Nancy Adler was a renowned health psychologist who documented the powerful role that education, income and self-perceived social status play in a person's health and longevity.

She was that rare person who was highly accomplished in her professional life but never lost touch with what mattered most to her: her family. As a mother, she was such a consistent and steady presence to her two daughters that they were surprised to discover that she even had a job.

In this episode, Julia Adler-Milstein and Sarah Adler-Milstein talk with Katie about what it was like to be raised by such an unflappable, warm, and generous mother.

Nancy Adler died in January 2024. Here is her New York Times Obituary.

Our Mothers Ourselves is an interview podcast that celebrates extraordinary mothers from all walks of life. Please share the one word that best describes your mother on the Mother Word Cloud.

A companion interview to Season 3 of Lost Women of Science, this episode is about the trailblazing mechanical engineer Yvonne Young "Y.Y." Clark. Katie talks with Y.Y,'s daughter, Carol Lawson, about what it was like to be the daughter of such a brilliant -- and pragmatic -- woman.

YY has been nicknamed “The First Lady of Engineering,” because of her groundbreaking achievements as a Black female mechanical engineer. Season 3 of Lost Women of Science traces her trajectory, from her unconventional childhood interest in fixing appliances to civil rights breakthroughs in the segregated South; from her trailblazing role at historically Black colleges and universities to her work at NASA. What can YY teach us about what it means to be the first in a scientific field, especially as a Black woman in America?

In this episode, Carol talks about what Y.Y. was like as a mom, Y.Y.'s role model of a marriage, her penmanship standards, and her 1968 Firebird.


Composer: Andrea Perry

Artist: Traci Mims

Our Mothers Ourselves is a production of Odradek Studios in San Francisco

Our Mothers Ourselves is an interview podcast that celebrates extraordinary mothers from all walks of life. Please share the one word that best describes your mother on the Mother Word Cloud.

Two years ago, to mark Father’s Day, I sat in the closet I’m sitting in now (which you can see only in your mind’s eye), and had an extraordinary conversation with Dr. Talmadge E. King, Jr., a world-renowned lung specialist who is dean of the Medical School at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. King and I talked about his father, Talmadge King Senior, who was born in 1922 in the segregated south. I loved our conversation, and it seems fitting to post the interview today, on June 19th, 2022. Mr. King, who died in 2018, would be 100 this year.

Talmadge Senior was so beloved a member of the community in Darien, Georgia that the town recruited him as the first Black police officer when the police force was first integrated.

He instilled in his five children a sense of doing better with each successive generation. He offered a simple metaphor: "If your father builds a wooden house, it's your responsibility to build a brick house."

Our Mothers Ourselves is an interview podcast that celebrates extraordinary mothers from all walks of life. Please share the one word that best describes your mother on the Mother Word Cloud.