EP146: Revisiting Childhood Mysteries, The Shocking Story Behind the Diamond Engagement Ring and The Holiday Tradition That Started At A Gas Station
Our American Stories
iHeartPodcasts
4.6 • 817 Ratings
🗓️ 22 December 2021
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On this episode of Our American Stories, Families move all the time due to job changes... But to children, sometimes it just doesn't make sense. Roger Rench reflects on his childhood move; Tom Zoellner purchased a diamond engagement ring and proposed. His girlfriend said, "yes" and then, suddenly, walked out of his life making Tom the owner of a used engagement ring; Hess Toy Truck Director, Justin Mayer, and superfan, Mike Roberto share the story of how for nearly 60 years, Hess trucks have brought smiles to children, and adults, up and down the East Coast.
Support the show (https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate)
Time Codes:
00:00 - Revisiting Childhood Mysteries
10:00 - The Shocking Story Behind the Diamond Engagement Ring
23:00 - The Holiday Tradition That Started At A Gas Station
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
Support the show: https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories, the show where America is the star, or the American people of the star. |
| 0:19.0 | And we're looking for your stories. Always send them to our American Stories.com. |
| 0:24.1 | Our listeners' stories are some of our favorites. |
| 0:27.0 | Which brings us to this one, a listener's story sent to us from Roger Wrench in Iowa. |
| 0:33.4 | Take it away, Roger. |
| 0:38.3 | My father, Richard Wrench, was a great golfer. |
| 0:41.3 | He was an amateur champion and member of the Marine Corps Championship team. |
| 0:46.3 | He died in 1996 at the young age of 62. |
| 0:51.3 | And I have a scrapbook full of newspaper clippings, pictures, and awards he won as a young man. |
| 0:58.0 | Though he never quite made it, his dream was to be on the PGA tour. He loved the game and taught it to me at a very young age. |
| 1:08.0 | When I was 10 years old in the winter of 1971, my dad got a job as a |
| 1:14.7 | golf pro at a country club. We packed up quick and moved from the inner city of Kansas |
| 1:20.6 | City to the small town of Sheridan, Iowa, population 4,000. Because we moved into a small apartment in the Lakeview Country Club |
| 1:31.1 | Clubhouse, we couldn't bring our dog Flash with us, so we had to give him away. |
| 1:38.3 | Flash was my first pet, and I loved that dog. I cried for days. |
| 1:46.0 | It still hurts to think about it today. |
| 1:49.0 | I begged my dad to let me bring Flash, |
| 1:52.0 | but they wouldn't allow a pet in the clubhouse. |
| 1:56.0 | As much as I loved golf and the idea of living on a golf course, |
| 2:00.0 | giving my buddy away was heartbreaking. |
| 2:05.6 | Once we got there, I began to make adjustments to our new home. Some pleasant, some not so pleasant. |
| 2:12.6 | To my delight, I got to go sled riding any time on the hilly fairways of the golf course, and I made tracks everywhere. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from iHeartPodcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of iHeartPodcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.

