P.T. Barnum

Portrayed by Doug Mishler

The Something of Humbug

PT Barnum, sometimes known as the Prince of Humbug, was born in Connecticut in 1810.  In many ways, he personified the American character that Frenchman Alexis De Tocqueville described in his book, “Democracy in America.”  Barnum delighted in making money and telling the truth, as he saw it.  Some truths were told in the political arena, where he was twice a member of the Connecticut legislature and, in the interim, Mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut.  Some of his truths were lies when they were told to other people, like the history of some of his circus performers.  Other truths were told in his newspapers.  PT Barnum, ‘PT’ as he liked to be called, was best known as the creator of the ‘Best Show On Earth,’ the Barnum and Bailey Circus.  I spoke with PT Barnum, personified by Doug Missler, in the studios of Radio Curious in July of 1996 when this program was originally broadcast.

P.T. Barnum recommends "My Toils and Struggles," the autobiography of PT Barnum. Doug Mishler recommends "The Culture of Complaint," by Robert Hughes.

Originally Broadcast: July 24, 1996

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Emily Dickinson

Portrayed by Wendy Norris

Hiding in Her Own House

Emily Dickinson, better known now than she was then, was known well for her phrases which sang out in a multitude of forms, meters and styles.  Her words presented her innermost feelings and thoughts.  A passionate and witty woman, she made a craft and an art of her words and her life.  I met with Emily Dickinson, in the person of actress Wendy Norris, in the parlor of the Dickinson family home, magically carried from Amherst, MA, to the stage of the Willits Community Theater, in Willits, CA, where the belle of Amherst told her story.

Originally Broadcast: December 5, 1997

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Benjamin Franklin

Portrayed by Ralph Archbold

Visit with Benjamin Franklin

This conversation with Benjamin Franklin, as portrayed by Ralph Archibald who shares a birthday with Benjamin Franklin, was recorded in the summer of 1994 in two parts.  The first was recorded on a walk to where Benjamin Franklin lived and worked, and the second was recorded at the City Tavern, both Philadelphia landmarks in Franklin’s life and now.  Benjamin Franklin is, perhaps, the most noteworthy and animated of the Founding Fathers.  His contributions to science, common sense, and, most importantly, this nation of ours set him apart from most other figures in American history.

Originally Broadcast: July 18, 1994 and July 25, 1994

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Horace Greeley

Portrayed by David Fenimore

Go West, Young Man, Go West!

Newspapers were the primary means of mass communication in 19th Century America.  They not only told the news, but they pervaded social and political ideas of the times.  Horace Greeley was one of the most colorful and outspoken newspapermen of his day.  “Read and judge yourself,” was a slogan of his, almost as well known in his lifetime as his slogan, “Go west, young man, go west,” is known now.  I spoke with Horace Greeley through the personage of Chautauqua scholar David Fenimore during the 1996 Democracy in America Chautauqua series that visited Ukiah, CA.

Horace Greeley recommends "Democracy in America," by Alexis de Tocqueville. David Fenimore recommends "Breaking News: How the Media Undermine American Democracy," by James Fallows & "Who Will Tell the People?" by William Greider.

Originally Broadcast: February 26, 1997

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Grace Carpenter Hudson

Portrayed by Laura Ferri

The Painter Lady

Grace Carpenter Hudson was known as the painter-lady in her hometown of Ukiah, CA.  She started her career as a painter when she was a teenager in the 1870s.  By the time of her death in 1937, she had produced over 600 canvas paintings and numerous other works.  Her skills focused almost exclusively on the lives and cultures of the Pomo Indians who lived in Mendocino County.  Her husband, Dr. John Hudson, assisted her by making the study of native culture his life’s work, overshadowing his profession as a physician.  Grace Carpenter Hudson was a shrewd businesswoman, as well as an artist of increasing renown.  Most of the family income came from the sale of her artwork.  I spoke with Grace Carpenter Hudson in the person of actress Laura Ferri at the Grace Carpenter Hudson museum in Ukiah, CA, during an exhibition of her work.

Grace Carpenter Hudson recommends "The Age of Innocence," by Edith Morton. Laura Ferri recommends "Stones from the River," by Ursula Hegi.

Originally Broadcast: March 5, 1997

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Thomas Jefferson

Portrayed by C. Jenkinson

The Author of the Declaration of Independence

Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States of America, stands as one of the lead political theorists of American history.  His ward republican theory required an agrarian population, a government originating in the individual household, and a consistently questioning and rebellious public.  My guest in this edition of Radio Curious is Mr. Jefferson, personified by Clay Jenkinson.  We discussed what has gone wrong in the US since Mr. Jefferson was President and addressed some of his concepts of what are necessary for a democracy.

Thomas Jefferson recommends "The History of the Peloponnesian War," by Thuclydides. C. Jenkinson recommends "In the Absence of the Sacred," by Jerry Mander.

Originally Broadcast: May 21, 1994

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Abraham Lincoln

Portrayed by James Getty

The 16th President

In 1995, James A. Getty, who appears in public as Abraham Lincoln, visited Ukiah, California and joined us in the studios of Radio Curious.  In talking with President Lincoln about his life, the events of his time and about his presidency, the conversation focused upon the economics of the mid-19th century.  I asked Mr. Lincoln to give us his opinion about the effect that Eli Whitney’s cotton gin had on the spread of slavery.

Abraham Lincoln & James Getty recommend "Malice Toward None," by Steven Oats.

Originally Broadcast: March 7, 1996

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 Mother Jones

Portrayed by Ronnie Gilbert

The Most Dangerous Woman in America

Mary Harris Jones, Mother Jones, was born in 1830.  She lived a quiet, non-public life until she was approximately 47 years old and then, for almost the next fifty years, she was a fiery union organizer, strike leader, and fighter for safe and humane working conditions, the eight hour day, and child labor laws.  Around the turn of the century, she was called the most dangerous woman in America.  Her legacy has lived on in the form of a magazine that bears the name, Mother Jones; and in the form of a one-woman play about her life, produced, acted and written by singer and songwriter Ronnie Gilbert.

 Mother Jones recommends any books by Leo Tolstoy. Ronnie Gilbert recommends "Hawaii," by James Mechiner.

Originally Broadcast: March 12, 1997

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John Muir

Portrayed by Lee Stetson

An Early American Conservationist

The Wild Muir

One of the greatest early conservationists of America was a Scottish immigrant named John Muir who, as a young boy, went first to Wisconsin and then later, as a young man in the 1860s, moved onward to California.  A friend of President Theodore Roosevelt, he successfully sought to preserve the spectacular Yosemite Valley and the Sierra Nevada range; it was joy in his lifetime. Yet the loss of the equally spectacular Hetch Hetch Valley to a dam to provide water for San Francisco was his greatest sorrow.  John Muir founded the Sierra Club and he has been credited with founding the National Park System in the United States.  In this program I spoke with John Muir in the person of Lee Stetson.

John Muir recommends "Sixty Miles from Contentment," by M.H. Dunlop.

Originally Broadcast: October 20, 1995

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Clarina Nichols

portrayed by Eickhoff Diane

The Revolutionary Heart of Clarina Nichols

Revolutionary Heart, The Life of Clarina Nichols and the Pioneering Crusade for Women's Rights

The life of Clarina Nichols and her work in the early women's rights movement of the United States has been greatly overlooked.  As one of the country’s first female newspaper editors and stump speakers, Clarina Nichols spoke out for temperence, abolition and women's rights at a time when doing so could get a woman killed.  Unlike other activists, she personally experienced some of the cruelest sufferings that a married woman of her day could know.  In her pursuit for justice she traveled westward facing all of the challenges of being a single mother and a women's rights activist of her day with good humor and resourcefullness.  Clarina Nichols was portrayed by Diane Eickhoff in this chautauquan style interveiw and we began when I asked Clarina about her childhood.

http://clarinanichols.googlepages.com/home

Clarina Nichols recommends "The Sexes Throughout Nature (Pioneers of the woman's movement)," by Antoinette Louisa Brown Blackwell.

Originally Broadcast: January 13, 2007

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Pio Pico

Portrayed by Roberto Garza

Meet the Last Mexican Governor of California

In this program, we are going to go back into California history about 150 years, and visit with the last Mexican governor of California, Pio Pico.  Pio Pico was born at the San Gabriel Mission in 1801, of Spanish, Italian, Indian and African ancestry.  Both as a politician and as an entrepreneur, he espoused the views of many native-born Californarios over distant seats of government.  As the last Mexican governor of California, he presided over the secularization of the missions, and turned over their vast land holdings to private hands.  Although he fled California during the American takeover, Pio Pico returned to build the first major hotel in Los Angeles.  Later, he served on the Los Angeles City Council.  I met with Pio Pico in the person of Roberto Garza in February of 1998.

Pio Pico recommends "Pio Pico, A Historical Narrative," by Pio Pico. Roberto Garza recommends "Pio Pico Miscellany," by Martin Cole & "Decline of the Californios," by Leonard Pitt.

Originally Broadcast: February 27, 1998

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Domingo Sarmiento

Portrayed by Daniel Lewis

An Argentine President

Domingo Sarmiento, a teacher and later President of the Republic of Argentina, spent several years traveling in Europe and the United States in the mid-19th Century.  He spent six weeks in the US in the fall of 1847 and later published his account of this visit, selectively interpreting what he saw and experienced to conform to his ideas.  In this archive edition of Radio Curious, I visit with Domingo Sarmiento in the person of Professor Daniel Lewis, a scholar-presenter in the 1996 Democracy in America Chautauqua.  I met with Domingo Sarmiento during a break in the Chautauqua programming in Ukiah, California, and asked him what he saw the future of the American Union to be, from his perspective in 1843.

Domingo Sarmiento recommends any book by James Fenimore Cooper. Daniel Lewis recommends "The Invention of Argentina," by Nicolas Shumway.

Originally Broadcast: July 27, 1996

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Dame Shirley

Portrayed by Kate Magruder

Women and the Gold Rush

When word that California had gold in its creeks and streams reached the United States of America in 1848, fortune seekers from all over the world soon began to arrive in California by boat, covered wagon, and on foot. Some people made their fortunes by selling provisions or services and very few actually found enough gold to take home.  Louise Smith Clapp of Amherst, Massachusetts, using the name of Dame Shirley, wrote detailed and vivid descriptions of the life and ways of the gold seekers and of mid 19th century California.  In this two-part program, we will talk to Dame Shirley in the person of Kate Magruder, a Chautauqua performer and participant with the California Council for the Humanities Sesquicentennial Project, Rediscovering California at 150.

Dame Shirley recommends The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. Kate Magruder recommends "Days of Gold," by Malcolm Rhorbough & "The Shirley Letters," by Dame Shirley.

Originally Broadcast: March 16, 1999 & March 23, 1999

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 Socrates

Portrayed by Ron Gross

Socrates of Athens, in Conversation

Socrates' Way: Seven Masterkeys to Using Your Mind to the Utmost

Socrates of Athens, who lived before the Common Era, is respected as one of the greatest independent thinkers of all time.  Socrates himself refused to be recognized as a teacher.  Instead, Plato, his well-known student and reporter of Socrates’ dialogues, tells us he asked to be seen as a “midwife of ideas.”  Socrates’ passion to achieve self-understanding, and the proper ways to live, continues to be studied and emulated to this day.

 Socrates recommends "The Trojan Women," by Euripides. Ron Gross recommends "The Clouds," by Aristophanes.

Originally Broadcast: January 13, 2003

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Frederick Douglass & Elizabeth Stanton

Portrayed by Charles Pace & Sally Wagner

A Visit with Eliz. Cady Stanton & Frederick Douglass

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Frederick Douglass were good friends from the mid 19th century to the late 19th century, and were active leaders in the fight for the rights of women and blacks throughout their lives.  From time to time they got together to visit and talk about America, as they knew it. In this archive edition of Radio Curious recorded in May 1998, I met with Chautauqua scholars Sally Roach Wagner and Charles Pace who portrayed Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Frederick Douglass and asked them each to tell us what it was like to be an American during their life time.

Frederick Douglass and Elizabeth Stanton recommend “The Columbian Orator: Containing a variety of original and selected pieces together with rules, which are calculated to improve youth and others, in the ornamental and useful art of eloquence,” by Caleb Bingham and “The Woman’s Bible” edited by Eliz. Cady Stanton. Charles Pace and Sally Wagner recommend “W. E. B. Du Bois: Biography of a Race, 1868 to 1919,” by David Levering Lewis and “The Homesteader: A Novel,” by Oscar Micheaux.

Originally Broadcast: July 3, 1996

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Maria Stewart

Portrayed by Sandra Kamusukiri

A Visit With a Free Black Women - Boston 1840

Maria W. Stewart, as characterized by professor and scholar Sandra Kamusakiri, was a free black woman who lived in Boston, MA, from the 1820s to the early 1840s.  She was the first American born woman to lecture in public on political themes and likely the first African-American to speak out in defense of women’s rights.  A forerunner to Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth, she was intensely religious and regarded as outspoken and controversial during her time. For more than a century, Maria W. Stewart’s life contributions remained obscured, illustrating the double pressures of racism and sexism on the lives African-American women.  I met with Mariah W. Stewart in the person of Professor Sandra Kamusukiri during the 1996 Democracy in America Chautauqua, held in Ukiah, California.

Maria Stewart recommends "The Fair Sketches of Women," by John Adams and "The Bible." Sandra Kamusukiri recommends “Maria W. Stewart: America's First Black Woman Political Writer: Essays and Speeches,” by Marilyn Richardson.

Originally Broadcast: November 27, 1996

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Alexis de Tocqueville

Portrayed by Dick Johnson

A Visit With Alexis de Tocqueville

Democracy in America

In 1831, a 25 year-old Frenchman, Alexis de Tocqueville, trained as a lawyer, and preoccupied with democracy, came to the US to study this new political scheme.  Alexis de Tocqueville and his traveling companion, Gustave de Beaumont, arrived at Newport, RI, in an America comprised, then, of 23 states and 13 million people.  They stayed for nine months, and then returned to France at which time de Tocqueville began his epic poem entitled “Democracy in America.”  At a time then when slavery was an economic base in the South, and abolitionism was beginning to thrive in the North, America had three frontiers: geography, industry, and democracy.  In this program of Radio Curious, we’ll be talking with Alexis De Tocqueville, through the person of Chautauqua scholar, Dick Johnson.

Alexis de Tocqueville recommends “Democracy in America,” by Alexis de Tocqueville. Dick Johnson recommends “Habits of the Heart,” by Robert N. Bellah.

Originally Broadcast: July 17, 1996

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Corporal Gabriel West & Sgt. Hugh Griffin

The First English Settlement in the New World

Please join me as we go back in history to the year 1584, to the East Coast of what is now the United States.  In that year, Queen Elizabeth the First, then the Queen of England, sent Sir Walter Raleigh in command of three seafaring expeditions to what they called the New World.  These expeditions landed on the central coast of what is now North Carolina and became the first English settlements in North America.  They called the region Virginia, in honor of Elizabeth the First, the maiden Queen of England.  The Cultural Resources Division of the North Carolina Division of History has recreated a model of the seafarers' ship, called Elizabeth the Second, which carried these small groups of soldiers across the ocean in 1585.  In-character actors, talking as real people living in 1585, are on site near Roanoke, North Carolina.  I first spoke with a man who called himself Sgt. Hugh Griffin.  He claimed to be in charge of the small outpost, one of several they established on their arrival a few days before.

Originally Broadcast: July 1, 1995

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