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Aug 2025

9m 59s

The Mountain Man Who Inspired Robert Red...

About this episode

On this episode of Our American Stories, when Robert Redford took on the role of Jeremiah Johnson in 1972, audiences fell in love with the image of a rugged mountain man who carved out a life in the wilderness. But the real Johnson lived a life far stranger and harsher than Hollywood ever showed. Historian Ashley Hlebinsky joins us to pull apart fact from folklore and reveal what Hollywood got right—or wrong.

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