Uniquely Milwaukee

How often do you think about how your shopping and dining habits may have an impact on our planet? We’re being asked to consider it more as cities like Chicago have implemented plastic bag taxes to reduce use of plastic, but it’s also understandable that environmental impact is not an everyday thought for people. The Milwaukee VA Medical Center is striving to be a leader in the community when it comes to reducing environmental impact.

Every year for the last five years, Milwaukee Renaissance Theaterworks hosts the Br!NK Festival as a way to uplift the voices and stories of women playwrights in Milwaukee and around the Midwest. This year a young woman named Nabra Nelson was one of two resident playwrights for the Br!NK Festival, which gave her an opportunity to turn a story close to her heart into a full-length play.

The rare art of a handwritten letter, dare I say, in cursive, has become nearly extinct. Penpals, however, have managed to survive natural selection and make a comeback for the greater good. Listen in on a volunteer group of Milwaukee penpals, forming friendships with incarcerated LGBTQ people.

UW-Milwaukee's Enquest engineering camp was created eight years ago to give high school girls exposure to an education and career in engineering. This summer, the girls created solar panel USB phone charging stations to send to a village in Guatemala. Listen to the audio story to learn more about their project.

“It’s really a beautiful experience… to be surrounded by young minds in a beautiful garden, it’s a great experience,” said Jeff Brown, as we were surrounded by the same garden he mentioned. I met Brown at Alice’s Garden on a Thursday evening for “Brown Boys Bonding Thru Books,” a community program Brown inherited from the owner of the garden Venice Williams.

The bright neon lights of rollercoaster rides and carnival games light up I-94 every August – but have you ever wondered who it is that helps make the Wisconsin State Fair glow? Meet Shari Black, the woman filling your stomach with fried foods and nacho cheese then turning it upside down on rollercoasters at State Fair’s Spin City.

Kyle Denton is an herbalist. His expertise revolves around all that grows from the ground: plants, flowers, fruits and more. He also owns Tippecanoe Herbs & Apothecary, a Walker’s Point boutique-style store selling herbal medicines, trinkets, household items and more. Throughout the summer, Denton leads Milwaukeeans on herb walks where he teaches them about herbs and plants to forage around the city.

Christine Conley, whose grandparents are from Italy, has been a festivalgoer and volunteer from just about the beginning. She currently manages the Italian Heritage Photo Exhibit, which has a lifespan as long as the festival. It’s made up of religious artifacts and photos from Milwaukee’s Italian community dating back to the late 1800s.

Les Paul Foundation's Sue Baker talks about Paul's innovative work designing one of the most well known recording studios in the world, Capitol Records in Los Angeles.

Les Paul would have celebrated his 103rd birthday this year, and all these years later, the Wisconsin native's influence is still heard in virtually every genre of recorded music. Listen to my conversation with Sue Baker, program manager for the Les Paul foundation and close personal friend of Les', as she talks about his life of innovation.