Midday

It's time again for theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck to join us with her weekly reviews of the regional stage. Today she spotlights A.D. 16, a musical romantic fantasy now getting its world premiere at Olney Theatre Center . Set in Bible-era Nazareth, A.D. 16 imagines a romance between two Nazarene teens - a 16 year-old Mary Magdalen and that interesting boy next door — Jesus.    &nb...

Today, we resume a series that we've presented during every recent election cycle. Our Conversations with the Candidates 2022 interviews will allow voters to hear directly from the candidates for federal, state and city offices up and down the ballot. Tom Hall will sit down for extended discussions with candidates between now and the June 28th primary elections, and we’ll archive these conve...

When Joe Biden was running for President, he promised that if given the opportunity, he would nominate a Black woman to the Supreme Court. Justice Stephen Breyer is retiring at the end of the current term of the court, and on Friday, the President announced he would nominate Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson , whose career has taken her to many corners of the legal profession as a lawyer and as a judge....

With Thursday's full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russian military forces, the world order has been shaken. Hours after the invasion began, President Joe Biden announced a second tranche of sanctions against Russia, which include measures against several more Russian banks and wealthy individuals. He asserted that the NATO alliance has never been stronger, and he warned that there will be hardship...

Today on Midday, reactions to Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to launch a full-scale military invasion of Ukraine. Ahead of by President Joe Biden's remarks from the White House Thursday afternoon on US and NATO responses to the invasion, Tom is joined by Senator Ben Cardin , Maryland's Democratic senior senator, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations and Finance Committees and chair...

And now, Tom's Newsmaker guest is Al Hutchinson , the president and CEO of Visit Baltimore , the city's official destination sales and marketing organization. Charm City is playing host for the first time to the annual CIAA Men’s and Women’s Basketball Tournament this week (2/21-2/26). Visit Baltimore hopes the event will draw thousands of tourists and kickstart the return of local tou...

On today's Midday NewsWrap, an update on the situation in Ukraine. Tensions in Ukraine continue to rise. Yesterday, the upper house of the Russian Parliament allowed President Vladimir Putin to take military action outside of Russia, and in defiance of international law, the Kremlin recognized the independence of two statelets in Ukraine, and sent troops there. President Biden announced what he de...

Tom's guest for the hour today is Jabari Asim , one of the country’s most imaginative and versatile writers, whose body of work encompasses fiction and non-fiction, poetry, plays and children’s literature. He’s a former editor of The Crisis , the journal of the NAACP , and the Washington Post, where he wrote a syndicated column. He is the author of acclaimed non-fiction books, in...

Tom's next guest is Imani Black . She is an oyster farmer who comes from a long line of oystermen from the Eastern Shore. Her degree is in Marine Biology, and her passion is bringing the story of African American participation in aquaculture to the next generation of Black women. In 2020, she founded an organization called Minorities in Aquaculture to encourage women of color to pursue careers in...

Joining Tom now is another gifted storyteller. Tara Roberts is a National Geographic Explorer and the host of Into the Depths, a 6-episode podcast that launched last month. It follows a group of Black scuba divers called Diving With a Purpose as they search for the wreckage of ships that were used to bring enslaved Africans to the Americas. Tara's account of the group's expedition is the cover sto...

Happy President’s Day! Today on Midday , conversations with three groundbreaking chroniclers of African American history who are telling important stories in unique ways. A little later in the program, I’ll speak with Tara Roberts , a National Geographic Explorer who hosts a podcast devoted to the search for lost slave ships. I’ll also speak with Imani Black , a marine biologist...

It's time for our visit with theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck , who joins us each week with her reviews of local stage presentations. This week, she tells us about the national touring company production of the Broadway hit, Summer: The Donna Summer Musical, now on stage at Baltimore's Hippodrome Theatre. Directed by Lauren L. Sobon , with book by Colman Domingo , Robert Cary, and Des McAnuff and mu...

Tom's first guest today is Amanda Litman , a Democratic operative who worked on the presidential campaigns of Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton, and the gubernatorial campaign of Charlie Christ in Florida in 2014. In 2017, on the day of Donald Trump’s inauguration, she and a friend, Ross Morales Rocketto, founded a political action committee called Run for Something , dedicated to helping youn...

Tom's Newsmaker guest today is Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski, Jr. Mr. Olszewski has a full plate of issues to contend with. The County has relaxed some COVID restrictions. Masks are no longer required in public buildings. As of the end of the month, masks will no longer be required in County government buildings too. It’s budget season in Baltimore County; hundreds, maybe thous...

Last month, three firefighters — Paul Butrim, Kelsey Sadler and Kenny Lacayo — died while fighting a fire in a vacant house in South Baltimore . That tragedy put the issue of Baltimore’s vacant houses back in the headlines , and top of mind for many. For many others in our city, vacant houses and blight have been part of their lives for decades. Over the years, city officials hav...

Tom's Midday Newsmaker guest today is Dr. Darryl L. Williams , the Superintendent of the Baltimore County Public School System . He was appointed to the post in 2019, and he has been contending with problems caused by COVID-19 nearly ever since. The pandemic has led to almost every school system in the country facing staffing shortages, and enrollment numbers have dipped here and across America. I...

Happy Valentine’s Day! Today on our show , it’s Midday on Romance .  A little later, Tom speaks with a medieval historian who has written a history of love in what she calls five fantasies. Barbara Rosenwein looks at love through the ages and how human beings fall in love and stay in love. Of course, in order for that to happen, you’ve got to meet someone with whom you are i...

Next on today's Midday on Books , Tom welcomes back to the program the award-winning author of more than 60 books for children, Carole Boston Weatherford . She is the winner of two Caldecott Medals and a Newbery Award. Her last book on the Tulsa race massacre won the Coretta Scott King Author Award and Illustrator awards from the American Library Association. She will be appearing in a virtual eve...

It's Midday on Books today, and Tom's first guest is Tessa Hadley , an award-winning British writer whose short stories are familiar to many readers of The New Yorker, where she’s been a contributing writer for 20 years. She is the author of eight novels, the latest of which is an explosive exploration of loyalty and betrayal, love and passion, and individual and cultural transformation. It&...

Time now for another visit with our theater critic, J. Wynn Rousuck, who joins us each week with her reviews of important local stage productions. Today, she tells us about Everyman Theatre 's world premiere of Behold, A Negress , Jacqueline E. Lawton's historical drama about the intimate relationship between a White artist in late-18th century Paris and her muse, a formerly enslaved Black woman....

Today, it’s Midday on Parenting . We begin with a conversation about a movement known as “ Gentle Parenting . ” It advocates an approach to raising children based on understanding, empathy and respect, and which shuns traditional parental notions of corporal discipline and autocratic control over children's behavior. A series of Tik Tok videos by a former TV news reporter, Kayla...

Tom's guest today is Dr. Charles Chavis, Jr. He’s the author of a new book that places Maryland squarely in the middle of the long and horrific legacy of racial lynching in America. As Dr. Chavis vividly portrays, lynchings did not only take place in the Deep South, and they were not only a technique of terror employed in the 19th century. Here in Maryland, lynchings were occurring throughou...

Now, we turn our attention to a controversial legislative proposal, being advanced in Annapolis by State Senator Bill Ferguson, that would order clubs on The Block in Baltimore to close several hours earlier than they currently close. The Block, a stretch of E. Baltimore Street, is Baltimore’s adult-entertainment district, located adjacent to Baltimore City Police headquarters, and according...

It’s the early weeks of Year Three of the COVID-19 pandemic, and following a surge caused by the omicron variant , the pandemic numbers in America are once again heading in the right direction. New cases and hospitalizations are down. The New York Times reports that since the pandemic began in January 2020, at least 1 in 4 people who live in the United States have been infected. More than 90...

Since 2017, four times each year, a wonderful organization - Baltimore Ceasefire 365 - organizes events over the course of a weekend that send out a call to end violence, and for everyone in Baltimore to commit to be a part of creating the change we want to see in our city. Ceasefire Weekends bring people together to acknowledge the pain and heartbreak that the homicides in our city cause for the...