Big Talk – WFHB

Last week we began our conversation with university administrator and higher education diversity pioneer Charlie Nelms. The second half of our chat reveals many of the internal traits and characteristics that allowed Nelms to thrive in the world of academia after growing up on a subsistence farm without electricity in Arkansas when Jim Crow laws …

He was born to subsistence sharecroppers in Arkansas. One of 11 children, Charlie Nelms’ love affair with reading began when the farm’s landlord started bringing a weekly delivery of newspapers and news magazines. Nelms’ parents told him and his siblings they could grow up to be anything they wanted to be and the kids took …

Both Michelle Martin Coleman and Elaine Guinn have experienced the effects of suicide. Both have dedicated their lives to understanding the act and reaching out to people who may be considering it as well as those touched by the loss of a loved one because of it. They are part of Project Stay — its …

He juggles writing verse with trying to get rural electric customers to take a more active role in their energy delivery. Alex Chambers sometimes even combines his two passions, referring to the global climate crisis in his poetry and even, once, writing a poem for an environmental journal. Chambers, an adjunct lecturer at Indiana University, …

A part of the WonderLab experience since the mid-1990s, Karen Jepson-Innes now leads the science and natural history museum on West 4th Street. Jepson-Innes, a biologist, got together with other like-minded scientists who wanted to bring the wonders and joys of science to both children and adults alike. At first they traveled to schools and …

The Arts Alliance of Greater Bloomington at last has a home it can call its own. The long-standing arts advocacy organization signed a lease this month to occupy a space at the College Mall on the east side. Board president Himsel had tried to persuade the board to seek a brick and mortar site for several …

Flow arts mama Paula Chambers and poet-slash-foley artist Tony Brewer are co-producers of the third annual revue inspired by the storied song, dance, magic, and you-name-it traveling extravaganza that defined American entertainment from the late 19th through the mid 20th centuries. Vaudeville gave the nation the likes of the Marx Brothers, Bob Hope, W.C. Fields, …

Gender and sex: Simple topics, right? Not so, especially in light of the changes in popular notions about these topics in the last few years. It seems most people who expound most vociferously on gender and sex know the least about the distinctions between the two or even what each word means. Jen Maher, clinical …

He started drawing at the age of two and almost immediately knew that’s what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. Milton Knight hated school and was discouraged by his parents from making comic books but he taught himself the rudiments of drawing and read, voraciously, about the great artists. He has …

A senior at Indiana University in 2016, Alexi King turned her work at an internship into the Midway Music Festival. Dedicated to promoting and connecting women and those who identify as women through music, the Fest features performers and music professionals from all over the United States. The nonprofit, Midway Music Speaks, with King as …

As next year’s 100th anniversary of the ratification of 19th Amendment (mandating the women’s vote in all elections in the United States) approached, Monroe County History Center collections manager Hilary Fleck became curious about the role of local women in the fight for the vote. She was warded the May Wright Sewall Fellowship from Indiana …

After volunteering for the Lotus Education & Arts Foundation since its inception 26 years ago, appearing as a performer in Lotus Fest, and serving on the organization’s board of directors, Tamara Loewenthal became its chief this past May. Next week, she’ll oversee her first Lotus Fest as 27 international music, dance, and performance acts appear …

Previously un-aired conversation with six guests who’ve appeared on Big Talk during the last year. They’re passionate and committed. They give of their time and energy. They want to make their local community and the world better places. They are Tracey Hutchings-Goetz of Hoosier Action, Kassandra Botts of the Indiana Recovery Alliance, Dr. Rob Stone …

The nonprofits Hoosier Action and the Indiana Recovery Alliance are working together to raise awareness about the state’s work requirement for Medicaid recipients. Bloomington organizer Hutchings-Goetz and the Alliance’s interim executive director Botts hope to send a message to the Indiana state legislature from people  all over the state that the requirement is a needless …

As she approaches her third year at the helm of the Cardinal Stage Company, artistic director Kate Galvin talks about South Central Indiana’s premier regional theater company as well as how she wound up in Bloomington. The Cardinal’s 2019-20 season begins in two weeks with its production of “The Great Gatsby.” Galvin was an award-winning …

He’s our town’s doctor, having spent some 28 years working in the Bloomington Hospital emergency room. Now he tends to people in palliative and hospice care programs, helping them through the last stage of life. Rob Stone is a loud and insistent voice for health care reform in this country. A strong advocate for universal, …

Big Talk is back for a new season of original shows! This week’s guest is songwriter, busker, traveller, philosopher, puppeteer, off-the-gridder Travis Puntarelli. He’s an ambassador for music, both for the ear and the heart. Simultaneously soft-spoken and determined, he’s gone from high school dropout to husband, father, and self-supporting balladeer. Fellow street-music-maker M...

Diagnosed as a small child with a learning disorder, Adria Nassim experienced problems with spatial recognition and social interactions through her late teens. Then she was told by her doctors she was on the autism spectrum. That inspired her to learn as much as she could about the neurodevelopmental disorder. Now she lectures and instructs …

Searching for direction after college, Wes Martin volunteered at WFHB at his father’s urging. Seven years later, he became the station’s fourth news director. Before taking the job, Martin had left Bloomington to earn his master’s in journalism and then to serve as editor of an English language daily newspaper in Thailand. Now he’s leaving …

Another helping of stories, flights of fantasy, gags, recollections, and observations from the two surviving members of the Firesign Theater, Phil Proctor and David Ossman. The pair came to town for the spring 2019 edition of WFHB’s Firehouse Follies, “Fireheads & Tales.” Thanks to Richard Fish for helping set up this conversation. Host Michael Glab …

The Firesign Theater created sketch comedy; fantastic, psychedelic, associative improv; and absurdist performances beginning in the mid-1960s. Four talented, imaginative friends began fashioning their own audio world at a Los Angeles listener-supported radio station. They graduated to albums, movies, and television through the years. Now only Phil Proctor and David Ossman survive. They bill themse...

After Adam Nahas and his art school friends graduated from Indiana University they found themselves without the school’s physical resources and human network. So he and a few other artists started up a shared work space — akin to a clubhouse — for creative types here in Bloomington. Their seminal locus has evolved into a support …

After taking a “walkabout” for several years to raise funds for Wayne State University Press and then to manage the Boise (Idaho) Contemporary Theater, Gabe Gloden and his wife, actor and playwright Emily Goodson, came back to Bloomington. Gloden took over the Cardinal Stage Company without missing a beat. He had served as managing director …

Like many Americans, Denise Valkyrie has struggled to make ends meet and has experienced devastating health care expenses. She works multiple jobs to keep her family afloat. These experiences give her a perspective, she says, the current city council lacks. Currently administrative support coordinator for WFIU/WTIU and Indiana Radio & Television Services as well as …

One of two mid-20s candidates for city council in this year’s municipal election, Ryan Maloney also is one of two Indiana University students hoping to gain a seat. Born in Australia and raised in Nevada, Maloney has worked as a bus driver since moving to Bloomington to study at SPEA. He hopes to become a …