Jean Shepherd

You know the movie A Christmas Story with Ralphie with the glasses? Of course.

Who doesn't? That was written by a guy named Gene Shepard.

Okay.

And he complained.

A lot of it is hazy to me.

I was wondering if Gene Shepard, I don't see him as someone who might have influenced you, but was he an

influence? I'm glad you mentioned that because again, so much of what I experienced as a kid came through the radio.

Gene Shepard would appear late at night on these stations that my parents listened to in the car.

And so I have very clear memories of driving back from a trip to the Jersey Shore or visiting relatives in Pennsylvania and hearing Gene Shepard telling these amazing stories about his childhood in Indiana, I think.

Yeah, he was a real influence.

And he was on the radio.

You know, it wasn't like I could ever say to my parents, like, let's listen to Gene Shepard.

For an IU connection.

Gene Shepard, proud former resident, I believe, Collins Quad.

He was there for a couple of

years.

I said, wait a minute, that's a guy I heard of.

Done it via complications.

And if you guys, and again, just one more thing, and we'll close here real quick after this one, I'm just going to say, Gene Shepard's radio shows out of New York, he had a Saturday night radio program.

So all of that world, Genesis, it was a Genesis from there.

It was a wooden boat and a kid.

And so I had an interest in telling stories from the time I was a little kid, but it kicked into high gear, really, when I discovered Gene Shepard, the radio host that most people know as the voice and the author of the movie A Christmas Story.

But Gene was a storyteller.

Today, he'd be a podcaster.

It was spinning original fiction.

or observations, and it totally changed my life.

I was one of the millions of people who thought that we were the only ones who knew about Gene Shepard.

And I'd go through a lot of nine-volt batteries, flipping transistor radios under the pillow so I could listen without getting caught by my parents.

You might laugh.

You might also read Gene Shepard, the funniest writer I've ever come across.

I'd like to give some examples of how he uses exaggeration for comedy.

In his short story, Scut Farkas and the Murderous Mariah, Scut Farkas is the neighborhood bully.

In Scott Farkas and the Murderous Mariah, Ralphie says...

In my day there were two types of top spinners, those who merely played with a top, dilettantes, haphazard, sloppy, beneath notice, and those to whom a top was a weapon in the purest sense, an extension of the will, an instrument of talent and aggression, anything but a toy.

Gene Shepard's exaggerations here, he calls people dilettantes and sloppy and beneath notice, and his top is a weapon of aggression.

He's talking about a toy top, and it's a weapon of aggression.

And it's so wonderful to, to hear the feedback and, and how you've been able to provide what they call evergreen content too, which is content for people that are young and old.

We especially try to do that as well, where I tell coming-of-age stories, like Gene Shepard used to do, and so forth.

And, and just, just like you're doing, is just to try to bring a, a podcast, a- and/or a radio show in our view, to people where they could sit down with grandpa and the son and they could talk about, uh, make it up, whatever, the, their favorite Disn- Disney princess or something, you know? [laughs]

Uh-huh.

But it's very...

It has a very Gene Shepard quality for it-

Okay

... to it.

It's John something.

Shepard.

John Shepard?

Gene Shepard.

Ah, damn it.

Close.

Honestly, I do.

Gene Shepard, the great monologist, he was asked once.

He said, "Why don't you, uh, ever talk about today's news? Why, why don't you ever talk about today's news?" And he said, "Because that's too easy."

Why do you support immigration? Because I want my future daughter to be alive, not raped and killed.