StoryCorps has Left the Building

After spending three weeks at the Rundel Library in Downtown Rochester, the StoryCorps MobileBooth crew has moved on to their next recording site, Erie PA. Over 200 people in Rochester shared their stories, some of which will be heard on WXXI starting in September. Here is a sampling of some of the stories that will be broadcast:

• A one-hundred year old nun talks about what Rochester was like in the early 20th century. She remembers when Mr. Wegman used to push a vegetable cart through the streets of the city; now Wegmans is a huge chain of grocery stores.
• The director of the Center for Holocaust Awareness talks about growing up as a child of Holocaust survivors. She is also a singer/songwriter, and she shares a song she wrote to her grandparents, who died in Auschwitz.
• A young mother tells the tragic story of losing both her daughter and her husband. Her nine year old daughter died after developing flu-like symptoms, and her husband’s health declined in the wake of this untimely death.
• A Laotian-American artist created the sculpture “Let’s Have Tea” at the Susan B. Anthony House. He’s proud to be an American, and to create art inspired by the men and women of American history.
• A young man tells his mother about the time he stuck his tongue to the flagpole after seeing Ralphie do it in the movie “A Christmas Story.”

StoryCorps Rochester will be broadcast Thursdays at 6:35am, 8:35am and 5:45pm on WXXI-AM 1370, WRUR-FM 88.5, WJSL-FM 90.3 and WXXI-FM 91.5 HD2, and will be streamed on the web at wxxi.org/listen. The stories will also be available as pod casts on wxxi.org/podcasts.

I’m proud to produce these stories in partnership with StoryCorps!

Help Save an Important Community Resource in New York State

Governor David Paterson has proposed a 50% reduction in operating aid to public broadcasting stations in New York State. If adopted, this budget cut will seriously impair the ability of New York’s PBS and NPR stations to produce local broadcast programming and deliver education programs and services, both on and off air, to teachers and students across the state. Many communities will loose access to great music and informative, objective news coverage.

Please let your elected officials know how you feel about this proposed cut, and that public broadcasting is an important community resource. You can write a letter to your NY State Senator or Assembly Representative, or call the Governor’s Office at (518) 474-1041. Or you can contact Albany by clicking on the link to Save NY PBS. Protect your community and your local public broadcasting station.

Thank you.