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Indiana

us state · in 57 videos (2007–2026)

John's home state, where he votes in the primaries and where all fireworks, even 'bombs', are legal. He uses it as a yardstick, as with its over 16,000 doctors against Sierra Leone's 150, and lately talks of its red-state politics and its lieutenant governor.

Videos by year: 2007: 7 · 2008: 2 · 2009: 3 · 2010: 1 · 2011: 3 · 2012: 2 · 2013: 4 · 2014: 2 · 2015: 4 · 2016: 2 · 2017: 3 · 2018: 2 · 2019: 1 · 2020: 4 · 2021: 4 · 2022: 2 · 2023: 2 · 2024: 5 · 2025: 2 · 2026: 2

Threads

Also named in the threads: John asks Hank what to do about the grass at his new Indianapolis house (2007) · John's 1984 tee-ball 'all-star in our hearts' trophy (2007) · Sarah's Green Green Manifesto: John and Sarah's household green changes (2007) · Paper Towns movie tour (2015): Europe stops and US states chosen by Tumblr vote · John asks viewers to vote for their state for the Paper Towns US tour at papertownsmovie.com/tour (2015) · John's Paper Towns film promotional tour: New York, Indianapolis, Columbus, Dallas (July 2015) · 2016 US presidential election · The Sunset Series: John's videos looking at horizons (2016) · John: The Anthropocene Reviewed book will probably be published in Brazil (2020) · John: Dan Quayle could end up buried at Crown Hill Cemetery (2020) · Pizzamas 2021 edition · John and his mom's homemade hot sauce (2023)

Often together

What comes up in the same parts of the videos; the number is how many parts.

Indianapolis (12) · United States (13) · China (3) · The Fault in Our Stars (film) (3) · Sierra Leone (4) · Partners In Health (4) · Tumblr (3) · Montana (3) · Sarah Urist Green (5) · Paper Towns (film) (2)

What the videos say

The most important statements of each year; all statements.

2007

Also named in: September 6th: The Book Club Returns, Oct. 2nd: Brotherhood 2.0 on the Road (Literally), December 20th: HANK SHALL BE PUNISHED!

2008

2009

  • 2009-04-14 · The World's Largest Balls — John: The world's largest ball of paint is in Alexandria, Indiana: in 1977 Michael Carmichael began painting a baseball and kept painting it for 30 years, so it now has tens of thousands of coats. — 00:01:45
  • 2009-09-27 · TV For Chickens — John says Sarah is working with the artist Tea Mäkipää, who is Finnish, lives in Germany and has an exhibition in Indiana. — 00:00:40

Also named in: How To (Not) Demolish a Wall

2010

  • 2010-04-16 · The Patron Saint of Youtube — John argues YouTube gives everyone the superpower of bilocation: he is in his Indiana basement and at Hank's house in Missoula at once. (playful) — 00:02:29

2011

  • 2011-03-28 · Participatory Geometry — John argues sports matter: as a Harry Potter fan would treasure an email from J.K. Rowling, others treasure the Cubs winning the World Series or an Indiana college reaching the Final Four. — 00:02:29
  • 2011-10-10 · Animal Mating and Librarian Talking — John goes to talk to the medical librarians of Indiana, filming only a few things, and afterwards says medical librarians are so nice. — 00:00:00

Also named in: Harry Baals & Dick Trickle: The Funniest Names in History

2012

2013

Also named in: On the TFIOS Movie Set, Applying for Health Insurance: Then and Now

2014

  • 2014-08-26 · Food Is Weird: Understanding Agriculture in the Developing World — John's Indiana corn produces 6000 kg per hectare; Ethiopia gets around 2000 kg per cultivated hectare even after dramatic improvement over the last 20 years. — 00:01:14
    • The hope is that sustainable higher yields bring Ethiopia growth and poverty reduction like China, Brazil and India; the program seems to be working but is extremely complicated. (hedged) — 00:04:41

Also named in: MORTIFICATION

2015

  • 2015-06-02 · Let's Go Outside — John says politicians sited Indianapolis in the geographic middle of Indiana on the White River, but the river is in many places about six inches deep, making it the largest American city not on a navigable waterway. — 00:00:39
  • 2015-06-30 · Some News — announcement: John says he, Cara Delevingne, Nat Wolff and Halston Sage will tour the US before the Paper Towns film comes out, in the states that won a Tumblr vote: Ohio, Texas and Indiana. — 00:00:41
    • John thanks the many voters from outside Indiana who helped his small home state win so he could have a tour day with his family. — 00:00:54
  • 2015-08-11 (said on 2015-08-10, implied) · 454 Days: Understanding America's Ridiculous Political Campaigns — announcement: John's pledge: he will begin caring about the US presidential election 100 days before Indiana's May 3rd primary; if Donald Trump is still a candidate on January 23rd, 2016, he will think about Trump for the first time. — 00:03:03
  • …and 1 statement more in 2015 — all statements of 2015

2016

2017

  • 2017-03-07 · Hoping for an Airport Reunion: One Refugee Family's Story — John says Saw Kyar Aye began to wonder if he would ever see his son, whom he had prepared to start school in Indiana. — 00:03:06
  • 2017-04-04 · Why I Won't Run for Office — John says politicians attend endless meetings: running for governor of Indiana means meeting rich people to ask for money and meeting strangers across the state daily to hear their concerns. — 00:01:43
  • 2017-07-04 · Civil Twilight — John: Sunsets in Michigan are so ostentatiously beautiful that they are ordinary there, unlike back home in Indiana, where the light just gets grayer until dark. — 00:00:31
  • …and 1 statement more in 2017 — all statements of 2017

2018

  • 2018-01-23 · On Emergencies — John: For context, John's home state of Indiana, with a slightly smaller population than Sierra Leone, has over 16,000 practicing physicians. — 00:01:01
  • 2018-05-22 · The Liger Delusion — John: In the dream John reasoned it out: his yard often has wildlife, the ligers were probably siblings escaped from captivity, and his wooded yard offers food, mostly four million chipmunks. (playful) — 00:00:10

2019

  • 2019-10-01 · Why Are Poor Countries Poor? — John: When Ebola reached Sierra Leone in 2014 the whole country had about 150 doctors; Indiana, with a similar population, has over 16,000. — 00:03:53

2020

  • 2020-03-31 · Let's take a walk. — John: In early spring in Indiana, John says life feels vastly different than a few weeks ago and his omnidirectional anxiety is often overwhelming, so he suggests they take a walk together. — 00:00:00
  • 2020-06-23 · You'll Never Shine if You Don't Glow — John: Say's firefly became Indiana's state insect in 2018, and the Department of Natural Resources stressed that it is a true Indiana native, unlike many states' state insects. — 00:00:58
  • 2020-07-14 · The ice we skate is getting pretty thin. — John: Last week (week of 6 July 2020) Indiana, population under 7 million, had more new COVID cases and deaths than Germany, population over 83 million. — 00:00:58
  • 2020-12-15 · America's Capital of Dead Vice Presidents — John says Indiana is most known for not being known for much: a race car thing, some sports teams, and a children's museum being attacked by dinosaurs. (playful) — 00:00:00
    • John says Indiana limestone built many famous American buildings, including the Empire State Building, but none of them is in Indiana. — 00:00:00
    • John says Marshall was known for self-deprecating humor, once writing that Indiana is the mother of vice presidents, home to more second-class men than any other state. — 00:00:58
    • John says no Indiana vice president went on to become president: 18% of US vice presidents who never became president are from Indiana, which has just 2% of the US population. — 00:01:27
  • …and 4 statements more in 2020 — all statements of 2020

2021

  • 2021-01-12 · My 2021 Vision Board — John: Every year more Canada geese become permanent non-migratory residents of Indiana; John wants to convince them to fly south. — 00:01:46
  • 2021-10-06 · Searching for Betsy in Brazil — John: On the third day of Pizzamas, John drives to Brazil, Indiana, because someone there ordered Pizzamas items and he wants to partially fill the order himself. — 00:00:00
    • John's book The Anthropocene Reviewed comes out in Brazil this week (week of 4 October 2021); unable to go there because of the state of the world, he celebrates in Brazil, Indiana. — 00:00:00
    • John says the fountain in downtown Brazil, Indiana is a replica of a famous Brazilian fountain given to the town by Brazil almost 70 years ago, and it is lovely and well cared for. — 00:01:34
  • …and 3 statements more in 2021 — all statements of 2021

Also named in: let's go on a parts adventure

2022

  • 2022-10-07 · Planets Don't Exist — John jokes that Dan Quayle, an Indiana boy now living in Arizona, could be a future Crown Hill Cemetery resident, and he thought of writing to suggest it. (playful) — 00:09:12
  • 2022-11-29 · The Weight of Life — John says Indiana, thought of as endless cornfields, was all hardwood forest 400 years ago: a forest land terraformed for corn. — 00:02:26

2023

  • 2023-08-22 · The Panera Phenomenon — ask: John asks viewers to suggest this year's (2023) hot sauce name in the comments, conveying that it will be hot but also fun, like August in Indiana. — 00:03:30
  • 2023-10-04 · A Messy and Unhinged Introduction to Geoengineering — Hank says US carbon dioxide emissions already cause death and suffering, but incidentally, not on purpose; doing it on purpose matters, though part of him thinks it shouldn't. — 00:06:45

2024

Also named in: Hank and John Reunited WITH RAX

2025

  • 2025-05-27 (said on 2025-05-25, implied) · The Longest (and best) Day — John says Speedway, Indiana, is most days a town of about 35,000, but on race day, with over 400,000 people there, it is Indiana's second-largest city. — 00:00:00
  • 2025-06-10 · 90,000,000 Lives for $20 — John says living in a red state makes him unusually powerful now: people in Indiana, South Carolina, Texas or Maine, or represented by Tom Cole or Mario Diaz-Balart, matter enormously. — 00:05:21

2026

  • 2026-08-18 · My Nemeses — John: Last week (week of 10 August 2026) John made an Instagram video praising the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles that also criticized Indiana's lieutenant governor. — 00:02:28
    • John says his video's real point, that Indiana BMV employees do hard jobs extremely well, was lost in the clickbait takeaway that he hates his nemesis. — 00:02:57
    • John says the lieutenant governor tried to remove John's books from the YA sections of public libraries in central Indiana. — 00:03:27
    • By making the snarky video he was incentivized to make, John made his own life worse and Indiana's already poor political discourse a little worse. — 00:03:56
  • 2026-10-20 · Correcting a Mistake in Everything Is Tuberculosis · 50 x 50 Science — John: The video is the Indiana entry in 50x50 Science Across America, a national series in which 50 creators talk with scientists. — 00:00:00
    • To research the video, John met Dr. Leslie Enane, a tuberculosis researcher in Indiana, joking that this will shock Hank, and consulted other experts around the world. (playful) — 00:00:00