With Good Reason

In the years after World War I, stunt pilots in small airplanes would fly throughout the country, performing tricks and selling rides to locals—introducing Americans to flight for the first time. By the end of World War II, says Historian Houston Johnson, air travel and airports were commonplace, in large part because of the efforts of the Works Progress Administration. Plus: The BBC television fantasy series Dr. Who has been around for more than 50 years and has a large devoted fan base here in America and around the world. This month saw the debut of the 12th doctor who can travel through time and space. Jason Barr is coeditor of the new book The Language of Dr. Who.

Later in the show: Over the past decade, Mexican drug traffickers trying to get their products to the U.S. have had a spiritual “protector.” Her name is Santa Muerte, and she’s a Mexican folk saint for not just drug traffickers, but prostitutes too. Andrew Chesnut is the author of Devoted to Death, in which he looks at Santa Muerte’s growing cult of followers in both Mexico and the U.S. Also featured: Africa is often thought of as a continent rife with wars, famines, wild animals, and primitive tribes. But Robert Vinson is working on a new book that challenges those ideas. He says Zulu people of South Africa were active shapers of the modern Atlantic world, influencing popular culture, literature, sports, and the Civil Rights movement.

In the years after World War I, stunt pilots in small airplanes would fly throughout the country, performing tricks and selling rides to locals—introducing Americans to flight for the first time. By the end of World War II, says Historian Houston Johnson, air travel and airports were commonplace, in large part because of the efforts of the Works Progress Administration. Plus: The BBC television fantasy series Dr. Who has been around for more than 50 years and has a large devoted fan base here in America and around the world. This month saw the debut of the 12th doctor who can travel through time and space. Jason Barr is coeditor of the new book The Language of Dr. Who.

Later in the show: Over the past decade, Mexican drug traffickers trying to get their products to the U.S. have had a spiritual “protector.” Her name is Santa Muerte, and she’s a Mexican folk saint for not just drug traffickers, but prostitutes too. Andrew Chesnut is the author of Devoted to Death, in which he looks at Santa Muerte’s growing cult of followers in both Mexico and the U.S. Also featured: Africa is often thought of as a continent rife with wars, famines, wild animals, and primitive tribes. But Robert Vinson is working on a new book that challenges those ideas. He says Zulu people of South Africa were active shapers of the modern Atlantic world, influencing popular culture, literature, sports, and the Civil Rights movement.

In the years after World War I, stunt pilots in small airplanes would fly throughout the country, performing tricks and selling rides to locals—introducing Americans to flight for the first time. By the end of World War II, says Historian Houston Johnson, air travel and airports were commonplace, in large part because of the efforts of the Works Progress Administration. Plus: The BBC television fantasy series Dr. Who has been around for more than 50 years and has a large devoted fan base here in America and around the world. This month saw the debut of the 12th doctor who can travel through time and space. Jason Barr is coeditor of the new book The Language of Dr. Who.

Later in the show: Over the past decade, Mexican drug traffickers trying to get their products to the U.S. have had a spiritual “protector.” Her name is Santa Muerte, and she’s a Mexican folk saint for not just drug traffickers, but prostitutes too. Andrew Chesnut is the author of Devoted to Death, in which he looks at Santa Muerte’s growing cult of followers in both Mexico and the U.S. Also featured: Africa is often thought of as a continent rife with wars, famines, wild animals, and primitive tribes. But Robert Vinson is working on a new book that challenges those ideas. He says Zulu people of South Africa were active shapers of the modern Atlantic world, influencing popular culture, literature, sports, and the Civil Rights movement.

Thomas Jefferson said Patrick Henry “got the ball of revolution rolling.” Henry was five times elected governor of colonial Virginia, but it was his ability to electrify an audience that made him the idol of the common people. Historian John Ragosta (Robert C. Vaughan Fellow at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities) is writing a book about this extraordinary orator. Plus: Before Patrick Henry died, he credited a Presbyterian minister named Samuel Davies with “teaching me what an orator should be.” With Good Reason producer Kelley Libby finds the story of Davies at a “ghost church” on a stretch of rural road. Also: Two hundred years ago this week the British burned Washington in the War of 1812. The man in the White House at that time was our nation’s fourth president, James Madison. Andrew Burstein (Louisiana State University) says Madison was an intensely political man, but he wasn’t slippery—you knew where you stood with him. Burstein and Ragosta were keynote speakers at UVa’s Summer Jefferson Symposium.

Later in the show: In his most recent book Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and his Slaves, Henry Wiencek (Virginia Foundation for the Humanities Fellow) creates a portrait of the founding father that challenges the long-held perception of Thomas Jefferson as a benevolent slaveholder. Also featured: In her biography of Thomas Jefferson’s daughter, Martha Jefferson Randolph, Daughter of Monticello: Her Life and Times, Cynthia Kierner (George Mason University) says the nation’s first daughter of its third president lived a full life that reveals the privileges and limits of celebrity. The biography offers a unique look at American history from the perspective of this intelligent, tactfully assertive woman.

Thomas Jefferson said Patrick Henry “got the ball of revolution rolling.” Henry was five times elected governor of colonial Virginia, but it was his ability to electrify an audience that made him the idol of the common people. Historian John Ragosta (Robert C. Vaughan Fellow at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities) is writing a book about this extraordinary orator. Plus: Before Patrick Henry died, he credited a Presbyterian minister named Samuel Davies with “teaching me what an orator should be.” With Good Reason producer Kelley Libby finds the story of Davies at a “ghost church” on a stretch of rural road. Also: Two hundred years ago this week the British burned Washington in the War of 1812. The man in the White House at that time was our nation’s fourth president, James Madison. Andrew Burstein (Louisiana State University) says Madison was an intensely political man, but he wasn’t slippery—you knew where you stood with him. Burstein and Ragosta were keynote speakers at UVa’s Summer Jefferson Symposium.

Later in the show: In his most recent book Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and his Slaves, Henry Wiencek (Virginia Foundation for the Humanities Fellow) creates a portrait of the founding father that challenges the long-held perception of Thomas Jefferson as a benevolent slaveholder. Also featured: In her biography of Thomas Jefferson’s daughter, Martha Jefferson Randolph, Daughter of Monticello: Her Life and Times, Cynthia Kierner (George Mason University) says the nation’s first daughter of its third president lived a full life that reveals the privileges and limits of celebrity. The biography offers a unique look at American history from the perspective of this intelligent, tactfully assertive woman.

Thomas Jefferson said Patrick Henry “got the ball of revolution rolling.” Henry was five times elected governor of colonial Virginia, but it was his ability to electrify an audience that made him the idol of the common people. Historian John Ragosta (Robert C. Vaughan Fellow at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities) is writing a book about this extraordinary orator. Plus: Before Patrick Henry died, he credited a Presbyterian minister named Samuel Davies with “teaching me what an orator should be.” With Good Reason producer Kelley Libby finds the story of Davies at a “ghost church” on a stretch of rural road. Also: Two hundred years ago this week the British burned Washington in the War of 1812. The man in the White House at that time was our nation’s fourth president, James Madison. Andrew Burstein (Louisiana State University) says Madison was an intensely political man, but he wasn’t slippery—you knew where you stood with him. Burstein and Ragosta were keynote speakers at UVa’s Summer Jefferson Symposium.

Later in the show: In his most recent book Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and his Slaves, Henry Wiencek (Virginia Foundation for the Humanities Fellow) creates a portrait of the founding father that challenges the long-held perception of Thomas Jefferson as a benevolent slaveholder. Also featured: In her biography of Thomas Jefferson’s daughter, Martha Jefferson Randolph, Daughter of Monticello: Her Life and Times, Cynthia Kierner (George Mason University) says the nation’s first daughter of its third president lived a full life that reveals the privileges and limits of celebrity. The biography offers a unique look at American history from the perspective of this intelligent, tactfully assertive woman.

From the Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, oysters have influenced our history, our culture and, of course, our eating habits. When Captain John Smith sailed into the Chesapeake Bay, he said oysters were as big as dinner plates. Chefs, oystermen, conservationists, oyster-lovers, and poets Nikki Giovanni and Tim Seibles all weigh in about the legend and allure of Crassotrea virginica.

Later in the show: They’re baaaaack! Liberal use of DDT and other pesticides virtually eliminated bedbugs in the U.S. in the 1950s and 1960s, but international travel has brought these unwanted passengers back into our hotel rooms. Entomologist Dini Miller is growing them in her lab, and volunteer graduate students are offering up their arms to study just how the bedbugs bite. Also: Wildlife photographer Lynda Richardson has risked life and limb traveling the world to photograph animals in the wild.

From the Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, oysters have influenced our history, our culture and, of course, our eating habits. When Captain John Smith sailed into the Chesapeake Bay, he said oysters were as big as dinner plates. Chefs, oystermen, conservationists, oyster-lovers, and poets Nikki Giovanni and Tim Seibles all weigh in about the legend and allure of Crassotrea virginica.

Later in the show: They’re baaaaack! Liberal use of DDT and other pesticides virtually eliminated bedbugs in the U.S. in the 1950s and 1960s, but international travel has brought these unwanted passengers back into our hotel rooms. Entomologist Dini Miller is growing them in her lab, and volunteer graduate students are offering up their arms to study just how the bedbugs bite. Also: Wildlife photographer Lynda Richardson has risked life and limb traveling the world to photograph animals in the wild.

From the Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, oysters have influenced our history, our culture and, of course, our eating habits. When Captain John Smith sailed into the Chesapeake Bay, he said oysters were as big as dinner plates. Chefs, oystermen, conservationists, oyster-lovers, and poets Nikki Giovanni and Tim Seibles all weigh in about the legend and allure of Crassotrea virginica.

Later in the show: They’re baaaaack! Liberal use of DDT and other pesticides virtually eliminated bedbugs in the U.S. in the 1950s and 1960s, but international travel has brought these unwanted passengers back into our hotel rooms. Entomologist Dini Miller is growing them in her lab, and volunteer graduate students are offering up their arms to study just how the bedbugs bite. Also: Wildlife photographer Lynda Richardson has risked life and limb traveling the world to photograph animals in the wild.

Getting people to talk about their trauma is an essential part of helping people heal. Fred Bemak and Rita Chi-Ying Chung (George Mason University) created Counselors Without Borders and use talk therapy in their relief work following disasters in Thailand, Myanmar, Haiti and New Orleans. Also featured:A new study finds that widows and widowers experience less emotional and physical pain than their married, divorced, or single counterparts. Jim Wade (Virginia Commonwealth University) says these findings speak to the strength of the human spirit to develop psychological strength after misfortune. And: Many parents push their biracial children to one race group or another in an attempt to help them “fit in.” Kristen Nugent (Longwood University) finds that experiencing multicultural family and community groups is supremely important in developing a strong sense of self-esteem in biracial children.

Later in the show: The End of Men Figuring out how to behave as a man in America is ever more difficult. Real American men, so the narrative goes, are disappearing. David Magill (Longwood University) explores the myths and realities of the male crisis. Also featured: As an English teacher in Atlanta, Joseph Jones (Radford University) recognized the damaging effects of homophobia among students in his classroom. He now wants to help other teachers address bullying. His book is Making Safe Places Unsafe: A Discussion of Homophobia with Teachers.