Wander with the Audacious crew through 175 acres of wonder and delight to meet the people who bring The Big E to life!   

From a Lost & Found sage, to a fairy from the Florence Griswold Museum, to a hot tub ace, to Amber, the bathroom attendant/joy DJ.  

President & CEO Gene Cassidy shares the soul of the Exposition, then we follow our heads, hearts, and (especially) stomachs through cream puffs, Pepe’s pizza, and cookie dough-on-a-stick.

This episode originally aired on October 4, 2025.

Suggested episodes:

• Scenes from the Big E: A fair filled with food, animals, music – and heart

 

GUESTS: 

• Mary Naughton and Cyndy Penner: mother and daughter duo behind Cyndy’s Bears, selling embroidered teddy bears and other personalized items
• Andrea Anderson and Sabrina Gagnon: at The Big E with their Clydesdale horses from Hobby Knoll Stable in Duxbury, MA
• Susan Rotondo and Bill Motyl: longtime fair regulars from Southwick, MA
• Tammi Flynn: Director of Communications at The Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, CT
• Rita Rivera: a fairy for the day, advertising the Wee Faerie Village at The Florence Griswold Museum
• Amber Stone: bathroom attendant at The Big E and recovery coach from Springfield, MA
• Ed Ame: a Chicago native, who spends most of the year traveling and works at the Lost & Found booth at The Big E
• James Tackett: a man from Madison, IN, who runs the mini ball booth at The Big E
• Darryl Wilson: sales representative for MAAX Swim Spas and Hot Tubs
• Melissa Russell: fife player from Bristol, CT, who performs with a fife and drum corps, and spent Connecticut Day with her family at The Big E
• John Barrows: printer at Eastern States Exposition
• Eugene Cassidy: President and CEO at Eastern States Exposition
• Greg: a Faribault, MN, native, who sells blooming onions at The Big E
• Kevin Gagliard: Operations Manager at Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana 
• Lynn Lischke: Newburyport, MA, resident, who sells cream puffs at The Big E
• Josh Virkler: owner of Luann’s Bakery in Ellington, Stafford, and soon Hartford, CT 
• Jackson Panek-Henderson: nine-year-old fairgoer from Newington, CT
• Joseph Haag: owner of Kora and Mila’s Cookie Dough from Plymouth, WI, serving cookie dough on a stick at The Big E
• Josh, John, and Henry Pupa: repeat fairgoers from Griswold, CT

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After Charles Wolf’s wife, Katherine, was killed in the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, he found himself taking on an unlikely new role: activist. 

Wolf became a tireless advocate for victims’ families, challenging the federal compensation system and successfully pushing for reform. His efforts later became part of the movie Worth, with Stanley Tucci playing him. 

Twenty-five years later, Wolf looks back at what grief made him do, what justice can and cannot accomplish, and the life he built without the woman he still loves. 

Suggested episode:

• Life after Parkland: A victim’s dad turns to art and activism

GUEST: 

• Charles G. Wolf: After his wife, Katherine, was killed in the North Tower of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, he became a prominent advocate for victims’ families, pushing for changes to the federal compensation system and working to preserve the legacy of those lost

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Welcome to the Brimfield Antique Flea Market!

Thousands of buyers and sellers descend on a small Massachusetts town three times a year, filling fields with furniture, vintage clothes, tools, art, oddities and things you didn’t know existed five minutes ago. 

We spend the day roaming the country’s largest outdoor antiques show, meeting serious collectors, first-timers, lifelong dealers and shoppers operating almost entirely on instinct. 

Along the way: haggling advice, the difference between an oar and a paddle, clown art, a singing bowl sound bath and one important lesson: if you love it, somebody else probably does too. So grab it (preferably using cash). 

Suggested episodes:

• The Big E: What it takes to create 17 days of magic
• Audacious at sea: Wisdom from strangers on a cruise ship
• Audacious Scotland: CT’s Highland Festival & Games, plus quarrelsome dames seek justice for witches
• The minds, hearts (and stomachs) of competitive eaters
• Welcome to the Punderdome! We're entering NYC's punniest pun competition
• It’s A Brand Nude Day!

 

GUESTS: 

• First segment: Lois Shelton, Jacey Bradshaw, Mike Vojnich, Monica Pedroso, Sarah Gray, and Emily Cahill, Ram Limbu, Bruce Baier, Sam Sutner
• Second segment: Jen Davidson, Jen Weckbacher, Deborah Baird, Mary Smith, Collin and Kari McCaffery, Robert Simas, Kate Corriveau
• Third segment: James Enders, Shiree Cole, Tonya Cameron, Mo Benzriouil, Sarah Baroud, Luke Davis, Ross and Laura Bonner, Garett Eisele

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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In honor of Dolly Parton, we’re rebroadcasting a conversation with her niece, singer/songwriter Jada Star. 

Jada shares what it was like growing up with Aunt Dolly, watching the rest of the world fall in love with her, and learning from her example of kindness, faith, hard work, and generosity.

For a transcription of this episode, click here.

Original air date: January 6, 2024.

GUEST: 

• Jada Star: Singer-songwriter whose debut album is called Tell Me I'm Your Angel. She also starred in the ABC reality series Claim To Fame.

You will also hear the voice of Heather Ream, author of "Lunchladies Bought My Prom Dress," East Tennessee native, and Dolly Parton fan. She was a guest on the Audacious episodes about super smellers and nostalgic childhood scents.

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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The Playboy Bunny is one of America’s most recognizable symbols, but it never represented a single experience. 

Candace Jordan was both a Bunny and a Playmate in the ‘70s, and remembers Playboy as a source of sisterhood, ambition, opportunity and lifelong belonging. 

Victoria Valentino was Miss September 1963, and for her, becoming a Playmate became tied to family rejection and an identity she never wanted. 

Decades later, both women look back on the same famous institution, and reveal two profoundly different truths about power, choice, survival and what lived on beyond the photographs. 

 

Suggested episodes:

• Going Flat, or Building New Breasts: Two Women’s Post-Mastectomy Stories
• Models On Beauty 
• Behind The Screens: Hollywood Hairstyling, Coordinating Intimacy, And Illustrating The Great British Bake Off

 

GUESTS: 

• Candace Jordan: Former Playboy Bunny, Chicago’s 1976 Bunny of the Year and Playmate who appeared on nine Playboy covers. She later became a prominent Chicago writer, social chronicler and nonprofit supporter through her long-running Candid Candace brand 
• Victoria Valentino: Was Playboy’s Miss September 1963. A former hospice nurse and author of Dirty Diamonds, she became a prominent Bill Cosby accuser and has spent decades advocating for sexual assault survivors and legal reform

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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For decades, journalist Scott Wallace has traveled the world documenting conflict, culture, and extraordinary lives. But nothing compared to a ten-week expedition through one of the most remote regions of the Brazilian Amazon. 

His assignment: accompany an effort to help protect one of the last uncontacted tribes on Earth, the Flecheiros, or “People of the Arrow,” while avoiding contact with them at all costs. 

He talks about the eerie realization that the tribe was silently tracking his every move, the ethical tensions of documenting such a story, and why the experience forever changed how he thinks about humanity, wonder, and our responsibility to one another. 

Suggested episodes:

• What it's like at the bottom of the world with Dr. “Deepsea Dawn” Wright
• Hot Shots: Photography, music, and pizza from inside a volcano
• A conversation with Humans of New York creator Brandon Stanton

 

GUEST: 

• Scott Wallace: Award-winning journalist, photographer, and associate professor in UConn's Department of Journalism. He's the author of The Unconquered, a firsthand account of an expedition into the Brazilian Amazon to help protect one of the world's last uncontacted tribes

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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Most days fade into the next. You make the coffee, answer the emails, run the errands, fold the laundry, try to keep up. 

But every once in a while, life gives you a moment that blows your freakin' mind. 

For more than a year, at the end of Audacious interviews, we've asked guests one final question: Will you tell me about a pinch me moment in your life?

Here are their answers: stories of love, second chances, belonging, transformation, and awe, including a few from 250 miles above Earth. 

 

Suggested episodes:

• Life advice, one Audacious guest at a time 
• Forgiveness: How we define it and how it defines us 
• I saw it coming! When premonitions come true 
• What smells remind you of childhood?
• Kitchen objects with a story. Listen at your own whisk  
• Awe yeah! Exploring the magic of mind-blowing moments 
• How regret teaches us to live 
• Stories of everyday courage, from getting a needle in the eye to tackling a purse thief 
• The surprising ways we ritual 

 

GUESTS (in order of appearance): 

• First segment: Andy Corren, Bruce Campbell, Steve Feltham, Leroy McSmith, Jeffrey Marsh, Dr. Cori Breslauer, Logan Goodspeed, Casper ter Kuile, Jody Jahn, Harriet Newman Cohen, Andrew Luber, Patrick O'Connor, Glynn Washington, and Bill Edgar
• Second segment: James Tillman, Cassandra Madison, Julia Tinetti, Rebekah Spicuglia, Danielle Meinert, Candace Jordan, Drew John Ladd, Mikaela Higgins, Ari Cobb, Meredith Dietz, Sarah Thomas, Dr. Lisa Kenton, and Karen Smith
• Third segment: Audley Stephenson, Tamia Potter, Jay Bragg, Dr. John Elefteriades, Landon Proctor, Marci Pelzer, Karen Nyberg, Nicole Stott, and Chris Hadfield  

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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When someone tells you they’ve survived sexual abuse, the conversation can feel tender for everyone involved: the person choosing what to share, and the person trying to respond with care. How can we make those moments feel safer, more honest, and less lonely? 

Beth Hamilton, executive director of the Connecticut Alliance to End Sexual Violence, offers guidance on how to respond with steadiness, care, and humility. 

Then Drew John Ladd shares his story as a male survivor of childhood sexual abuse. He reflects on silence, family response, masculinity, justice, shame, survival, and joy. 

This episode is about how to integrate trauma, what disclosure asks of a survivor, and how the rest of us can learn to listen better

Resources:

• RAINN’s National Sexual Assault Hotline
• 1in6 offers support, information, and community specifically for male survivors
  

Suggested episodes:

• Forgiveness: How we define it and how it defines us
• What two suicide attempt survivors want you to know about staying alive
  

GUESTS: 

• Beth Hamilton: Executive director of the Connecticut Alliance to End Sexual Violence, where she works on advocacy, prevention, survivor support, and public policy. She is also a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, which informs the care and clarity she brings to conversations about disclosure and healing
• Drew John Ladd: Writer, musician, and teacher. He shares his experience as a male survivor of childhood sexual abuse, and reflects on silence, family response, masculinity, justice, and what better conversations can make possible

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What happens when a Brooklyn woman who identifies as queer, liberal, vegan, and an atheist donates her kidney to a conservative Christian man from Virginia?

Kerry Kennedy and Joey Shervey tell the story of what it looks like when compassion outvotes everything else. Their transplant crossed party lines and personal beliefs to create an unexpected friendship.

Then, Lindsay Vigue describes how a small flyer on the wall of a diner led her to become a living kidney donor, and then to becoming the executive director of Donate Life Connecticut.

Resources:

• Donate Life Connecticut
• National Kidney Foundation
• National Kidney Registry
• OrganDonor.gov
• Former Middletown mayor Dan Drew's TED Talk about why he donated his kidney 

Suggested episode:

• The Story Of The First African American Face Transplant 

GUESTS: 

• Joey Shervey: Kidney transplant recipient from Moneta, Virginia
• Kerry Kennedy: Living kidney donor from Brooklyn, New York
• Lindsay Vigue: Living kidney donor and the executive director of Donate Life Connecticut 

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

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How do you play the violin without a right hand? How do you drum after losing a leg? How do you rap and create beats when you can only move your head and shoulders? 

Adrian Anantawan was born without his right hand and most of his right forearm, and learned violin using a custom bow adaptation attached to his arm. Billy Brimblecom Jr., a drummer who lost his left leg to cancer, shares how he returned to music and now helps other amputees get prosthetic limbs. And Pheez, a rapper and producer who became paralyzed after a diving accident, explains how he records using breath control, memory, and accessible technology. 

 

Suggested episodes:

• New ways to see, new ways to move: The tech that’s changing disability
• Stunt performers David Holmes and Jonathan Goodwin on life after paralysis
• Multiple sclerosis tried to bench her. Karen Smith won gold instead
• Joe Stone, wheelchair rugby, and the full-contact art of resilience

 

GUESTS: 

• Billy Brimblecom Jr.: Drummer, nonprofit leader, and amputee who turned the support he received after cancer into help for others through Steps of Faith Foundation
• Corey Lee, AKA “Pheez“: Rapper, producer, and Navy veteran who became a quadriplegic after a diving accident. He's a disability advocate and the host of The Super Adaptables podcast
• Adrian Anantawan: Violinist born without his right hand and most of his right forearm. Using a custom bow adaptation, he has built a career as a performer, teacher, and advocate for musicians with disabilities

Support the show: https://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.