Episodes

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Resting peacefully in graves across the United Kingdom are some of the 20th century's best mystery writers who set the standard for the detective stories we know and love today. Get ready for a whodunit of an episode! We're "investigating" the fascinating story of the 94 year old "Detection Club", formed by a group of renowned detective fiction authors including Agatha Christie, Anthony Berkeley ...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. What if you knew the exact date of your own death? For Samuel P. Golden, a series of prophetic dreams foretold his passing...or so he believed! Join Jennie and Dianne as they uncover the Ordinary Extraordinary life and death of Samuel P. Golden, a charismatic man whose obituary described him as one who "dressed nicely and was a fine specimen of physical manhood." His short life on earth was anyth...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Join Jennie on this week's Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery podcast as she explores the incredible story of William R. Harland, whose cremains were discovered 85 years after his death in an Oregon hospital's 'Room of Forgotten Souls.' Learn how Life Forest Whistle Ridge, a conservation cemetery in Maine, provided Harland's final resting place among the trees. Chelsea Eaton and Michelle Melaragno s...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Step into the enchanting world of Italian cemeteries with Jennie, Dianne, and special guest Tui Snider who shares her adventures as a tour guide in Italy's iconic Monumental Cemeteries, visiting Milan, Genoa, Bologna, and Florence. From 19th-century widow sculptures to groundbreaking Jewish burial grounds, Tui helps uncover the treasures hidden within Italy's Ordinary Extraordinary cemeteries. "T...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. In the stillness of a dense Newfoundland forest, a hidden cemetery whispers a tale both tragic and triumphant. This week on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery Podcast Jennie and Dianne explore the St. Martin-in-the-Woods Cemetery, a plane crash site turned burial ground in the autumn of 1946. Among the victims were refugees who had endured the Holocaust, seeking a new beginning, only to face an...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Join Jennie and Dianne for the annual "Beyond the Grave" episode of the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery, just in time to put you in a spooky mood for Halloween! Wrap yourself cozy, dim the lights and let Mary Shelley's haunting masterpiece envelop you as you venture into 'Frankenstein's eerie world. The tale begins with an introduction from Percy and Mary Shelley before transporting you to 19th-c...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Beyond the ornate 19th century headstones and crumbling mausoleums lies a world of custom and superstition that dictated death and mourning for more than eighty years. This week on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery Podcast Jennie and Dianne explore the complex social norms dictating grief, the rise of spiritualism, and the eerie practices that governed Victorian society. While some of these cus...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Step into history with Jennie and Dianne on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery podcast! This week, they uncover the fascinating story of Pauline Cushman, a Union spy and actress who risked it all during the American Civil War. Joining them is living historian MJ Henion, who brings Pauline's courage and determination to life. From stage to battlefield, Pauline's bravery and cunning will leave you...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. The story continues...Jennie, Dianne and Professor Jared Richman continue their discussion about the life and legacy of Mary Shelley. From the heartache of losing three of her four children in infancy, to the tragic drowning death of her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mary was often forced to be resilient and rise above darkness and depression. Yet, amidst sorrow, Mary continued to impact the Ordi...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. This year's Beyond the Grave event honors Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, but who was the woman behind the iconic novel? Born to radical parents Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin, Mary Shelley navigated a life of intellectual fervor, passionate relationships – including her tumultuous marriage to Percy Bysshe Shelley – and literary friendship with none other than the bad boy of English literatu...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. This week on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery podcast; while Dianne is away, Jennie welcomes a new guest, JoEllen Hundeland, to share her passion project, "Hillside Cemetery: Middletown, New York: Beyond the Graves". From school bus curiosity to researching incredible local stories, JoEllen's journey is as fascinating as the book itself. JoEllen shares how the cemetery reveals the extraordinar...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Join The Ordinary, Extraordinary Cemetery podcast for a milestone episode - our 200th! For this special episode Dianne and Jennie welcome back returning guest Kristen Allen of Bloombridge, the cemetery flower delivery service, to share exciting updates on the organization's remarkable growth since its inception in 2021. Discover how Bloombridge has formed connections across the US, weaving powerf...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Jennie and Dianne are excited to share Part 2 of our discussion with author Joy Giguere on "Pleasure Grounds of Death: The Rural Cemetery in Nineteenth-century America". They explore how the rural cemetery movement transformed the funeral industry, especially following the civil war. The rise of funeral homes to handle the duties surrounding the deceased, hospitals as a place for the dying, and h...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. This week on The Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery, Jennie and Dianne welcome Joy Giguere back to discuss her new book "Pleasure Grounds of Death: The Rural Cemetery in Nineteenth-century America". They chat about the rise of rural cemeteries in the United States, including Mount Auburn Cemetery's pioneering design to the nationwide movement it inspired. Tune in for part one of a conversation about...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Saddle up, partners as Jennie and Dianne 'shoot' the breeze with Josh Taylor of the Wild West Extravaganza Podcast (and YouTube channel) while they pay their respects at the graveside of infamous outlaw Billy the Kid and his Ordinary Extraordinary life and legacy that ended before it had barely begun. Available on YouTube: https://youtu.be/DcdxHH7S8cc?si=unnJIo-w_DCJJKxm Ticket link to the 35th A...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. In part 1 of "The Great Eiffel Tower Swindle" Jennie and Dianne share the humble beginnings of a man who became known as one of the world's greatest swindlers, Victor "The Count" Lustig; and left listeners hanging after recounting his notorious first sale of the Eiffel Tower in 1925. In part 2 the ladies follow Lustig's escape from authorities in Paris and his return to the US to continue his lif...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. As the world's eyes are on Paris for the Olympics, we're looking back at a different kind of champion - the con artist who sold the Eiffel Tower not once, but twice! We're shining a light on the Ordinary Extraordinary story of Victor Lustig who sold the unsellable and swindled the unsuspecting. Join Dianne and Jennie for part one of a tale of deception and daring that's as thrilling as any Olympi...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. On this episode of The Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery, Jennie and Dianne pay a virtual visit to the graveside of a man who truly made a "splash" not only in America, but around the world. Join them as they relate the fascinating story of John Michael Kohler, the man credited as the inventor of the modern bathtub. From his humble beginnings as a young farm child in Austria to his journey as an im...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. This week on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery podcast Jennie and Dianne review their recent "gravestone preservation workshop" after attending the "48 State Tour" hosted by Atlas Preservation at Evergreen Cemetery in Colorado Springs, Colorado. They share what they learned and what was accomplished while working alongside others whose enthusiasm for cemetery preservation is infectious! They a...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. This week on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery podcast Jennie and Dianne chat about Dianne's recent East Coast adventures in Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Dianne shares about the many historical locations she visited including the Lizzie Borden house in Fall River Massachusetts, sites important to the American revolution and of course several of America's oldest cemeteries. Get ready for a do...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Happy Birthday America, or as Americans say, "Happy 4th of July!" Jennie and Dianne celebrate America's birthday with author and presidential historian Kurt Deion as he recounts his adventures in his book "Presidential Grave Hunter: One Kid's Quest to Visit the Tombs of Every President and Vice President". From sneaking past Secret Service agents to gaining entry to a private family burial groun...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. In this episode of the "Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery" podcast, Jennie chats with Sandra K. Doyle, a former deathcare industry professional turned author. Sandra's book, "MY LIFE AT THE CEMETERY: IT'S NOT AS DEAD AS YOU THINK", is a heartwarming and sometimes humorous collection of stories from her fourteen years working in the industry. She shares her Ordinary Extraordinary experiences and the...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. “Cemeteries are for the living. They’re there for us, they’re there to comfort us, they’re there to educate us, they’re there to provide peaceful meditative places to contemplate our own mortality and our own life." This is what Tui Snider told Dominic Genetti of the Midland Daily News and she said it again on this week's episode of the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery podcast. Join Jennie, Dianne...

Send us a text! We love hearing from listeners. If you'd like a response, please include your email. Join Jennie and Dianne on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery podcast as they delve into the hidden histories of Charleston, South Carolina's iconic graveyards. This week, they're joined by Patrick Harwood, a man who's spent his career uncovering the truth. From his days as an investigative journalist to his current work as a professor and author, Patrick's passion for storytelling shines through...