Shoe Leather

Episode 6: The Survivor

It’s been 56 years since the Greenwich Village townhouse exploded. Three people died. The rest vanished. The only one left alive to tell the story is Cathy Wilkerson, now 81—still wrestling with what she did, what she believes, and what, if anything, she truly regrets. Episode 6: The Survivor was reported, written, and produced by Chloe Stein and Eleanor Barzun.

Episode 5: The Prisoner

Kathy Boudin is the fourth member of the Weatherman. After running from the flames of the townhouse, she goes into hiding for over a decade. That’s until one day, when she resurfaces in a way that will define the course of her life. Kathy’s revolutionary ideals eventually land her in prison. Was she a hopeless idealist? Or a radical revolutionary? Is her redemption driven by conviction, or by guilt? … In the end, does everyone deserve a second chance? Listen to Episode 5: The Prisoner. This episode was reported, written, and produced by Justine Streichenberger and Aleah Gatto.

Episode 4: The Explosion

It’s March 6, 1970. A townhouse suddenly explodes in New York City’s Greenwich Village, killing three of the five people inside. Two escape. Police think it’s a gas explosion at first…until they find explosives in the rubble. Who was in the townhouse that day? What happened to the survivors? And what exactly were they planning?

Episode 3: The Comrade

Ted Gold is one of the five people in the townhouse when the bomb explodes. He's a student at Columbia University. And a fierce opponent of the Vietnam War. But before all that, he's just a witty, New York City kid, who loves the Yankees, Bob Dylan, and Karl Marx.  His friends say he is reliable, fearless and a ladies man. But how does a non violent kid like that end up in that townhouse in Greenwich village? What leads a 22 year old to be fearless of dying? And what does it mean, when your best-friend becomes radicalized?  This podcast was reported, written and produced by Genny Gottdiener and Gustave Muckensturm.

Episode 2: The Teacher

Diana Oughton was a straight-A student from a wealthy Republican family, a teacher who seemed destined for a conventional life. But over a decade marked by war, campus activism, and radical politics, she drifts into the orbit of the Weather Underground. What turns belief into action, and how does someone like Diana end up willing to bring the war home?