On today’s edition of “Two Way Street” we’re going to go underground. We’ll explore cool, dark, subterranean regions where thousands of species – from humans to reptiles to insects – have sought shelter and safety, in some cases for hundreds of millions of years, back to the earliest appearances of animal life on Earth.

On today’s “Two Way Street” we talk with Rodger Lyle Brown, the author of “ Party Out of Bounds: The B-52s, R.E.M. and the Kids Who Rocked Athens, Georgia .” It’s the story of how Athens became the center of the rock and roll universe starting around 1980 and continuing for almost 20 years.

This years marks the 150 th anniversary of the oldest Jewish congregation in Atlanta – the Temple, which was founded in 1867. The congregation was made up largely of well-to-do Atlantans – businessmen and their families who were well respected by many in the much larger Christian community.

On today’s show we talk to two singer-songwriters who are part of the rich community of musical artists who live and work in Nashville – one of the great music mecca’s of this country.

Our show today is devoted to looking at the work of one of Georgia’s literary giants: Carson McCullers. She was born in Columbus in 1917. Her father ran a jewelry store. Her mother’s chief occupation always seemed to be doting upon and caring for her sickly daughter Carson.

On today’s show we’re going to talk about food and cocktails. What more could you ask for than that? Our guests are three people in the Georgia food and beverage business who we’ve come to know and admire.

It has been 100 years since Grigory Rasputin was murdered in Russia. And yet he continues to fascinate us. He was born a peasant in Siberia, found God, and made his way to the St. Petersburg palace of Tsar Nicholas and Tsarina Alexandra in 1905.

I’m really thrilled about this edition of “Two Way Street.” For some time, we’ve hoped to coax into our studio a man who became one of the important leaders of print and broadcast journalism in the 20th and early 21st centuries. We finally persuade Tom Johnson to join us and share stories about his life and career.

Have you ever wisecracked that you’d like to escape your troubles by running off to join a circus? It was no joke for brothers George and Willie Muse at the turn of the last century. These African American brothers, born albinos to a poor sharecropper’s family, were kidnapped from the tobacco fields in rural Virginia. For decades, they were displayed as freaks in the circuses that crisscrossed America for many years.

Host Bill Nigut reads one of the most beloved of all holiday stories: Truman Capote’s “A Christmas Memory.” In this heart-warming memoir, Capote recounts the Christmases he spent with an elderly, distant cousin when he was a young boy living in Monroeville, Alabama. Bill introduces the story by describing the sad circumstances that led to Capote’s being taken in by distant relatives, and how his career as a writer unfolded from the time he was 11 years old. We hope you’ll listen with family!