Knox Pods

Just Mercy is at once an unforgettable account of an idealistic, gifted young lawyer’s coming of age, a moving window into the lives of those he has defended, and an inspiring argument for compassion in the pursuit of true justice.

Mark Stephens is serving his fourth term as the elected District Public Defender for the Sixth Judicial District in Tennessee.

Suzanne Supplee is the author of Artichoke's Heart and When Irish Guys Are Smiling. Supplee visited on May 24, 2010 and read from her book Somebody Everybody Listens To, the story of a girl blessed with a beautiful voice and big dreams of leaving her tiny Tennessee hometown. With a beaten down car, a pocketful of hard-earned waitressing money, and stars in her eyes, Retta Lee Jones sets out to make it big in Nashville. But the road to success isn't a smooth one in a town filled with dreamers, and Retta begins to have doubts: can she make her mark while staying true to herself?

Suzanne is a graduate of Southern Illinois University, and she earned a masters degree in creative writing from Towson University in Maryland. For a number of years, she has worked as both a teacher and a writer. Suzanne is married and has three daughters. Her favorite hobbies include exercise, reading, and, of course, writing.

Dr. J.C. Tumblin led a walking tour of historic Fountain City on September 14, 2009 for the organization Fountain City Town Hall. You can listen and follow along with the map and illustrations in the tour booklet. We begin and end in Fountain City Park.

Saidiya Hartman tells of her journey to Ghana to reckon with the lives undone by slavery in Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route. Michelle Commander, University of Tennessee Assistant Professor of English and Africana, discusses the book in this podcast. "Lose Your Mother traces transatlantic slavery’s continued impact on the author and Black Americans in general," Commander says. "The institution of slavery is often described as the United States’ original sin, as it set the stage for what followed, including lynching, Jim Crow legislation, the denial of full citizenship rights to Black Americans, and other race-related injustices. By visiting and researching at the vestiges of slavery that exist on Ghana’s coastline, Hartman catalogs the history of dispossession and loss experienced by enslaved Black people and their descendants."

In 1910 the city of Knoxville prepared to receive half a million visitors (so it was hoped) to the Appalachian Exposition. How would the crowds be transported to the grounds? What would they see? Would they show up? The selected reading anticipates a successful exposition with details about railway preparations and buildings.

In August of 1932 a party of nine members of the Smoky Mountains Hiking Club made what they believed to be the first continuous hike from one end of what would become the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to the other. Among the company was Harvey Broome—for whom the local chapter of the Sierra Club is named—and Carlos Campbell, who chronicled the adventure in his memoir, Memories of Old Smoky. By the kind permission of the Campbell family, we read an abridged version of his tale of the journey.

John Sevier died on September 24, 1815, while on a mission in the territory of Alabama. In 1889 his remains were removed from an Alabama cotton field and brought to Knoxville for burial on the courthouse lawn. The newspaper articles for this episode describe in detail the excavation of the grave, the pageantry of Sevier Day, the gathering of dignitaries, and the pride of Knoxvillians in discharging "a duty incumbent upon her citizens."

Mark Campen expresses the importance of farmer's markets in discussing the book Gaining Ground: A Story Of Farmers' Markets, Local Food, And Saving The Family Farm by Forrest Pritchard.

Pritchard grew up on a farm but didn’t know much about farming. Fresh out of college with a degree in English and geology, he decided he could save the family farm from financial ruin, a farm his parents have been barely keeping up by using all expendable income from their full time jobs in the city. Beginning with his initial attempt to raise money selling firewood, he tells an engaging story of his career as a nonconventional farmer. Mr. Campen explains, "This book is about family, community and a will to successfully carry on the farming lifestyle, albeit in a different way. Knowing where our food comes from and our potential role in the food system is ‘gaining ground’ here in Knoxville."

Mr. Campen serves on Knoxville's City Council representing the 5th district and is Executive Director of the Tennessee Chapter of the Izaak Walton League of America.

On a rainy October day in 1882, a shotgun blast ripped across Gay Street showering bystanders with stray shot and bringing instant death to the intended target, General Joseph A. Mabry. A volley of shots followed. After their echos faded, the gathered crowd was shocked to find three corpses in the street, several men and a horse wounded, and two men under arrest. One corpse was that of a prominent banker, Major Thomas O'Conner—the very man who had fired the first shot.

Robert J. Booker has been a civil rights leader, teacher, state legislator, historian, newspaper columnist, and Knoxville City Council member. In this program offered by the East Tennessee Historical Society, he spoke to a group of history teachers about his involvement in lunch counter sit-ins in Knoxville during the civil rights movement. (Recorded in July, 2009)