Incredible Feats

How many great-grandmothers do you know who are also competitive gymnasts? Meet Johanna Quaas, who kept competing well into her 90s. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 1972, the Miami Dolphins were still a fairly new franchise. But that season, they proved they had the chops to beat the NFL’s best — and make history while they were at it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The invention of the transistor helped three physicists clinch a Nobel Prize — but not even sharing the illustrious award could mend their broken bond. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Desmond Doss was a pacifist and a medic who was mocked for his beliefs before saving 75 soldiers during one of the bloodiest battles of WWII. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

27-year-old Captain Matthew Webb made himself a household name after swimming nearly 40 miles unassisted across the jellyfish-filled English Channel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

While most songwriters dream of writing even just one hit single, country music legend Dolly Parton wrote two utterly iconic songs… in one day. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Needing a big spectacle to draw viewers and land a lucrative TV contract, the NFL tapped Motown legend Diana Ross to sing the national anthem at the biggest game of the year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Shea Diamond wrote her first song while serving a 10-year prison sentence. Now, the singer-songwriter has gone from behind bars to behind the mic. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Would you rather have a #1 hit song in four different decades, or the most popular Christmas song of all time? Thankfully, Mariah Carey doesn’t have to choose. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Robyn Fenty wasn’t a household name in 2003 when she auditioned for an American music producer in Barbados. Now, she’s the wealthiest female musician in the world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What would you do to keep a family legacy alive? Geoff Smith spent over four months living underground after his mom’s record was broken by an American. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

With a terminal and highly stigmatized diagnosis, Magic Johnson rallied to play in the 1992 NBA All-Star Game… and was named Most Valuable Player. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ken Jones’s solo hike in Romania became a fight for survival when he was engulfed by twin avalanches and forced to crawl for days to find help. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When Katharine Graham was installed as head of a small D.C. newspaper, she turned it into a historic institution, publishing risky journalism that changed the course of American politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It was Brian vs. Brian at the 1988 Calgary Olympics, where only one could be crowned the best male figure skating champion in the world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A French engineer and a British architect teamed up in 1993 to design and build the Millau Viaduct — a record-breaking bridge that spans a gorge. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yankees pitcher Jim Abbott — who was born without a right hand — pitched a no-hitter in a 1993 game against the Cleveland Indians. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 1893, boxing matches didn’t end until someone was knocked out — explaining how Andy Bowen and Jack Burke once boxed for over seven hours. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In a breath-taking stunt, daredevil Travis Pastrana put his life in the hands of three near-strangers when he went skydiving without a parachute. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Marie Curie’s discoveries saved millions of lives — at the expense of her own. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Years of studying, months of planning, and a nighttime break-in were all precursors to a 1974 stunt in New York City — but this was no heist. It was a high-wire act by Philippe Petit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jesse Owens became the most decorated Olympian at the 1936 Berlin Games, despite Hitler’s best efforts to see Aryan athletes triumph. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Benjamin Von Wong used 168,000 recycled drinking straws to create a towering art installation. The record-breaking structure was dubbed “The Parting of the Plastic Sea.” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A childhood experiment helped turn Judit Polgár into a chess prodigy, but not everyone was willing to recognize her chops — until she bested her idol in a 2002 tournament. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A political prisoner in South Africa for 27 years, Nelson Mandela was unjustly regarded as an enemy of his country before he helped radically transform it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

At first, all 14-year-old William Kamkwamba wanted to do was power a lamp so he could read at night. But the young Malawian inventor’s ambitions soon grew far bigger… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The 1980 Winter Olympics match-up between the U.S. and Soviet Union hockey teams pit young amateurs against reigning champions. But U.S. coach Herb Brooks had a few tricks up his sleeve… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Kenya’s first female professor, Wangari Maathai, went up against a dictator to protect green space in Nairobi. The movement she started has gone on to plant over 51 million trees. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When three hikers found themselves stranded on the tenth highest mountain in the world, Daniel Aufdenblatten and Richard Lehner risked their own lives to pull off a daring rescue. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Breast cancer survivor Nicky Spinks has run hundreds of miles through the wilderness, breaking records as she conquered steep, muddy, mountainous routes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To save his island home from flood-driven erosion, Jadav Payeng began planting trees. Decades later, there’s over a thousand acres of forest. And he’s still planting. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In a much-anticipated 1964 match, he floated like a butterfly… stung like a bee… and defeated the champion boxer that everyone had favored to win. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Kiko Matthews spent nearly two months rowing over 3,000 miles in the Atlantic Ocean to raise money for the hospital that twice saved her life. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After a bar fight in 1893, James Cornish was rushed to Chicago’s first interracial hospital, helmed by Dr. Daniel Hale Williams, for a pioneering open-heart surgery. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

12-year-old Tom Schaar trained on one of the only Mega Ramps in existence to become the first person ever to land a 1080 on a skateboard. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

By 1887, the Kellers had run out of ideas on how to educate their 6-year-old daughter, Helen. Enter 21-year-old Anne Sullivan, whose unusual methods would revolutionize the way deaf and blind children around the world would be taught. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

With a dire cancer prognosis and an unfulfilled dream, professional jockey Bob Champion resolved to win the Grand National race with his horse, Aldaniti. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

They said it couldn’t be done. That it was physically impossible for a human body. But in 1954, Roger Bannister proved everyone wrong by running a mile in under 4 minutes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Vanessa O’Brien is the first and only woman to have reached our planet’s highest peak and lowest depth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Former art student Cindy Jackson holds the record for most cosmetic procedures, while performance artist Lucky Diamond Rich boasts layers of tattoos in the most unlikely places. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dickey Chapelle became one of the first woman war correspondents during WWII, sneaking onto the front lines and putting her life on the line to cover stories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Racing pioneer Janet Guthrie made motor sports history after qualifying to compete in both the Daytona 500 and the Indy 500. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 1999, Robbie Knievel launched his motorcycle straight over the edge of the Grand Canyon in a stunt not even his father, the famed Evel Knievel, had ever attempted. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Serena Williams faced her stiffest competition at the 2017 Australian Open in Melbourne. But we don’t call her the GOAT for nothing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Diana Nyad was 26 when she dreamed up a long-distance swim from Cuba to Florida. Several decades and multiple attempts later, she did it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

No sleep tonight! 17-year-old Randy Gardner stayed awake for days on end, in what started as an experiment to see if sleep deprivation could induce paranormal abilities. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Bob Beamon shot into the air for an epic, world record-breaking long jump at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov became the first person to ever walk through outer space. But his inaugural spacewalk nearly ended in disaster… twice. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

They say it takes a village to raise a child. How about rescuing one? In 1987, hundreds of people came together to save a toddler trapped in a well. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A secret Navy-funded mission gave one oceanographer the opportunity to find the Titanic’s final resting place, over seventy years after a tragic maritime disaster sank the steamship. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices