An audio guide to the world’s strange, incredible, and wondrous places. Co-founder Dylan Thuras and a neighborhood of Atlas Obscura reporters explore a new wonder every day, Monday through Thursday. In under 15 minutes, they’ll take you to an incredible place, and along the way, you’ll meet some fascinating people and hear their stories. Our theme and end credit music is composed by Sam Tyndall.
The Miraculous Staircase
The Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, New Mexico has a pretty unusual spiral staircase – it winds round and round like a DNA helix, and has no visible center “bar” for support. But the story of the staircase’s origins is even stranger. It was built by an itinerant carpenter who wandered in from the desert – and 200 years later, we’re still not sure who it was.
This episode was brought to you in partnership with Visit Santa Fe. Find out more about visiting the Loretto Chapel here:
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