The Atlas Obscura Podcast Creators & Guests

Dylan Thuras, born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is the co-founder and creative director of Atlas Obscura, the co-author of the Atlas Obscura book, and the host of the AO Youtube series 100 Wonders. He and his co-founder started Atlas Obscura because they felt that the world was a huge, bizarre, vast place filled with astounding stuff. Dylan is now a father of two and host of the Atlas Obscura podcast.

Talon Stradley is the creator of the independent podcast studio, Newton's Dark Room. He has produced a variety of shows including the award winning Newton's Dark Room Presents and the fly-on-the-wall documentary style show, Soapboxers.Talon lives in Long Beach, CA with his wife and two cats.

Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant is a large carnivore ecologist at National Geographic.

Cara Giaimo is a writer and researcher.

Mary Roach is an American author, specializing in popular science and humor. As of 2016, she has published seven books,: Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers (2003), Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (2005) (published in some markets as Six Feet Over: Adventures in the Afterlife), Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex (2008), Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void (2010), My Planet: Finding Humor in the Oddest Places, Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal (2013), and Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War (2016).

Paul Scheer, born January 31, 1976, in New Hyde Park, New York, is a SAG Award-winning actor, writer, producer, pod-caster, and director. Scheer is a series regular on the Emmy nominated Showtime series Black Monday opposite Don Cheadle. He also is known for his role as Andre on the hit FX show The League, as well as his role of Mitch in Fresh off the Boat, and Stevie on Veep. Scheer won the Screen Actors Guild Award (2018) for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series in Veep. In 2019, he won the HollyWeb Festival award for best comedy in The Amazing Gayl Pile.

Deborah Cohen is a correspondent at BBC Newsnight and executive producer of The Infinite Monkey Cage Podcast.

Jacob Wysocki is an LA native performer, sketch writer, comedian, and actor.

Susan Casey is an award-winning journalist and editor, bestselling author of The Wave, and premiere chronicler of the aquatic world.

Susan Orlean is a journalist and bestselling author of 'The Orchid Thief' and 'The Library Book. '

Mitchell Yockelson is a military historian and archivist.

Dan Pashman is the creator and host of WNYC's James Beard Award-nominated food Podcast The Sporkful. He is also the host of Cooking Channel's James Beard Award-nominated web series You're Eating It Wrong.

Rebecca Boyle is a freelance science journalist who covers astronomy, physics, deep time, and climate change. She is a contributing writer for The Atlantic and a frequent contributor at FiveThirtyEight.Boyle's work has appeared in Scientific American, New Scientist, Aeon, Wired, Popular Science, and other publications, and has twice been anthologized in the Best American Science & Nature Writing. Her first book, "Walking with the Moon: Uncovering the Secrets It Holds to Our Past and Our Future," was published in 2023.

​Blake Pfeil is an award-winning multidisciplinary artist.​His current project is All-American Ruins, a multimedia travelog in which Blake fantastically recounts his experiences exploring abandoned spaces through multimodal storytelling. The project has been featured at On Air Fest, UK International Radio Drama Festival, Croatia Radiotelevision’s 27th Prix Marulic, North Carolina Museum of History, History Colorado, ArchFilm Lund, Eugene Environmental Film Festival, Peekskill Film Festival, International Media Festival of Wales, North Star Story Summit, SONOHR Radio & Podcast Festival, as well as New Jersey, Cusco, Sydney, Melbourne, and New Zealand Web Fests. All-American Ruins has been spotlighted in Business Insider, People, Atlas Obscura, Colorado Magazine, with accolades from the 2024 Signal Awards (Best Experimental Podcast, Best Indie Podcast, Best Writing of an Individual Episode winner), 2024 Ambies (Best Indie Podcast nominee), Press Gazette Future of Media Awards (Regional Podcast of the Year nominee), Parapod Podcast Awards (Best History Podcast winner), and PopCon Podcast Awards (Best History Podcast winner). In 2025, the podcast arm of the project, abandoned, reached no. 1 on the Apple Podcasts Travel and Places charts.Prior to his work with All-American Ruins, Blake co-founded Macabre Americana, wrote and performed the solo folk music piece The BBC: 1970, and collaborated on theatre and music performance projects worldwide, with stints in The Netherlands, Mexico, South Korea, as well as professional stage credits at Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, Huntington Theatre Company, New Rep, Company One, and more.During the week, he steps into the role of Operations & Programs Manager at the nonprofit storytelling organization TMI Project, where he also serves as a producer for The TMI Project Story Hour, winner of an International Women's Podcast Award. On Wednesday evenings, Blake hosts The Pfeil File, an intergenerational community dialogue program on Radio Kingston/WKNY (107.9 FM/1490 AM in the Hudson Valley, NY), and he recently worked as a guest producer for season 5 of History Colorado's Lost Highways, a project of the National Endowment for the Humanities.​Blake is a Disctopia TruePlay Innovative Podcaster Award Finalist.​Alumni, SUNY Stony Brook's Audio Podcast Fellowship​MA, Purchase CollegeBFA, Emerson College​Member, Actor's Equity + BMI

Rick Steves is a travel writer, author, activist, and television personality. He has hosted Rick Steves' Europe, a travel series on public television and currently hosts a public radio travel show called Travel with Rick Steves.

Colin Dickey is an author, curator, and critic known for his new book The Unidentified.

Abigail Keel is a freelance podcast producer, reporter, and editor.

John Andrew Lepiarz, better known by his stage names Jack the Whipper and Jacques Ze Whipper, is a circus performer and social media personality.

Moiya McTier is an astrophysicist, folklorist, and host of Exolore Podcast.