In 2023, Kirin Clawson's endocrinologist placed a puberty-blocking implant in her arm, a medical intervention that is associated with improved mental health for many trans kids with gender dysphoria. In February 2024, Indiana joined several other conservative states banning this treatment for minors. In this episode we hear from the Clawsons how the ban has impacted their family. And, we hear from psychologist, Dr. Myeshia Price about how all adults in the lives of children can support gender diverse youth, despite increasing discriminatory anti-trans laws aimed at kids.

This episode, originally released in June 2024, kicks off the Making Contact Anniversary Capsule: celebrating 30 years of social justice journalism. The miniseries will take us from protests on the streets of Seattle to an Indiana family fighting for their daughter's gender affirming care. It will explore a racial reckoning in the world of romance writers, and tell the story of border walls from Gaza to Arizona. These shows embody how Making Contact has been digging into the story beneath the story since 1994.

Featuring:

This episode features the Clawson family including Beth, mother and Child Health Worker; Nathaniel, father and Project Manager; and children Kirin, Max, and Izzy Clawson. The episode also features Dr. Myeshia Price, an Associate Professor at Indiana University in the Human Development program within the Department of Counseling & Educational Psychology and Associate Research Scientist with the Kinsey Institute; and Bradford Barrett, Indiana State House Representative.

Credits:

This episode is hosted by Amy Gastelum with Production Assistant Emily Miles. It is produced by Anita Johnson, Lucy Kang, Salima Hamirani, and Amy Gastelum. Our executive director is Jina Chung. Jeff Emtman is our engineer and LIssa Deonorain does digital media marketing.

Learn More:

Gender Nexus | Gender Expansive Kids and Company | Trans Solutions | Protect Our People | LGBTQ services and support map from Family Acceptance Project and the Innovations Institute | Family Acceptance Project |The Kinsey Institute

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

In 1965 Margaret Crane was a young designer creating packaging for a pharmaceutical company when a scientist gave her a tour of the lab. Looking at the long rows of pregnancy tests she thought, well anyone could do that test at home! So she set about designing a prototype for America's first home pregnancy test. While the design of the prototype was simple, convincing the company, the medical community and conservative social leaders that at-home pregnancy testing was safe and necessary was an uphill climb for Crane, who is only now receiving credit for her contributions to the industry. This show first aired in February 2024.

Featuring:

• Margaret Crane - Graphic designer and inventor of the first home pregnancy test
• Wendy Kline - Dema G. Seelye Chair in the History of Medicine, History Faculty Purdue University
• Jesse Olszynko-Gryn - Head of the [Laboratory for Oral History and Experimental Media](https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/research/projects/laboratory-oral-history-and-experimental-media) at Max Planck Institute for the History of Science
• Arthur Kover - Emeritus Professor of Marketing, Fordham University
• Alexandra Lord - Chair, Division of Medicine and Science at the National Museum of American History

Making Contact Staff:

• Host: Amy Gastelum
• Guest Producer: Anne Noyes Saini
• Producers: Anita Johnson, Salima Hamirani, Amy Gastelum, and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Editor: Adwoa Gyimah-Brempong
• Engineer: Jeff Emtman
• Digital Media Marketing: Lissa Deonorain

Music:

Podington Bear, Rhythm and Strings

Learn More:

• National Museum of American History https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/nmah_1803285
• A Woman's Right to Know, Pregnancy Testing in 20th Century Britain - https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262544399/a-womans-right-to-know/
• Predictor, by Jennifer Blackmer https://newplayexchange.org/plays/348156/predictor

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

Dr. Flemmie Kittrell was a Black home economist whose research in the field of early childhood education shaped the way we think about child development today. She became the first Black woman to earn a Ph.D. in nutrition and contributed immensely to programs like Head Start – even though her name is often left out of the history. We'll hear more about her life and work in a story from the podcast Lost Women of Science, hosted by Carol Sutton Lewis and Danya AbdelHameid. This episode first aired on Making Contact in March 2025.

Featuring:

• Dolores Caffey-Fleming, Program director of Project STRIDE, Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science
• Allison Horrocks, Public historian
• Lauren Bauer, fellow in Economic Studies at the Brookings Institution

Credits:

Making Contact

• Episode host and producer: Lucy Kang
• Producers: Anita Johnson, Salima Hamirani, Amy Gastelum, and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Engineer: Jeff Emtman
• Digital Media Marketing: Lissa Deonarain

Music

• "Science Documentary" by Aleksey Chistilin (Lexin_Music) via Pixabay

Lost Women of Science: "Flemmie Kittrell and the Preschool Experiment" Credits

• Hosted by Danya AbdelHameid and Carol Sutton Lewis
• Written and produced by Danya AbdelHameid with senior producer Elah Feder
• Music composed by Lizzie Younan
• Episode sound designed and mastered by Alex Sugiura
• Executive producers: Amy Scharf and Katie Hafner
• Chief multimedia editor at our publishing partner, Scientific American: Jeff Delviscio

Listen to the full episode from Lost Women of Science: https://www.lostwomenofscience.org/podcast-episodes/flemmie-kittrell-and-the-preschool-experiment

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

This episode honors the life and legacy of Alice Wong (Mar 27, 1974-Nov 14, 2025). We start the show with the Making Contact segment she produced in 2015, exploring the complex relationships between caregivers and care receivers: the vast majority of care recipients are exclusively receiving unpaid care from a family member, friend, or neighbor. The rest receive a combination of family care and paid assistance, or exclusively paid formal care. Whether you're a paid home care provider, or rely on personal assistance to meet your daily needs, or a family member caring for a loved one, the nature of the working relationship depends on mutual respect and dignity. The segment includes a conversation with Patty Berne, co-founder of Sins Invalid, who passed away in May 2025.

The show continues with an excerpt from Wong's powerful essay, [Diversifying Radio with Disabled Voices](https://focmedia.org/2016/04/diversifying-radio-with-disabled-voices/), which is a powerful call for better inclusion and representation of disabled voices in audio journalism. The episode closes with Alice's reading of Laura Hershey's 1991 poem You Get Proud by Practicing.

Featuring:

• Camille Christian, home care provider and SEIU member
• Brenda Jackson, home care provider and SEIU member
• Patty Berne, co-founder and director, Sins Invalid
• Jessica Lehman, executive director, San Francisco Senior and Disability Action
• Kenzi Robi, president, San Francisco IHSS (In Home Supportive Services) Public Authority Governing Body
• Rachel Stewart, queer disabled woman passionate about disability and employment issues
• Alana Theriault, disability benefits counselor in Berkeley, California
• Ingrid Tischer, director of development, Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund (DREDF)

Episode Credits:

• Host: Jessica Partnow and Laura Flynn
• Segment Producer: Alice Wong
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Engineer: Jeff Emtman
• Digital Media Marketing: Lissa Deonarain

Music:

• Dexter Britain: The Time To Run (Finale),
• Gillicuddy: Adventure, Darling,
• Steve Combs: March,
• Jason Shaw: Running Waters,
• Jared C. Balogh: BRICK BY BRICK DAY BY DAY,
• Jared C. Balogh: INCREMENTS TOWARDS SERENITY,
• Nheap: Crossings,
• Cherly KaCherly: The Hungry Garden,
• Trio Metrik: Vogelperspektive,
• Kevin MacLeod: Faster Does It

Learn More:

Diversifying Radio with Disabled Voices, by Alice Wong | You Get Proud by Practicing, by Laura Hershey | Year of the Tiger: An Activist's Life, by Alice Wong | UCSF: UCSF Study Projects Need for 2.5M More Long-Term Care Workers by 2030 | SEIU: Longterm Care Workers | Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund | Disability Visibility Project | Hand in Hand: The Domestic Employers Network | National Disability Leadership Alliance | Senior and Disability Action | Sins Invalid | San Francisco In Home Supportive Services Public Authority | Family Caregiver Alliance

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

In Episode 2 of "Exposed" from our friends at San Francisco Public Press, we explore a little-known chapter in San Francisco's nuclear era: human experiments carried out to assess the health effects of radiation. Scientists from the Naval Radiological Defense Laboratory, located at the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, designed and executed at least 24 experiments that involved gathering data from humans — in some cases, injecting test subjects with radioisotopes or having them ingest fluids laced with trace amounts of radioactive materials. Even football players from the San Francisco 49ers were enrolled as test subjects in these so-called tracer studies.

We hear from military veterans who were sent on a mysterious mission to spread radioactive substances onto rooftops at an Army base near Pittsburg, Calif., for an experiment the radiation lab played a role in designing. Some recount experiences of witnessing nuclear bomb blasts in the Nevada desert. We also examine a national pattern of human radiation experiments revealed by Eileen Welsome, the author of a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation, who shined a light on similar practices conducted by government facilities, hospitals and other institutions. This miniseries first aired on Making Contact in February 2025.

Featuring:

Eldridge Jones, served in the military and was part of Operation Stoneman | Merle Votaw, a Navy veteran who participated in Operation Stoneman II | Eileen Welsome, author of "Plutonium Files" | Holly Barker, Anthropologist and professor at the University of Washington who studied the Marshall Islands.

Credits:

San Francisco Public Press:

• Reporting: Chris Roberts and Rebecca Bowe
• Editing: Michael Stoll and Liz Enochs
• Research Editing: Ambika Kandasamy
• Web Design: John Angelico
• Copy Editing: Kurt Aguilar, Michele Anderson and Richard Knee
• Archival Research and Illustration: Stacey Carter
• Audio Editing: Liana Wilcox, Mel Baker and Megan Maurer
• Sound Gathering: Justin Benttinen
• Photography: Sharon Wickham, Yesica Prado and Guillermo Hernandez
• Graphic Design: Reid Brown
• Fact Checking: Dani Solakian and Ali Hanks
• Proofreading: Lila LaHood, Noah Arroyo, Zhe Wu and Sylvie Sturm
• Special thanks to Alastair Gee and Danielle Renwick at The Guardian and Ben Trefny at KALW Public Radio, and to Laura Wenus and Amy Pyle

Making Contact:

• Host: Salima Hamirani
• Producers: Anita Johnson, Salima Hamirani, Amy Gastelum, and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Editor: Adwoa Gyimah-Brempong
• Engineer: Jeff Emtman
• Digital Media Marketing: Lissa Deonorain

Music Credits:

Midday, by the Blue Dot Sessions | Sweet Leilani, by Bing Crosby

Learn More:

[Exposed full investigation | Exposed Part 2

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

Today we present the first half of a two-part radio documentary from our friends at SF Public Press, "Exposed," opening a window into the little-known history of the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard. The sprawling abandoned naval base, in San Francisco's southeast waterfront Bayview neighborhood, is currently the site of the city's largest real estate development project. The base played a key role in the Cold War nuclear era, when it housed a research institution known as the Naval Radiological Defense Laboratory, which studied the human health effects of radiation.

In Episode 1 of the podcast, we trace the radioactive contamination found in the shipyard soil today back to its origins, with nuclear bomb testing in the Marshall Islands. We also hear from environmental justice advocates, including one who led a health biomonitoring survey revealing that nearby residents have toxic elements stored in body tissues that match the hazardous chemicals of concern identified at the shipyard. It first aired on Making Contact in February 2025.

Featuring:

**Ahimsa Porter Sumchai, **community advocate and medical doctor | **Michelle Pierce:, **Executive director of [Bayview Hunters Point Community Advocates](https://bvhpadvocates.org/) | **Leaotis Martin, **resident of Bayview | **Raymond Tompkins, **community advocate, chemist and former member of the Hunters Point Shipyard Restoration Advisory Board | **Daniel Hirsch, **president of Committee to Bridge the Gap | **Derek Robinson; **Navy representative.

Credits:

**San Francisco Public Press:**

• Reporting: Chris Roberts and Rebecca Bowe
• Editing: Michael Stoll and Liz Enochs
• Research Editing: Ambika Kandasamy
• Web Design: John Angelico
• Copy Editing: Kurt Aguilar, Michele Anderson and Richard Knee
• Archival Research and Illustration: Stacey Carter
• Audio Editing: Liana Wilcox, Mel Baker and Megan Maurer
• Sound Gathering: Justin Benttinen
• Photography: Sharon Wickham, Yesica Prado and Guillermo Hernandez
• Graphic Design: Reid Brown
• Fact Checking: Dani Solakian and Ali Hanks
• Proofreading: Lila LaHood, Noah Arroyo, Zhe Wu and Sylvie Sturm
• Special thanks to Alastair Gee and Danielle Renwick at The Guardian and Ben Trefny at KALW Public Radio, and to Laura Wenus and Amy Pyle

**Making Contact:**

• Host: Salima Hamirani
• Producers: Anita Johnson, Salima Hamirani, Amy Gastelum, and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Editor: Adwoa Gyimah-Brempong
• Engineer: [Jeff Emtman](https://www.jeffemtman.com/)
• Digital Media Marketing: Lissa Deonorain

**Music Credits:**

• Midday, by the Blue Dot Sessions
• Sweet Leilani, by Bing Crosby

Learn More:

Exposed full investigation

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

We sit down with Kev Choice, a classically trained pianist, rapper, composer, and educator, who has reshaped the Bay Area music scene. Raised in Oakland with San Francisco roots, Kev blends hip-hop, jazz, soul, and classical music into a unique sound. His latest EP, _All My Love_, explores themes of love, vulnerability, and human connection, with soulful melodies and reflective lyrics capturing the complexities of relationships. This episode first aired in November 2024.

Featuring Kev Choice

Making Contact Team

• Episode host: Anita Johnson
• Producers: Anita Johnson, Salima Hamirani, Amy Gastelum, and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Engineer: Jeff Emtman
• Digital Media Marketing: Lissa Deonarain

Learn More

Kev Choice | on Instagram | interview in West Coast Styles | Oakland Symphony

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

To mark Indigenous People's Day, we'll hear two stories about communities working with food to revitalize identity and ancestry. First, we speak to Mariah Gladstone and Kenneth Cook in Blackfeet Nation in Montana about their online cooking show Indigikitchen and follow them into the field as they harvest a bison. Then, we talk to Dr. Keitlyn Alcantara about the Tlaxcala, an indigenous tribe living in central Mexico who were able to survive the expansive Aztec empire in the period just before colonization, and visit the Healing Garden at Hilltop in Bloomington, Indiana, where diaspora members connect with familiar plants, the earth and each other. This show first aired in August 2022.

Featuring:

• Kenneth Cook, helps operate Indigikitchen
• Mariah Gladstone, founder of Indigikitchen
• Boyd Evans, rancher on Blackfeet Nation
• Dr Keitlyn Alcantara, assistant professor of archeology at Indiana University
• Margarita Martinez Osorio, PhD student of history at Indiana University
• Andre Bispo de Jesus, gardener at Indiana University

Making Contact Team:

• Guest Reporter: Kathleen Shannon
• Episode hosts: Salima Hamirani and Amy Gastelum
• Staff Producers: Anita Johnson, Amy Gastelum, Salima Hamirani and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Engineer: Jeff Emtman
• Digital Marketing Manager: Lissa Deonarain

Music Credits:

• Caslo – Freedom
• Jonny Ripper – Opening Credits
• Danny Bale – Grevillia Music

Learn More:

• Indigikitchen
• The Healing Garden

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, so we are revisiting a show from our archives about criminalized survival, the criminal justice system's long practice of imprisoning survivors of intimate partner violence when they fight back against their abusers. We'll hear from journalist Natalie Pattillo and filmmaker Daniel A. Nelson, who followed the stories of imprisoned women Kim Dadou Brown, Tanisha Davis and Nikki Addimando for their documentary film And So I Stayed. This show first aired in July 2023.

Featuring:

• Natalie Pattillo, journalist, mother and co-director of the film And So I Stayed
• Daniel A. Nelson, filmmaker, cinematographer and co-director of the film And So I Stayed

Credits:

Making Contact Team

• Episode Host: Amy Gastelum
• Producers: Anita Johnson, Salima Hamirani, Amy Gastelum, and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Engineer: Jeff Emtman
• Digital Marketing Manager: Lissa Deonarain

Music via WFMU free music archive

• Poddington Bear, Alsace
• HoliznaCC0, Whatever

Learn More:

The Survivor's Justice Project | And So I Stayed Film | The National Domestic Violence Hotline

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.

Almost half of Puerto Rico's doctors have fled the island over the past decade, leading to a lack of specialists and treatment and incredibly long wait times. And this isn't just an inconvenience. People are dying from lack of care. Why is Puerto Rico's health care system collapsing, and why are doctors fleeing the island?

We take a look at its deeply dysfunctional private medical system and why attempts to fix it, and create a universal health care plan on the island, are being hindered by Puerto Rico's status as a US colony. Its massive unpayable debt, held by investors in the US, means that it cannot make its own economic decisions, even when it affects the livelihood of poor Puerto Ricans living there. But there might be a fix, getting rid of Puerto Rico's debt and rethinking its colonial relationship to the US. This episode first aired in October 2024.

Credits:

Making Contact Team

• Episode Host: Salima Hamirani
• Producers: Anita Johnson, Salima Hamirani, Amy Gastelum, and Lucy Kang
• Executive Director: Jina Chung
• Editor: Adwoa Gyimah-Brempong
• Engineer: [Jeff Emtman](http://www.jeffemtman.com/)
• Digital Marketing Manager: Lissa Deonarain

Music Credits

• Daniel Birch – Indigo Strokes
• Axletree – Goldfinch- Flight to the North
• Mindseye – Spores
• Soft and Furious – So What

Learn More:

Boricuas Unidos en la Diaspora | The Nation Magazine: Puerto Rico's Unnatural Disaster

Making Contact is an award-winning, nationally syndicated radio show and podcast featuring narrative storytelling and thought-provoking interviews. We cover the most urgent issues of our time and the people on the ground building a more just world.