Apr
10
Audio Producer | Journalist
Apr
10
I interviewed Kirk Adams for the Wesleyan Storytelling Project over Homecoming Weekend 2012. He’s the Executive VP of the SEIU and the guy who brought Obama to Wesleyan for the 2008 Commencement address. He shares a great story about some of his earliest rabble-rousing days at Wes.
Apr
3
I interviewed Diane Stein over Wesleyan Homecoming Weekend 2012. Her description of the rehearsal spaces in the CFA brought me back to my a capella days.
Mar
13
I interviewed Rick Gilberg and his daughter Emma over Wesleyan Homecoming Weekend 2012. Rick’s son Sam also goes to Wes. I’m not gonna lie – his story made me hope that at least one of my boys ends up at Wesleyan.
Mar
5
Ayelet Waldman is my new hero for so many reasons – she’s funny, she’s feminist, she’s honest, she’s a mother of four(!), and she’s a Wes grad. I had the great opportunity to interview her for the Wesleyan Storytelling Project over Homecoming Weekend 2012.
Mar
5
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We get punny on this episode of Distillations. From the website:
So Argon walks into a bar. The bartender says, “We don’t serve noble gases here.” Argon doesn’t react.
Buh-dum-dum-ching! On today’s episode of Distillations we’re breaking out our best chemistry jokes to celebrate the sillier side of science. First, producer Daisy Rosario hits the comedy circuit to reveal how scientists like Neil deGrasse Tyson are mixing education and entertainment on stage. Then CHF Fellow Deanna Day talks to historian Rebecca Onion about how the internet has cultivated a new generation of nerds and why it matters.
Image courtesy of snorgtees.com.
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Feb
27
I interviewed Michael Lewis for the Wesleyan Storytelling Project over Homecoming Weekend 2012. Michael majored in CSS (hardcore!) and now does market research for Teach For America. Typical Wesleyan do-gooder.
Feb
20
I interviewed Sharon Purdie ’74 at Homecoming Weekend 2012. She was in one of Wes’s first co-ed classes.
Feb
19
The latest episode Distillations is about how the Soviets and the US used science as a weapon during the Cold War. It was especially fun to have my friend and founding Executive Producer Audra Wolfe back in the studio. From the Distillations website:
For decades the United States and the Soviet Union were locked in battle; two superpowers with very different visions of how the world should work. Though both sides possessed nuclear bombs, each had another vital weapon in their arsenals: SCIENCE. On today’s show CHF’s Haas Postdoctoral Fellow Mat Savelli sits down with Distillations‘ founding executive producer Audra Wolfe to discuss how the science-tinged war for hearts and minds was waged. They also discuss her new book Competing with the Soviets: Science, Technology, and the State in Cold War America. Then we dip into CHF’s oral history archives to learn how the life of Intel co-founder Leslie Vadasz was shaped by the Hungarian Revolution in 1956, when students launched a revolt against Soviet rule.
Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
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Feb
13
Cynthia Rockwell interviewed TV producer Matt Penn ’80 and his son Dylan ’15 at Homecoming Weekend 2012.
Feb
6
This is the first full-length interview for the Wesleyan Storytelling Project. Cynthia Rockwell interviewed John and Sarah Holman during Homecoming Weekend 2012. They met at Wesleyan and share some poignant memories from their Wes days including thesis writing, tree hugging, and the night John Lennon was shot.
Feb
5
From the Distillations website:
Alchemists are known for equally dreamy and practical pursuits—trying to turn base metals into gold and achieve immortality while also conducting the experiments that would lay the groundwork for modern chemistry. But it turns out the alchemists had another trick up their sleeves: speaking the language of love—and lust. In this episode we sit down with historian Joel Klein to find out why so many alchemy texts are rife with blush-inducing romantic and sexual metaphors. Then CHF’s James Voelkel recites some of our favorite steamy passages.
Image from Symbola Aureae Mensae, by Michael Maier, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. Also available in CHF’s collections.
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Jan
23
So happy to have had the chance to interview my friend Zanne for the Wesleyan Storytelling Project. She tells a wonderful story about Mel Strauss, director of the Wesleyan Concert Choir.
Jan
23

My latest feature for IEEE Spectrum Radio is about the future of textiles – clothes that can keep you healthy, that charge your cell phone, and that never get dirty; fabrics that can change color, can keep you warm or cool depending on the weather, and can deliver medicines through your skin throughout the day. This is some seriously fascinating stuff. You can hear the full one-hour documentary about Life in 2030 on PRX, or just my piece below. Plus there’s this fancy landing page on the IEEE website.
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Jan
22
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From the Distillations website:
Little known fact: we have taste buds all over our bodies, not just our tongues. Another surprise? Our taste buds might play a role in more than just our processing of taste. On today’s show producer Mary Harris visits the Monell Chemical Senses Center and Beverly Tepper‘s Sensory Evaluation Lab at Rutgers University to find out if she is one of the lucky few whose super-taster status affords them better health. Then we welcome Nadia Berenstein to the studio to discuss her research on the early days of synthetic flavor development. She reveals how a cadre of early flavorists changed our very perception of familiar flavors like pineapple.
1950s ad from the Givaudan Flavorist. Image courtesy of the Society of Flavor Chemists Library at Monell Chemical Senses Center.
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Jan
16
I was treated to a mini spoken word performance in this latest interview for the Wesleyan Storytelling Project.
Jan
9
This latest piece for the Wesleyan Storytelling Project is a conversation between Sam Paik ’90 and his daughter Ellen, a current student. It was such a pleasure to speak with them both – the full conversation will be posted later this year.
Jan
8
On this episode of Distillations, sound artist extraordinaire Diane Hope shares a story about an innovative technology that could provide early detection of osteoporosis. Then, a conversation with Mütter Museum curator Anna Dhody about a famous skeleton in their collection. It belongs to Harry Eastlack, who suffered from a rare and devastating disorder known as stone man syndrome, which causes the body’s connective tissue to turn into bone when damaged. A similar problem has been affecting modern military troops.
Image of the skeleton of Harry Eastlack, whose disease-ravaged bones are on display at Philadelphia’s Mütter Museum. Image courtesy of Evi Numen, 2011, for the Mütter Museum of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia.
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