, you know there's all sorts of adjustments you can make to your posture, your fingering, your breath, even your mindset, that will make the difference in how a certain melody is conveyed. That same approach is brought to a script. And it is very much a dialogue with the script. And your skillset, you know, you're playing jazz the whole time. I hate to hear when I make the wrong choice. Uh, sometimes that's only apparent after the thing's published and, you know, there's nothing you can do. But I don't beat myself up. There's a lesson there. I care for it. I care for it. I care that this melody was not sung properly this one time. So next time, I'm going to sing a little better.

Elaine Appleton Grant

How has hosting these shows changed you in a way that you did not expect?

Lindsay Graham

In any measure, my career now is the most successful I've ever been in my lifetime. I am the most fulfilled. I am the most personally happy. I am the most commercially successful. I have more on every scale and every metric now than ever before. That includes confidence, or it breeds confidence. I don't know how connected they really are, you know, what the causality is. That confidence is amazing. I love it. The reason I can be honest with you is because of that confidence. The reason I can tell you Into History is not growing the way it should be and here are the ways I'm going to try and fix it, and not be bothered by that, not be ashamed—is because of that confidence. It is transformative. It kind of stinks that you have to find success to find the confidence to then get more success. But there are people that have it innately. I was not one of them. I really needed to scratch my way through life. So how has my career hosting changed my life? It's given me confidence. And that changes the way—how I approach a script. How I think about sound design, how I approach a contract, how I speak to peers or bosses or lawyers or accountants. It changes everything.

Elaine Appleton Grant

Who would be your dream guest for my show, Sound Judgment?

Lindsay Graham

There are a few people who are doing really well kind of what I want to do. So Guy Raz is one. And he has been doing some very interesting things in terms of building his brand and expanding. He's now into children's content, right? He's, well beyond the public radio confines that he started at. I mean, his signature show, How I Built This, comes from his interest in how he's building it, right? So I think he's a great host, a good interviewer, someone who's aware of content. But like me, is also very interested on the business side and can be fulfilled there as well. I would love to sit down with him and trade notes. 

Elaine Appleton Grant

I sent a note to his management agency. Never heard a word back, but I'm gonna try again.

Lindsay Graham

All right. Well, I'll get Ken Burns and you get Guy Raz and everyone will be happy.

Elaine Appleton Grant

That would be phenomenal. Thank you. That was a great interview. I really enjoyed it, Lindsay.

Lindsay Graham

Yeah, it was a fun conversation. Thank you.

Elaine Appleton Grant

At the end of every episode, I give you some takeaways. Here are today's. For more, subscribe to our Substack newsletter, also called Sound Judgment.

1. Wondery employs a format you might call controversial. They call it “immersive storytelling.” It relies on a single narrator—usually Lindsay—to voice all of the characters in an episode, or most of them. It also employs fictionalized scenes, based on historical facts. As Lindsay says, some people hate this. “I can’t do anything about it,” he says, “cause that’s the show.” He also says, “I can’t help those people who want it to be different than it is.” And that’s the lesson: Choose what your show IS and lean into it. YOUR people will love it. If you do your job well, some people may, in fact, hate it. That’s OK. It’s not for them.
2. When they conduct historical research, Lindsay and his writers aren’t just focusing on the facts. They’re also on a treasure hunt to learn how the characters felt, and how people in their lives felt about them. Those emotions make the historical world feel real, increase the stakes, and keep listeners glued to their headphones. This isn’t your father’s history class.
3. Here’s a tip for anyone leading a team: Create editorial guidelines and share them with everyone—writers, producers, sound designers, and engineers. Guidelines are great for onboarding newcomers. They also help make sure everyone’s on the same page. Originally, Lindsay made a narrative podcast out of the American History Tellers guidelines; that’s a memorable way to get this information across. Whatever you do, remember that editorial guidelines are living documents—keep them up to date. 
4. Lindsay calls himself a champion thinker, but an apprentice do-er. He admits that self-doubt and perfectionism get in his way, as they did with his long-delayed introduction of the subscription service Into History. Once he stopped overthinking and started just taking one step after another, introducing this new product turned out to be easier than he thought. Sure, there are ongoing challenges—but taking action brings confidence, and confidence, as Lindsay says, breeds more confidence.
   
   

That’s all for today. 

Thanks to my guest, Lindsay Graham. There are links to his shows, and all of the resources we mention, in our show notes—just go to sound judgment podcast dot com. If you liked this episode, you’ll also love my hilarious and instructive conversation with public speaker and marketing expert Jay Baer about his show, Standing Ovation, in Season 1. 

Do you want to keep improving as a storyteller and an influential communicator? Subscribe to our free newsletter, Sound Judgment, on Substack. 

Sound Judgment is a production of Podcast Allies. If you’ve been looking for help formulating a smart, fresh editorial strategy for your show, get in touch at the email in our show notes at sound judgment podcast dot com. We’d love to work with you. 

Sound Judgment is produced by me, Elaine Appleton Grant. Audrey Nelson is our production assistant. Engineering by Kevin Kline. And podcast management by Tina Bassir. Next in this season about bravery—we dive into the high-stakes world of medicine with the wondrous Emily Silverman of The Nocturnists! I’ll see you soon.