Hi friends!

We’ve been busy at Forever Ago headquarters. Joy’s organizing her chaos closet, we’re making a bunch of new episodes of Forever Ago AND we’re getting ready for a super fun live show!

Join Joy on November 10th in Minneapolis, MN as she takes the audience on a trek through time, exploring Eureka moments that led to amazing inventions. Find out how a bath became a breakthrough, how a mold-covered dish ended up saving lives and more. There will be games, singing, giant cartoons and a talking bag of frozen peas. Plus, kids will learn how they can have Eureka moments of their own, all while discovering the weird and wonderful history all around us.

Get your tickets at foreverago.org/events. Psst, Smarty Pass subscribers! Check your email for your discount code to get 20% off tickets. Don’t have Smarty Pass? Sign up today to get discounted tickets to the show, plus other perks like ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes. Find out more at smartypass.org. And if you can’t make the live show, don’t worry! A brand new episode of Forever Ago is coming out on October 9th — plus lots more this fall!

Joy and Anna are amped to go on a fun road trip! And with a garage full of transportation options nothing is gonna stop them from hitting the road. Grab your smarty pass to see what they use for their ragin road trip!

We’re back with part two of our string-tastic story of the banjo! In the last episode, musician Rhiannon Giddens helped tell the origin story of the banjo, an instrument many think of as American. But it actually comes from Africa.

Today, we’re focusing on how the banjo went from an instrument played mostly by enslaved people to one of the most popular instruments in the United States. The reason for this was a popular form of entertainment in the mid to late 1800s called minstrel shows. Later on, the banjo helped create the genre known as bluegrass. Now it's having a resurgence thanks to artists like Beyoncé.

Featured expert: Rhiannon Giddens is a Grammy Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning singer and instrumentalist. You can check out her website here!