Constant Wonder

Brilliant Planet, founded by an enthusiastic dreamer who has always believed in the power of photosynthesis, borrows a simple process from nature to produce food and sequester carbon. And, an ocean farm that needs no seeds, no fertilizer, no fresh water, no LAND. Through the non-profit GreenWave, its farmer teaches his competitors how do it, too.

Guests:

Raffael Jovine, Founder and Chief Scientist, Brilliant Planet; author of "How Light Makes Life: The Hidden Wonders and World-Saving Powers of Photosynthesis"

Bren Smith, Co-Founder of Greenwave; author of "Eat Like a Fish: My Adventures as a Fisherman Turned Restorative Ocean Farmer"

Photo credit: Brilliant Planet

Interested in regenerative ocean farming? Visit Greenwave's website to learn more about their work and ways to get involved: https://www.greenwave.org/

Constant Wonder is giving listeners a sneak peak of another BYUradio show, Top of Mind.

Millions of Americans move each year in search of a better house, neighborhood, job, or quality of life. Is leaving the only way to live some place better? What would it take for an imperfect place to become your perfect match? Today we crisscross the country and check in with Top of Mind listeners about what makes a city great.

Guests:

Majora Carter, author of “Reclaiming your Community”

Jim and Deb Fallows, co-authors of “Our Town: A Journey into the Heart of America”

Melody Warnick, author of “This Is Where You Belong” and “If You Could Live Anywhere”

Lynn Kreutz, Hayley Trotter, Reed Wolfley, Erika Layland, Jenny Van Stone, Kim Parati – Top of Mind Listeners

Constant Wonder is giving listeners a sneak peak of another BYUradio show, Top of Mind.

Millions of Americans move each year in search of a better house, neighborhood, job, or quality of life. Is leaving the only way to live some place better? What would it take for an imperfect place to become your perfect match? Today we crisscross the country and check in with Top of Mind listeners about what makes a city great.

Guests:

Majora Carter, author of “Reclaiming your Community”

Jim and Deb Fallows, co-authors of “Our Town: A Journey into the Heart of America”

Melody Warnick, author of “This Is Where You Belong” and “If You Could Live Anywhere”

Lynn Kreutz, Hayley Trotter, Reed Wolfley, Erika Layland, Jenny Van Stone, Kim Parati – Top of Mind Listeners

How the painfully shy John Steinbeck came to be the voice of a generation. And, preserving stories from the Great Depression.

Adam Nicolson went looking for tranquility and reflection when he built tide pools along Scotland's harsh coastline. He found plenty to reflect on, but things were not so peaceful in the pools. He discovered that to maintain harmony in the wild, species need to be at each others' throats.

Guest: Adam Nicolson, author of "Life Between the Tides"

Visit Adam online: https://www.instagram.com/adamnicolson1/?hl=en

There's plenty of warfare in animal kingdom, even within a species: battalions of mongooses square off against each other, hermit crabs evict each other in the quest for the perfect shell, ravens rally their brothers to back them up in a rumble. Sounds almost like West Side Story. But all of this conflict actually leads to more peace and harmony, not less.

Guest: Lee Alan Dugatkin, author of "Power in the Wild: The Subtle and Not-So-Subtle Ways Animals Strive for Control over Others"

Explore Lee's other writing: https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/author/D/L/au8005058.html

Photo courtesy of Harry Marshall/Banded Mongoose Research Project

A true national anthem isn't set by law: it's chosen by the people, often emerges out of conflict, and its meaning shifts over time. All of that and more is true of The Star-Spangled Banner. But still, it was sung by four generations of Americans before it became our official anthem. It's been translated into 40 languages, requires extraordinary athleticism to sing, and has long been both an object of awe and a lightening rod for controversy.

Guest: Mark Clague, author of "O Say Can You Hear? A Cultural Biography of The Star-Spangled Banner" and a professor of musicology at the University of Michigan.

Visit Mark on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/usmusicscholar/?hl=en

This greenhouse in the Utah desert seems to be right out of science fiction, where yummy tomatoes grow without soil and produce for nearly an entire year. The greenhouse gets heat and CO2 from a natural-gas power plant to which it is linked by a sort of umbilical cord. Within this bubble of clean, warm air, bumblebees pollinate the vines, and wasps fend off parasites. Whether you hope to build a colony on Mars or just aim to get a good tomato when there's snow on the ground, this is a good place to start.

Guests:

Travis Jones, General Manager of Longvine Growing Co.

Martin Weijters, Head Grower at Longvine Growing Co.

"The past is never dead," wrote William Faulkner. "It's not even past." Ron Coddington was a young boy at a flea market one Saturday, when he stumbled on a book of Civil War-era photos and felt his world shift beneath his feet. The boy's passion deepened as he grew to adulthood, maturing into a deeply felt obligation to uncover these stories. Many photos of the time were preserved on calling cards ("cartes de visite") that people would hand out to others, much like the profile pictures we post on social media today.

Guest: Ron Coddington, Editor and Publisher of "Military Images" magazine

Want to learn more about Cartes de visite? Visit Ron's website: https://ronaldscoddington.com/

Cartes de visite featuring Daniel Waldo, Martin C. Clark, and Almira Newcomb McNaughton Lockwood Fales from Ron Coddington's personal collection. These images are used with his permission.

An old friend of Benjamin Franklin always regretted not having asked the founding father if he could taxidermize his body. He thought Franklin might have agreed, and then maybe George Washington might have also followed suit. But (maybe to our collective relief) what we do have, instead, as a tangible reminder of our first president are several collections of cuttings from his hair. In the days before photography, a lock of hair might be the only proof that a person had access to a notable man like Washington. After his death, some pseudoscientists used Washington's hair to "prove" the biological superiority of America's founders. Others used their clippings to prove that they, too, were there at America's founding. Now, in our digital age, are these kinds of physical relics and mementos still important?

Guest: Keith Beutler, author of "George Washington's Hair: How Early Americans Remembered the Founders" and professor of history at Missouri Baptist University

Visit Keith's website to learn more about the Founding Fathers' hair: https://www.georgewashingtonshair.org/home