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This story originally aired on February 17, 2018. Prior to the summer of 1940, Woodland Park Zoo’s monkeys lived isolated in cages in the Monkey House. Then the zoo decided to do something progressive: relocate the monkeys to a more “natural” setting, on a human-made island in the middle of a shallow moat. What followed was a war for dominance that captivated Seattle for weeks. T he daily newspapers, keen for some comic relief amid the grim news out of war-torn Europe, offered breathless

This story originally aired on February 17, 2018. George Divoky is a scientist in Seattle, at least most of the year. But don’t expect to find him around here during the summertime. He’ll be on a small, flat little island in the Arctic Ocean, off the Alaska coast, called Cooper Island. Back in 1975, Divoky was doing survey work there, when he came across a colony of arctic birds called Mandt’s Black Guillemots. They’re little pigeon-sized birds with bright red legs, and they’re one of the few

This story originally aired on February 17, 2018. Ollie was a gray and white tomcat, a bit of a tough guy, but with a soft side. He’d often curl up on Tom Paulson’s chest at night. Tom is more of a dog person, but he and Ollie bonded — maybe because Ollie was “not weird and scary like a lot of cats. [He] had more of a dog personality.” But pets are mortal, and one day Tom got a call at work from his wife with the news: Ollie was dead. Please come home and deal with him. So Tom headed home, and

This story originally aired on Feb. 17, 2018. Have you seen Peaches? This free-flying Goffin's Cockatoo can be spotted in parks all over Seattle, usually within flying distance of his human companion, Taryn Smethers. Sound Effect host Gabriel Spitzer speaks with Smethers about why she chose to let her pet bird fly free — and about how his social life has changed hers for the better. If you'd like to be certain of a Peaches sighting, just head to Peaches McFly's Instagram page .

Eddie Muller — The Czar of Noir, as described by the Seattle International Film Festival — is taking a break from hosting Turner Classic Movies’ "Noir Alley" to introduce a lineup of films for SIFF’s Noir City festival beginning this weekend. Muller sat down for an interview with KNKX production manager (and resident movie buff) Nick Morrison.

There are thousands of stories about McNeil Island. And chances are, you haven’t heard any of them. This week on Sound Effect, host Gabriel Spitzer talks through some of them with KNKX reporters Simone Alicea and Paula Wissel, who host KNKX Public Radio’s podcast Forgotten Prison.

We start with a collection of people telling us about something they spent money on that wasn’t necessary, but was totally worth it. Then, a Seattle author talks about why she chose to pay a lot of money for a 150-square-foot apartment in the city. Also, a man takes a huge inheritance and spends it on building a school halfway across the world. Next, a local unrecognized tribe that doesn’t receive federal funding gets help with rent from a group of people in Seattle. Finally, a live storytelling

Seattle writer Paulette Perhach often finds herself confronted with the question, “Am I crazy for doing this?” What she means is, does it make sense, as an artist, to continue to live in a city where the cost of housing has nearly doubled in the past six years or so?

In 2017, Ryan Fenster was having a tough year. He'd been accepted into grad school, but the funding had fallen through. Then, after weeks of feeling weak and ill, the doctor told him that he had Type I diabetes. And then, Jeopardy! called.

If you had to choose between accepting a multimillion-dollar inheritance, or using that money to build a school in India for children who are trapped in poverty, what would you do? When Ajit George was 22 years old, this was the choice given to him by his father, Abraham George. Ajit George decided to forgo the money.