Enoch Pratt Free Library Podcast

This podcast details Baltimore Heritage's Patterson Park War of 1812 Archeology and Outreach Program, an archeology dig near the Pagoda in Patterson Park focused on East Baltimore's role in the War of 1812. Beginning in 2004 with the acquisition of Riggs Bank, PNC created the PNC Legacy Project to honor, document and preserve the history of predecessor banks, the employees and officers who guided them and the communities they served.Recorded On: Monday, July 21, 2014

In Lessons of Redemption, Kevin Shird, co-founder and president of the Mario Do Right Foundation, tells his life story, from the tough streets of Baltimore City, through several years in federal prison, to rebirth as a community leader championing substance abuse prevention and helping children of addicted parents."I want people to know that you don't have to be defined by your mistakes," says Shird. "You can turn your life around and become a positive member in society. I did."Recorded On: Wednesday, July 23, 2014

In Drifting, her debut collection of interlinking stories, Katia Ulysse follows the private lives of four secretiva Haitian families whose hopes for distant success are constantly challenged by the hard realities of the immigrant journey. Ulysse, a native of Haiti, lives in Baltimore. Her stores have appeared in Haiti Noir, Brassage, and other anthologies.Tiphanie Yanique's debut novel, Land of Love and Drowning, chronicles three generations of the Bradshaw family in the Virgin Islands: stories of magic and lust, unknown connections and hidden mysteries, family legacies, an island world undergoing historical changes. Yanique is the author of the story collection, How to Escape from a Leper Colony and a 2010 Rona Jafffe Writers' Award winner.Recorded On: Tuesday, July 22, 2014

Three Kundiman fellows with award-winning first books read and talk about their work.Cathy Linh Che is the author of Split (Alice James, 2014), winner of the 2012 Kundiman Poetry Prize.A Vietnamese American poet from Los Angeles and Long Beach, CA, she received her B.A. from Reed College and her M.F.A. from New York University. She has been awarded fellowships and residencies from Poets & Writers, The Fine Arts Work Center at Provincetown, Kundiman, Hedgebrook, Poets House, The Asian American Literary Review, The Center for Book Arts, and The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Workspace Residency.A founding editor of the online journal Paperbag, she is Program Associate for Readings & Workshops (East) at Poets & Writers and Manager of Kundiman. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.Eugenia Leigh is the author of Blood, Sparrows and Sparrows (Four Way Books, Fall 2014), which was a finalist for both the National Poetry Series and the Yale Series of Younger Poets. Her writing has appeared in numerous publ

Forgotten Sundays follows the life and relationship between Gerry Sandusky, sports director for WBAL-TV, and his father, former NFL tackle and coach John Sandusky. Gerry spent his summers at NFL training camps and his Sundays with superstars and Hall of Fame players and coaches. When John develops Alzheimer's disease, Gerry began to understand his father on a much deeper level.Gerry Sandusky is the play-by-play voice for the Baltimore Ravens. He has won Emmy and Edward R. Murrow awards for outstanding broadcasts.Presented in partnership with the Alzheimer's Association, Greater Maryland Chapter.Recorded On: Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Baltimore, like many other cities, is redesigning local government policy and programs to become a more sustainable city. Sustainability encourages city officials to integrate policy and programs addressing the economic, environmental, and social health of the community. This requires collaboration between city government and neighborhood and community organizations, funders, and state and federal agencies. Collaborative Strategies for Sustainable Cities examines how cities define sustainability and form policy implementation networks to integrate sustainability into city programs.Eric Zeemering is assistant professor in the Department of Public Policy at UMBC. Presented in partnership with 1000 Friends of Maryland and Baltimore GreenWorks.Recorded On: Tuesday, July 15, 2014

John D. Negroponte's career, spanning 50 years of unprecedented American global power, includes his service as U.S. ambassador to Honduras, Mexico, the Philippines and Iraq. Though considered the ultimate insider, he opposed Henry Kissinger in Vietnam and warned that the Iraq War could be another "Vietnam."George W. Liebmann, lawyer and historian specializing in American and international diplomatic history, delivers this incisive account of Negroponte's life and career, based on personal and shared experience.Recorded On: Wednesday, July 9, 2014

Twenty-one years ago, Jim Ziolkowski gave up a fast-track career in corporate finance to dedicate his life to buildOn, an organization that turns inner-city teens into community leaders at home and abroad. Walk in Their Shoes tells the story of Jim's movement and the thousands of young people who have decided to step forward and make a difference.The students of buildOn have contributed more than 1.2 million hours of service, from Detroit and the South Bronx to Haiti, Mali, and Nepal, while building more than 550 schools worldwide. Together they are breaking the cycle of poverty, illiteracy, and low expectations in their own lives and transforming their communities.Recorded On: Tuesday, July 8, 2014

On June 6, 1944, 160,000 Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy to battle German forces. It was the greatest sea-borne assault in human history. The invasion, and the victories that followed, would not have been possible without Neptune, the massive naval operation that led to it.Craig L. Symonds, professor of history emeritus at the U.S. Naval Academy, is the author of many books on American naval history, including The Battle of Midway and Lincoln and His Admirals, co-winner of the Lincoln Prize in 2009.Recorded On: Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Three bestselling Maryland writers – Sheri Booker (Nine Years Under: Coming of Age in an Inner City Funeral Home), Dan Fesperman (The Double Game), and Sarah Pekkanen (Catching Air) – talk about their books and the writing life with Tom Hall of WYPR’s “Maryland Morning.”Sheri Booker, teacher at Baltimore Leadership School for Young Women is the 2014 winner of the NAACP Image Award for outstanding literary work by a debut author for her memoir, Nine Years Under: Coming of Age in an Inner City Funeral Home.Award winning local author and former Baltimore Sun writer Dan Fesperman’s travels as a writer have taken him to thirty countries, three war zones and have proved great material for his many novels, including The Double Game, now available in paperback.Bethesda Magazine columnist and former Baltimore Sun writer Sarah Pekkanen’s fifth novel, Catching Air, has just been published by Simon and Schuster. Recorded On: Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Between 1935 and 1943, the U.S. government commissioned 44 photographers to capture American faces, along with living and working conditions, across the country. Of the 180,000 photographs taken and now preserved at the Library of Congress, Constance Schulz presents a selection from the 4,000 taken in Maryland -- the farms and coal fields of western Maryland, the tobacco fields of southern Maryland, watermen in wooden boats along the Eastern Shore. Constance Schulz is a professor emeritus of history at the University of South Carolina. Presented in partnership with Johns Hopkins University Press.Recorded On: Thursday, June 19, 2014

Carolyn Surrick is a musician who specializes in early music. She is an acclaimed viola da gamba player who tours and records with Ensemble Galilei. She and her colleagues played each week for soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, and Surrick wrote Between War and Here, a collection of poems and essays about her experience playing for wounded veterans. Her new book, Silently, Shadows are Sweeping, is about the final days of her father and stepmother, a deeply moving portrait of love, loss, finality and forgiveness.Recorded On: Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Sheila Connolly is the New York Times bestselling author of three cozy mystery series. Her Museum Mysteries are set in Philadelphia and the Orchard Mysteries in small town Massachusetts. Scandal in Skibbereen is the second in her Ireland-based County Cork Mysteries.Sandra Parshall writes the Rachel Goddard mysteries, set in Virginia. The first in the series, The Heat of the Moon, won the Agatha Award for Best First Novel of 2006. Her latest book is Poisoned Ground.Recorded On: Tuesday, June 10, 2014

"By almost every measure, the group that is facing some of the most severe challenges in the 21st century, in this country, are boys and young men of color." -- President ObamaJoin us in a discussion about President Obama's recently launched "My Brother's Keeper," an initiative created to advance the achievement of boys and young men of color. Despite their socio-economic backgrounds, young men of color are disproportionately more likely to become involved in the criminal justice system and to be victims of violent crime. They are also more likely to be expelled and suspended from school and disconnected from the labor force.Joe Jones, CEO of the Center for Urban Families, will discuss the innovations that are already beginning to create meaningful change in Baltimore, and Damon Hewitt, Open Society Foundations' senior advisor for special projects, will share information on what is occurring across the country.Joe Jones is a national leader in workforce development, fatherhood and family services programming,

Celebrate Maryland's spirit of innovation at the second annual Innovation Expo. Makers, scientists, librarians, artists, and other creative thinkers from across the state will gather at the Central Library to share their skills with Marylanders of all ages.Keynote Speaker: Justin Hoenke, teen librarian at the Chattanooga Public Library, shares some of his successful creative strategies and invite conversation about the potential for new forms of innovation in Maryland public libraries.Presented in partnership with the Division of Library Development and Services, Maryland Dept. of Education.Recorded On: Saturday, May 31, 2014

Celebrate Maryland's spirit of innovation at the second annual Innovation Expo. Makers, scientists, librarians, artists, and other creative thinkers from across the state will gather at the Central Library to share their skills with Marylanders of all ages.Keynote Speaker: Justin Hoenke, teen librarian at the Chattanooga Public Library, shares some of his successful creative strategies and invite conversation about the potential for new forms of innovation in Maryland public libraries.Presented in partnership with the Division of Library Development and Services, Maryland Dept. of Education.Recorded On: Saturday, May 31, 2014

Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan, editor of Singapore Noir, talks with Rafael Alvarez, a contributor to Baltimore Noir. From Singapore, land of mysteries and shadows that enticed Somerset Maugham and Rudyard Kipling, comes a collection of new stories from some of the best contemporary writers in Singapore. Three of its contributors have won the Singapore Literature Prize: Simon Tay, Colin Cheong and Suchen Christine Lim.A native of Singapore, Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan is the author of A Tiger in the Kitchen. A former staff writer at the Baltimore Sun and Wall Street Journal, her work has also appeared in the New York Times and the Washington Post.Recorded On: Thursday, June 5, 2014

Celebrity authors Josh Kilmer-Purcell and Brent Ridge, hosts of "The Fabulous Beekman Boys" on the Cooking Channel and winners of the 21st season of "The Amazing Race," talk about their new book, a year-long trip through the Beekman vegetable bounty.Dubbed "gay Green Acres," The Fabulous Beekman Boys chronicles the lives of two city boys, Brent, a physician who previously worked for Marth Stewart Omnimedia, and Josh, a former advertising art director, in their real time adventure as novice farmers. Their working goat farm is renowned for its handcrafted goat milk soaps and artisanal Blaak cheese.The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Vegetable Cookbook is packed with simple, delicious, and seasonal recipes that demonstrate how we can cook with fresh vegetables year round.Presented in partnership with Baltimore GreenWorks as part of the Sustainable Speaker Series.Recorded On: Monday, June 2, 2014

The Seven Disciplines of Wellness provides a roadmap for complete wellness of the body, mind and spirit. In a world full of confusion and contradictory health information, Surina Jordan uses scripture and science to uncover the true path to wellness.Surina Jordan runs a wellness practice in Annapolis. She earned a Ph.D. in holistic nutrition and has more than 20 years' experience as a consultant, health coach, and motivational speaker.Recorded On: Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Janice Gary's new book, Short Leash: A Memoir of Dog Walking and Deliverance, is a beautifully written portrait of two damaged souls and how they lean on one another to heal and find their way back to happiness.After a brutal rape in her youth, Janice Gary never walked alone without a dog. Her new Lab-Rotweiler pup, Barney, is attacked by a vicious dog and becomes a clone of his attacker; walking with him is impossible. However, Gary risks taking him to a public park near the Chesapeake Bay; and over the course of their walks, the leash of the past begins to unravel for both Gary and her canine companion.Janice Gary has an MFA in creative writing from Goucher College and is a fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Short Leash has won two Silver Nautilus Awards, one for memoir and one for animals/nature and has been shortlisted for the Grand Prize for the Eric Hoffer Award. Recorded On: Monday, May 19, 2014