July 3, 2025 • 9 mins
ICYMI: ‘Later, with Mo’Kelly’ Presents – A conversation with acclaimed Indigenous filmmaker Chris Eyre (Smoke Signals, Dark Winds), a member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes, joins the program to preview his new History Channel documentary film, ‘Jim Thorpe: Lit by Lightning,’ which profiles one of the greatest American athletes of all time and the first Native American Olympic gold medalist - on KFI AM 640…Live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app & YouTube @MrMoKelly
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Oho Wimbo Kelly one six from executive producers Lebron James,
Maverick Carter and award winning director Chris Ayre, The History
Channel's new documentary Jim Thorpe, lit By Lightning, offers a
comprehensive exploration into the life and legacy of the legendary
(00:23):
Olympian and one of the greatest all around athletes in
our nation's history. Acclaimed filmmaker Chris air tells the untold
story of, as I said, America's arguably greatest athlete of
all time, a man who played in the NFL, in
Major League Baseball, and a multi gold medalist at the
nineteen twelve Games.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Jim Thorpe. I haven't seen that level of greatness in
so many sports.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
And yet not many people remember his name.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Growing up on the reservation, he liked challenging his own body.
That was like a natural cross training.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Jim Thorpe was made for football.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
He's running, he's kicking, he's tackling. Jim plays every minute
of a game, offense and defense. Jim Thorpe is at
the top of his game, and yet he was about
to level up again.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Of his achievement at the Stockholm Olympics.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
I haven't seen that level of greatness. The gold medals
were taken away from it was an enormous injustice.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Americans didn't see indigenous peoples as human beings. He really
created that sport.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
He was the greatest athlete of all time and one
of the greatest Americans who ever lived. Jim Thorpe Lit
by Lightning premieres Monday, July seventh and eighth part of
History Honors two fifty only on the History Channel.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
And Chris Air joins me now on the show. Chris,
good evening. Thank you for your work.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Great mode. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it, and
I'm excited to talk about Jim Thorpe Lit by Lightning.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
I am a student of history. I'm a student of
sports history as well, and I know that we have
multiple generations which have grown up with no knowledge of
the significance and greatness of Jim Thorpe. And that's probably why,
or at least part of the reason why you've done
Jim Thorpe Lit by Lightning. But just top line for me,
the significance of his contributions and exploits in telling the
(02:12):
fullness of American history.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Well, I think it's important that we tell these stories
so people remember, we can reconfer on why somebody is
regarded with the admiration that they are. And Jim Thorpe
is part of that story. I mean, when you talk about,
you know, his accomplishments in athletics, they're still unparallel to
anyone else. When you talk about Lebron James, who's endorsed
(02:38):
this and as an executive producer and a goat himself,
and he's saying Jim Thorpe is the greatest athlete of
all time and one of the greatest Americans that ever lived.
It really gives you the scope of what we're talking
about here. So you know, the likes of which you know,
Barry Bonds, of Deon Sanders and Michael Jordan, all of
these are great, great goats. But Jim Thorpe is in
(03:03):
a category by himself. Like you said, he played professional
football in which he won nine championships with the Canton
Bulldogs of the American Football League which would become the NFL.
Jim Thorpe was the first president of the American Football League,
which became the NFL, So he is connected to the
(03:25):
history and the continuum of football today. He won collegiate
football championships against Penn State, against Harvard, and ultimately against
Army in a very famous game against Dwight Eisenhower, who
became President of the United States. Dwight Eisenhower. You know,
when Jim Thorpe passed away, wrote a telegram to his
(03:48):
wife in which he recounted how much he'd thought of
Jim Thorpe in those college days when he saw him
and said there was no other football player that was
comparable to him on that field that day. And then
you look at things like he played professional baseball, he
was a championship ballroom dancer, he played some basketball, and
(04:11):
what you highlighted was the King of Sweden in nineteen
twelve during the Stockholm Olympics touted him as the greatest
athlete in the world because he won the fifteen event
decathlon and the pentathlon gold medals in the same Olympics.
So when you put all that together, you recognize that
(04:34):
no one else has had that kind of achievement. And
as recently as two thousand, the Associated Press still voted
him greatest athlete of all time, and last year, interestingly enough,
President Biden awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. And
in twenty twenty two, the Olympic Committee reinstated his gold
(04:58):
medals that were taking away due to a controversy. So
he's the sole winner of his own gold medals from
the nineteen yeah the nineteen twelve Stockholm Olympics.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Chris, do we know what motivated him to excel? Was
it something internal? Was it external with what was going
on in America at that time with him being an
indigenous athlete? What do you think motivated him?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
That's the greatest question. And for me as a filmmaker,
I think my first job is to entertain and the
second job is to really look at what drives the
character beyond the headlines of the accomplishments. And so with
Jim Thorpe, I actually can see something, you know inside
(05:47):
of him that I recognize as a native person. He
was born in eighteen eighty seven on the Second Fox
Indian Reservation. There was thunder and lightning all around the
night of his birth, and his mother named him, which
translates in English to bright path. By age nine, he
had lost his twin brother to pneumonia. By age eleven,
(06:09):
he'd lost both of his parents. He was taken forcibly
to Haskell Indian School, where he ran away multiple times
back home to Oklahoma, and finally he was taken to Carlisle,
Pennsylvania at age eleven years old and put there because
he couldn't run away anymore. And when I think about
(06:30):
somebody who comes from those beginnings, I started to recognize
that he needed a channel, you know, he needed a
place to put his emotion, his anger, his passion. And
sports became that vehicle. And I think to myself, if
he wouldn't have had sports, what might have become of him.
(06:52):
But he did all this before you know, social media
and thumb likes and endorsements, million dollar deals. He did
all this for a different reason. He did all this
for the passion of competition and the love of winning.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Hey, Chris, let me jumping there.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Let me jumping there.
Speaker 1 (07:12):
Because yes, he did it before social media and all
of these accoutrement that we come to know as normal today.
But what do you think Jim Thorpe might have become
as far as the figure, well the size of his
legacy if he had been born in the in the
world of ESPN, in the world of TikTok, the world
of social media, more generally.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
I don't know exactly, mo I mean, that's the honest answer,
but I can I can say that I like to
think that he wouldn't have used those avenues for himself.
I think it was purely about the competition that he loved.
(07:53):
But he's certainly had a humility that wasn't just about himself.
And I can see that in his interviews. I can
see that throughout his life that he worked hard. He was,
you know, digging ditches in his later life, and I
see in his face that he wasn't shamed by what
he was doing. He was a prideful person that was
(08:16):
making himself useful from a generation that knew how to work,
a generation that came from the Great Depression, a generation
that came from World War One, a generation in which
he was put onto reservations, you know, as the first
Indians on reservations. And so when he was out there,
whether he was performing at his best as an athlete
(08:38):
or working digging ditches, or he was in a hundred
movies from the nineteen thirties in Hollywood, including King Kong,
he was working. He was not feeling sorry for himself.
He was putting one foot in front of the other,
and he was taking what was given to him and
turning it into success.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Jim Thorpe lit by Lightning, directed by My Guests Right
Now Chris Air premieeres Monday, July seventh at eight pm
on the History Channel. Chris as I said at the beginning,
I'm a student of history. I'm a student of sports history.
So I am overjoyed that this was done, and I
thank you for putting this together so this younger generation,
this social media generation, can learn about and fall in
(09:22):
love with Jim Thorpe as I did. Thank you so much, sir, Thank.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
You, Moe. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
It's Later with Moo Kelly CAFI AM six forty. We're
live everywhere on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and the iHeartRadio app.
You're listening to Later with Moe Kelly on demand from
KFI AM six forty
Oho Wimbo Kelly one six from executive producers Lebron James,
Maverick Carter and award winning director Chris Ayre, The History
Channel's new documentary Jim Thorpe, lit By Lightning, offers a
comprehensive exploration into the life and legacy of the legendary
(00:23):
Olympian and one of the greatest all around athletes in
our nation's history. Acclaimed filmmaker Chris air tells the untold
story of, as I said, America's arguably greatest athlete of
all time, a man who played in the NFL, in
Major League Baseball, and a multi gold medalist at the
nineteen twelve Games.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Jim Thorpe. I haven't seen that level of greatness in
so many sports.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
And yet not many people remember his name.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Growing up on the reservation, he liked challenging his own body.
That was like a natural cross training.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Jim Thorpe was made for football.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
He's running, he's kicking, he's tackling. Jim plays every minute
of a game, offense and defense. Jim Thorpe is at
the top of his game, and yet he was about
to level up again.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Of his achievement at the Stockholm Olympics.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
I haven't seen that level of greatness. The gold medals
were taken away from it was an enormous injustice.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Americans didn't see indigenous peoples as human beings. He really
created that sport.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
He was the greatest athlete of all time and one
of the greatest Americans who ever lived. Jim Thorpe Lit
by Lightning premieres Monday, July seventh and eighth part of
History Honors two fifty only on the History Channel.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
And Chris Air joins me now on the show. Chris,
good evening. Thank you for your work.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Great mode. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it, and
I'm excited to talk about Jim Thorpe Lit by Lightning.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
I am a student of history. I'm a student of
sports history as well, and I know that we have
multiple generations which have grown up with no knowledge of
the significance and greatness of Jim Thorpe. And that's probably why,
or at least part of the reason why you've done
Jim Thorpe Lit by Lightning. But just top line for me,
the significance of his contributions and exploits in telling the
(02:12):
fullness of American history.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Well, I think it's important that we tell these stories
so people remember, we can reconfer on why somebody is
regarded with the admiration that they are. And Jim Thorpe
is part of that story. I mean, when you talk about,
you know, his accomplishments in athletics, they're still unparallel to
anyone else. When you talk about Lebron James, who's endorsed
(02:38):
this and as an executive producer and a goat himself,
and he's saying Jim Thorpe is the greatest athlete of
all time and one of the greatest Americans that ever lived.
It really gives you the scope of what we're talking
about here. So you know, the likes of which you know,
Barry Bonds, of Deon Sanders and Michael Jordan, all of
these are great, great goats. But Jim Thorpe is in
(03:03):
a category by himself. Like you said, he played professional
football in which he won nine championships with the Canton
Bulldogs of the American Football League which would become the NFL.
Jim Thorpe was the first president of the American Football League,
which became the NFL, So he is connected to the
(03:25):
history and the continuum of football today. He won collegiate
football championships against Penn State, against Harvard, and ultimately against
Army in a very famous game against Dwight Eisenhower, who
became President of the United States. Dwight Eisenhower. You know,
when Jim Thorpe passed away, wrote a telegram to his
(03:48):
wife in which he recounted how much he'd thought of
Jim Thorpe in those college days when he saw him
and said there was no other football player that was
comparable to him on that field that day. And then
you look at things like he played professional baseball, he
was a championship ballroom dancer, he played some basketball, and
(04:11):
what you highlighted was the King of Sweden in nineteen
twelve during the Stockholm Olympics touted him as the greatest
athlete in the world because he won the fifteen event
decathlon and the pentathlon gold medals in the same Olympics.
So when you put all that together, you recognize that
(04:34):
no one else has had that kind of achievement. And
as recently as two thousand, the Associated Press still voted
him greatest athlete of all time, and last year, interestingly enough,
President Biden awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. And
in twenty twenty two, the Olympic Committee reinstated his gold
(04:58):
medals that were taking away due to a controversy. So
he's the sole winner of his own gold medals from
the nineteen yeah the nineteen twelve Stockholm Olympics.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Chris, do we know what motivated him to excel? Was
it something internal? Was it external with what was going
on in America at that time with him being an
indigenous athlete? What do you think motivated him?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
That's the greatest question. And for me as a filmmaker,
I think my first job is to entertain and the
second job is to really look at what drives the
character beyond the headlines of the accomplishments. And so with
Jim Thorpe, I actually can see something, you know inside
(05:47):
of him that I recognize as a native person. He
was born in eighteen eighty seven on the Second Fox
Indian Reservation. There was thunder and lightning all around the
night of his birth, and his mother named him, which
translates in English to bright path. By age nine, he
had lost his twin brother to pneumonia. By age eleven,
(06:09):
he'd lost both of his parents. He was taken forcibly
to Haskell Indian School, where he ran away multiple times
back home to Oklahoma, and finally he was taken to Carlisle,
Pennsylvania at age eleven years old and put there because
he couldn't run away anymore. And when I think about
(06:30):
somebody who comes from those beginnings, I started to recognize
that he needed a channel, you know, he needed a
place to put his emotion, his anger, his passion. And
sports became that vehicle. And I think to myself, if
he wouldn't have had sports, what might have become of him.
(06:52):
But he did all this before you know, social media
and thumb likes and endorsements, million dollar deals. He did
all this for a different reason. He did all this
for the passion of competition and the love of winning.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Hey, Chris, let me jumping there.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Let me jumping there.
Speaker 1 (07:12):
Because yes, he did it before social media and all
of these accoutrement that we come to know as normal today.
But what do you think Jim Thorpe might have become
as far as the figure, well the size of his
legacy if he had been born in the in the
world of ESPN, in the world of TikTok, the world
of social media, more generally.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
I don't know exactly, mo I mean, that's the honest answer,
but I can I can say that I like to
think that he wouldn't have used those avenues for himself.
I think it was purely about the competition that he loved.
(07:53):
But he's certainly had a humility that wasn't just about himself.
And I can see that in his interviews. I can
see that throughout his life that he worked hard. He was,
you know, digging ditches in his later life, and I
see in his face that he wasn't shamed by what
he was doing. He was a prideful person that was
(08:16):
making himself useful from a generation that knew how to work,
a generation that came from the Great Depression, a generation
that came from World War One, a generation in which
he was put onto reservations, you know, as the first
Indians on reservations. And so when he was out there,
whether he was performing at his best as an athlete
(08:38):
or working digging ditches, or he was in a hundred
movies from the nineteen thirties in Hollywood, including King Kong,
he was working. He was not feeling sorry for himself.
He was putting one foot in front of the other,
and he was taking what was given to him and
turning it into success.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Jim Thorpe lit by Lightning, directed by My Guests Right
Now Chris Air premieeres Monday, July seventh at eight pm
on the History Channel. Chris as I said at the beginning,
I'm a student of history. I'm a student of sports history.
So I am overjoyed that this was done, and I
thank you for putting this together so this younger generation,
this social media generation, can learn about and fall in
(09:22):
love with Jim Thorpe as I did. Thank you so much, sir, Thank.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
You, Moe. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
It's Later with Moo Kelly CAFI AM six forty. We're
live everywhere on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and the iHeartRadio app.
You're listening to Later with Moe Kelly on demand from
KFI AM six forty
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