Episode 94 is knee-deep in Thanksgiving festivities.
The place where the Pilgrims ultimately settled, Plymouth, Massachusetts, is featured in this episode's Road Trip. It is chock full of history like Plymouth Rock and the Mayflower II. There is much more to see though, from lesser-known sites, beautiful beaches, quaint shops, and a fun walkable waterfront area.
Cape Cod has had its share of popular night spots over the last century. Some still bring back fond memories, while others have sadly not received the recognition they deserve. One such forgotten icon is the Panama Club of Hyannis. Considered by many to be the birthplace of Cape Cod jazz this trendsetter thrilled patrons in the 1940s and 50s.
Michael Jackson's Thriller album is unquestionably one of the most important pieces of music in history. Beyond its awards and tens of millions of copies sold this album changed the culture and the landscape of music. We go way Back In the Day to look at what made this album so groundbreaking and why it still stands the test of time forty years after its debut.
There are so many classic Thanksgiving Day dishes from turkey to mashed potatoes, to stuffing. However, this week's Top 5 will not feature any of those. This countdown will share some of the weirdest recipes from decades past. Put these on your holiday table at your own risk.
There is also a brand new This Week In History and Time Capsule looking at the horrific Jonestown Massacre.
Helpful Links from this Episode(available through Buzzsprout)
Listen to Episode 93 here.
Episode 94 is knee-deep in Thanksgiving festivities.
The place where the Pilgrims ultimately settled, Plymouth, Massachusetts, is featured in this episode's Road Trip. It is chock full of history like Plymouth Rock and the Mayflower II. There is much more to see though, from lesser-known sites, beautiful beaches, quaint shops, and a fun walkable waterfront area.
Cape Cod has had its share of popular night spots over the last century. Some still bring back fond memories, while others have sadly not received the recognition they deserve. One such forgotten icon is the Panama Club of Hyannis. Considered by many to be the birthplace of Cape Cod jazz this trendsetter thrilled patrons in the 1940s and 50s.
Michael Jackson's Thriller album is unquestionably one of the most important pieces of music in history. Beyond its awards and tens of millions of copies sold this album changed the culture and the landscape of music. We go way Back In the Day to look at what made this album so groundbreaking and why it still stands the test of time forty years after its debut.
There are so many classic Thanksgiving Day dishes from turkey to mashed potatoes, to stuffing. However, this week's Top 5 will not feature any of those. This countdown will share some of the weirdest recipes from decades past. Put these on your holiday table at your own risk.
There is also a brand new This Week In History and Time Capsule looking at the horrific Jonestown Massacre.
Helpful Links from this Episode(available through Buzzsprout)
Listen to Episode 93 here.
Intro
Hello World, and welcome to the In My Footsteps podcast. I am Christopher Setterlund. Coming to you from the vacation destination known as Cape Cod, Massachusetts, and this is episode 94. It's going to be a very Thanksgiving-centric Show. This week, we're going to take a road trip to where the Pilgrims eventually settled the town of Plymouth, Massachusetts, there's going to be a brand new top five that are the top five weird old Thanksgiving dishes that I hope you don't make for your family. We're gonna look back at a forgotten icon of Cape Cod nightlife, the Panama Club of Hyannis. We're gonna go way, way back in the day, and look back at Michael Jackson's landmark Thriller album 40 years after it came out. And as always, there'll be a brand new this week in history and Time Capsule all coming up right now on episode 94 of the In My Footsteps podcast. So yes, it's a very Thanksgiving-centric show. This will be the last episode of the month, there will not be a new podcast next week as that is Thanksgiving Day. But hopefully, that gives you time to catch up on all the other episodes 94 of them including this one. And I'm sure I'll say it again. But I hope that all of you have a happy, fun, safe, and filled with food Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is a weird holiday because I remember when I was 11 years old, maybe we had a big snowstorm on Thanksgiving, and I had to go out and help push cars in the snow to help get them in and out of the driveway at my aunt's house. But then again, there have been other days when it's been in the mid to upper 60s and sunny and you go for a walk and it's like it's summer so you never know what you're gonna get. A few days from when this podcast goes live. I'm going to be heading out into the dunes with producer Frank Duran and Steven the medium as we go to the drop site where the lady of the dunes, Ruth Marie Terry was found in July 1974. This is kind of our closure from everything with the documentary and with the book. I plan to do an audio interview for the podcast with Frank and Steven on the way out there. And to shoot some sort of video podcast interview while we're at the drop site that will go up on YouTube in the coming weeks. There's been a lot going on as far as the Lady of the Dunes book goes. I've set kind of a soft deadline as far as traditional publishers and agents go because I firmly believe we need to strike while the iron is hot when it comes to this true crime book. What I might end up doing is starting a crowdfunding like Kickstarter or something to pay for the actual physical printing of a short run of books. So I might start gauging interest as far as the book goes, who would buy copies, because I really believe this book is the next big True Crime hit and I'm willing to put my money where my mouth is to get it published. Moving on from the Lady of the Dunes, I wanted to, of course, thank all of you for tuning into the podcast. I've been routinely setting highs for downloads daily, weekly monthly for the podcast over the last several months. And that's exciting because now I'm well over two years into doing this. That means that I'm starting to gain an audience. And the best way to keep that going is to share the podcast word of mouth. If you want to donate you can buy me a coffee go to buy me a coffee.com Find the In My Footsteps podcast and search for Cape Cod and New England. Anything I get for donations goes towards advertising the podcast. So it's you know, reinvesting in the show. I still don't know what I'm going to do for episode 100. I'm leaning towards a cheesy clip show where I've got the bits and pieces of my favorite segments of the most popular episodes because it might be a good way to kind of tease people and get them to listen to more episodes with clips. But if you've got better ideas, definitely shoot me a message and let me know. That's where I'm leaning right now. But this is not a clip show. This is a brand new episode of the podcast. We're going to start it off right now by looking back at one of the Forgotten icons of Cape Cod nightlife, the Panama Club of Hyannis, and we're going to look at it right now on episode 94 of the In My Footsteps podcast. As nightspots on Cape Cod go, there are a few which can rival the history or the legendary status that Panama club earned and it's time. In the days before the Cape Cod melody tent or even the West End rotary in Hyannis existed. The Panama Club was drawing in the masses in huge numbers to an area which at the time was not yet an epicenter for after dark fun. The Panama club put Hyannis and jazz music on the map on Cape Cod and in southeastern New England.
Panama Club of Hyannis
The story of the Panama club began shortly before World War Two landed on America's front step. It was a time shortly after the worst of the Great Depression had subsided. In those days, there were very few places for young people to get together and have a good time. That changed with the arrival of Antonio Caggiano from Boston in 1937. In 1941, he along with his son Raynald, would open the Panama club near the end of Main Street in Hyannis, decorated in red and white velvet. This would usher in a new era of nightlife on Cape Cod. It was the first swinging jazz club, though the father and son owners would also operate other businesses like Rennies lounge in Hyannis and Rico's restaurant in Centerville. The club on Main Street would forever etched their names in Cape Cod history. Their Panama club would be a hotbed for the use of Cape Cod, guys and girls dressed to the nines looking to meet up couples and those who had never laid eyes on each other like would pack together on the small dance floor and get their feet moving to lively swing music. Not very long after bursting onto the scene, the Panama club became an escape for locals after news hit of the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Those who were in the club learned of the news inside some rushed home while others stayed in shock. Despite Pearl Harbor, Panama club did not close and it was packed again the next day, with some even bringing their own beer with them. The events of Pearl Harbor and the Panama club would become the subject of a popular fictionalized play written by Larry Marsland of Chatham in 2006. The Panama club also became the jumping off point for Cape Cod's first lady of jazz Marie Marcus, who first graced their stage in 1943 when she was still billed under her maiden name of Marie Doherty. She teamed up with Alma gates white to form the piano maniacs, playing the Panama club as well as the Hakuna Mehsud club in Falmouth. While performing at the Panama club. Marie would meet her future husband trumpeter Bill Marcus. The bar at the club was always packed with beer being the drink of choice, selling for 75 cents, while shots of whiskey cost 60 cents. For those who did not wish to travel to the busy club, there was another way to listen to the live music being performed there. This was thanks to the occasional live radio broadcasts being transmitted from the Panama club. However, there were issues with these radio broadcasts because the Panama club became so crowded at times that during one show in 1943, legendary WOCB DJ Vern Coleman, who was then only 17, had to set up his equipment and broadcast tonight's live music from underneath a table. Despite those sometimes issues, the radio broadcasts would remain a fixture on Cape Cod throughout the 1940s. As the decade passed, the club became the place to be World War Two did not dampen the business. Everyone from celebrities to soldiers at nearby camp Edwards to the average everyday worker made their way to the end of Main Street Hyannis. Those who worked at the nearby businesses would get off of their shift and walk down to enjoy a drink and a chat. Many local musicians would become well known due to their playing at the Panama club, including pianist Mike Mark coverage, and Marian Cohoon, who would teach piano at the Cape Cod Conservatory of Music for three decades. The joint will be jumping until after midnight, after which people would pour out of the Panama clubs several exits. Some would wander down the byway alley winding behind the club, while others would simply congregate in the streets. The crowds were so large that during its heyday, it was said to look like a mini Time Square outside after the Panama club would gain perhaps its most famous regular in the form of summer resident and future President of the United States John F. Kennedy. The course of history was changed inside the walls of the Panama club in September 1944. It was shortly He after the Great Atlantic hurricane had hit the cape that Kennedy and two female friends paid a visit to the Panama club, as they not only enjoyed it, but it was also one of the first places to reopen after the storm. It was during a break between dancing where Kennedy first mentioned his desire to become a politician, specifically a potential run for governor despite only being 27 years old at the time. In the 1950s. The Panama club would see some changes in June 1953 That Caggiano would sell the establishment to former Oxbridge in owner John Cornelia. There would also be new competition in the form of the Catalina Club, which opened at 654 Main Street. The Panama club continued its run for a few more years before closing in the late 1950s. The building itself was torn down in 1972. And as of today, there's a little strip mall there that contains a Dunkin Donuts. Today, there's nothing left of the Panama club only memories and a scant few images remain of how Cape Cod's original swinging jazz club changed nightlife on Cape Cod. Luckily, there is Larry muslins play that brought some light back to the Panama club. But like I said, at the top of the podcast, this is one of the Forgotten icons of Cape Cod nightlife. I have found very few in the way of photos of this building when it was open. But you can only imagine how fun it must have been to be in that swinging jazz club in the 1940s with future icons of local music or the nights that you couldn't get there and you just turn on the radio and you could hear the music playing. It was definitely a different time and place that we will probably never see again.
Visiting Plymouth for Thanksgiving
For those that are not from Cape Cod or New England, if someone asks you about the pilgrims, you're naturally going to say that they landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620. Now we all know after last week's podcast I told you the places where the Pilgrims walked on Cape Cod, hopefully you've gone to see them. But this week, we're taking a road trip to where they eventually settled in the town of Plymouth, Massachusetts. Back in episode 88, I did a road trip to New England's largest town area-wise Pittsburgh, New Hampshire. In that episode, I mentioned to you that the second largest town in New England, area-wise was Plymouth, Massachusetts. It's 134 square miles. Only when driving on Route three going through Plymouth, do you realize how big it is where there are, I think five or six exits seven exits that it takes to get through Plymouth. It's got a whole bunch of smaller villages like Cedarville, Manomet, and Ellisville. As of 2021, it has a population of 62,131. There are miles of beaches and State Parks from the smaller Ellisville Harbor state park at 1861 State Road to the much larger mile standard state forest which is in Plymouth and Carver, but it's more than 12,000 acres, and it's the largest open space in all of southeastern Massachusetts, and Plymouth has miles of beaches. Perhaps Plymouth's Long Beach is the most well-known or the most populated. It's at 1 Ryder Way, and is known for the long sandy spit of beach that reaches out well over two and a half miles out into the water. Obviously, though well beyond state forests and hiking and beaches and swimming. Plymouth is known for its history and its deep roots in the beginning of the New England settlement and English settlements in America in general. My biggest suggestion to you is if you've never been to Plymouth, which I mean, really, but I suppose there's a few of you that don't live around here that have never been there. If you're going for the first time, Park on Water Street and just walk around. There is pilgrim Memorial State Park, which is on Water Street and it contains a lot of these historic sites like Plymouth Rock, which it seems like always has people there taking pictures. It is purported to be the site where the Pilgrims landed. The rock is engraved with 1620 on it to designate when the Pilgrims landed there. There's this beautiful monument around it and the rock is down below a few feet on the shoreline. And even if it's not where the Pilgrims landed, it is still an amazingly important area in turn of what it means to American history. Only a few steps away from Plymouth Rock is the Mayflower which is a replica of the Mayflower that the Pilgrims came over on. This reproduction was constructed in Devon, England in 1955-56, and sailed across to Plymouth. There are tickets you can buy to take tours of the ship. But even if you don't want to go on it, there's plenty of opportunity for amazing photos of the ship against the backdrop of Plymouth harbor. One of the coolest things about the Mayflower too, is I think it's annually. It is sailed from Plymouth through the Cape Cod canal, where it heads to the Mystic Seaport in Connecticut, typically for just some touch up repairs usually. But people line along the canal to get pictures of the Mayflower going through Plymouth Rock in the Mayflower. Those are the two biggest attractions on Water Street, but there's so much more. There's Brewster Gardens, which is a small park that runs around town Brook, which flows west to the Plymouth grist mill. It's at six spring lane, and also plimouth.org and that's Plimoth you can go to that site to get all the information you need about the historic sites in downtown Plymouth. The mill is a reconstruction of the original 1636 grist mill built by the pilgrims. And you can go in for tours, they still do the fresh ground corn meal so you can take that stuff home. It's also fun just a walk around Brewster gardens as usually tons of ducks swimming along town Brook at 33 sandwich Street is the Jabez Holland house, which is the only pilgrim house left in Plymouth. It was built in 1667 and became a museum in 1912. And inside it looks like what you would expect a 17th century home to look like. With all of these historic sites and monuments. Located right along Water Street, you'd be forgiven to not know that one of the best sites to visit in Plymouth is located a few streets over from Water Street. The National Monument to the forefathers on Allerton Street is just in a regular residential neighborhood. A lot of people wouldn't even know it's there unless you took a wrong turn. And then there it is in this open field and 81-foot tall granite monument built in 1889. It's dedicated to the pilgrims and the reasons why they chose to leave England to come to America. It's a beautiful and unexpected monument just in this residential neighborhood. And like I said, there's so much to see in Plymouth as far as history and natural beauty you can just walk Waterstreet and look at the boats over the harbor. And I've said there's a lot of walking you need to do. So what you'll need to do is refuel if you've been walking around Plymouth and in my opinion, there's no better place to go than the East Bay grill. That's at 173 Waterstreet or East Bay grill.com. They've got two locations one right there on the Plymouth waterfront and one at the pine Hills Golf club a little more south in Plymouth. It's classic New England dining. Pretty much casual, not fine dining, but great food a great menu great selections. And the view can't be beat. Especially Fourth of July with the fireworks going off and you're sitting there enjoying dinner watching the fireworks. In the summer. There's live music, outdoor dining, and sure they might be packed during the summer. So luckily there are other places you can go to eat in Plymouth, but start with the East Bay grill and if they're busy go somewhere else. Plymouth is also a place where you might want to spend more than one day. So when looking for a spot to spend the night you can't go wrong with the hotel 1620 at Plymouth harbor. That's at 180 Water Street so literally a stone's throw from the East Bay grill. It's another reason why Plymouth is such a great walkable town. Granted, it's 134 square miles but there are areas where everything is kind of congregated that you don't even need a car. Hotel 1620 is at Hotel 1620 plymouth.com They're very affordable in the offseason they do weddings, they have date night packages, and although it's upscale and modern, it's very child friendly. So check them out eat at East Bay grill go stay at Hotel 1620 You only have to walk a couple 100 feet. One of my favorite places and memories of Plymouth is Plimouth Plantation, now known as the Plimouth Patuxent Museum. It's at 137 Warren Avenue. And it's a recreation of one of the original Plymouth villages with people that work there that are in character like they're from the mid 17th century. It's a lot of fun you go, it's like going back in time without having a time machine. And you learn a lot about what life was like here. 400 years ago, we went there for a field trip in fourth grade. So it's very kid-friendly. And it's another reason why you need to spend more than one day in Plymouth because you're not going to get to see all this stuff. And the funny thing is, there's still a lot that I haven't mentioned. But like I always say, that's the best part of doing road trips is finding your own way. Plymouth itself is only 40 miles south of Boston and 45 miles east of Providence, it's not far. And if you go this time of year, it's naturally going to be more crowded because it's Thanksgiving. And people are thinking about the pilgrims and landing at Plymouth and the first Thanksgiving and all of that. But it really helps capture the spirit of early days colonial America. But then you take a walk, and then you're in the modern amenities on Water Street, it's such a popular summer destination. You could be at Plymouth Rock and then walk down the street. And there's these beautiful restaurants and hotels that look nothing like what the pilgrims would have seen. Like I said earlier, visit plymouth.org. I'll put a link in the description of the podcast that will give you all you need to know about the historic sites to check out. There is also Plymouth chamber.org, which is the Chamber of Commerce, obviously for Plymouth. They have a more wide scope of the town, going past the pilgrims and the history of the pilgrims there. But more importantly, just go and just find a place to park if you can on Water Street and just walk and enjoy it. There are so many monuments there that you're going to miss all these little nooks and crannies that are filled with history. So it's worth the drive from wherever you gotta go to get there. And I'll be back in the next episode of the podcast with a brand new road trip featuring another of the beautiful historic cities and towns in the six New England states and beyond.
This Week In History
This week in history, we are going back 44 years ago to November 18, 1978. And the horrific mass suicide of the People's Temple cult also known as Jonestown. The People's temple agricultural project, better known as Jonestown, after its leader Jim Jones, was a remote settlement in the country of Guyana, created by the California-based People's Temple cult. Jim Jones was a charismatic but paranoid leader who opened his first church in Indianapolis in the mid-1950s. And though he wasn't affiliated really with any particular religion, His Church became popular because it was integrated and not segregated, like a lot of places were in the 1950s. In the 1960s, it became known as the people's temple. Jim Jones and his wife incorporated the church and with about 100 followers settled in the town of Ukiah, California, which was about 150 miles northwest of Sacramento. They were in this small town kind of in the middle of nowhere, thinking that the remoteness of the area would protect them from the potential nuclear holocaust that could be coming. Jim Jones was respected at first and made friends with politicians. A key to his appeal to his followers was his supposed mind reading and faith healing. But behind the scenes, Jones's treatment of his followers was not good. They were regularly beaten, humiliated, and coerced into signing over their property and possessions. In 1977. With allegations mounting and other followers questioning his motivations. Jones moved with several 100 followers to the Jonestown camp in Guyana that he had been building for years. In November 1978, US Congressman Leo Ryan traveled to Guyana to inspect the Jonestown camp, as there were rumors that members of the cult were being held there against their will and being subjected to physical and psychological abuse. Ryan was there on November 17. And when he was ready with his delegation to leave, several members of the Jonestown cult were trying to get on the truck to escape with him. All their cult members attacked Ryan and the delegation but they were able to escape unhurt at that time. When they got to the airstrip to get ready to leave Guyana, more of the cult members attacked. Five people, including Congressman Ryan and three members of the press, were shot and killed while 11 more were wounded. In the wake of this horrible event, Jim Jones ordered his followers to commit a mass suicide in which a fruit drink often purported to be Kool-Aid was laced with cyanide sedatives and other tranquilizers. It was given to babies, children adults. In total, 909 people died at Jonestown, with Jim Jones dying of a gunshot wound. It was an unbelievably tragic event and shows the dangers of cult and cult worship of false gods like Jim Jones. And that dark day of the Jonestown Massacre happened 44 years ago this week in history. Now let's change the pace and get things a little brighter as we go back in time for a brand new time capsule. We will stick to the same day as the Jonestown Massacre November 18, 1978. Let's bring a little levity to the time capsule and see what was going on in pop culture. The number one song was MacArthur Park by Donna Summer. This was from her album I remember yesterday, Donna Summer was the queen of disco music. This was a cover song written by Jimmy Webb and first recorded by Irish singer Richard Harris in 1968. It was number one for Donna Summer for three weeks and earned her her first Grammy nomination. The number one movie was magic. This was a psychological horror movie starring Anthony Hopkins and Margaret and Burgess Meredith. It's about a failed magician who finds fame as a ventriloquist. But his dummy is evil and homicidal. It's very similar to a Twilight Zone episode. It's very critically acclaimed 86% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, and made nearly $24 million on a budget of about 7 million. The number one TV show was Laverne and Shirley. The show was a spin-off from Happy Days that ran for eight seasons from 1976 to 1983, and a total of 178 episodes. It starred Penny Marshall and Cindy Williams as the titular Laverne and Shirley, who worked as bottle cappers at Schatz brewery in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the late 1950s. And if you were around back then November 18, 1978, and it was a hot day or you were thirsty, looking for something cool to drink. You're in luck, you could find some Kool-Aid, not laced with cyanide and tranquilizers. At the finest grocery stores, also known as first national. You could get yourself a 33-ounce can in one of six delicious flavors grape, strawberry, orange, lemon, lime, raspberry, and fruit punch for only $2.19. And maybe if you're lucky, you could yell Hey, Kool-Aid and the Kool-Aid Man comes busting through your walls. So maybe you're better off yelling that when you're outside. But that'll wrap up this week in history and time capsule. Now it's time for a brand new top five as we jump back into the Thanksgiving theme. These are the top five weird old Thanksgiving dishes that I found in my research. Hopefully, you won't make any of these but who knows it might spark your interest.
Top 5: Weird Old Thanksgiving Recipes
Man, you want to talk about opening up Pandora's Box? Little did I know when I started looking up old Thanksgiving recipes that I would find so many weird things. I'll be honest, I was just curious about what people used to make for Thanksgiving 100 years ago. And I started finding all this stuff. Some of it's just weird. Some of it's weird and gross. And some of it I'm mildly curious about what it would taste like. And what I'm going to do now is share them with you. As with all of these top fives, it's in no particular order. It's all subjective. And of course, as always, honorable mentions to kind of Get your mind going and whet your appetite for what's to come. With these honorable mentions. I'm not going to do too much describing of them. So if you want to look them up and make them yourself, you're going to have to do that on your own. Are you ready? Hopefully, you're not listening on an empty stomach. Honorable Mentions for weird old Thanksgiving dishes include ambrosia mashed parsnips and root veg, mincemeat pie, and frog I salad. So just to leave you not in suspense frogeye salad has nothing to do with frogs. Just so you know. Did you recognize any of those? We'll get ready here we go for the actual top five. I should put a disclaimer with some of these and how gross they are. Number one is hot. Dr. Pepper. Yes, you heard that right, the soda. This is fairly basic and straightforward. You take the Dr. Pepper soda, put it in whatever kind of glass you have heated either on the stove or microwave, and pour it over slices of lemon. This was popular in the 1960s there are ads for it. I don't know where the idea came from to heat soda and pour it over lemons. But reading some reviews people said it had a bad chemical aftertaste. These are the ones that made it recently. But who knows maybe a different hot soda over lemon would taste better but I'm not going to try. Number two is Mayo jello cranberry sauce candles. This was the first one that I saw that was so weird. In the old photos. They legit look like candles with a wick and fire. The recipe says you mix apples with cranberry sauce, mayonnaise, a little lemon juice and salt and then a package of gelatin jello. And you make them into these candles. If you go look them up and look at the photos. It's terrifying. It looks like at best, it's spam. At worst. It's like human body parts. From the looks of the ads I saw this seems to have been popular in the 50s and 60s as well. But my God who came up with the idea to mix mayo and jello, make candles out of it. Number three is frozen jellied Turkey vegetable salad, that's a mouthful, and you don't want a mouthful of it. This is kind of what you think it is where you take your leftover turkey, kind of shred it, mix it with vegetables. I don't know if you add in gravy or mayonnaise. And then you mix it with gelatin and either freeze it or refrigerate it and then cut it up into squares. Because everybody knows that the best flavor of jello is Turkey and mayo or turkey and gravy. This again in ads I've seen looks like something out of the 60s. I don't know what in the world. They were thinking about Thanksgiving. Maybe they didn't want families coming over to their house. So they made up the most disgusting ideas for recipes in the hope that people wouldn't come back. Number four is cranberry fish souffle salad. Does that sound any more appetizing than the others? The joke here is there's no fish. In one of the ads I saw they made it shaped into a fish. But again, it's gelatin. It's cranberry sauce. It's mayo. This just doesn't look appealing to me. As I'm just not a big fan of mayo, mixing with lemon and cranberry and salt. There was an obsession with putting mayo and everything back in the 60s and 70s with the Thanksgiving ads and recipes I've seen. And I remember not being a fan of my Nana's green bean casserole. I'd eat 500 pounds of green bean casserole rather than any of these things on this countdown. But finally, we come to number five on the top five weird old Thanksgiving dishes. This is tomato soup cake. This recipe was started by Campbell's soup in the 1920s I guess looking for other ways to use their classic tomato soup. But no matter how sweet you make the rest of the filling, adding tomato soup to a cake is not good. Basically, the idea came from finding a way to make your rations last longer during the Depression and World War Two. But the recipe is everything you would expect in a cake. And then tomato soup. So I don't know. You can find recipes for it's still online. Good luck to you if you decide to try to make it. But yeah, that's five pretty rough recipes right there. Have you heard of any of these or have you made any of these on the top five? Did you drink hot Dr Pepper? Try those Mayo gelatin cranberry sauce candles? Have a piece of that jelly Turkey vegetable salad whether it was frozen or just refrigerated? Did you take a bite of that cranberry souffle salad? Or did you have a nice dessert with a slice of tomato soup cake? I can tell you I've had none and I'm looking forward to a normal Thanksgiving at least normal in my eyes. And I'll be back in the next episode with a brand new top five that hopefully will not make any of you sick with the disgusting recipes, it'll be way more safe to listen to.
Michael Jackson's Thriller At 40
Michael Jackson is one of the most polarizing musical artists in the history of music. His weird personal life became much harder to ignore as the quality of the music started to dip in the mid-90s. And that, coupled with his changing appearance, made it so that you didn't focus as much on the music he put out and more just on the weird choices and things he was doing. But for those of my generation, we can remember a time when Michael Jackson was the biggest star on the planet in anything. His music was must listen to his videos on MTV were must see, and this week we're going to go way back in the day to kind of when it all started, and the 40th anniversary of the release of Michael Jackson's Thriller album. The album was officially released on November 30, 1982. So almost two weeks from now but there's no podcast next week. I was five years old, I got the vinyl LP for Christmas that year. Before Thriller Michael Jackson had been in music for well over a decade, especially with the Jackson Five with his brothers thriller was the sixth studio album by Michael Jackson solo. He released the disco album off the wall in 1979, which was an excellent album, and I was too young to remember off the wall when it came out. But I don't think anybody could have predicted how big thriller would become and how it would just change music. Michael Jackson had said at the time that he wanted to create an album where every single song was just a killer. And interestingly, the first single off of the album The girl is mind with Paul McCartney is probably the weakest song on the album. But still having Paul McCartney on the album with you is a big deal. The album was mostly R&B Although his song Beat It did make it onto the Rock Charts. That's right, Michael Jackson had a rock hit song. Even though the girl is mine did make it into the top 10. It wasn't until the next single Billie Jean, where Michael Jackson really took off. The song is my favorite Michael Jackson song ever but the video is really what put Thriller into a different stratosphere. The video where he's walking down that sidewalk and every step he takes everywhere lights up the ground underneath him. Interestingly, or sadly, until Billy Gene came out in the video became so undeniable, African American artists were having trouble getting their music played on MTV. So Billy Gene And Michael Jackson kind of broke down some barriers because the video was so important. Thriller became Michael Jackson's first ever number-one album, getting to number one on February 26, 1983, and spending 37 non-consecutive weeks there until April 14, 1984. Beat it in Billie Jean both went to number one and the performance of Billie Jean on the Motown 25 special which is where he debuted the moonwalk dance move, shot Thriller beyond anything you could have imagined. Where at its peak, it was selling more than a million copies a week. I can still remember watching Motown 25 And just being amazed at what he was doing. But it seemed like it never ended. 1983 was just all Michael Jackson. He released seven total singles out of the nine songs on thriller with six of them being released in 1983. And all seven being at least in the top 10. The last single released on thriller was the thriller song itself. And for those of my generation or you know a few years younger or older, you remember the Thriller video. It was this 10-12 minute long mini-movie directed by John Landis where Michael Jackson turns into a werewolf and then He's a zombie and he's doing the dance with all the other zombies. It was played on MTV seemingly every hour when it first came out. I can remember going to the video store and renting the making of Thriller. Now think about that in today's world, going to well maybe not rent a video but watching something about the making of a music video, spending your money to watch that. But I was a huge Michael Jackson fan. I can vividly remember using my Fisher Price record player sticking it in the window and just playing the album for the neighborhood kids and we'd all dance in the front yard. I can still hear want to be starting something 40 years later and a picture in my head. Those days. It's one of those things where you talk about how music can capture a moment and it just seeps into your soul. Maybe not all of the Thriller album but wanna be starting something was one that seeped into my soul by the end of 1983 so a little over a year into its release Thriller had already sold 32 million copies. And Michael Jackson was everywhere, not just on MTV but also meeting with President Reagan going on tour. Having that famous slash infamous Pepsi commercial where his hair caught on fire and thriller is still a big album. It has spent more than 500 nonconsecutive weeks on the Billboard charts. And I think especially around the Halloween season, the album The song popped back into the iTunes charts. I think I had one of the first or original pressings of the album, you know the first run because my mother has told me that it had a different cover inside it was Michael Jackson with a baby tiger. And I think she said it would be valuable if I still had it and it wasn't damaged. But I don't have it because I was five. But I wore that album out I wore that Fisher Price record player out. And Billie Jean is still my favorite Michael Jackson song I remember a few years ago, hearing for the first time the extended mix of that song. And it was like hearing it for the first time all over again. It was like I was five or six years old. Today thriller is the second highest-selling album of all time behind only the Eagles' first greatest hits album. It has sold more than 70 million copies worldwide, which shows what an achievement it is for a musician to have a platinum album selling a million copies. And how rare that is for a musician. It doesn't grow on trees, not everyone gets a platinum album. Most people don't get a gold album with 500,000 sales. And then think about Thriller with more than 70 times platinum. And Michael Jackson rode the wave of thriller for several years because his follow-up album bad didn't come out until 1987. So it was nearly five years. And bad is actually not bad. But when you compare it to Thriller, it's nothing even close. And I think that's where things started to go downhill for Michael Jackson because he made a perfect album. And he was always chasing that trying to either match or top what he did with thriller and it was impossible. And he made so much money off of thriller and then off of all his endorsements and tours, that he was able to kind of indulge all his fantasies and make Neverland that ranch house that he had. And then it led to all the weird stories and rumors buying the elephant man's bones having his own pet chimp. And as the album sales went down after bad there was dangerous. Then there were the accusations of child molestation. In the 90s, it became less important about the music he made and more about just the freak show kind of life that he was living. So for a child of the 80s, It's weird. It was kind of a two-sided coin where on one hand, I felt bad because Michael Jackson was such a huge part of my childhood and thriller was so important to my formative years. But then, on the other hand, you couldn't look away from just all the weirdness that surrounded him. And eventually, you knew it wasn't just the media making it up. Michael Jackson's Thriller album became more culturally significant than any other piece of music outside of maybe the Beatles, maybe Elvis, as far as culturally changing genre defining that album helped make and legitimize MTV and it's now 40 years old. So if you haven't listened to thriller before, which I mean, you've probably heard at least one song, go and check it out. If you haven't listened to it for a while, put it on and remember being younger when it first came out, I may not have my Fisher Price record player anymore, and I might not have a copy of Thriller on vinyl. But I can pull up all the songs on my iTunes playlist and give thriller a play 40 years after it first came out, and get all the good feels from childhood all wrapped up in one single album.
Closing
That'll do it. That'll wrap up episode 94 of the in my footsteps podcast. Thank you to all of you for tuning in, not just this week, but every week, whether you've heard every episode or this is your first one. Thank you so much, because you're the reason why I keep doing this. Because each week more and more of you come in tune in. I am so glad you enjoy my New England and Cape Cod travel in history, my 80s nostalgia, some fun lifestyle topics some fun self-deprecating humor, as I tell stories from life that are funnier than any story I could make up. As I've said before, we may not all come from the same background or be the same age. So my stories may be far different from yours, but you can relate to the vibe, the feeling from a similar time in your own life. For example, you may not have had a fisher price record player and played thriller and dance in your front yard in the 80s. But there is some music from when you were the same age that made you feel the same way. So in that way, we're connected all of us. And that's what makes this podcast special, in my opinion, is I'm basically sharing all my favorite things in my own life. And you all are responding by coming along on the ride. And I really appreciate it. I say it all the time. But it's true. And if you want more of me, find me all over social media, Twitter, Instagram, my YouTube page, the In My Footsteps podcast blog, visit my website, Christopher setterlund.com. It's got links to all of my six books so far, it'll have a link to the seventh book when it comes out in the spring. I want to take a moment to wish a very happy birthday to my sister Kate. I'm the oldest of five she is second in line. Hopefully, I'll get to see you hang out and have some laughs either way, I hope it's just the best birthday ever. Let me just take a moment to gush about my sister. She is all about perseverance, hard work, and desire. I'll start by saying she has lost more than 200 pounds. That is not an exaggeration. That's through hard work and a desire to better herself. Because she's had it tough at times. I won't get into details. But she's fought through everything that's been handed to her and continued to fight. She set an example for me. She set an example for her three kids who have turned out to be incredible human beings and three of my favorite people on Earth. And even when there are bumps in the road, she knows that it's only temporary and keeps moving forward. These are qualities that all of us as humans should have on our journeys through life. To know that even on the worst days, if you keep pushing, you keep fighting you will get to where you want to be. I try to live that way. And my sister Kate has kind of shown me how to do that. And she's done it a lot of the time on her own. She's got her family that has her back but she ultimately has to do it on her own everything in life. All she has is from her two hands. So I'll stop gushing and wish you a happy birthday and just tell you that I love you and I'm so proud of who you are and I'm so excited to see where you go. The holiday season is coming up. What better gifts to get for those you love than handmade handcrafted gifts from Cape Cod from a 13th-generation Cape Codder. I'm a 12th Kaleigh marks is 13th. Check out all she has at Kiwis Kustoms both spelled with K's at etsy.com Kaleigh works so hard to perfect her craft. It takes talent to do what she does with crocheting with creating jewelry. She's got balaclavas, dog and cat sweaters fairy hats, jewelry that she made, like I said, and she takes requests. If you go to her page on Etsy and you see something that looks kind of like something you might want, send her a message and explain what it is you're looking for. She will give it her best and give you something that you can proudly share and proudly give as a gift for the holiday season. The link is in the description of the podcast like I said it costs nothing to look go to Kiwis customs@etsy.com. You will be glad you did. Like I said there's no new podcast episode next week. Since it's Thanksgiving and we'll all be celebrating. But if you can't get enough of the podcast remember, there are 94 Total episodes, and you can catch up on some you've missed. I am starting now to share full audio of the first episodes on YouTube. So it's just another way to experience the podcast. They're easy to find, just look for the in my footsteps podcast, there's only me. In two weeks, I'll be back. As we start December, I'll make sure to do the road trip to Patuxent Rhode Island that I put off when the lady of the dunes was identified. We're gonna go back in the day and talk about hair metal music from the 80s into the early 90s, which Nirvana then killed. And there'll be so much more coming up in two weeks on episode 95 of the in my footsteps podcast. And I want to wish all of you a very happy Thanksgiving. I hope you all get the time to spend with those that matter the most to you. This is my favorite time of year. And I'm so glad I get to spend it with the family that I have. But it also makes me miss my childhood when all of the family was still around. So never take a holiday never take a thanksgiving for granted. Because we all get older and there'll be a time that you'll look back no matter what your age is now and you'll look back and reminisce about the old days like I do. So happy thanksgiving. Enjoy the rest of November. I will see you in December. Thank you for making me part of your day and part of your week. This has been the in my footsteps podcast. I have been Christopher Setterlund and I will talk to you all again soon.