Midday

Today, a conversation about diversity in the news media with Dorothy Butler Gilliam, a journalist who has spent a lifetime breaking down barriers. She has been a journalist for more than six decades. She started in the Black press, working in Louisville, Memphis and Chicago. And then, at the age of 23, she became the first woman of color to be a reporter at The Washington Post. When Ms. Gilliam wa...

Today, Tom is joined by people who are active in three neighborhoods: Edith Gilliard is president of the Franklin Square Community Association. Franklin Square is just south of Route 40, between Carey and Monroe. Beth Braun is president of the Butchers Hill Association. Butchers Hill is a small neighborhood in East Baltimore bounded by East Fayette and East Pratt, between South Patterson Park Ave...

Today on Midday, as the U.S. House of Representatives continues its impeachment inquiry, a conversation about the subject of that inquiry, President Donald Trump: what shaped his political rise, and how he has singularly shaped American culture. Tom's guest for the hour is James Poniewozik, the chief television critic for the New York Times. He was previously the television critic for Time magazin...

Tom's guest today is Dr. Brit Kirwan. He is the chair of the Commission on Innovation and Excellence, also known as the Kirwan Commission. Last week, the Commission on Innovation and Excellence in Education made its long awaited recommendations about how much state and local jurisdictions should pay to improve educational outcomes in MD. Email us at midday@wypr.org, tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call...

It's Thursday and time for another of theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck's weekly reviews of the Maryland stage. Today, she spotlights In the Blood, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks’ 1999 urban retelling of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, and presented on stage by Fells Point Corner Theatre. A compelling look at motherhood, race and poverty, In the Blood (a finalist for the...

Tom’s guest is Reginald Dwayne Betts. He came to our attention last year when he wrote a wonderful piece in The New York Times Magazine entitled, “Could an Ex-Convict Become an Attorney? I Intended to Find Out,---- for which he won a National Magazine Award. When Betts was 16, he was part of a group that committed an armed car-jacking. For that crime, he spent eight years and three months in adult...

On Sunday, Thomas D’Alesandro, III passed away at the age of 90. He was part of a Baltimore-based powerhouse political dynasty that includes his younger sister, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and a father who served as both Mayor and member of the US Congress. Joining Tom to talk about the legacy of ”Young Tommy,” as he came to be known, is Fraser Smith, a former news man at WYPR and a former...

Last month, the Labor Department reported a national unemployment rate of 3.5%, the lowest it’s been in 50 years. The unemployment rate is only one metric by which the job market can be evaluated, and many point to its inherent flaws, but the reality for many employers is that filling jobs with skilled workers is harder than it used to be. One estimate has it that there are nearly 70 million avail...

Tom's guest today is Mike Rowe, a Baltimore-born and bred television personality, producer and podcaster. He’s also an author. His latest book shares the name of his popular podcast: The Way I Heard It. The book is a clever and engaging admixture of essays in the style of the great radio raconteur Paul Harvey, juxtaposed with Mike’s chronicle and observations of his own life, collected in a career...

Today, we remember Congressman Elijah E. Cummings, who died yesterday in Baltimore at the age of 68. From his early career as a lawyer known for his quiet diligence and generous mentoring, to his rise to the top ranks of the U.S. Congress, we reflect today on the legacy of a political giant. After 14 years as a Democratic delegate in the Maryland General Assembly, where he led the Legislative Blac...

In his latest book is called Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About the People We Don’t Know, Malcolm Gladwell explores how bad we are, generally, understanding people we don’t know, and how we often think we know people better than we do. It’s that lack of ability to accurately anticipate the motives and actions of people that have led to tragedies both individual and global. Email us at...

It is a sad and somber day in Maryland today, as people here and across the country, and across the political spectrum, mourn the passing of Congressman Elijah Cummings, who died early this morning at the Johns Hopkins Gilchrist Hospice Center. He was 68 years old. He had served Maryland's 7th District in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1996. He lived in West Baltimore. Today, three long-t...

A controversial school redistricting plan in Howard County, aimed at addressing overcrowding and segregation, has polarized that community. Tom speaks with ,Jess Nocera, of the Howard County Times, Howard County NAACP president, Willie Flowers, and anti-redistricting advocate Dr. Hemant Sharma about equity in education. Email us at midday@wypr.org, tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780...

Tom's guest is the award winning writer, Charles Johnson. In 1990, Charles Johnson won the National Book Award for his best-selling novel Middle Passage, a heroic, complex and powerful story that acutely and authoritatively explores the brutality of the slave trade. Johnson’s place in the panoply of great American writers has been unquestioned ever since. Email us at midday@wypr.org, tweet us: @Mi...

With the new school year underway, we thought it a good time to check in once again with Baltimore City Public Schools CEO, Dr. Sonja Santelises, who joins Tom today for the hour. The Commission on Excellence and Innovation in Education, known as the Kirwan Commission was formed in 2016. The commission, chaired by former University of MD Chancellor Britt Kirwan, has developed recommendations in fi...

Today, it’s another installment of Midday on Higher Education, our series of interviews with local college presidents. A couple of months ago, University of Baltimore President and former Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke made an interesting proposal in an op-ed in The Baltimore Sun. He imagined that three local colleges —UB, Coppin State and Baltimore City Community College — could come together to fo...

Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck joins Tom in the studio for another of her weekly reviews of the Maryland stage. Today, she tells us about Dracula, a haunting adaptation of Bram Stoker’s seminal 1897 vampire novel that opens Chesapeake Shakespeare Company's 2019 season. Adapted by Steven Dietz and directed in the CSC's ornate theater space by Gerald Alex Taylor, the play unfolds in a sanator...

On Tuesday, White House Counsel Patrick Cipollone wrote a letter to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and three Democratic committee chairmen making both legal and political arguments opposing the current impeachment inquiry into President Trump. Cipollone contends, in part, that the president did nothing wrong in his now infamous phone call with President Zelensky of Ukraine last summer, so an im...

On today's show, State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby joins Tom to talk about the consequences of police corruption and strategies to end our city’s epidemic of violent crime. Yom Tov, and an easy fast to all of our listeners observing Yom Kippur today. Email us at midday@wypr.org, tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

We’ll take a look at the effect of budget cuts and some of the critical issues that have caused a decline in public transit ridership in the Baltimore metro area. Samuel Jordan, of the Baltimore Transit Equity Coalition, Brian O’Malley, of the Central Maryland Transportation Alliance, and Delegate Robbyn Lewis. Email us at midday@wypr.org, tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Fall officially began on September 23rd. Two weeks later, we had a record high temperature of 98 degrees. Things cooled off a bit this weekend, although we’ll likely make it back up close to 80 degrees today. The region has also been suffering for the past month through a moderate drought, which shows little sign of ending soon. But assuming real fall weather will kick in at some point, Tom checks...

We learned over the weekend, to the surprise of many, that the city of Baltimore has reached an agreement with The Stronach Group, the owners of the Pimlico Race Course in Park Heights, on a plan to redevelop the aging track facility and the surrounding neighborhood, and to keep the Preakness Stakes -- the second jewel in horse racing’s prestigious Triple Crown -- permanently at Pimlico. Joining T...

Midday host Tom Hall began the Friday Midday on Music show with this update about an important development in the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump. ----A brief word on the latest revelations in the impeachment inquiry. Last night, the House Foreign Affairs, Oversight and Intelligence Committees released text messages between diplomats related to President Trump’s posture towards Ukr...

Today's edition of Midday on Music continues now with two great musician friends of Midday joining Tom in Studio A: They are Robin Bullock, who has appeared as a solo artist and as part of Helicon, and Sue Richards, who is a member of Ensemble Galilei. Both have played for us several times here in Studio A. Now, they have teamed up as a duo and recently released a terrific CD of traditional Celtic...

Today on Midday, a break from the news of the day, and focus on that which is great and good about the human condition. It’s Midday on Music. A little later, we’ll be treated to some tunes by the guitar/harp duo, Robin Bullock and Sue Richards. Their performance is posted separately here on the WYPR Website).We begin today with Hanzhi Wang. This virtuoso concert accordionist was born 29 years ago...