Curse of Oak Island: the World's Longest Treasure Hunt

Guest: Randall Sullivan, author, "The Curse of Oak Island: The Story of the World’s Longest Treasure Hunt"

The legendary buried treasure on Oak Island, Nova Scotia has confounded searchers for more than 200 years, killed six people, and contains booby traps that no engineers have been able to figure out or dismantle, even with millions of dollars of today’s cutting edge technology.  What is the true story behind this cursed, real life treasure hunt – which is also the subject of a hit TV show on the History Channel?  

 

Why the World Needs Dung Beetles

Guest: Marcus Byrne, Professor of Entomology, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa and author of “Dance of the Dungbeetles”

Small phenomena on this planet quite possibly make the world go round, as they say. The fundamental small stuff on which everything else depends. And in the case of dungbeetles, many of them make the world go round by rolling little balls of dung around, as we’ll learn. We’ll learn of their importance in the world’s various ecologies, about how they do their business, and why you should care in the first place.

 

Kumari: Time to Say Good-bye to a Goddess?

Guest: Isabella Tree, author, "The Living Goddess: A Journey Into the Heart of Kathmandu"

In recent years in Nepal, the practice of designating a young girl as a Kumari, a goddess, has come under scrutiny as an archaic practice. The problem, is that getting rid of of the practice would mean, essentially, the demise of a goddess. Take away the practice, and you destroy what some have deemed to be a fundamental pillar of the society. Who are these girls called Kumari? What is the tradition? Just how old is the practice and how essential is it, or is it not, to the cultural identity and political stability of a country?

 

How to Write about the Life and Legacy of Someone You've Never Met

Guest: Adam Bernstein, obituary editor for "The Washington Post"

Gary Vaynerchuk once wrote “please think about your legacy because you are writing it every day.” In the smash Broadway musical "Hamilton," Alexander Hamilton says that a legacy is “planting seeds in a garden you never get to see.” But how do you go about literally writing a legacy?