Two things African American history is full of are power and resilience. The following podcasts listed below are available on Atlanta-based content creation company, Tenderfoot, created by Donald Albright and Payne Lindsey.
What is Tenderfoot
Nicknamed ‘Atlanta’s Podcast Kingmaker by Atlanta Magazine, Albright and his business partner, Lindsey launched Tenderfoot following the success of their 2016 audio documentary, Up and Vanished, about the Georgia cold case disappearance of beauty queen Tara Grinstead. The award-winning documentary resulted in two arrests in the case.
Since then, the platform has received over 330 million downloads and has become a platform for other podcasters to become the griot of Black storytelling, specifically crimes and politics. These podcasts reveal the truth and lay the foundation for justice and insight into some of the most notorious periods in modern history.
Somebody
From The Intercept, Invisible Institute, and Topic Studios, in association with Tenderfoot TV, is a podcast exploring the murder of Chicago man, Courtney Copeland. Copeland’s mother, Shapearl Wells, probes her son’s homicide and joins forces with a team of journalists to confront Chicago Police and challenge the city’s long-standing racial disparities. This podcast was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for Audio Reporting.
The MLK Tapes
Debuted in January 2022, this podcast explores little-known facts and new information surrounding MLK’s assassination. It includes never-before-heard interviews with people who saw or did something the day Dr. King tragically left us. Watch the trailer here.
We Stay Looking
The satirical comedy is a spinoff of the hit podcast “Looking for LaToya,” which debuted in December 2021. The parody true-crime podcast is co-produced by Issa Rae’s label Radio and HBO. It’s based on INSECURE’s show-within-a-show of the same name. It tackles strong topics in the Black community from prison reform, Black maternal health, and more. The launch of the first season resulted in all partners donating $30,000 to the Black and Missing Foundation through this podcast. Watch the trailer here.
Gaining Ground: The New Georgia
In December 2020, Atlanta-based Tenderfoot TV partnered with Crooked Media for their first political podcast engrained in storytelling. It launched ahead of the heated Georgia Senate runoffs to explore the pivotal moments, movements and citizens on the ground that brought the state to a tense political boiling point, leading to Georgia’s historic flip to blue. Hosted by Atlanta natives Rembert Browne and Jewel Wicker, the podcast aimed to inspire fellow Georgian voters to turn out to the polls for the senate runoffs.
Atlanta Monster
Launched in 2018, this podcast helped renew interest in the 29 cases of Atlanta’s missing and murdered children, known as the Atlanta Child Murders. The podcast garnered tens of millions of downloads. Soon after, the city of Atlanta announced that after 40 years it would be re-examining evidence in these cases.
