During which period did WBEZ become associated with national storytelling programs?

The late 1990s and early 2000s. That's when WBEZ started carrying *This American Life* and later launched *Serial*, cementing its reputation for national narrative-driven content.

It was in the late 1980s and early 1990s that WBEZ really started building its reputation for national storytelling. They began producing and distributing *This American Life* in 1995, but the groundwork was laid years earlier when the station invested in local narrative features and helped pioneer the kind of long-form audio journalism that later defined public radio's signature shows.

"Don't know what you've got 'til it's gone," but Chicago sure knew what it had when WBEZ started weaving national storytelling into its fabric. The real shift happened around the mid-1990s, when the station began producing and airing *This American Life* in 1995, which quickly became a cornerstone of public radio's narrative identity, and by the early 2000s, they had fully cemented that reputation with shows like *Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!* originating from their studios.