There are many reasons to love KALW, our local public radio partner in San Francisco. Let me count (a few of) the ways: For one, they are a community-driven radio station that really puts the public back in public radio. Two, their news magazine program, Crosscurrents, is award-winning and the best way to stay informed on Bay Area issues and events. And last, but not least, because of their support and commitment to airing locally-recorded StoryCorps clips on a weekly basis, they have become one of the most successful, long-term public radio partners in StoryCorps history!

Plus, they are all really wonderful people. Which is why it was so lovely and amazing to host them for a day at the Contemporary Jewish Museum. In January, the KALW crew came for a bagel breakfast, listening session, and discussion. While they had heard many-a-StoryCorps clips on the radio, some had no idea what actually happens during a StoryCorps interview, nor the Facilitator’s exact role in the process. We also talked about how we could make our partnership even stronger…discussing ways we can further reach out to the community and provide even more stories for the station to edit and broadcast. This radio rap session was followed by a group museum and booth tour.

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This week the StoryCorps San Francisco staff went out for our first Door-to-Door recording as part of the Memory Loss Initiative at the Institute On Aging, a senior day center in San Francisco. Our hostess, Tracy McCloud, was incredible – moving between multiple conversations and responsibilities with so much grace, competence, and kindness. She participated as an interviewer in one of our interviews and even treated us to a few dance steps when she led Jim, one of our participants, into the temporary recording studio we set up for the day. Jim and Tracy recently won the 1st Annual Dancing Contest at the IOA.

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Our San Francisco StoryBooth is now official. On Sunday, October 26, StoryCorps founder Dave Isay traveled out west to officially launch our StoryBooth at the Contemporary Jewish Museum and to read from his book, Listening is an Act of Love. Special thanks for all their help to Connie Wolf and Lisa Chanoff from the Museum, and to Matt Martin from partner station KALW (whose adorable daughter Reba definitely stole the show).

As we continue listening to incredible stories here in the Bay Area, our thoughts are turned to master oral historian Studs Terkel, who passed away earlier this week. For more on Studs, see here, here, and listen here. We will miss him greatly.

Hello from StoryCorps’ newest home, our StoryBooth at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco!

Photo: Bruce Damonte/Courtesy of the Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco.

This past June, the Contemporary Jewish Museum began a new chapter in its history by opening the doors to a new building by the architect Daniel Liebskind—an adaptive reuse of the 1907 Jesse Street Power Substation. Inspired by the Hebrew phrase L’Chaim, meaning “To Life,” the building is the physical embodiment of the Museum’s mission to bring together tradition and innovation in a celebration of life and shared humanity. The Museum is designed not only as a space to experience works of art, but also–more importantly–as a space to experience other people through conversation and debate.

Sound familiar? We couldn’t be more thrilled to be here.

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