This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human. Get ready for the wildest sight your lawn has ever seen. Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. This spring, unleash soil science like never before.
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We put it through the worst, so you get its best. Yeah. For JD Power 2025 US Initial Quality Study Award information, visit jdpower.com/slash awards. Awards based on 2025 model year, newer models may be shown. Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously.
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Um Spring is starting at the Home Depot and bringing you everyday low prices so you can wake up your yard this season. Shape up your lawn with top-brand outdoor power tools like Ryobi 40-volt mowers that have up to 50 minutes of runtime. Bring in a splash of color with spring blooms and fresh plants from the Home Depot Garden Center. Then refresh your garden beds and keep them clear of weeds with Earth Grow mulch. Five bags for $10 to make your yard feel like new.
Start your spring with low prices now through April 2nd, only at the Home Depot. Exclusions apply. See home depot.com slash pricematch for details. Shop now. This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories, the show where America is the star and the American people.
Up next, a story that's close to my heart. My favorite sport in the world, and one I played relentlessly as a kid. Going to some of the greatest basketball camps in the world with names like Shaszewski and Karniseka and Knight. And I became a captain of my basketball team not one year, but two. And also the all-time leading scorer of my high school.
It was indeed a deep passion. I slept with my basketball.
So up next a story about The Billy Graham of basketball, the man who helped, in the end, create the sport, if not invented. You know his name. you probably owned a pair of sneakers that bear his signature. I bought my first pair. back in grade school.
There's a fairly new pair in my closet to day. My seventeen year old daughter well, she just bought a pair, and not for sport. She just thinks they look great.
So do her friends. What's remarkable about the man whose name we all know and whose sneaker is still worn today a century after it was created. is that he was never a famous athlete like Michael Jordan. Chuck Taylor was a basketball player, that's true. but he didn't get his name on the Converse sneaker because he was a great NBA player.
The League wouldn't come into existence until 1949. Baseball at the time had the most famous athletes in the 1920s and 30s. That's when Taylor was entering adulthood. Stars like Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig. But baseball players don't wear sneakers.
Boxing stars of the day, Jack Dempsey and Joe Lewis.
Well, everybody knew them, but try selling that sports footwear to a mass public. And then there were the horse racing stars, stars like Man of War and Sea Biscuit. But those four-legged athletes wear a very different Yeah. Chuck Taylor got his name on a sneaker because he may have been one of the greatest salesmen in American history. Mm-hmm.
He was born in 1901 in Indiana, a mere 10 years after Dr. James Naismith. invented the games. He grew up in Columbus, Indiana, where he was a high school superstar. After graduating in 1919, he played for a number of semi-pro basketball teams, starting with the Columbus Commercials.
Their debut barely got a mention in the local paper. But it didn't take long for basketball's popularity to spread like wildfire from its Midwest roots to high schools and colleges across the country. Basketball hoops became a fixture in cities and rural landscapes because it was cheap. and it was easy to play. It was fast.
And it was fun. Making a living playing basketball?
Well, it wasn't in the cards for Taylor.
So he joined the Chicago office of the Converse Company in 1922. in the sales department. Basketball shoes didn't exactly sell themselves.
something that Taylor discovered when he started working there. Taylor recalled a conversation with his mother that changed his life. It went something like this. Who needs the shoes? His mother asked him.
Basketball players. The son replied. Who buys them for the players? she asked. the coach and the high school officials, he replied.
I think you've been going to the wrong people. Why don't you go to the coaches and show them your shoes? Said his mum. Taylor acted on his mom's insight, and for the next 40 years, he barnstormed across America, holding clinics for players and coaches. teaching them the ins and outs of the game.
His clinics were so entertaining that local newspapers covered them when they rolled into town. Taylor dazzled audiences with his hoop skills. Taylor's other contribution to the game was the Converse Basketball Yearbook. It featured articles on strategy from leading coaches, along with rosters, season reports, and team photos. But there was a sales catch.
If you wanted your photo in the yearbook, The team needed to wear Converse sneakers. And then There was the Taylor All-Americans. It was the yearbook's centerpiece, as Taylor's time on the road gave him great credibility and an eye for spotting talent. Taylor made certain to pick players from across the country and not just big cities. If you were a player from a high school in rural Nebraska or rural Ohio, The yearbook might be your one shot.
At nationwide recognition, appearing in tens of thousands of copies that Converse mailed out each year. The yearbook put Converse at the epicenter of the basketball world. Taylor would do more than just promote the sport and brand he loved. He also offered critical suggestions on sneaker designs and engineering. By 1934, it was clear Taylor was a star in his own right.
and his signature was added to the ankle patch of the sneaker. that still bears his name. One would be hard pressed to name another iconic sports brand in America named after a salesman. but calling Taylor a salesman, would be like calling Vladimir Horowitz a piano player. or Arnold Schwarzenegger, a weightlifter.
Taylor was a lifelong evangelist of the sport. He was the Billy Graham of basketball. The sneaker cells Well they just follow. after decades on the road preaching the gospel of basketball and converse. Taylor retired in the mid-1960s.
He never asked Converse for a royalty. He asked only for an expense account for his travels. Taylor married, he divorced, He married again. and never had children. And that's because his true love was basketball itself.
In 1968, He was inducted into the basketball home. Hall of Fame One year later, He passed away. Converse lost its dominance on the basketball floor in the 1970s. But in the decades to come, an assortment of misfit cultural pioneers, skateboarders, rappers, punk rockers, and grunge artists adopted his sneaker and turned the brand into a part of America's cultural fabric. The story of Chuck Taylor is the American dream personified.
and proof of America's love affair with his sneakers.
Well, it's in my closet. and my daughters. and the closets of so many millions of other customers and fans, new and old, around the world. The story of the Billy Graham of basketball, Chuck Taylor, here. on Our American Stories.
Lee Habib here, and I'm inviting you to help Our American Stories celebrate this country's 250th birthday coming soon. If you want to help inspire countless others to love America like we do and want to help us bring the inspiring and important stories told here about a good and beautiful country, please consider making a tax-deductible donation to OurAmerican Stories. Go to ouramericanstories.com and click the donate button. Any amount helps. Go to ouramericanstories.com and give.
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GetSunday.com. No one knows what the future holds, but you deserve a weather app that can help. Weatherbug is easy to use and provides forecasts for your every need, from storm warnings to pollen levels, right at your fingertips. Get the fastest local alerts and comprehensive 10-day forecasts wherever you are. It's hyper-local, real-time, customizable alerts.
Make sure the weather never takes you by surprise so you can plan every day with confidence. Download the free weather bug app from the App Store today and start getting accurate weather forecasts 24-7. This is Julian Edelman from Games with Names. I want to take a second to talk about something that's personal to me. I've had the privilege of working closely with Robert Kraft for a long time.
And one thing I've always respected is how seriously he takes up standing up to hate. As a Jewish athlete my identity is something I am proud of. But I also know what it feels like to be singled out for it. That's why this new commercial for the Blue Square Alliance Against Hate that aired during the big game really hit home. It's about showing up for someone when they're targeted, even if you don't have the perfect words.
And sometimes standing next to someone is enough. And you can show support by sharing the blue square. You won't see the engineer that slams the Nissan Rogue's door 13,920 times, or the corrosive chamber that simulates 15 years of life in five months, or the rogue heat-baked for over 300 combined hours. What you will see is a vehicle that can take punch after punch and keep rolling. Nissan, number one in new vehicle quality among mainstream brands by JD Power.
We put it through the worst, so you get its best. Yeah. For JD Power 2025 US Initial Quality Study Award information, visit jdpower.com/slash awards. Awards based on 2025 model year, newer models may be shown. This is an iHeart podcast.
Guaranteed human. Mm-hmm.
