The first episode of 2021 starts with an interview with Kaylin Orr, Koach KO. An accomplished fitness trainer and expert in nutrition she gives some advice on how to get fit in the new year. From beginners looking for a gentle hand, to those who have fallen off and need to get back on the horse, Kaylin has something for everyone looking to improve their lives.
We take a look back at the first really detailed account of alien abduction next. Betty and Barney Hill, a newlywed couple from Portsmouth, New Hampshire were returning from a trip to Montreal in 1961 when something strange and unexplained happened. Learn more about this In Their Footsteps.
This Week In History takes a shocking look at the Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919 that severely damaged the city's North End. We learn the origins of the richest man in the history of America, John D. Rockefeller, and his Standard Oil Company. Next is the amazing story of a female, teenage captain of a seal hunting vessel in the late 19th century. Finally we celebrate the creation of Motown Records.
Lastly take a trip Back In the Day 20 years to when I called Las Vegas, Nevada home. Learn about the culture shock of going from the relative rural lifestyle of Cape Cod to the extravagant indulgent life one can live in Sin City.
All of this and more is here in Episode 6, so come and take a walk!
Check out Episode 5 here.
The first episode of 2021 starts with an interview with Kaylin Orr, Koach KO. An accomplished fitness trainer and expert in nutrition she gives some advice on how to get fit in the new year. From beginners looking for a gentle hand, to those who have fallen off and need to get back on the horse, Kaylin has something for everyone looking to improve their lives.
We take a look back at the first really detailed account of alien abduction next. Betty and Barney Hill, a newlywed couple from Portsmouth, New Hampshire were returning from a trip to Montreal in 1961 when something strange and unexplained happened. Learn more about this In Their Footsteps.
This Week In History takes a shocking look at the Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919 that severely damaged the city's North End. We learn the origins of the richest man in the history of America, John D. Rockefeller, and his Standard Oil Company. Next is the amazing story of a female, teenage captain of a seal hunting vessel in the late 19th century. Finally we celebrate the creation of Motown Records.
Lastly take a trip Back In the Day 20 years to when I called Las Vegas, Nevada home. Learn about the culture shock of going from the relative rural lifestyle of Cape Cod to the extravagant indulgent life one can live in Sin City.
All of this and more is here in Episode 6, so come and take a walk!
Check out Episode 5 here.
00:00 Intro
Hello world! Happy 2021. Happy New Year and welcome to the In My Footsteps Podcast. I am Christopher Setterlund coming to you from the popular vacation destination known as Cape Cod, Massachusetts. This is episode 6 of the podcast. So how was everyone's new year's? You stay up to watch the ball drop? I stayed up until 12:01 and I was out cold after. What about new year's resolutions? Have you made any? That's always the big thing, January 1 hits and it's the soft reset on life. A lot of people their new year's resolution is to drop some weight, I know that's mine. The Covid 15 is real I am living proof of that, not proud of it ,but hey got to take care of that. So actually that ties into this week's podcast I'm going to have an interview segment, the first 1 on the podcast, with a great trainer and a personal friend her name is Kaylin Orr also known as coach KO. She is going to answer some questions about getting fit in the new year give you some tips. It's going to be a 2 part interview this week will be more generalizations whereas next week it'll be some Q&A from listeners and a little more details you know give you the tools to make 2021 the year that you become the best version of yourself you can.
I want to give a big thank you to all of you that made episode 5 my fastest downloading episode yet. It was the fastest downloaded in the first week and it broke the previous mark in the first 24 hours. So I'm really thrilled that this seems to be gaining some traction that people are actually interested in the subject I talk about. Which is great because I love it, I love coming up with the layout for the shows and getting to share them and hoping that people like them as much as I like sharing them. If you haven't listened to episode 5 yet or you want to go catch up on the other episodes, not that there any sort of order is not like a comic book, you can listen to 1 and it's not going to affect the others but you can go to any of the places that you stream podcasts: iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, Stitcher, I heart radio, all those and just check them out and if you have any ideas for potential topics in the future you can always shoot me an email: Christopher Setterlund@Gmail.com. Email you know questions comments I'm always looking for ideas to push forward and things like that to make it better each time that's the goal and my love of history is a big tie in with this podcast Cape Cod, Massachusetts, New England and beyond. That's always been my favorite subject from high school when I was a student at Dennis Yarmouth regional high school and my history teacher Mr. Jim Coogan who also became an author he kind of stoked the fire of the love of history and that kind of goes into tracing my family tree and doing things like that on Ancestry.com.
Speaking of that I finally ordered myself an Ancestry DNA kit and so that came in the mail. It took awhile but it came in the mail and I did the whole thing. You gotta spit in a tube and seal it and send it off but when that comes back with my DNA results I'm gonna make sure to have that as a segment on here because it's definitely worth it to check out and see where you're from. Learning about your roots is great and I've enjoyed all of that on Ancestry so this will be interesting. As this is the first podcast of 2021 and I had said in the last 1 that my goal is to do more podcasts so I'm going to try to do 3 weeks on 1 week off so instead of being every other week there's going to be another 1 coming next week. That's gonna be interesting to see just how much work it is and how hard it is to actually make these good and do my research properly but you know that's my problem. Hopefully you all will enjoy it. So as I said this is episode 6 of the in my footsteps podcast this week we've got the interview with Koach KO it's going to be very good for you guys and for me I'm using that as my own excuse to jump start my return to fitness. In addition to that though we're gonna go back in time to a molasses tsunami that hit Boston. We're gonna take another trip in time where I share my days of living in Las Vegas from just over 20 years ago and we will talk about the first real major UFO abduction story that took place in New Hampshire. All that and more coming to you now in the in my footsteps podcast and let's go take a walk.
05:36 Interview: Kaylin Orr, Koach KO
Coming up now is my exclusive interview with Kaylin Orr, Koach KO. This is going to be taking place in the studio EX fitness center in Hyannis so if you hear some echoes we're inside of a classroom. I'm also using a little hand held digital recorder also so that might change the audio just a bit, but anyway let's jump right into the interview right now with Kaylin.
Chris Setterlund: Hi everyone I am coming to you live from Studio EX fitness studio in Hyannis. This is a new year's resolution part of the podcast. I'm interviewing Kaylin Orr fitness trainer extraordinaire. So a little bit about how we know each other. We worked together at Mid-Cape Athletic Club 4-5 years ago, how time flies. We wet our feet there and then went out and about on our own. She is extremely talented and very knowledgeable and that's why I chose her as far as the new year new you. It is part of the podcast and for this I'm shooting a video too. I just want you to tell the listeners and the watchers how you got started training.
Kaylin Orr: Hi everyone, my name is Kaylin Orr, or Koach KO with a K. It can stand for my name. Whatever you want. I started as a competitive gymnasts so I was hardcore. I started working in agencies like the YMCA, Gym Express in Centerville years ago when I was 18. I never worked on the other side of the desk that always just boss them around.
CS: I remember that when I first met you, you were working behind the desk.
KO: Saying hi when they came in bye when they left. I was really good at that. Then I moved on to classes. That's really what I call that my performance part of things that I do which I still do. We'll make them forget their day have fun. And I began taking on small groups and it came first you can't I went private into boot camps which I still have today 3 years later, some of the same people. Going to fitness conferences every year getting a million certifications and now after that I just signed on to do another certification which is why the scientific side of things.
CS: See she knows what she's talking about.
KO: I just do as much as I can, learn as much as I can, grow, always learning from somebody.
CS: What are some of the certifications you have just in case the people don't know quite what that means.
KO: So I have a personal training certificate I've gotten a few different times. From some of the best instructors and people that you can learn from. I have a cardio kickboxing, and Body Combat. I have Barre, Yoga, and Pilates. When I say I have yoga I'm a little bit of a faker because it's not the real 200 hour yoga it's the weekend yoga class you know. I kind of fuse the yoga fitness and then I even breath like the yoga breath into fitness so now like a breath coach. It's really cool and it works.
CS: That's the main thing is that it works and you've got people that have been loyal to you for years now and that's that's the real proof is that people come to you for fitness and stay.
KO: Exactly.
CS: Okay, obviously it's a new year and everyone wants to get in better shape. Well not everyone, but a lot of people that's their goal that's one of my goals and I need to drop 15 pounds because the Covid 15 is real like I mentioned at the top of the podcast so that I'm not just spouting and I'm going to actually live it. What advice can you give to people that are looking to jump start their fitness in 2021?
KO: Okay ready? A new year's resolution fantastic. I love it it's like the people who love the Mondays Or love to start on Monday. That is great for this reason, it gives you time to prep for that goal. Okay it's going to be New Year's Day or maybe the 2nd after new year's day. We're going to find out how we can make sure we have food, or we have a journal, or we get a gym membership. That's great for someone who can handle that pressure, it's pressure. I have a friend that needs me to tell them exactly what to do, which I'll do it. Or there's the people who need a little bit more of a hand holding, need the small steps to ease into my new life. So if you're the person to take the pressure of a New Year's resolution and make it and keep it good.
Be prepared for failure and be ready to get right back up and keep going. We're all going to fail. It's not the failure it's the giving up that's the problem. So my best advice is the small shifts so little changes every day are what make the changes for the rest of your life. So taking out creamer and putting almond milk in your coffee, start every morning stretching for 10 minutes, and keeping our commitment every day and insert anything there and then celebrating those small wins. I did it for a week. Finding the way to celebrate yourself is a way to keep you on your track. If you did something wrong you don't want to feel bad the rest of the day. If I could get out of bed and stub your toe and your days off to a bad start that day that's we tend to do. We can use our solutions we'll just ease your way into small things. Every day grow from there, new small things, you'll tend to stick to it and do a better job.
CS: So that leads into the the follow up question. What would you tell these people that I've seen in working at gyms, you get flooded with new clients the first week of the year and like you said the first hint of difficulty, failure, hardship, they are done. What can you tell them to kind of stop them from making it a 3 week experiment?
KO: I'm the first person that will share my feelings with people because it is my profession but I'm the first person not sticking to my goals. I still have the same goals and I still feel bad when I eat 16 cookies like I tend to do. It doesn't mean just because I do this for a living that I don't fail, please I think so I can really understand. Some people need more motivation it is good to get someone, doesn't have to be your trainer, to hold you accountable that tends to really work. I just found myself buddy and boyfriend Chris.
One more thing I need to make sure that anyone that's listening or watching doesn't do anymore scrolling the internet comparing yourself it's a really really awful thing to do and I feel really bad when I do it. Whether it's 'I'm not going to look like that person' 'I don't work as hard as a person.' So we're all in the same sea different boats, different goals, different bodies, but we're all trying to better ourselves so we have to remember that there's people all over that are feeling the same way. When your at the gym working out and you feel like you're not working hard, nobody's looking at you, so basically you can feel confident knowing you're there just by yourself. You do what you can do when you push yourself. The fitness industry has become all about looks and one of my recommendations also is to not make your goals based on the way you look. There are a million other goals that you can achieve like more small shifts in your case, challenging your kids to pushup contest, or you want to be able to go up the stairs without being winded, or you want to take time off your mile or you want that sure you want to sleep better, all of those things are better attainable goals and just want to be.
CS: On that when I was working at the anytime fitness gyms around here that we had the question that was the 'big why.' You know, why are you here, and if people said I just wanna look thinner or be in better shape. I would say it needed to be a specific thing and like that's what you're saying get up the stairs without being winded.
KO: That's what it is and then you can actually measure that goal. It's not you know where I'm always gonna look like other people we compare ourselves to. We all have different body shapes if you and me, or me and my sister, did the same workout we'd end up looking different that's fact.
CS: So tell me about yourself. What makes people want to train with you? I mean I know, we need the listeners and viewers, who are just hearing your voice for the first time, they need to know why exactly do I go to train with coach KO?
KO: Okay so let's just mention really quick first that not everybody is going to choose me as their trainer. I mean I can show up as a bunch of different people which is my favorite thing to do. I am loud, I am fun, I am going to make a little bit of a scene in the gym. I have a client that I had this morning that sings all the work out. The answer to the question, all right so my ability to show up as a different person everywhere I go. So here(Studio EX) it's as a performer and everyone has a great time. Everleigh Retirement Home that's more as a coach, somebody to brighten their day, also help them. So I mix, the silly and the loving and kind with the educational because they need to know more. You need me to be a drill sergeant I can be that. If you need me to hold your hand I'm really good at that but the way you do that is adjusting and being passionate. I can help you figure out your goals and I really care. I think I'm able to take them on for a long time and sometimes you see drastic changes sometimes we don't sometimes the brain improves and the mentality the life improves instead and that's okay. Need guided meditation? I got to there too.
CS: So you basically kind of give the people what they need. Like you said not everyone needs or wants the same thing so you meet them where they are.
KO: Come in and do one of my classes with me if you want a great community and have a great time. If you need something that I just don't do, like spinning which I don't teach, if it's good for you I will recommend it to.
CS: So now that we've gotten to know you where can people find you they can come and experience it rather than just hear about.
KO: Here we go. I'm here at Studio EX which is a community. I do class with bands we do a lot of bands we have fun. I tell people in class that if you're going throwing kettlebells and you're not having any injury it's because of this because of the stuff we do with the bands. I'm also at Forte Fitness which is a private training facility so you need a membership to go there. I do Rock Steady boxing which is Parkinson's boxing which is some of the most fulfilling things I've ever done in my life, but I do in home training, group training.
CS: And you also have a YouTube video series don't you?
KO: That's right I have 130 videos if you go on there Kaylin Orr Fitness. I have training I have functional training I have cardio training I have high interval training, low interval training. I have also done custom videos and yoga classes and there's 130. Social media of course I have a Facebook Kaylin Orr. Koach_ KO_ is my Instagram and I'll tell you what I have on there everyone it's called Kaylin In the Car and I drive safely mostly safely, my car rides are all crazy stuff in it, all very silly, very funny. We don't take ourselves too seriously but I give you a lot involved if you feel like laughing having watched that thank you so much.
CS: Thank you so much to Kaylin Orr for that great interview answering so many questions. There will be a second part with some more Q&A coming up in next week's podcast hopefully you'll stay tuned for that and more interviews probably to come in the podcasts that follow down the road.
21:36 In Their Footsteps: Betty & Barney Hill Alien Abduction
Unidentified flying objects. The idea of UFOs, extraterrestrials, aliens has been a part of human culture for generations, centuries, millennia. From curious cave paintings to legends about some ancient architecture that has been influenced by aliens curious lights in the sky, they existed long before commercial airliners were dotting the skies at night.
In 1947 a supposed UFO crashed in Roswell, New Mexico sparking a whole new fascination and interest with UFOs. Then they were in movies little green men from Mars. Visits from UFOs crop circles things like that they lead to the next natural step which was interaction with these beings. In the 21st century as of now there have been hundreds and hundreds of documented alien abduction stories. Whether you believe them or not is totally up to you. However the first of these documented alien abductions took place in 1961 and took place in New England in the northern part of the state of New Hampshire and that's what we're going to talk about now the alien abduction story of Betty and Barney Hill.
Betty and Barney Hill lived in Portsmouth, New Hampshire and in September of 1961 after being married for about 16 months they decided to finally go on their honeymoon trip which included going out to Niagara Falls, New York and then up to Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The trip was pleasant if not uneventful for the relatively newlywed couple until they started their descent south back towards their home on September 19th. They were heading south through the small town of Lincoln, New Hampshire and if any of you have been to Lincoln, New Hampshire it's a beautiful little town that I'll cover at some point on this podcast but at night it's very very dark and very very desolate. Heading southeast through Vermont into New Hampshire late at night on September 19th they were trying to beat a rain storm home. They assumed they would get back to Portsmouth around 2:00 AM. So it was very late at night when they were driving through Lincoln. As they headed south they spotted a curious light in the sky that they thought might be a falling star. Barney was a World War 2 veteran so he thought there was nothing to worry about so they kept pressing on but the light followed them. It zig zagged with the curves of the road, although when you drive at night when you're a kid you you think the moon is chasing you how it moves along with the car so I could see where the couple would think this is just an illusion that this light is just playing tricks. At 1 point on the drive their curiosity got the better of them and they pulled over Betty used a pair of binoculars to look at the light which appeared to be a white light that was spinning and she told Barney that he was ridiculous if he thought that this was a plane or a falling star. They pressed on a little further with the light following them but eventually the worry started to get the better of them they pulled over.
Barney stepped out of the car he had a handgun with them by this time the light was about 100 feet above them in the sky and it was silent there was no noise that could make you know like a helicopter just silently spending above them. Barney would later say that the object was as big as a jet but round and flat like a pancake and it blew his mind. What he saw in the windows were little grey men all standing and staring down at him with these little gray uniformed aliens in the window staring at him Barney lost it and ran back to the car to get out of there because he realized they were probably about to be captured. They barreled down the road trying to escape this light in the darkness of this New Hampshire highway they both heard loud rhythmic beeps coming from the area of the car's trunk and at that point both the couple lost consciousness.
When they came to back in the car it was 2hours later than they remembered and they were 35 miles down the road from where they last remember driving. They did arrive home in Portsmouth but couldn't shake the feeling that that was more than just some sort of a dream. In the weeks and months that followed Betty started reading up books about UFOs after Betty started having these horrible vivid nightmares and Barney developed an ulcer from stress They decided to get help and they went to a therapist name Benjamin Simon. It was during the sessions that the couple were both hypnotized separately and recall the events of that evening and both their stories matched up and with a little help piecing together the events of the story this is what apparently occurred that night.
A vessel landed down on top of the car put the couple to sleep and a few of these uniformed gray aliens walk them up under the ship where they were separated they were both subject to basic medical examinations including samples being taken of their hair, fingernails, skin scrapings. Betty had a 4 to 6 inch needle injected into her abdomen it is basically a pregnancy test. There was 1 alien that both of them referred to as the leader who seem to be kind of in charge. 1 of the aliens explain to Betty where they were from although I guess he kind of said if she didn't know anything about the universe it would be kind of pointless to tell her where they were from but with help she kind of drew a map of where their planet was. Both of the couple reiterated that the aliens were not really hostile more curious and eventually they let them go and they went home.
So with the help of Benjamin Simon they pieced together what had happened to them on that night in 1961 the big change came though in 1965 when their story was published in a Boston newspaper and suddenly everyone was interested in this story of alien abduction. It was the first real documented 1 they were the subject of a book. They were also portrayed in the movie with James Earl Jones playing Barney. Of course when it comes to UFO's and aliens and alien abduction opinion is split where some people believe it some people don't. The thing that always gets me about this story is the fact that Betty and Barney were an interracial couple in the early 1960's which makes me think why would they want to draw attention to themselves when just the fact that they were married would be a cause of a lot of problems for some people in the country. The Betty and Barney Hill story though kind of pave the way for the way that aliens and alien abductions were portrayed not just in regular life but in the media in movies and books with the examinations and such their story their abduction was not the first ever to be documented but it was the most in depth that was documented at the time specially for 1961.
If it wasn't an alien space craft that obstructed the hills on that deserted road in New Hampshire in 1961 other experts say it could have been something, sleep paralysis, hallucinations from a long drive late at night, but that's all subjective. It's all up to you what you think and what you believe Barney died young at the age of 46 in 1969. Betty lived on it lived a much longer life and she remained very deeply connected to the UFO community going to UFO vigils routinely she spent the rest of her years still living in Portsmouth, New Hampshire before dying in 2004 at the age of 85. Throughout all of the publicity and the scrutiny which came after the story went public Betty and Barney Hill never changed their story 1 bit. They remained steadfast that they were abducted by aliens that night in 1961 with Betty saying that she was visited several more times in the decades that followed after that initial abduction. If you want to learn more about Betty and Barney Hill there's plenty of information on the internet. There are files about their hypnosis and what was there and different things like that, but that is the story of the first real huge documented case of supposed alien abduction and it occurred right here in New England in New Hampshire in the northern part in Lincoln.
30:50 This Week In History:
It's time once again for this week in history. The segment of the podcast where I go over 4 events that occurred this week in history: 1 local, 1 national, 1 world, and 1 pop culture. So let's jump right in and see what was happening during this week in history.
This week in history locally 102 years ago this week on 1/15/1919 the great Boston molasses flood occurred. So around noon on January 15 a giant tank ruptured it was a 50x90 foot tank filled with millions of gallons worth of molasses in the north end of Boston. Incredibly the tank ruptured and the molasses was expelled from it 2 million gallons spilled out into the streets, but it wasn't just a spill this was a tsunami. The molasses reached 35mph flowing through the streets of the north end. It resulted in 21 deaths and 150 injuries which is incredible, it's molasses. It was a horrible scene there was a long trial in court as people thought that it was a bomb that had gone off. It turned out to be flawed steel in the tank which caused the rupture and evidently some safety measures surrounding the tank were ignored so this is something that could have been prevented. It ended up being just such a horrible disaster they said that some horses would die from this getting stuck in in the molasses it's incredible to think about something like that becoming such a horrible disaster. Molasses you don't think of it.102 years ago this week the great Boston molasses flood was a disaster in the north end of Boston.
Nationally this week in history 131 years ago on 1/10/1870 John D. Rockefeller incorporated his Standard Oil corporation. The company was founded in Ohio and by the early 1880's Standard Oil controlled 90% of the U. S. pipelines and refineries. It basically was a monopoly it dominated that industry and Rockefeller became the richest man ever in the history of the world. At the time he was 1 of those magnates you know the ones that had all the money Rockefeller, J. P. Morgan, and the Vanderbilts, those type people that you hear about these days that were in the latter part of the 19th century that had comparable to today billions and billions of dollars. Standard Oil was allowed to kind of run unchecked for a couple of decades before it was dissolved in Ohio and then it reformed in New Jersey later on but then finally in 1911 it was ordered to officially dissolved because of the illegality of the monopoly. When Standard Oil was forced to dissolve it ended up becoming split up into more than 30 companies and some of those companies are still going strong today they include Exxon, Mobil, and Chevron, those are names you see everywhere gas stations and they came from the breakup of Standard Oil and like I said earlier. John D. Rockefeller ended up becoming the richest man ever in the history of America. When you adjust the money for inflation by the time of his death in 1937 he had had a net worth of $418 billion when it's adjusted for inflation for 2020 but it wasn't all bad. He was also very philanthropic he donated a lot of money so when adjusted for inflation by the time of his death Rockefeller had donated $9.7 billion to various charities but he made ungodly sums of money on the back of his standard oil corporation which he incorporated 100 31 years ago this week in Ohio.
In world events this week in history 134 years ago on 1/10/1887 the schooner Maggie Dalling was shipwrecked off of the coast of Alaska. This ship has a very interesting history and story that I felt I needed to include here. Originally the ship was owned by the Alaska Commercial Company which was basically a seal hunting company. It was captained by Alexander Mcdonald and the ship did multiple runs, you know seal hunting. In the summer of 1886 captain Alexander McDonald died and the ship was taken over by his daughter named Calm. Essentially Calm had been born on the ship, basically her life revolved around the Maggie Dalling and being on the sea. She at the age of 17 became captain of the ship she was said to be pretty and brave and respected and referred to by the crew as Captain Calm. So she was a female teenage captain on a seal hunting ship in the 1880's which I just find fascinating. However as you heard in the beginning there was obviously not a happy ending for this. During rough weather on 1 of the runs between Vancouver, British Columbia and the town of Sitka on the Alaskan coast, which is just south west of Juneau the ship was lost. It crashed on some rocks as Captain Calm tried to navigate through the storm. 1 of the survivors actually washed overboard and floated away and was rescued and this survivor was the 1 that alerted the people to the ship. A rescue vessel was sent out and discovered Captain Calm. She was slumped over the wheel of the ship that was just destroyed but she was still there. They thought she was dead too but she was actually still alive although she died a few days later from her injuries. She was basically pressed up against the wheel so the injuries and exposure killed her. If there's any silver lining to it her story became well known and told. I don't know if she was the first ever female captain of a ship, I'm sure not but her story ended up being shared all around even though it ended tragically 134 years ago this week.
Finally this week in history 62 years ago this week 1/12/1959 Motown records was formed by Berry Gordy in the city of Detroit, Michigan. Berry Gordy took an $800 loan out from his family to form the record studio which he originally named Tamla records. He actually also lived in the studios to kind of to make sure it was a success you got to put in the the work. On 4/14/1960 that was when the studio was officially named Motown. It was the first African American record label to reach national acclaim and boy did they have a lot of stars that came out of that. The first ever single through Motown records when it was still Tamla records was called 'Come to Me' by Mark Johnson that was released on 1/21/1959. Their first big hit was from Barrett Strong and it was called 'Money(That's What I Want). That was in 1960 and when listing off the names of some of the biggest acts in the history of Motown it's like a who's who in music history. You've got Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Diana Ross and the Supremes, Stevie Wonder, the Jackson 5, the Temptations, the 4 Tops, and so many more. Maybe for some of the younger generation, well alright I'll say my generation, ones that were born in the late 70's early 80's your first memories of Motown maybe just like mine and that's the Motown 25 show that they had that was the huge special. For those that don't aren't familiar with it that was the show where Michael Jackson unveiled his moon walk when he was doing Billie Jean. That became 1 of the most iconic moments maybe in music when you saw him do that and I can remember vividly. Motown was an independent record label until it was purchased by MCA records in 1988. It is actually still going today although now it operates out of Los Angeles it's part of Capitol Records. The original studio in Detroit, Michigan is a museum that you can go visit.62 years ago this week Motown records was formed in Detroit and changed R&B and changed music in general for the better once it was formed.
That'll do it for this week in history tune in again next week and I'm sure I'll have some more interesting stuff.
40:34 Back In the Day: Las Vegas Living Pt. 1
So I know I said at the end of the last episode that for the Retro segment of episode 6 I was going to talk about 1991 the year in music being that is 30 years ago now, which still blows my mind, but it got me to thinking that there was another anniversary that was occurring this week when the podcast would air that I wanted to share some memories of. So in short 20 years ago roughly around this week I took a bus from Las Vegas, Nevada to Hyannis, Massachusetts and moved from Vegas back to Cape Cod after living in Las Vegas for much of 2000. Seems like ages ago now but I wanted to share some of that story. So this will probably be a two-parter. I'm going to share the time in Vegas and then in the future episode share the bus trip back because that's a movie all in itself that bus trip on its own.
So flashback January of 2000 I'm 22 years old living on Cape Cod, still in college and you know, you grow up in the same place you want to explore you want to see what else is out there. Believe me I get it. I hear it from my two oldest nieces that are both in college about how they can't wait to get away from Cape Cod and I get it. I spent my 20's moving away from here. So in January of 2000 I booked a flight to Las Vegas because my father had moved out there a couple years before and I had an uncle and aunt and a cousin that lived out there also. So it seems like a natural sort of leap to go out there and have a stable situation. It was a visit I visited I loved it.
It's so much different than anything I've been apart of. Just landing at the airport and there's slot machines when you're walking through the airport there's a culture shock right there. So I visited, loved it, came back to Cape Cod and decided that was it I was moving back out there so that's what I did. I packed up made another flight out there and brought all my belongings with me and made Las Vegas my home. For those of you that have only visited Vegas and gone you know to the Strip, living in Las Vegas is a lot different than visiting Las Vegas. It's very similar to almost anywhere else in the country where the people that live there work and they have their own lives. I believe in my entire time that I lived in Vegas I was on the Strip once and that was actually to take a drug test for a job I applied for at a Target store.
That was my first sort of slap in the face of reality was hitting Las Vegas and then okay I need a job and I went to Target and I was making minimum wage in 2000 which was a whopping $6 an hour that was a fun time. My sister Kate loves that story, when we're sitting in kind of the orientation meeting, and we're filling out our forms and they say ok next to your salary write down $6 an hour and it was kind of like a slap 'oh my god what have I done.' Target was fun though I worked in the back stock room. I was the oldest of the crew when I was 22 and there were some crazy guys back there. Also while I was there I went to college too. I went to the Community College of Southern Nevada which was a 1,000 foot walk from the end of my apartment complex which was on West Charleston Boulevard. It was a neat school I went there and I took, I think one of the classes was broadcast writing, writing for a news show. That really helped out and helps out in doing things like this podcast which is amazing that 20 years ago things I learned I can actually apply here.
Life in Vegas was, not mundane, it was exciting I enjoyed it. I'd leave college and within a mile of my apartment complex was every fast food restaurant you could imagine. I mean anything even the lesser-known ones. I don't know if anyone's ever heard of Der Wienerschnitzel which is a hot dog place. We had Panda Express my favorite a mile walk away. See you walk a mile in 115 degree heat and get your Chinese food you've burned enough calories just walking there so it was all good. Besides that the one that I made my home a lot was Jack in the Box. Sure a lot of you have heard of Jack in the Box. It was really good, chili cheese curly fries, I would watch from school stop at Jack In The Box get my food go home do my homework and eat. One of the best things was being on the west coast the time was 3 hours early so you would get the NFL game start at 10 a.m. wake up and have breakfast while watching the NFL.
Even though I lived with my father in his apartment he worked double shifts at a restaurant called The Lakes lounge and so he was never around and all intents and purposes it was like I was living on my own and my uncle and aunt and cousin they had their own lives. It wasn't like I saw them all the time. I think I saw them my birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, like that but otherwise it was me living in Vegas and finding my way at 22 and then 23 when I had my birthday. I had no car so I would take the bus everywhere which is fun. Most of what I like to do was within walking distance I would walk to the gym there was a gym called Q the sports club on Rainbow Boulevard. It was a three-story gym that had kind of a glass pyramid ceiling and it was 24 hours a day. I remember going in there to get my membership and the guy that showed me around, this is a hundred percent true, he brings me to the hot tub and pool area and he points at the hot tub and he says 'yeah if you ever want to come in here at 3 a.m. and do whatever you want no one's around.' So yeah that was kind of how I got indoctrinated to Las Vegas, in the gym being told if you want to bring someone with you to the hot tub at 3 a.m. at the gym you could do what you wanted.
Yes the heat was for real out there. I tell people when they say it's a dry heat it's akin to having a hair dryer kind of blowing in your face. Leave the apartment you open up it'll be like a hairdryer in your face. It is 110° routinely there which meant that I could do my laundry in the laundry room at the complex but then if I wanted to dry them I could hang them out on the balcony. We were up on the second floor and this leads to another famous story that my sisters and brother enjoy. One day I did my laundry in the laundry room and hung the clothes out all over the balcony to let them dry and then I went to school. When I came back I'm walking towards where the stairway was to the apartment and I can see a shirt laying in the grass and I said my God that's one of my shirts and I looked up towards the balcony of my apartment in there was nothing there and no lie scattered all around the parking lot was all my clothes. The wind blew them off the balcony and they were just laying there. They were dry but they were now dirty again and scattered all across the parking lot. Needless to say I would never do that again.
Another fun story that I like to tell consisted of me needing to walk across West Charleston Boulevard to the local Walgreens. This was at like 11:00-11:30 at night. I needed something God knows what it was but I crossed the road there was nobody anywhere and I'm walking into the parking lot of Walgreens and suddenly a police car comes flying in. An officer gets out and puts me against the hood of the car I guess I was seen as a threat. I ended up not getting a ticket but I was yelled at for jaywalking when there was nobody around. Put on the hood of the car in the Walgreens parking lot for jaywalking with no cars within sight at all. Holidays were fun going in having Thanksgiving at this little Casino called Arizona Charlie's with my dad and they had the buffet there. There was a place called Chuy's that I went like the couple times and had lunch with my uncle Aunt and cousin that was kind of their favorite place. It was a different feel a different vibe than Cape Cod in the way that everything was open and sprawling and mean after all it's in the middle of a desert.
So naturally I know what you're saying if everything was great Vegas I enjoyed well work except for not making money and college and having the chance to have any kind of food you want the gym right there and you don't need a car, why did you end up leaving and going back to Cape Cod? Well that leads into another good story so at one point I think this was in December of 2000 and my family from Cape Cod came to visit, my nana, my aunt Susan, and my Uncle Bob. When family comes to Vegas you want to go out to the casinos and have a good time so even though I didn't really go to the casinos when I was just living on my own there I went with the family. There was a place at the end of West Charleston Boulevard a new casino called the Suncoast which was the place we all went to because it was kind of centrally located not on the Strip. I went in there and we all started gambling and I started playing roulette and roulette is fun except when you forget to take into account that what you're using for the chips to bet is real money and it's not a video game. At first I started winning and I was winning a lot I was up several thousand which is great but the rest of the family was at the table and they kind of looked at me and said 'well this table's yours so we're all going to clear out and give it to you,' and that must have been the turn of my luck because I started lose. Slowly I was whittling away at my stack of chips until I got all the way to where I had no chips left and I had in my mind that you know the tables hot I got to get more money. So I started running to the ATM machine pulling money out left and right going back betting, losing, going back, betting and losing over and over. Then we get done at the end of the day and we laughed and everything seemed to be all right until the morning. That was when I went to the ATM I had a Washington Mutual account. Then you could take out $5 from your ATM machine to spend now it has to be 10 or 20. I try to take out $5 for breakfast and it said insufficient funds I said that's not good, so I checked my balance and it was I think -$400 so basically I had blown all the money that I had made at the casino before, then blew through everything in my account, and overdrew it by several hundred dollars all in the name of 'the tables hot I got to play roulette.'
Now that one gambling time wouldn't have been the end all be all but occasionally I'd take my paycheck from Target and I had gone into an Albertsons Supermarket or a 7-Eleven and blown through most of or all of my paycheck at the keno and slot machines on a Friday. So bottom line was I had a nice gambling problem even though I didn't go to casinos gambling is legal and it's everywhere and if you got a problem you got to have moderation. I did not. The first week of January in 2001 I bought a one way bus ticket on Greyhound from Las Vegas that would end up back in Hyannis and I will be back on Cape Cod after my time in Vegas.
That's the story, well kind of cliff notes story, of my time in Las Vegas that ended about 20 years ago this week. There's some retro you get to hear about some of my favorite stories from Vegas and what made it special and why I would still love to go back and visit my Uncle Aunt and Cousin are all still out there so that might happen once Covid ends maybe by the end of 2021 I'll be back out there to visit Vegas. I promise you at some point in the future I will do the second part of the story which is the bus trip back which is exciting and I'll do the 1991 year in music review that I want to do in a future episode but I hope you had some laughs at my expense for my time in Vegas.
54:07 Closing:
That's gonna do it for another episode of the In My Footsteps Podcast Episode 6. The first of the new year is now in the books. Thank you so much to everyone who has listened to any of these episodes I really appreciate it. I'm gonna keep working hard trying to make each episode better than the one before. That being said we got another one coming next week it's my first attempt at doing 3 weeks on 1 week off so we're going to have part 2 of my interview with Kaylin Orr, Koach KO. It's going to be good, I got some good Q&A in there for her but there's more than that to episode 7. We're gonna take a trip up to the beautiful ski resort town of Stowe, Vermont. We're gonna go this week in history again including a really interesting one about the history of MTV's Unplugged show, and also we're gonna go back in the day and relive some old school snow days. Some of the fun that we used to have when we were kids all around the neighborhood and stuff we used to do in the snow.
As always find me on Facebook at the In My Footsteps Podcast page, on Twitter ChrisSetterlund is my handle, Instagram I've got 2 pages my personal one which is all my photography and then In My Footsteps Podcast has its own page. I also have a YouTube channel. I just posted a new video 4K New England featuring Fort Tabor Park in New Bedford, Massachusetts, that's a good one. I'll also be posting the video part of my first interview with Kaylin Orr today. It's good we take a little tour of Studio EX so that'll be good. That'll be going up next week. Check out my website Christopher Setterlund.com it's been run by my good friend Barry Menard a great graphic designer he designed this in 2008 and he's been keeping up on it since then even though he's so busy that he really shouldn't have the time to do that but he's such a great guy and I really appreciate him. But on that site we've got all 5 of my books that are currently out are there for sale they're also on Amazon so if you want to check out the In My Footsteps travel series, Historic Restaurants of Cape Cod, and Cape Cod Nights.
I wanted to give a shout out to DJ Williams whose song James River is what you hear in the intro and outro he's got some stuff up on Soundcloud. It's a great song I love it I have it on my iPod now and also a shout out to Kevin Macleod. His song Lightless Dawn was what you heard at the beginning of that Betty and Barney Hill UFO segment earlier in the podcast. I had been looking for that song for a while I heard it on a you tube video and couldn't find it anywhere. I heard it on another video more recently and actually tracked it down.
So tune in next week for episode 7 until then stay safe everyone the corona virus pandemic is not over yet we're getting closer but just keep safe. Remember don't walk in anyone else's footsteps create your own path on this journey we call life and I'll see you next week take care everyone.