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Episode #444

Finding the Proper Words

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Friday, July 02, 2004

It’s not easy to find just the right word. To wit, this week, we follow the efforts of fifth graders trying to interpret a Wallace Stevens poem; a British expat struggling to remain ever the proper lady; Orson Welles tripping over ad copy; and Thomas Jefferson (as imagined in a 1950s radio drama), lobbying for his version of the Declaration of Independence. And then there’s young singer Sophie Auster, in a recording studio, striving to hit the right note.

Declaration Drama

Alexander Hamilton At present, most Founding Father fanatics are directing their attention toward Alexander Hamilton. In honor of Independence Day, we thought it appropriate to divert some of that attention to Thomas Jefferson – with the help of a 1952 educational radio broadcast titled ...

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The Odds

In the United States it is illegal to bet on elections, but that doesn’t keep Ben Eckstein from figuring out the odds. Eckstein runs "America’s Line," a company which publishes odds on things like sports events, the Oscars, the Grammies … and the upcoming presidential election. Host Dean Olsher goes ...

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Again...

One Ring Zero Novelist Paul Auster and the band One Ring Zero collaborated on the band’s recent album, "As Smart as We Are." Now they’ve pulled Auster’s 16-year-old daughter Sophie into the mix. We stopped by a modest recording studio in the heart of ...

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The Sound of a Blog

It seems blogs have taken a new turn towards more (and more interesting) audio. Here’s our pick of the week, from the "365 Days Project," curated by Otis Fodder. It’s titled "Orson Welles - Frozen Peas Spot."

» Listen to more of Fodder’s findings

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Thirteen Ways

Wallace Stevens We leave the summer behind and step into a classroom in Queens, New York, filled with restless eleven-year-olds. At the front sits Sam Swope, a visiting writer who is determined to teach these children the pleasures of reading Wallace Stevens’ "Thirteen Ways ...

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Farewell to Sis

Guthrie and Sis As an accordion player in the group The Almanac Singers, which included Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, and later as co-founder of the folk-song journal Broadside, Agnes "Sis" Cunningham was at the heart of the American folk music revival. She died ...

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The English Rose of Indiana

Elsie Arnold is a proper English woman. Only she’s not thoroughly English anymore. She’s lived in America’s heartland ever since she became a war bride in the 1940s. Nor is she exactly a woman – rather, she’s a fictional character created by David Cale. In this short story, he imagines ...

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