Civil Rights Filmmaker Takes on Voter Suppression in “After Selma” (0:32)

Guest: Loki Mulholland, Emmy-winning Documentary Filmmaker of “After Selma,” Executive Director of The Joan Trumpauer Mulholland Foundation

With the presidential election coming up very quickly–let's look to a past interview about voting. Because many of us take that right of citizenship for granted. But it took a series of constitutional amendments to extend voting rights to all Americans. First was the 15th Amendment passed after the Civil War, giving black men the vote. It wasn’t until 1920 that women got the vote. But racial discrimination in the South kept many black men and women from voting until the Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965. A new documentary about voter suppression in America today is called “After Selma.” (Originally aired January 9, 2020).

 

Connecting with Nature through Professional Tree Climbing (21:36)

Guest: Tim Kovar, Founder, Tree Climbing Planet

Most of us stopped climbing trees a long time ago. But Tim Kovar never stopped, and now spends his time coaxing adults back into the branches. (Originally aired October 14, 2019).

 

Award-Winning Cartoonist on Stepping Into the Unknown With Young Readers (33:33)

Guest: Gene Luen Yang, MacArthur Genius Grant Recipient, National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, Cartoonist and Graphic Novelist, “Dragon Hoops”

Gene Luen Yang’s first graphic novel drew from his own experiences growing up Asian in America. It was called “American Born Chinese” and won him all kinds of praise, including being the first graphic novel ever nominated for a National Book Award. Yang’s latest graphic novel for teens also draws from real life–but it’s about basketball, which is something much less familiar to him. In fact, the very first line in the book, “Dragon Hoops” is Yang telling us, “I hated sports ever since I was a little kid. Especially basketball.” So why write a whole book on it? (Originally aired April 6, 2020).

 

Florida Oranges Are Being Decimated By Disease (52:49)

Guest: Michael Rogers, Director of the Citrus Research and Education Center, Professor of Entomology and Nematology, University of Florida

A bacterial disease is driving Florida’s citrus growers out of business. Thousands of farmers have quit in the decade since the disease arrived in America. Two-thirds of the factories that processed juice have shut down. The University of Florida’s Citrus Research and Education Center is racing to find a solution that can save Florida oranges. (Originally aired on December 11, 2019).

 

Whole Hog BBQ with a Rocket Scientist (1:09:04)

Guest: Howard Conyers, Whole Hog Pitmaster, Engineer, NASA Stennis Space Center

As any barbecue aficionado knows, Texas barbecue is not the same as North Carolina barbecue is not the same as Kansas barbecue. The meats, sauces and cooking methods all vary. Howard Conyers’ technique is among the rarest: he smokes a whole hog in a pit, the way indigenous and enslaved people in America were cooking barbecue long before white celebrity chefs were crowned the “kings of barbecue.” 

 

When School Districts Splinter, Segregation Rises (1:25:07)

Guest: Erica Frankenberg, Professor, Education and Demography, Pennsylvania State University

Sixty-six years ago, the US Supreme Court ruled in Brown vs. Board of Education that public schools cannot be segregated by race. Court-ordered desegregation programs, such as mandatory busing, led schools across the country to be far more racially mixed over the next few decades. But beginning in the early 90s, public schools have been steadily re-segregating by race. Some of that has to do with housing segregation. But school district secession is also part of it. There’s a growing trend nationwide of “splinter” districts that are mostly white and wealthy breaking off from larger school districts.