Episode 44 begins by going back more than a century to the story of the creation of the Cape Cod Canal, more specifically the three original bridges that spanned across it. Whatever happened to them?
This week's Road Trip takes us to the city of Lynchburg, Virginia. Chock full of culture, waterfront scenery, an historic marketplace and more this will surely leaving you itching to pay the city a visit.
We go way Back In the Day to 30 years ago and the release of Tecmo Super Bowl for the NES. This football classic changed what sports simulation games meant. The only question was did you play as Bo Jackson's Raiders, or Lawrence Taylor's Giants?
A brand new Top 5 showcases some of the best Maine towns. From the coast to inland, from south to north, big cities to small towns, check out which made this list and then go and see them for yourself.
There's a new installment of This Week In History and a Time Capsule all surrounding the creation of the legend of children's television, Sesame Street.
Be sure to watch for my livestreams called Without A Map Friday's at 8pm on Instagram which serve as a sort of postgame show for the podcast. Find them on IGTV and YouTube after they've finished.
Helpful Links from this Episode(available through Buzzsprout)
Listen to Episode 43 here.
Episode 44 begins by going back more than a century to the story of the creation of the Cape Cod Canal, more specifically the three original bridges that spanned across it. Whatever happened to them?
This week's Road Trip takes us to the city of Lynchburg, Virginia. Chock full of culture, waterfront scenery, an historic marketplace and more this will surely leaving you itching to pay the city a visit.
We go way Back In the Day to 30 years ago and the release of Tecmo Super Bowl for the NES. This football classic changed what sports simulation games meant. The only question was did you play as Bo Jackson's Raiders, or Lawrence Taylor's Giants?
A brand new Top 5 showcases some of the best Maine towns. From the coast to inland, from south to north, big cities to small towns, check out which made this list and then go and see them for yourself.
There's a new installment of This Week In History and a Time Capsule all surrounding the creation of the legend of children's television, Sesame Street.
Be sure to watch for my livestreams called Without A Map Friday's at 8pm on Instagram which serve as a sort of postgame show for the podcast. Find them on IGTV and YouTube after they've finished.
Helpful Links from this Episode(available through Buzzsprout)
Listen to Episode 43 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 44. This week’s show is going to kick off with a little slice of Cape Cod history as I share the story of the original Cape Cod canal bridges not the ones that we see today, Sagamore and born. But the ones that were there when the canal first opened. We're gonna go way back in the day as I get all excited to tell you about Tecmo Super Bowl for the Nintendo Entertainment System and all the fun times I had playing that there's another stop on the road trip as we stopped into Lynchburg, Virginia, we're gonna have a brand new top five, this will be my top five favorite main towns so that's a good one to get some travel tips on is going to be a brand new this week in history and time capsule. All of that more on episode 44 of the in my footsteps podcast. Welcome everybody. It's more of a normal week this week. Thankfully after last week when we had the huge storm that knocked out power for when I recorded the podcast. I'm so happy that it's mundane and normal now power and everything seems back to its regular ways. And also thankfully the storm didn't take down all the leaves. So there's still some foliage around that was another thing I was worried about is not getting out there to get any beautiful foliage on Cape Cod shots. Because when you think of foliage, I would think most of you think about Northern New England, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, but Cape Cod gets a lot on its own. It's just usually later in the season around this time mid-November. I'm a big fan of the foliage stuff I don't know if you are if you think it's overrated that people go crazy. The leaf peepers. I love November, not just because it's my birthday month, which just passed last week, but my mother's birthday is coming up. It'll be a few days after this podcast goes live. Then my sister Kate, her birthday is a few weeks after that. Naturally, we got Thanksgiving. So there's a lot of celebrations and family stuff. And that gets more important as the years go by Thanksgiving back when I was a kid was just an excuse to eat and eat and eat. And now yeah, the food's still great. But it's more important to spend time with the people that mean the most to you, especially when you get older and those days kind of get fewer and further between. The one thing I think we can all agree on though is the ending of Daylight Savings Time and turning the clock back. That's just the worst thing about November it like signifies that Winter's coming which winter is fine. Like the first snow of the year is usually nice unless it's a blizzard. But then after that, it's just cold and dreary and everything is barren. But yeah, now that the sunset, so when this goes live on November 11. Sunset is at 4:24 Oh my god, it's terrible. And I just went to check to see to really make it depressing when the earliest sunset of the year is and we're looking at the first week of December. Basically, the sunset gets down to 4:10. But then it's hard to go back up. But Oh man, it's just rough. But no matter the weather, or the sunset times or whatever. I keep coming through with the podcasts. Hopefully, you've enjoyed the first year now we're in year two. And this is episode 44. So it's the second episode of year two, but I'm not going to renumber the episodes I'm too lazy. Thank you to everyone who has been tuning in. And hopefully I keep the content fun and interesting. And here's one that I think is interesting, and I'll try to make it as interesting for you. Let's kick off episode 44 with the story of the original Cape Cod canal bridges right now on episode 44 of the in my footsteps podcast.
The Original Cape Cod Canal Bridges
On July 24 1914. The Cape Cod Canal was opened after construction had begun five years earlier. On June 19 1909. It opened as a privately operated toll waterway and connected Cape Cod Bay to Buzzards Bay. The canal shorten the distance needed to bypass Cape Cod immensely. After that the Peninsula that was known as Cape Cod once the canal had been completed, it became a man-made island, and naturally being an island there was a need for bridges to cross the canals, so the canal was originally 100 feet wide. It was expanded to its current 480-foot width in 1935. But there were bridges needed to drive across the canal. In 1910 the Buzzards Bay railroad bridge became the first to be constructed with the first Bourne bridge edge cutting a year later in 1911 and the Sagamore Bridge becoming the third and it was completed in 1913. Those two vehicle bridges Sagamore in Bourne, they consisted of 280-foot cantilever spans. These are long projecting beams fixed at one end. So yeah, the original born and Sagamore bridges were dropped bridges electronically operated, which when opened provided 140-foot navigational clearance for boats to pass through. The drawbridge is would prove to be a hassle for mariners, though the swift current of the canal prove dangerous for the vessels, trying to wait for the drawbridge just to be opened. After officially opening the canal. The problems with the bridges and current caused fear among the mariners leading to an underwhelming number of vehicles passing through the canal in its first few years. It was like people would rather keep going around the Cape than go through the canal and risk smashing into the sides waiting for the drawbridge. So initially, the Cape Cod canal was deemed a failure. During World War One, the canal was taken over by the Federal Railroad Administration under the orders of President Woodrow Wilson. Despite it being returned to the control of the original owner, August Belmont after the war, it became apparent that there needed to be at least some improvements made to the bridges over the canal. In 1928, the United States Army Corps of Engineers took over the operation of the Cape Cod canal thanks to the authority of the Rivers and Harbors act of 1927. The canal was improved, widened, and deepened. Despite those improvements to the actual waterway. The biggest improvements came through the construction of three entirely new bridges. The new Bourne and Sagamore bridges would be fixed structures rather than draw bridges. They also would have an elevation of 135 feet above the mean water level, which was a stark increase from the 41-foot clearance underneath the original drawbridges when they were closed to new bridges that were built simultaneously beginning in 1933, thanks in part to the Industrial Recovery Act of that same year. It was trying to help get businesses going more as the Great Depression started to take hold. They would be located in close proximity to the original bridges and open for business on June 21 1935. The original railroad bridge would also be replaced. Construction began in December 1933 With the new railroad bridge opening September 20 1935. The bridge at the time was the longest vertical lift railroad bridge in the world at 544 feet in length that was eventually topped by the Arthur keel vertical lift Bridge, which connected Elizabeth port New Jersey to Staten Island, New York. That mall was built in 1959 and it's 558 feet in length. The three current Cape Cod canal bridges have been helping people cross the waterway for more than 80 years now. And it's easy to believe that they were always there. However, if one looks, they can actually find the remnants of the original born in Sagamore bridges. For the Bourne bridge, one can cross over the canal get off immediately at the first exit and go about three-quarters of a mile down Route 28. And there you'll find the appropriately named Old Bridge Road. You follow it to the end and get out onto the bike trail of the canal you go to the right and there is one of the drawbridges approaches it looks like just a giant 20 foot tall concrete slab it's got a painting on it like a mural of what the bridge used to look like. And that's pretty cool because it brings it to life. What used to be there. And then on the other end of the canal on the cape side do you go out onto the bike trail on the canal but on the cape side and it's roughly about light pole number 115 they're all numbered along the canal. I guess it helps if there's any trouble with people getting hurt or lost or boats if there's any damage you can kind of judge by the light pole to where emergency crews have to go. But there is where you'll find a similar giant concrete slab for where the Sagamore drawbridge was located. And this one is topped by an A-frame house which is on Pleasant Street and born those original drawbridge abutments to concrete. They're fun to find. It's like being a detective. And it's a connection to the past. I mean those things opened over 100 years ago. And you can find photos too. There's a website I go to a lot when I'm doing blog posts for the in my footsteps podcast blog. It's called digital commonwealth.org and it's run by the Boston Public Library, it's 1000s and 1000s of historic photos and documents from the State of Massachusetts. And if you look up Sagamore Bridge or Bourne bridge, you're gonna find a lot of these old drawbridge photos, it's wild to see how different they looked. And to think that that was what originally crossed the canal. I think they even have photos of shipwrecks where the boats that were waiting for the drawbridge crashed into the rocks on the side. And of course, when it comes to the canal, and the current Sagamore and Bourne bridges, there's always construction going on with those, which especially like if they do it in summer, it just kills traffic and slows it down. So the question is always around of when those bridges are going to be replaced. Because think about it, they're coming up on 100 years since they've been opened. So I'm sure at some point, maybe in my lifetime, maybe in your lifetime, they will replace the canal bridges a second time. But until then, we've got the old Sagamore and born bridges still going. Part of me wishes we had dropped bridges, though, I would love to go back and see what those were like. But for those of you that had never heard the story of the original Cape Cod Canal bridges, there you go a little trip back in time, over 100 years to the original canal bridges, the problems that went with them and their eventual replacement.
Road Trip: Lynchburg, VA
All right, this is the next installment of the 2019 road trip. After the last two, the Blue Ridge Parkway being a fail, and Appomattox, Virginia being a semi-fail. This one is more normal. The next stop on the road trip was the city of Lynchburg, Virginia. It's basically right next door to Appomattox, Virginia, which is why it was convenient to stop there. It's 115 miles west of Richmond. And with a population of just over 80,000 in 2019. It was one of the biggest cities that I stopped at. I tried intentionally to not stop at big cities on this trip. So if you've been following and you know the loop that I took out through upstate New York, Pennsylvania and south, I easily had chances to go through New York City, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, they were all right there but I chose to go to the smaller ones mid-size ones, because that interested me more. Lynchburg is definitely quintessential Virginia. It's got the foliage like many places do this time of year, but it's also got that industrial heartbeat underneath. It dates back to John Lynch and his first ferry crossing of the James River in 1757. And that's another interesting thing is the James River that crosses through it. For those of you that have been listening to the podcast, you heard it at the beginning. The song that I use for the theme is called James River by a man named DJ Williams. I always put the links to his website and his albums in there and it's an awesome song. But the James River that it's named for goes through Lynchburg. Lynchburg is very much a walkable city. They've got 40 miles of urban trails, the downtown riverfront area, and they've got one of the things that I love about a lot of different cities and towns and that's a historic Main Street. on Cape Cod. We've got Chatham and Falmouth and Hyannis have pretty nice Main Streets. I'm a big fan of those, Lynchburg has got the same thing. They've got a mix of history and modern amenities, with trendy boutiques and lofts and local cafes, and a new craft brewery. But then you've got landmarks from a century ago like the iconic Beaux Arts Theater, the Grande Virginian hotel, which have all been restored to make them look like they're brand new, but they're from over a century ago. If you're strolling along Main Street, one of the places you've got to visit is the Lynchburg Community Market, which has been open since 1783. It's actually one of the nation's oldest markets located in downtown Lynchburg. Back in the 19th century, when it was on Water Street it served more as a town square and open-air market people would just go and meet there. It's been enlarged and rebuilt several times. But today after many changes in the building style and location, the Community Market and armory stands on the corner of Main and 12th streets. And that area, the downtown area Main Street it's got that neat little throwback feel with cigar shops and gentlemen John's classic barber shop. Even if you're not into that or you're not looking for that when you get to Lynchburg it's hard not to get immersed and kind of just lose yourself in the atmosphere. After you're done strolling the town or wandering main street or going to the community market, you can grab a drink at Star Hill on Main. They're located at 1300 Main Street and also star hill.com. And it is the second-oldest craft brewery in Virginia. The most popular drink in there is the specially made Main street IPA, so you can stop in there for a drink but if you want something to eat, there's a lot of restaurants in the area. If you're looking for a classic typical Sports Bar, they got the main street Sports Bar and Grill at 1125 main street, or also main S T grill va.com They got pizza at Benny Scarpetta has you got sushi at RG ramen and sushi, and they got incredible rolled ice cream at rolled cold Creamery on 819 Main Street and rolled cold creamery.com If you've never had it, it's literally what it sounds like rolled ice cream is wild. It's something that you've got to try at least once. If you're looking for more culture, you can visit the Academy Center of the Arts. It's a historic theater that plays host to five resident companies. They got Opera, Chorus, Symphony ballet and theater. They bring in people from Broadway shows. And it's got a neat history because it was opened in 1905. But then for 60 years, it was closed before it was reopened in 2018. After a $30 million renovation. Check out what they've got coming up at Academy center.org and then go visit them if you're down in Lynchburg at 600 Main Street. So you've checked out Lynchburg you've grabbed something to eat maybe a drink get one of the breweries you've taken a walk around the riverfront, you've gone to see some culture gone to take into show. Now you got to find a place to stay to spend the night because you got to take more than one day there. I would recommend booking your stay at the Lynchburg Grand Hotel that 601 Main Street and also at Lynchburg grandhotel.com But of course, you know make up your own mind when you go down to Lynchburg or you go to any of these places on my road trips. I always just give suggestions and recommendations based on my tastes and my likes, and yours may be different. So that's why it's always better to kind of get an overall scope and overall view on your own. So visit Lynchburg virginia.org They've got everything you could possibly need to book your stay and find places to go things to do things to eat and drink. And you're so close to a lot of different things. As I said the Blue Ridge Parkway goes near there, and Appomattox, Virginia is close to there. Richmond isn't that far away. And I hope you've enjoyed these road trip segments so far from this six-day 2100 mile road trip that I did now two years ago basically this month, I've still got several more places to share that I got a lot that I'm excited about to share. So tune in again next week on episode 45 When the next road trip will be historic Jamestown, Virginia, but before then check out Lynchburg and now every time you hear James River to begin or end the podcast, you can think about going to Lynchburg because that's where James River is from and you can take your own road trip
Sponsor: Wear Your Wish
November is here. That's the month that has Thanksgiving in it. And there's so much to be thankful for health friends and family, but it's also the birth month of the Creator, owner CEO of Wear your wish Katie marks. Katie has worked so hard on her clothing accessory apparel line and so much more. There's always new things to check out at wear your wishes.com They've got new boho T-shirts, check out the double-layer feather anklet in the jewelry. There's so much more there for bracelets for T shirts, and sweatshirts. There's fashions for all ages, and all genders at all times of year for gifts for yourself. All of it high-quality merchandise created with love straight from the mind of Katie marks. Anything from joggers, and sweatpants to tote bags to tabletop fountains and there's always new stuff coming out. Whatever I mentioned now for November, there's going to be new stuff coming out in the next weeks. Things for Thanksgiving or Christmas or New Year's or spring. It's all there. There's wearable aromatherapy, sacred chakra wellness stone kit there are things You wouldn't even think of if you go to Wear your wishes.com and check out the Wear your wish brand, you're going to find something you want for yourself or something that you want to give to others. And that is the whole point, giving something wonderful to someone wonderful. And Katie marks at Wear your wish does that. So visit them today Wear your wishes.com and find that special something for that special someone.
This Week In History
This week in history, we're going back 52 years ago this week to November 10 1969. And the debut of probably the most iconic children's television show ever Sesame Street. Basically, anybody listening to this podcast, is familiar with Sesame Street and probably watched it considering that it's been out for 52 years. But if you're one of the handful that has never heard of it, it's a fictional street with a lot of fictional characters that were the Jim Henson Muppets that kind of got started on there. But there are other characters you know, Big Bird was the main one. Today's kids got Elmo. But there was Grover, Bert and Ernie, and the count, and they had regular people human characters as well. And it was all about learning and dealing with situations and growing up. as of the recording of this podcast, there are nearly 4600 episodes of Sesame Street. Everybody knows the song can you tell me how to get to Sesame Street? It was on PBS, and I think it still is on PBS but in 2016 It moved over to HBO and HBO Max. I think that's like the first run episodes, the new ones. But I believe you could find Sesame Street on PBS probably right now, if you pause this and go look at what started out as a simple educational program for kids. It grew into something so much bigger. It's like a cultural phenomenon. They did their live show Sesame Street Live. If you listened to episode 26 of the podcast where I talked about the Cape Cod Coliseum, you'll know that I said that the only time I ever went to the Coliseum was to see Sesame Street live in 1982. There have been movies including follow that bird where big bird gets kidnapped. I went and saw that in the theater when I was a kid got I was probably eight years old. There have been more than 180 albums of Sesame Street Music and the people that have written them there have been 11 Grammy Awards for Sesame Street. And they've got so many toys now based around the show. I mean, God you remember Tickle Me Elmo. Let me There you go. That thing was a huge huge deal up there with Cabbage Patch dolls. As of 2018, Sesame Street had received 189 Emmy Awards more than any other show in history. They've gotten award-winning website Sesame street.org it's consistently ranked as one of the greatest shows of all time, not just children's shows, but just the impact that it made. Think about it you listening to this part right now you've got your own memories of Sesame Street, whether it's Big Bird, Snuffy, Oscar the Grouch, Grover, Elmo, Cookie Monster, Kermit the Frog, and so many more. It's hard to imagine a world without Sesame Street. And that all began 52 years ago this week when Sesame Street debuted in 1969. And now it's time for a new time capsule. So this week, we're going to go back to that same day that Sesame Street debuted November 10 1969, and give you a little idea of what else was going on in the world of entertainment. The number one song was wedding bell Blues by the fifth dimension. This was off of their age of Aquarius album which I'm sure a lot of you know that song just look it up you'll know that one. The song was originally written by Laura Niro, and was actually covered by Morrissey years later after the fifth dimension covered it. The fifth dimension version of the song spent three weeks at number one. The number one movie was Easy Rider. It starred Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda Dennis Hopper and more and it's this is another speaking of cultural icons like Sesame Street, Easy Rider. Everybody knows. It's a motorcycle road trip movie that became kind of a slice of life slice of culture of 1969. And it was a huge success and ended up making more than $60 million on a budget of less than $400,000 when adjusted for inflation which brings its box office total to about $450 million. So that'll give you a better idea of what a success it was. The number one TV show was Rowan and Martin's laugh in. This was a classic variety show starring Dan Rowan and Dick Martin. They ran for six seasons between 1967 and 1973 with a total of 140 episodes. This was one of my youthful Nick at Nite pleasures When they first got Nick and night around here I used to watch laugh in, and it started the careers of a lot of people. Goldie Hawn, Lily Tomlin, Ruth, Buzzy, Henry Gibson, Gary Owens. Legend has it that when Richard Nixon appeared on it to do the socket to me part that that helped him win the election in 1968. The show definitely comes highly recommended. Just look it up and find any episode and you'll see if you like it or not if you like 1960s humor. And if you're a little kid, in November 1969, you just got done watching Sesame Street and you wanted to go play outside and enjoy the day, you could get a Jim set swing set straight out of the Sears catalog for 4995. Or about $373. when adjusted for inflation. It may not sound familiar, especially to the kids from the 1980s and 90s. But it's literally it's like the precursor to the classic swing set that you would use to have with the slide a couple of regular swings. And then that swing that was like a bench two benches put together. And they had the other swing that looked like the flying scooters they had in Star Wars Return to the Jedi. If you go to Christmas dot Muse technical.com There's a picture of it. That's where I found it from an old Sears catalog, an old beautiful swing set that would probably tip over if you all swung on at the same time. Those were the good old days. And that's going to wrap up another time capsule another this week in history. And it's the time right now to dive into a new top five. This is my top five picks for my favorite Maine towns. So let's jump right into that.
Top 5: Favorite Maine Towns
The term quintessential New England I throw around a lot. I'm sure a lot of people have heard that term. It's just the sights and sounds and attractions and the things to do that just scream New England, it's hard to describe until you're a part of it, whether it's skiing in the north, or shellfishing, or lobster fishing, long scenic drives, clam chowder, baked beans, all these things that you think of when someone says New England. And for me, there's quintessential New England, there's also the quintessential small towns. And so for me, the towns are what I want to share here with the top five and we're going to pick out the state of Maine. It's more than 35,000 square miles. A lot of it is unincorporated, especially way up north. But this here is going to be my list of the top five main towns. And boy this was a hard one to narrow down. Remember, as I always say these go in no particular order. So if you hear one that you like, and it's not where you think it should be, these are not going from A to Z. It's just random order. So let's let the arguments begin right now with some honorable mentions for my favorite Maine towns. They include Lubec, Portland, Old Orchard Beach, and Bangor. If any of those are on your top five are not on your top five or if you're curious about them or any of these checkout, visit maine.com. That's the state's tourism department and you'll kind of get a better idea of why I love these towns. But here they are the actual top five. Number one is York, York. Maine is the second town you will enter in Maine after crossing from the New Hampshire border right after Kittery. I could sum it up by saying York Maine is home to Cape Neddick also known as Nubble lighthouse and save that's enough for me, but it's also home to Long Sands Beach, Mount Agamenticus, York's Wild Kingdom zoo and park and a lot more. Number two is the town of Rockland. I fell in love with Rockland when I went up and stayed in neighboring owls head in 2010. It was my first ever real road trip. And naturally, surprise surprise, it's home to Rockland breakwater lighthouse, so there's a lighthouse so that naturally gets me all jazzed up. Rockland is so awesome, as far as I'm concerned that my buddy Steve and I actually drove all the way up there for one day to do photo trip. And for us down on Cape Cod, it's five hours to drive up there. So we had to get up at like 330 in the morning to head up there. I think we got we stopped a few places on the way but we got up to Rockland at like 930 But that's how great it is. It's also home to the Farnsworth house. Art Museum, the Maine lobster festival and a lot more. Number three is Bar Harbor. I love this because it's out on mount desert island. It's right next to Acadia National Park. It's got this feeling like you're on Nantucket or Martha's Vineyard or one of those islands. I guess it is an island. So that makes sense. The real key to Bar Harbor though is Acadia National Park. That's really, I mean, there is so much more, hotels and shops and restaurants. But for me, it was Acadia. I mean, Cadillac Mountain, the thunder hole, Katie is incredible. You need a week just for that. It'll be coming up on a road trip segment in the future, just Acadia. But there's a reason why so many cruise ships come into port at Bar Harbor. But I try to keep the segments shorter, the top five ones, so go to visit main.com and just look up Bar Harbor, you'll see why it's on my top five list. So those first three are probably places that you've heard of. And all the honorable mentions I think you will have heard of except for maybe Lubec. So these last two in the top five might be a little more obscure, but they're nonetheless just amazing. Number four on my top five favorite main towns is Machias. Machias is another place that I got familiar with on that original 2010 main road trip. And I got more familiar with it when I went up to Maine and 2019. When you're traveling east along Route 1, once you get past Bar Harbor, you keep going so when I was going out to Lubec, which is the furthest East you can go in the state of Maine and the United States, you start to realize just how wide open and how barren the area is. So much is became like an oasis. It was the last bastion of civilization before you got to Lubec which was 45 minutes further east. And it's every bit of small town there's only a population of just over 2000, but it's home to the bold coast. Bad Little Falls Park which is pretty neat. Middle River Park, and for me, I loved eating at the bluebird ranch family restaurant. That's where I first learned what fiddleheads were. For those of you that don't know it's a vegetable, it's kinda like asparagus, sorta, but it's neat. It's pretty good. And finally, number five on my list of favorite main towns speaking of small towns, it is the small town of Hallowell. This one may seem out of left field, this one might be the place that you've never heard of. It's a small town just outside of the capital city of Augusta. They have a population of just over 2400 and it is every bit classic small-town America. You can take a walk in the historic Vaughn woods, grab a drink at the liberal cup, you can sit in one of the Adirondack chairs at Granite City Park and just overlook the Kennebec River. You can grab a bite to eat at the lucky garden Chinese food restaurant, or just wander the streets and just enjoy what it's like to be in a classics quintessential New England, small-town Maine area. It also doesn't hurt that one of my oldest friends Shayna and her husband and their two kids live in Hallowell. So that always makes it more fun to go there as well. Maybe I'm a little biased. But that wraps up my top five. Have you been to any of those places in Maine? Have you been to York or Rockland Bar Harbor? Or Mathias? Have you been to Hollowell you should check out all of those and the honorable mentions make it a big road trip. And I'll be back next week with another top five.
Back In the Day: Tecmo Super Bowl
Oh, man, this has been one that I've wanted to talk about for quite a while on the podcast as we go way, way back in the day. And I discussed what was probably my first-ever favorite video game. And I'm sure a favorite of a lot of 80s young boys and 90s kids. And that was Tecmo Super Bowl for the Nintendo Entertainment System. An all-time classic. I spent hundreds and hundreds of hours playing this game for Nintendo. Back when it came out in 1991. In 1989, there was the original tech mobile, which you know, it was all right, it was a football game. The sequel though Tecmo Super Bowl in 1991 was leaps and bounds ahead. I mean, not in terms of you know, graphics, it was whatever it's eight-bit for Nintendo. It's nothing like what you see today with PS five and such. But back in the day when that was all you had. It was amazing. And the big thing was Tecmo the company that created the game, they got all of the NFL licenses, so they could literally have all the real players on there, which made it so much more realistic. I mean, playing a football game with just no name people wasn't as much fun. So let's transport ourselves back to 14-year-old me playing Tecmo Super Bowl for the first time. Obviously, I grew up in New England, you know from this podcast. So who did I choose to play as the New England Patriots? No, they stunk. So 1991 I guess they would have used the 1990 team. The 1990 patriots team is one of the worst in NFL history. They went one and 15 they were an absolute disgrace. Like I said in Episode 39. When I talked about being a 1980s Patriots fan, their games, they were so bad, they were blacked out here in the whole market. So I always got giants games, or Buffalo Bills, games. So naturally, that's who I gravitated towards the teams were good. If you pick the New York Giants, you had Lawrence Taylor, who was like having a tank ripping through the offensive line, he just would throw guys left and right. No one could stop him. Except for one. If you weren't Lawrence Taylor and the Giants, there was only one other team that you could be to stand a chance against them. And that was the Los Angeles Raiders. With their running back. Bo Jackson. If you don't know Bo Jackson if you're younger, man you missed out you need to look him up and find he was one of the greatest athletes in the history of American sports. Literally, great at football great at baseball, a terrible hip injury ended his career early. But if you play as him on Tecmo Super Bowl, that guy can just run over five guys at once. It was almost unfair. If you played as the Raiders, he would just every time do the power sweep or go right up the middle and Bo Jackson would just crush everybody. So you'd have to be either the Raiders or the giants to have any chance to win really because you had the two best players in the game. Some of the funny things I'm remembering about the game was that not everybody that was in the NFL at the time granted the use of their name. So for example, the Philadelphia Eagles had Randall Cunningham as their quarterback but he didn't give his name. So he was just QB eagles. So we so even though it didn't have Randall Cunningham, it was all the same attributes. So super fast, a great running quarterback way ahead of his time, but he was QB eagles. There were some great players though if you weren't Lawrence Taylor, if you weren't Bo Jackson. They had some great ones. I mean, on defense, Derrick Thomas Mike Singletary. Howie long Chris Doleman. Those are legends of Tecmo Super Bowl and the NFL in general. Even Joe Montana was in there before he came out with his own sports talk football, which that'll be in some future episode, I'll cover that one. It was so much fun to play, either one player or two players, play against friends and see him get pissed off. If you pick the Giants or the Raiders. That would be would basically be it. You'd always be playing as those teams. Although when I think of Tecmo Super bowl, mostly I think of my friend Hasan. He and I would play that all the time. And he was a big New York sports fan. So he was you know, huge into the Knicks and Patrick Ewing and huge into the Giants and Lawrence Taylor, and the Mets and Darryl Strawberry. You'd play a full season week by week and you'd amass your stats and get into the playoffs and then go for the actual Super Bowl. We used to play it at his house a lot. He had the game. I think I got my copy after him. But we were playing at his house. And I remember I got called my mother called his house told me it was time I think to go home and have dinner. And we were literally in the middle. I was watching him play the actual Super Bowl game. And I was so mad because I hadn't seen anyone win the Super Bowl yet. And I had to go home and I told him I said call me if you win. And he did. It wasn't that long after that he called up I remember he was so excited. We won the Super Bowl, and I was all excited. You know, 14-year-old me was so excited about Tecmo Super bowl being beaten that shows the times there. The game was so much fun, you know, a sports simulation game. There weren't that many back in 1991-92. And yeah, the music is cheesy eight-bit sounding music. The graphics aren't great, but that doesn't matter. The gameplay is still pretty fun. The ability to be actual NFL players or have the Pro Bowl mode where you had the all-star team. You'd score touchdowns and they'd have these cutaway scenes of like someone catching the ball. There was so state of the art back 30 years ago, a 16 bit version of Tecmo Super Bowl was released in 93 for the Sega Genesis and the Super NES, I think I had the Genesis one. And it was the same idea, just better graphics, and a few new modes to it, there will be different things like the weather would change for game so you could get rain or snow and playing in the snow was fun. You could change up the playbook if you wanted to. And obviously, there were different players as the years went on the game and the series has received such a huge cult following with the rosters constantly being updated with new college players, you know, even up to now, there are tournaments that they do. At the peak in 2016, there were 26 Different Tecmo Super Bowl tournaments, which is wild. It just goes to show the staying power of the game. And even doing this now I haven't played that game in 25 years. But I immediately can think of players that were great back then in the game. I mean, besides the ones I mentioned, Bo Jackson and Lt. But guys like Christian Okoye, from the chiefs, or Dalton Hilliard from the saints. I literally hadn't thought of those guys names in decades and just researching and going back over Tecmo Superbowl I just remember playing as them. And sure I'd play as the Patriots every now and then. They had Andre Tippett, Irving Fryar, and they still had Steve Grogan, I think. But man, that team wasn't good. If you wanted to win on Tecmo Super Bowl, you needed to be the Raiders or the Giants. But looking back Tecmo Super Bowl was a game that changed sports video games and put more emphasis and eyes on NFL players that you might not have heard of, especially back in the day when you didn't have streaming and you didn't just get any game you want at any time. And although you could probably get a copy now or you could probably get it for the PC where it's hacked, and you've got today's rosters in it. Nothing beats the original 1991 game, because it just blew everyone's mind if you were a teenage boy, back then playing Nintendo and Tecmo Super Bowl. It was like nothing we'd seen I played it hundreds and hundreds of hours, even if every now and then I had to blow on the cartridge to get it to start. Or I had to start all over because I forgot to save it and someone stomped on the floor and the cartridge shot up out of the Nintendo. Oh my God, those were the worst times to lose your game right in the middle. Did any of you out there play Tecmo Super Bowl? Are you my age? You know kids are the 80s Did you play it? Have you ever heard of it? If not, go check it out. I bet you could find it on the PC even to play one of the emulator games. Those were definitely some good old days I missed those days playing with Hasan. Tecmo Super Bowl getting mad if he was the Giants and Lawrence Taylor. I definitely grew up in a great time to be a kid for sure.
Closing
That's going to do it that will wrap up episode 44 of the in my footsteps podcast. Thank you so much to everyone who checks it out every week. Thank you so much to those that may maybe this is the first episode you've ever heard. Thank you for giving it a shot. I do my best each week to come up with interesting topics to share with you. Hopefully you find them interesting. And you share the podcast with people you know, that's how we grow this thing. More eyes and ears on it means the longer I can keep going with this. Make sure to find me on Instagram and check out the weekly live streams I call them without a map Fridays at eight. Hopefully, there'll be no more power outages which makes it where it's almost every other week that something happens where I don't do the live stream. Also find me on Twitter go become a fan of my Facebook page the in my footsteps podcast page, and find the blog it's all in my footsteps. I tried to make it real easy to find me if you find me in one you find me in them all. Interestingly, this podcast will go live on November 11, 11-11 So make sure you go to visit Wear your wish it Wear your wishes.com I know I had the ad in there but the fact that it's 1111 is when this podcast will go live. It was just too much of a coincidence that I couldn't miss mentioning that and as I mentioned in the Lynchburg road trip part go to DJ williams.com He's got albums tons of great music that's where I found James River which the song is awesome. I have it on my actual iPod playlist if that's a thing anymore. If you want to buy me a coffee you can go to buy me a coffee.com Donate to support the podcast, and find the in my footsteps podcast there any donations go to advertising the podcast because that's what I'm looking to do. increase visibility for this creative work I do. If at any point you have any questions about the podcast Sorry about topics or things like that. shoot me a message on Instagram or Twitter, Christopher setterlund@gmail.com. I keep saying I want to do a q&a segment. But you know, things happen where I forget. And here I am at the end of the podcast this weekend to go Yeah, I probably should mention that in case people want to do that. I wanted to send a special birthday shout-out to my mom Laurie. Her birthday will come after this podcast goes live. And next week's episode, we'll have a special time capsule for her birth date. But I wanted to make sure I gave her a shout. And I hope you enjoyed the present that you got because you'll probably have it in your hand as you're listening to this, hopefully. But I love you very much. And I hope that you had a great birthday and you got a lot of special messages from a lot of special people because we in the family, you know, we all come from you. All of us kids, all the grandkids were here because of you. And the hits will just keep on coming next week with episode 45 of the podcast. Like I just mentioned, my mom will get a special time capsule for her birthday. There's going to be a new road trip, like I said to historic Jamestown, Virginia. I'm going to share the story of another all-time Cape Cod icon and that is the Cape Cod melody tent. There'll be a new top five with the top five disco era bands. And I'm gonna go way way back in the day, 30 years to look back at U2’s Achtung Baby baby album, which I think is one of the best albums at least of my lifetime. And I'll tell you why. So it's going to be a very music-heavy episode next week. I'm excited about that. I wanted to make sure that I took a minute to give my condolences to the friends and family of legendary Red Sox player and commentator Jerry Remy. He passed away on October 30. I found out about it on Halloween but I was out on kind of an expedition and last week's podcast had already been recorded. But he battled lung cancer so many times and beat it so many times. And it's just sad and he was definitely he was too young at 68 with his birthday actually would have just passed on November 8. But growing up, especially during the time when the Red Sox were just getting good. And starting to sniff the World Series. There was nothing better than watching a baseball game with Jerry Remy and Don Orsillo calling it because even when the game was boring or slow or a blowout, just the banter between those two was just it was incredible. We who grew up in this area had been so lucky with our sports commentators, especially back then Remy and Orsillo, Tommy Heinsohn and Mike Gorman, Gil Santos and Bob Cousy, Fred Cusick, Shawn Grande and Cedric Maxwell, Scott Zolak and Bob Socci. All those guys. It's amazing, but I wanted to give my condolences to Jerry Remy’s family and friends, he will be missed. And until next week, remember in this life, don't walk in anyone else's footsteps. Create your own path and enjoy every moment you can on this journey that we call life because you never know when the next sunset is the last sunset. So take advantage of every second we've got breathing this air on this beautiful planet. Thank you all again for tuning into Episode 44. I'll be back next week. Until then, have a great week. A great weekend and I will talk to you all again soon.