A Wife Remembers Her Husband and the Stress of Family Farming
Springtime is planting season on farms all across the country. The stress of the season can take its toll: farmers have one of the highest suicide rates of any profession in the United States.
For more than 35 years, Matt Peters grew corn and soybeans on the Iowa farm that his father and grandfather farmed before him. Then in May of 2011, at the age of 55, he took his own life.
His wife, Ginnie Peters, came to StoryCorps to remember him. She spoke with Trent Andrews, the man who took over the farm after her husband’s death.
Today, Ginnie lives a few miles away from the farm where she and Matt made their life together. Now and then she returns to visit Trent and his family, who continue to work the 1,500-acre farm.
Top photo: Trent Andrews and Ginnie Peters at their StoryCorps interview in Des Moines, Iowa, on April 19, 2018.
Bottom photo: Ginnie Peters and Matt Peters on vacation in February of 2011. Courtesy of Ginnie Peters.
If you or someone you know is feeling suicidal or just needs someone to talk to, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255.
Originally aired May 18, 2018, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
The Country’s Oldest Female BMX Bike Racer on Her Thrills and Spills
At nearly 70 years old, Kittie Weston-Knauer is the oldest female BMX racer in the United States.
When she started competing in off-road bicycle races, or BMX, in the late 1980s she was often the only woman on the track. It was her son Max Knauer, a championship BMX rider himself, who introduced her to the sport when he was ten years old.
While Max, now 40, is currently retired from the sport, Kittie has no plans to quit any time soon. She looks forward to the day she can watch her grandchildren hit the track — and hopes Max will start competing again with them, too.
Top photo: Max Knauer and Kittie Weston-Knauer at their StoryCorps interview in Des Moines, Iowa on April 20, 2018.
Bottom photo: Max Knauer assists Kittie Weston-Knauer as she prepares to start her first-ever BMX race on Mother’s Day of 1988. Courtesy of Kittie Weston-Knauer.
Originally aired May 11, 2018, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
Original Cast Member of Hair on the Groundbreaking Broadway Musical
The rock musical Hair centers on a “tribe” of hippies who resist the Vietnam War to celebrate peace and love in New York’s East Village.
Mary Lorrie Davis was part of the original Broadway cast in 1968. She came to StoryCorps to tell her friend, Rima Cohn, what it was like to be part of that moment.
Photo: Rima Cohn (left) and Mary Lorrie Davis at their StoryCorps interview in Culver City, California. Photo by Melissa Kuypers.
Remembering DJ Simmonds, Officer Injured During Capture of Boston Marathon Bombers
On April 15, 2013, two explosives placed near the finish line of the Boston Marathon detonated within seconds of each other, killing three people and injuring over two hundred others.
In the days following the attack, a massive manhunt took place. Four days later, police confronted the bombers on a suburban street in nearby Watertown, Massachusetts.
Boston police officer D.J. Simmonds was one of the officers who arrived on the scene. He was injured by a homemade bomb the Tsarnaev brothers threw at police.
Simmonds’ injuries led to his death almost a year later.
At StoryCorps, his parents, Roxanne and Dennis Simmonds, sat down to remember their son.
Middle photo: D.J. Simmonds. Credit: Boston Police Department, via the Associated Press.
Bottom photo: from left to right, Dennis, Nicole, Roxanne, and D.J. Simmonds. Courtesy of the Simmonds family.
Originally aired April 13, 2018, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
“Tubby” Johnston: The Girl Who Changed Little League Baseball
In the spring of 1950, 13-year-old Kay Johnston spent her afternoons playing baseball on the neighborhood sandlot in Corning, New York. Kay wanted nothing more than to play Little League baseball. But at that time, it was unthinkable for girls to play on an official team.
At StoryCorps, Kay sat down with her husband, Cy Massar, to remember what she did next.
Top and middle photos: Kay “Tubby” Johnston in her King’s Dairy Little League team uniform in 1950. Courtesy of Kay Johnston Massar.
Bottom photo: Cy Massar and Kay Johnston Massar at their StoryCorps interview in San Francisco.
Originally aired March 30, 2018, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
Religious School Rape and Abuse Survivors Confront The Past
When the New Bethany Home for Girls in Arcadia, Louisiana opened in 1971, the religious reform school was known as a safe haven for “wayward girls.”
Over the next three decades, law enforcement officials repeatedly investigated claims of physical and psychological child abuse at the school. Girls routinely ran away, and state officials raided the compound twice and removed children from the home.
Joanna Wright was 16 years old when she first arrived. She had been sexually abused at home and hoped the school would be a refuge. But when she got there, she was raped by the man in charge of the school.
For years, Joanna thought she was the only one. It wasn’t until years later that she connected with other former students, including Tara Cummings, who survived physical and psychological abuse while at New Bethany.
At StoryCorps, they shared difficult memories from their childhoods. Joanna begins their conversation.
In 2014, a group of women — including Joanna and Tara — came forward to say they were raped and abused at the school.
After a year-long investigation, a grand jury declined to indict the founder of the school. He died the following month.
Top photo: Joanna Wright with Tara Cummings in Cypress, Texas. Morgan Feigal-Stickles for StoryCorps.
Middle photo: Outside the gates of the New Bethany Home for Girls in an archival photo from 1988. Ellis Lucia for the Times-Picayune.
Originally aired February 23, 2018, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
Doctors on Their Groundbreaking Multigenerational Passion for Medicine
Dr. Jenna Lester comes from a family of African American women who have dedicated their lives to medicine. Her grandmother, Ruby Brangman, became a nurse practitioner during the 1970s. At that time, Ruby was one of the first black women in her profession in New York state.
A generation later, Jenna’s mother, Sharon Brangman, became a doctor. Sharon says it was her own mother’s determination that set her on that path.
At StoryCorps in New York City, Jenna and Sharon sat down to reflect on their family’s legacy.
Top photo: Sharon Brangman and Jenna Lester at their StoryCorps interview in New York City.
Bottom photo: Sharon Brangman, Ruby Brangman, and Jenna Lester in 1988, when Jenna was three months old. Courtesy of the Brangman family.
Originally aired January 26, 2018, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
A Mother on the Challenges of Becoming a Teenage Parent
April Gibson and her teenage son, Gregory Bess, love talking to each other. Gregory says they can talk for hours, and that he feels he learns more from his mom than from school. But there was one subject that they hadn’t really explored.
So when the StoryCorps MobileBooth traveled to St. Paul, Minnesota recently, April invited her son to sit down with her for a recorded conversation.
Gregory asked about his mom’s childhood and their family’s past. He learned that his mom was a quiet kid who liked to write, and that his grandfather was a party DJ before becoming a pastor.
But April knew her 16-year-old had something more he wanted to talk about.
Bottom photo: April Gibson and Gregory Bess in 2001. Courtesy of April Gibson.
Originally aired January 19, 2018, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
Christopher Harris
StoryCorps Legacy gives people with serious illnesses the chance to share their stories.
At Grady Hospital in Atlanta, Christopher Harris recorded his memories from the early days of the AIDS epidemic.
In the early 80s, his marriage fell apart after he came out as gay. He was diagnosed with HIV in 1988. At the time, there was only one drug approved to treat the disease, and a diagnosis often meant a death sentence.
With StoryCorps, Harris remembered how he came to work with the Atlanta Buyers Club, which distributed medications from the black market to people with HIV before the drugs had been approved by the FDA.
Originally aired December 1, 2017, on NPR’s Morning Edition.
Bottom photo: Christopher Harris holds his infant daughter. Courtesy of Christopher Harris.
David Wynn and Carolyn Lyon
The scene could be a bleak one — a hospital room, a patient near death, and no family or loved ones present during their final moments. But David Wynn and Carolyn Lyon are determined to prevent the lonely from dying alone.
David and Carolyn are volunteers at St. Joseph Hospital in Orange, California, where they sit at the bedside of dying patients. David has been doing these vigils since 2008; Carolyn began in 2011.
When they get a call from the hospital staff that someone is alone and nearing death, David and Carolyn rush to the hospital — even in the middle of the night — to sit by the side of a stranger.
Originally aired November 24, 2017, on NPR’s Morning Edition.