Happy Birthday Sarah Vowell

Like many mid-career authors of popular history, what Sarah Vowell really wanted to do was be a cartoon character; appearing as Violet in The Incredibles made that dream a reality, and hopefully introduced her (and her work) to a whole new audience in more ways than one...

Born on this day in 1969 (alongside a fraternal twin sister named Amy) Vowell moved from Oklahoma to Montana to Chicago in pursuit of her education, and now resides in Manhattan, where she is a sought-after author and commentator on shows like This American Life on Public Radio International, as well as a popular guest on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, as well as more serious fare such as Nightline.

Her most recent books - 2002's The Partly Cloudy Patriot, Assassination Vacation (2005), and The Wordy Shipmates from 2008 - look at history from a personal angle, often in the form of travelogues.
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