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Liz Kay
Hello and welcome to the Providence College podcast. I'm your host, Liz Kaye, and I'm joined by producer Chris Judge of the Class of 2005 here in the Providence College podcast. We bring you interesting stories from the Friar Family. This week, we have the pleasure of speaking with Sarah Corbin, a member of the Class of 2014. Sarah's day job is in global brand development at Hasbro, but in 2021, she launched the Weird Island podcast chronicling the strangest tales in Rhode Island history with episodes on unsolved mysteries, conspiracy theories, weird history and even murder.

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Liz Kay
Since then, she and the podcast have become a media sensation with features in the Providence Journal and the Boston Globe. Sarah, thanks so much for joining us.

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Sara Corben
Yeah, thank you so much for having me.

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Liz Kay
Please share the origin story of Rhode Island with us.

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Sara Corben
Yeah, no problem. So I started the podcast. I think it was I'm terrible with time, but about a year and a half ago when kind of in the heart of the pandemic still wasn't really going anywhere, doing too much outside of my house. I was working from home, working out from home, not seeing a ton of people, and was kind of looking for a project to keep me from going a little stir crazy.

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Sara Corben
I knew I was listening to tons of podcasts, like wait like 5 hours a day of podcasts, which was ridiculous while I was doing work. It's a little embarrassing to admit that. So I knew I wanted to create some sort of podcast and has kind of started to brainstorm what that could look like or what the subject could be.

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Sara Corben
I listen to a lot of true crime and I knew for sure I should not do a true crime podcast because I was starting to get a little bit paranoid, even just listening to a lot of true crime and I thought if I really immerse myself in looking more into that, I am going to be unable to sleep.

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Sara Corben
So it was talking with my family and actually my dad suggested the idea that that kind of kickstarted this. He works for a Rhode Island company called ALM Global and that company has some long history in Rhode Island related to Rhode Island's many mills. So he had said You should do a podcast all about Rhode Island. Mills is a little bit too granular for me.

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Sara Corben
I was like, I think I want to go a little broader than that. And so I ended up really liking the heart of the idea, which is something Rhode Island based and blowing it out a little bit bigger.

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Liz Kay
So where do you get your ideas?

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Sara Corben
Initially, it was a lot of just searching on my own, so started with a pretty basic Google search. Pretty much everything starts with a basic Google search and, you know, checks and books out of library, books on, you know, compilations of weird history, weird facts, weird places in Rhode Island. And I started with a list of maybe around 50 ideas, some that were better than others.

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Sara Corben
And that's where I really started off. Since then, I've gotten a ton of ideas from listeners, so I'm up to about 200 ideas on the list right now, and that's not counting the ones that I've already covered. So most of those, I would say, are coming from listeners who are reaching out on Instagram or email to suggest ideas.

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Liz Kay
So walk us through how you create each episode. How do you do your research? How much time do they take to produce?

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Sara Corben
They are pretty quick turnaround. I'm sure you do the same thing creating this podcast typically. So I was doing weekly episodes. I have spread it out a little bit to be every other week right now because I'm in a pretty busy time at work. But typically it starts with, like I said, basic Google search. Let me get the lay of the land on a subject and then I'll really start to tease things apart that I've found from that basic Google search.

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Sara Corben
I'll kind of highlight some areas where I want to dig in deeper. I'll look for archives, I'll look at libraries and try and find ways to corroborate facts that I have found initially. There's a lot of stuff on the Internet that is super questionable. So a lot of my time is spent just trying to verify things, which is very tedious, but I enjoy it quite a bit.

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Sara Corben
The turnaround time is generally about one week of really focused effort. Like I said, right now I'm kind of spacing them out to be every other week so that I don't get too burnt out. But they're pretty quick turnaround.

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Liz Kay
So I think we've teased our listeners enough. Tell us about the stories. Which ones are your favorites? Which ones, if you found to be the most surprising or unusual?

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Sara Corben
I think I initially started with some ones that I think everybody would be really interested in. Rhode Island's got some really interesting history that is pretty unusual. Rhode Island's got some local vampires, which was one I knew right off the bat. You know, I have to do a vampire story. I'm not going to spoil the whole story of it.

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Sara Corben
But that was one that kind of I knew everyone would be interested in. There are others that I was more surprised by, especially a lot of listener suggestions. So I've got some pretty cool suggestions for things that you might not initially think were weird. One listener suggested the highest point in Rhode Island as an interesting story. If you've ever been to the highest point Rhode Island, you'll know it's not very high.

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Sara Corben
So I was like, I don't know if that'll be a really good story. But it had this kind of secret history about this this reason why it was very difficult to get to that highest point in Rhode Island for quite a while, based on someone who lived nearby it and didn't want people going on the land. And so there are those stories that, like, come out of nowhere and surprise you, I think are the ones that I've been the most excited about.

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Sara Corben
So they they vary from, you know, like I said, vampires and runestone. There's these stones in Rhode Island with markings that are kind of mysterious that no one totally understands where they're where they came from to like a cement wall that has a secret backstory that you might never know about. So pretty varied.

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Liz Kay
And the format kind of differs from episode to episode. I listen to a few where you it sounds like you had written it out and basically just recorded it and others where you include interviews like the story, the infamous story of the difference between the intersection of bridge and Pitch Avenue in Pawtucket.

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Sara Corben
I would say I would love to do more of those interview episodes. Those are my favorites. The ones that I've gotten have guests on I think are the most captivating stories. So that that was something I'd like to do a little bit more of. Don't do a ton of it because of bandwidth right now, to be honest, I'm sure you face this on your podcast schedule and scheduling people can be very difficult, but I think those are really captivating.

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Sara Corben
And then the kind of flip side of it is I'll write kind of a totally scripted story that I've researched all myself.

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Liz Kay
And who have been some of the guests we mentioned. I mentioned the episode about Ridge and Pidge, the intersection of Origin Page, where you interviewed a veteran Providence Journal reporter. Who else have you been had on on a guest?

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Sara Corben
One episode I really enjoyed was featuring a church in Woonsocket called St Anne's. It's actually no longer a church named St Anne's Art and Cultural Center, but this church was really funded and built by all of the parishioners and has these incredible frescoes on the wall, like floor to ceiling, just artwork everywhere. It's beautiful. And so I had the the team there come on the podcast and talk about the stories behind the frescoes.

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Sara Corben
Not to spoil it, but all of the people on the walls are real people who went to the church. So they all have, like, rich stories behind every single person on the wall that was on my favorite episodes have ever done. I also had on I've had people talking about ghosts or some local ghost experts. I had a pumpkin grower who is famous for growing these enormous world famous pumpkins.

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Sara Corben
So really like experts in very different areas have come on the podcast.

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Liz Kay
And I think you alluded to another aspect of this. So did you went to visit St Anne's in Woonsocket? Like so it seems like the podcast is taking you probably taking you to corners of the state you never would have visited otherwise.

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Sara Corben
Yeah, definitely that that was another big thing that was appealing about doing a podcast on Rhode Island, particularly during the pandemic, was the idea of getting out and being a tourist locally. Obviously, like everyone else, I wasn't traveling too much during the pandemic, so kind of taking a step back and forcing myself to be a tourist of the state where I've been living for quite a while was really interesting.

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Sara Corben
I've definitely seen a ton of things that I didn't know existed. I like to go to as many places as possible. There have been a few I haven't gone to, but for a couple of reasons. I want to check them out for myself. I also want to make sure that if I'm telling a story and sending people to a place that it's still there, it's safe.

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Sara Corben
You know, some places are abandoned. I want to call out like, hey, if you're going to go to this abandoned place, don't go here or, you know, be safe and watch out for this just to make sure that's definitely something particularly with a ban in place, I want to make sure I'm not putting people in danger. So a couple different reasons for wanting to go.

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Liz Kay
So if people were taking a brief visit to Providence College, Safer homecoming weekend, which is coming up September 29th to October 2nd, what are a few episodes you would do that you would recommend they check out, you know, and possibly go visit the locations themselves? Any any places close to campus, maybe? Well, that's a.

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Sara Corben
That's a very good question. There are a couple classics that I think if you're in town for a short while, be worth checking out. I did an episode on Water Fire. Water Fire is very iconic for Providence, but the story of how Providence is downtown evolved and changed since the seventies and eighties I think is kind of interesting to hear.

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Sara Corben
And then walk around downtown and see, you know, what it looks like today. So I would definitely recommend that one. There's an episode on Roger Williams, the founder of the state, which I think is really, really fun and interesting to kind of understand the the origin of the state as well. Is that really the story centers around this apple tree that grew down into his grave and supposedly consumed his body and took on the shape of Roger Williams.

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Sara Corben
You can go visit the apple tree root. It's at the John Brown House Museum in downtown. So that's kind of a cool one to get some history of the state and this quirky little fact and then go see the route which they preserved. So those are two I would definitely recommend.

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Liz Kay
And so what if you got more time? Like if you are a Providence College student who'll be here for the academic year or if you're a local alum, what else would you recommend listening to and then going to check out?

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Sara Corben
Yeah, let me think about that. I think if you're a local, you probably it's I don't know if I felt this way when I was a student because I didn't have a car for most of my college days. But as it just said, local driving around often. I drive by the Apex Department store all the time and for a long time I wondered what that was.

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Sara Corben
I think if you're a local, that story is definitely one worth knowing.

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Liz Kay
So that is a really iconic department store that shaped like a pyramid that you can see in the southern part of Pawtucket on 90 off. 95, right?

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Sara Corben
Yes, exactly. Yeah. Thank you for that.

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Liz Kay
I think you mentioned this that you just got started during the pandemic. What's your podcast set up like? Where are you recording? Can you tell us about that?

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Sara Corben
Yeah, it's not anything fancy. I record in my living room. I have just my one microphone that is really just like a pretty basic microphone. It cost me 50 bucks when I got it and I've got my laptop, so it's nothing super out there for setup. I know a lot of podcasters have much more elaborate and sophisticated equipment, but I think if anyone listening has any interest in starting a podcast, it can be done very easily and cheaply.

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Sara Corben
You're just getting started.

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Liz Kay
As a PC student you worked on WD. When did that experience influence the creation of Rhode Island in any way?

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Sara Corben
Yeah, I think so. I loved having a radio show is very different from what I'm doing on the podcast today. When I had the radio show, it was at like six in the morning on a Thursday, I think so many. Yeah, it was really it was really popular, these really fun. I think at the time I really was not accustomed to waking up that early.

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Sara Corben
It's probably the only day of the week where I would see the sunrise, so I have fond memories of kind of getting up early and, you know, trudging up to the radio station in my pajamas. And we just mostly played music and, you know, chit chatted. So very different in format. But I think it was the first time I really put myself out there and, and tried to portray a little bit of confidence.

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Sara Corben
I don't know if I necessarily actually felt it at the time, but first time really putting myself out there. So that definitely planted the seeds for kind of developing a little bit more confidence, talking to people, you know, on the radio and on the Internet.

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Liz Kay
I think it's important to mention that you are not a history major PC, but you studied marketing. Tell us a little bit about your day job at Hasbro.

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Sara Corben
I work at Hasbro, the the toy company, not the hospital, which I feel like is you only need to say that in Rhode Island, but I work in marketing on the toy side of the business. So there's within Hasbro, lots of different types of marketers. Working on the toy side means I'm kind of integrated into all of the product development on the brand that I work on, which is Transformers.

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Sara Corben
So I feel incredibly lucky because what that means is I get to play with toys all day long and that's just super fun. And definitely something I dreamed of doing when I was at P.C., didn't know if it was actually going to happen. So I feel very, very lucky that my dream job actually came to life.

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Liz Kay
It's what's it like to work for such a recognizable brand? Did you grow up with with Transformers yourself or did your friends who played with them siblings?

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Sara Corben
I didn't actually grow up with Transformers, to be honest. I I'm trying to think of I don't even think that my brother had transformers really, but of course, knew the brand was aware of it, you know, saw the cartoon but didn't necessarily have the toys. When I came to Hasbro, I initially started working on Beyblade, which is a another brand.

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Sara Corben
These are Topps. I don't know if you've ever played at Beyblade before and then moved over onto Transformers and felt super lucky, but also very intimidated because I didn't have that history playing with them as as a kid. So just on the down low, tried to research and become an expert without anyone knowing that it wasn't. I didn't have that kind of history playing with the brand, but it's amazing to work on a recognizable brand that, you know, people hear and they just get excited.

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Sara Corben
And I love talking about work.

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Liz Kay
So I kept just revealing a generational difference between the two of us. But as you mentioned, I think there are very avid fans of this brand. You know, people who grew up with the cartoons, watched the movies. How have you interacted with them and what's it like? You know, getting their feedback on a regular basis.

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Sara Corben
It's super cool working on a fan oriented brand. I do work particularly so our team is split into fan and kid. I work on kid toys and then we have, you know, a very strong fan driven side of the business as well. We go to things like Comic-Con. So I was recently at San Diego Comic-Con and just interacting with people who care so much about a brand or thing is the most amazing feeling.

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Sara Corben
I think talking to people who just grew up loving Transformers is super inspirational, so it makes going into work and doing what we do every day just fun to know that it really means something to someone. Both the adults who played with those kids and the kids who are growing up right now.

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Liz Kay
So as a marketing major, a PC, what courses or experiences did you have that you thought you think helped you, particularly with your career now?

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Sara Corben
Well, a couple of things. I actually had a teacher who was who had worked at Hasbro previously. I took a class I think was a marketing class with Professor again. So that was like the first time I really kind of had the idea planted in my head that, Oh, I could work at Hasbro someday. So that definitely stuck with me kind of hearing about his experiences, which just seemed so incredible.

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Sara Corben
So on that side, definitely influenced where I ended up. My career also took a lot of art classes when I was at P.S., which I don't specifically do anything really art related right now. But having those foundational skills as a marketer are really helpful. I don't think I realized how much of my job would be making PowerPoints and how important it is that they look beautiful and communicate the right ideas.

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Sara Corben
So I would actually say that I use a lot of that art side, which I wasn't really sure if I would or not. I just loved taking the classes at the time.

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Liz Kay
It's funny to think how even just getting familiar with the tools like can help you work with people who work with those tools. Like you might not use, you know, the Adobe Suite or, you know, Photoshop or InDesign yourself, but it can help you in your conversations with people who use those every day. Possibly.

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Sara Corben
Yeah, 100%. That's so huge. Especially a lot of my job is kind of an intermediary between product design and packaging design and branding. And you can definitely see when someone doesn't have a background in working in the programs that, you know, a designer might use because oftentimes you'll hear people saying like, Oh, that'll take 2 seconds to Photoshop.

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Sara Corben
Right? And knowing how long and how complicated a lot of what those teams are doing, I think, is really important in making sure that you're not making unrealistic demands as a marketer. So I definitely value having that experience.

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Liz Kay
Just a vocabulary, right, of just like using the right terms to to have that authority for sure. Yeah. So what brought you to Providence College in the first place?

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Sara Corben
I actually came to Providence a few times when I was a kid. I used to when I used to come to Pawtucket to go to PawSox games and we would come to water fire sometimes. And I remember going to a water fire when I was in high school. We had family in town and had kind of taken the drive down to Providence.

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Sara Corben
I grew up in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and just thinking that the city was so beautiful and so alive with that water fire. And that was something that kind of stuck with me. When I was looking at schools, I kind of came down to three different schools. I was torn between, I think was Emerson and Boston was one and Babson, I can't remember a town that Babson is in right now and then Providence College.

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Sara Corben
And I think a big part of it was just having fallen in love with the city of Providence itself. That really helped me make that that final decision.

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Liz Kay
That's really an interesting observation because, I mean, I think people think of Boston as sort of like an iconic college destination, but like you really had a like a gut feeling the providence would be a good city to be in even more than just the campus.

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Sara Corben
Yeah, absolutely.

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Liz Kay
So what's on the horizon for you and for Weird Island? Can you give us a sneak peek of episodes that are in the works or like projects, other projects you might be working up?

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Sara Corben
I am, like I said, kind of going week to week, so I'm usually flying by the seat of my pants. Currently working on an episode about the history of the first oyster and Ale house in Rhode Island. So researching oysters this morning, which is really interesting, learning some facts I wish I hadn't learned like that. They're still alive when you eat them.

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Sara Corben
Really unfortunate to know, so I'm pretty excited about that episode. I don't generally plan out further than my next week's episode because I like to pick whatever I'm most excited about that week. It makes the process of really diving in deep and obsessing over something easier. One, I don't feel like I or when I feel like I've chosen something that I'm just excited about in the moment, I don't really have like more broadly, any big plans for the podcast other than just continuing to do it?

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Sara Corben
Because I love doing it and just seeing where it goes.

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Liz Kay
And are there any personal projects that you're working on that you know that you're more familiar and comfortable with? The mic?

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Sara Corben
Yeah, I'm also working on a project with my grandfather capturing some family history, which I'm pretty excited about. Basically, we're just recording together. He's telling stories about his childhood, things that were going on, you know, early in his life and kind of connecting what his personal experience was with kind of the bigger historical moments going on. So I don't know what I'm going to do with that necessarily, if it'll just be for myself and my family or I'll end up putting it out there at some point.

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Sara Corben
But that's kind of the other big project I'm working on that I'm excited about.

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Liz Kay
I think it's interesting to note that again, like, this is a project you can do that connects you with your family that you know, you didn't have to make a huge financial or time investment to do, but like you can do it while your grandfather's still here and with us to capture those stories, which is amazing.

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Sara Corben
Yeah, definitely.

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Liz Kay
Sir. It's been wonderful chatting with you today. Thank you so much for joining us.

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Sara Corben
Yeah, thank you for having me. I appreciate.

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Liz Kay
It. Subscribe to the Providence College podcast in all the usual places, including iTunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher, Google Play and Spotify as well as your smart speaker. If you like what you hear, please review and share with others. Thanks for listening and go Friars.