Katie Thornton
Location
- Minneapolis, MN
Contact Katie
- Producing
- Reporting
- Scripting
- Writing
About Katie
I am an award-winning independent journalist, 2018-2019 Fulbright-National Geographic Digital Storytelling Fellow, and multimedia producer. My writing, audio, and photos have been published by National Geographic, the BBC, National Public Radio, 99% Invisible, Atlas Obscura, and others. As a storyteller, my background in historical research informs all my work—from explorations of how and where we remember the dead, to the spectacle of early American urbanization, to our present-day food, sport, and culture. When I'm not producing, you can find me getting intentionally lost in familiar and unfamiliar places alike, turning door handles in public spaces in case they're unlocked, seeking out the historical oddities hidden among our built environment, or falling off my skateboard at the local park (and making radio about it).
Katie's Portfolio
99% Invisible - "The Infantorium"
A 40 minute documentary explaining why this South Minneapolis apartment building used to be called “The Infantorium,” and how premature babies and the incubators that kept them alive were amusement park sideshows for over four decades.
Association of MN Public and Education Radio Stations - "A Brief History of Women in Bars: A Minnesota Story in Three Rounds"
An independently researched, written, edited, and produced audio documentary about the intersections—and shortcomings—of Minnesota’s women’s suffrage and temperance movements. The 45-minute doc uses the stories of women from 100 years ago to show how Minnesota’s temperance movement set the stage for its women’s suffrage movement. But it also shows how white temperance leaders—and, by proxy, many early white suffragists—failed to engage working class, immigrant, Black, and Native women.
99% Invisible: Life and Death in Singapore
A 35 minute documentary about the constant exchange of land between the dead and the living in modern Singapore—as told through one particularly intriguing cemetery-turned-housing-project.
National Geographic Traveler: "Obsessions: Cemeteries" Essay
This first-person essay about my love for cemeteries ran in the second-to-last ever print edition of National Geographic Traveler Magazine, with a supplemental sidebar article online. I also took the full-page image featured in the magazine.
Experience
Skills
- Audio Engineering
- Field Recording
- Grant Writing
- Interviewing
- Logistics and Coordination
- Producing
- Reporting
- Research
- Social Media
- Story Editing
- Voiceover
Equipment
- Recording Studio
- Hindenburg
- Specialized mics
- Camera