Radio Diaries

There’s a program in Richmond, CA that has a controversial method of reducing gun violence in their city: paying criminals to not commit crimes. Sounds crazy, but the even crazier part is…it works.

The 1950s were the golden age of the American road trip. But of course freedom of movement didn’t apply to all Americans. Jim Crow was the law in the South. Traveling while Black wasn’t easy. Today on the podcast we’re bringing you a story about how Black travelers made a secret road map so they could get around safely. It’s told by our friends and fellow Radiotopians at 99% Invisible.

At 26-years-old, Jose William Huezo Soriano—a.k.a. Weasel—was deported back to his parents’ home country, El Salvador, a country he hadn’t seen since he was 5. This is his audio diary.

You’ve heard of Rosa Parks, but do you know about Claudette Colvin? On March 2, 1955, when Claudette was 15 years old, she refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a segregated bus in Montgomery, AL. This was nine months before Rosa Parks did the same thing.

Nowadays we’re very accustomed to recording and hearing the sound of our own voices. But in the 1930s many people were doing it for the first time. And a surprising trend began. People started sending their voices to each other, through the postal service. It was literally: voice-mail. We recently combed through a large collection of early voicemail at the Phono Post Archive, and we discovered that many of these audio letters are about the same thing: Love. *** This episode is supported by Zola, a company that’s reinventing wedding planning. To sign up and receive a 50 dollar credit towards your own registry, go to http://www.zola.com/radiodiaries

Abortion is one of the most divisive issues in American life and politics. 45 years after Roe vs. Wade – our country is still split. It’s easy to forget that it wasn’t so long ago when abortions were illegal everywhere in the United States. In 1965, an underground network formed in Chicago to help pregnant women get abortions. At first, they connected women with doctors willing to break the law to perform the procedure. Eventually, they were trained and began performing abortions themselves. The group called itself “Jane.” Over the years, Jane performed more than 11,000 first and second trimester abortions.

Every day, we go about our lives doing thousands of routine, mundane tasks. And sometimes, we make mistakes. Human error. It happens all the time. It just doesn’t always happen in a nuclear missile silo. A collaboration with This American Life. *** If you enjoy this podcast, please consider making a donation before the end of the year. www.radiodiaries.org/donate Thank you!

Majd Abdulghani is a teenager living in Saudi Arabia, one of the most restrictive countries for women in the world. She wants to be a scientist. Her family wants to arrange her marriage. From the age of 19 to 21, Majd has been chronicling her life with a microphone, taking us inside a society where the voices of women are rarely heard. In her audio diary, Majd documents everything from arguments with her brother about how much she should cover herself in front of men, to late night thoughts about loneliness, arranged marriages, and the possibility of true love.

16 years after recording his teenage diary, Juan now lives in Colorado. He has a house, a good job, and three American kids. But…he’s still undocumented. This is Juan’s story, from our series, Teenage Diaries Revisited. *** We are proud to be founding members of Radiotopia, a network of the most creative, smart, and inspiring podcasts in the world. We hope you’ll become a Radiotopia citizen today! Go to www.radiotopia.fm to donate and support the podcasts you love.

Juan crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally as a teen, and settled with his family in Texas. In 1996, he recorded an audio diary for our Teenage Diaries project. In this week’s episode, listen to Juan’s Teenage Diary, as well as a new story that he told live on stage (as a grown-up) at The Moth. *** We are proud to be founding members of Radiotopia, a network of the most creative, smart, and inspiring podcasts in the world. We hope you’ll become a Radiotopia citizen today! Go to www.radiotopia.fm to donate and support the podcasts you love.

Asa Carter and Forrest Carter couldn’t have been more different. But they shared a secret. The Education of Little Tree, by Forrest Carter, is an iconic best-selling book, with a message about living in harmony with nature, and compassion for people of all kinds. But there’s a very different story behind the book. It begins with the most infamous racist political speech in American History. This week on the Radio Diaries Podcast, the true story of the untrue story of The Education of Little Tree.

When you spend so much of your life getting to the next stage, thinking about the next move, what is it like to find yourself in…the Last Place? In this episode, we bring you audio diaries from a retirement home.

For Labor Day, we’re bringing you a special, one hour episode of our series The Working Tapes of Studs Terkel. In 1974, oral historian Studs Terkel published a book with an unwieldy title: “Working: People talk about what they do all day and how they feel about what they do.” This collective portrait of America was based on more than a hundred interviews Studs did around the country. And after “Working” came out, something surprising happened. It became a bestseller. It even inspired a Broadway musical. Something about ordinary people talking about their daily lives, struck a cord. Studs recorded all of his interviews on a reel-to-reel tape recorder, but after the book came out the tapes were packed away in boxes and few have ever been heard. On this episode of the podcast, we’re bringing you eleven stories from the book. There’s the telephone switchboard operator, the Chicago police officer, the private eye, the hotel piano player and many more.

In 1945, Willie McGee was accused of raping a white woman. The all-white jury took less than three minutes to find him guilty and McGee was sentenced to death. Over the next six years, the case went through three trials and sparked international protests and appeals. But in 1951, McGee was put to death in Mississippi’s traveling electric chair. His execution was broadcast live by a local radio station. Narrated by Bridgette McGee, this documentary follows a granddaughter’s search for the truth. *** We want to know more about you and what you think of this podcast! Please fill out our survey at www.surveynerds.com/radiodiaries It’s a small thing, but one that will help us out a lot. Thanks.

Most beauty pageants promote the fantasy of the ideal woman. But for 35 years, one contest in New York City celebrated the everyday working girl. Each month starting in 1941, a young woman was elected “Miss Subways,” and her face gazed down on transit riders as they rode through the city. Her photo was accompanied by a short bio describing her hopes, dreams and aspirations. The public got to choose the winners – so Miss Subway represented the perfect New York miss. She was also a barometer of changing times. Miss Subways was one of the first integrated beauty pageants in America. An African-American Miss Subways was selected in 1948 – more than thirty years before there was a black Miss America. By the 1950s there were Miss Subways who were Black, Asian, Jewish, and Hispanic – the faces of New York’s female commuters.

In 1968, Mexico City was preparing to host the Olympics. It was the first time that a Latin American country would host the Games, and the government was hoping to show off the new, modern, Mexico. At the same time, student protests were regularly sweeping through the streets of Mexico City. And just 10 days before the Olympics were to begin, on October 2, the Mexican army fired on a peaceful student demonstration in the Tlatelolco neighborhood. The official announcement was that four students were dead, but eyewitnesses said they saw hundred of dead bodies being trucked away. The Tlatelolco Massacre is one of the darkest episodes in Mexican history. Over the years, the death toll isn’t the only thing the government has covered up.

The New York City public school system is huge. More than a million students, all being taught by 75,000 teachers. Except, a few hundred of those teachers are being paid NOT to teach. These are teachers who are accused of misconduct. Often without warning, they’re removed from their classrooms and sent to a Department of Education reassignment center. Teachers call it: “The Rubber Room.” The truth is, some of these teachers haven’t done anything wrong. And sometimes they don’t even know why they’ve ended up in the Rubber Room. But the worst part is that teachers can remain there for years while their cases slowly creep through the system. Not guilty, not innocent… just doing time. In 2010, the NYC Department of Education made an agreement with the Teachers Union to close the Rubber Room. Turns out, that hasn’t been so easy.

This month, the big tent is finally coming down. After 146 years, Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey are closing the ‘Greatest Show on Earth.’ The elephants have already retired to a farm in central florida. Where will the 400 human cast and crew members go next? Perhaps they’ll go just an hour west of that elephant farm…to Gibsonton, Florida. It was once known as the Oddest Town in America. Gibsonton – aka Gibtown – is where the Sideshow went to retire.

When our friends at the storytelling show, The Moth, heard Melissa Rodriguez’s audio diary, they invited her to tell a story live on stage, in a special show in Brooklyn. For Mother’s day, we’re bringing you Melissa’s story, as she told it live at The Moth.

This is the story of a song, “Ain’t No Grave Gonna Hold My Body Down,” written by a 12-year-old boy on his deathbed. A boy who – instead of dying – went on to become a Pentecostal preacher. A boy who would later help inspire the birth of Rock & Roll. His name was Brother Claude Ely…and he was known as The Gospel Ranger.