Oliver Sipple
6/5/20261 hr 3 min
One morning, Oliver Sipple went out for a walk. A couple hours later, to his own surprise, he saved the life of the President of the United States. In a story we reported back in 2017, we explain how in the days that followed, Sipple’s split-second act of heroism turned into a rationale for making his personal life into political opportunity. What happens next makes us wonder what a moment, or a movement, or a whole society can demand of one person. And how much is too much?
Through newly unearthed archival tape, we hear Sipple himself grapple with some of the most vexing topics of his day and ours - privacy, identity, the freedom of the press - not to mention the bonds of family and friendship.
Special thanks to Jerry Pritikin, Michael Yamashita, Stan Smith, Duffy Jennings; Ann Dolan, Megan Filly and Ginale Harris at the Superior Court of San Francisco; Leah Gracik, Karyn Hunt, Jesse Hamlin, The San Francisco Bay Area Television Archive, Mike Amico, Jennifer Vanasco and Joey Plaster.
EPISODE CREDITS:
Reported by - Reported by Latif Nasser and Tracie Hunte
Produced by - Produced by Matt Kielty, Annie McEwen, Latif Nasser and Tracie Hunte.
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First 90 secondsSpeaker 00:00
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Latif Nasser· Host0:28
Big news. Radiolab is headed to the Tribeca Festival podcast stage for a special live show in NYC. We'll be headlining the podcast program with this one night only live show at the festival's twenty-fifth anniversary. Come out on June 9th. I think I can safely promise that it will be sweeter than anything you have ever seen or heard. Tickets are available now at tribecafilm.com/audio. That's tribecafilm.com/audio. Hey, it's Latif. Today, we have a story about someone attempting a crime so big and so brazen that if they had pulled it off, it would no doubt have changed the world, but they didn't pull it off because one random guy stopped it. And instead of changing the whole world, it just changed the world for this one guy. The story took place in the 1970s. We originally reported it back in 2017, but people