Working, Then and Now

Radio Diaries

50 years ago, radio broadcaster Studs Terkel published a book called WORKING: People Talk About What They Do All Day, and How They Feel About What They Do.

Terkel went around the country with a tape recorder and had conversations with ordinary Americans about their jobs and their reflections on them. The book ended up being an unexpected bestseller.

For a long time, the recordings of these interviews went unheard, but back in 2015, we and Jane Saks at Project& were given access to the original raw interviews. We also tracked down some of the people Terkel had interviewed to catch up on their lives, and made a series called "Working, Then and Now." 50 years later, it's interesting how much some jobs have changed, and others have disappeared entirely. Today on the podcast, we revisit that series in an hour-long special.