A few years before Grandpa Casdorph passed away, my mother, Virginia Casdorph Porter, compiled and published his autobiography. A few years after Grandpa died, I uploaded the text of the book to FamilySearch.org in the form of Memories (one for each chapter). This has made his stories easily accessible via a smartphone or tablet. However, I can’t count the number of times I’ve found myself on a long trip with my kids and wished I had an audio version of grandpa’s stories. After researching various options, I determined that a serial podcast would provide an easy way to host and distribute audio recordings of his autobiography. I published the first episode (chapter 1) on Dec 10, 2023, and I plan to record and publish episodes for the remaining 31 chapters over the next year.

I don’t really have Grandpa’s distinct voice or inflection, but I’ve tried to record the text in a way that will be easy to listen to and enjoyable for the family to listen to.

How to Listen to the Podcast

The podcast is semi-private, that is, it doesn’t show up in search results when searching for podcasts on Apple or Spotify. However, anyone may add the podcast to their preferred Podcast app via the podcast’s URL. Here are instructions on how to add it to the Podcast app on an iPhone:

  1. Open the Podcasts app (purple icon)
  2. Select the Library tab (at the bottom of the screen).
  3. Select the option: “Follow a Show by URL…” (it might be in the triple-dot icon in the upper-right corner).
  4. Paste in this URL:
    • https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Xk034PASWRt0BBW3VnOcSabf2-RHQ_1Q/view?usp=sharing
  5. At this point, you should see the podcast appear with Grandpa’s face.

Note: I’m working on adding an integrated podcast player to this page.

Invitation to Participate

I would like to invite any of Grandpa’s children or grandchildren to help me with this project. Here are two ways:

  1. Record a chapter – if anyone would like to try their hand at recording a chapter, I would love to share the joy that I’ve felt reading aloud and recording Grandpa’s stories. I can help with any difficulties and with editing and publishing the final result.
  2. Participate in a recorded roundtable discussion – I would like to append each chapter with a live discussion (3-5 people) to provide additional insight and anecdotes about the events and topics from the chapter, especially providing more details about Grandma.

If you would like to help out, feel free to contact me directly.

Merry Christmas 2023!

Sterling Casdorph Porter