Beth’s been listening to a book called “The Murrow Boys: Pioneers on the Front Lines of Broadcast Journalism.” Which means, because I’m interested in the subject, I’ve been listening to it, too. And it’s been enlightening, heartening, and disheartening all at once. Not to mention, entertaining.

Worth the read.

I’ve always understood Edward R. Murrow as a broadcast journalism legend, but what I knew of him had mostly to do with his “See It Now” television news program. I somehow remained ignorant of “Murrow’s boys,” a team of news people who more or less created broadcast journalism with their coverage of the lead up and conduct of World War II. (A shout out is owed here. We wrote about visiting our friends Henry and Benita Black during a snow storm in New York City. It was during our lovely time together that Dr. Black, an avid history buff, recommended the book.)

“The Murrow Boys” is rife with names of broadcast news names I grew up with—Eric Sevareid and Howard K. Smith to name two. But more than that, these people all lived like “The Most Interesting Man in the World” of Dos Equus fame. Jumping out of planes just before they crash, evading cannibals (yes, really), surviving the London Blitz, more jumping out of planes. Waiting on a raft in the English Channel amongst U.S. forces and on land with British soldiers, waiting for D-Day to commence. At one point Eric Sevareid, who had been stationed in Paris (before Nazi occupation) was called to London on assignment. This, while his wife was on bed rest in the hospital waiting to deliver twins. While Sevareid was in London, his children were born. Shortly thereafter, the Nazis arrived. The hospital his wife and children were in lost power.

Sevareid managed to return to Paris and make his way down dark hospital hallways, until he found his wife holding their newborns, crying.

The bravery of the journalists, as well as their perspective in understanding that their plight was not nearly as arduous as the fighting forces they covered, was inspiring. As was the quality of their broadcasts. They grew up in print and knew how to write. And their dispatches were brilliant and gripping. Heartbreakingly, some of their best work was never heard because of how nascent the technology was.

All at a time when broadcast was treated as inherently inferior to conventional print journalism. And when the technology was new. Threatening. Unsettling.

Which reminded me once again of my favorite college class of all time. “The History of Communications” taught me that pretty much every communications technology advance has been treated as threatening—to order, to culture, to society. The printing press. Telegraph. The telephone was treated by many as a threat—a Boston newspaper lamented “the awful and irresponsible power it will give to the average mother-in-law who will be able to send her voice around the habitual world.”

Whew. There’s too much in that one to unpack. But, it does sound familiar, doesn’t it? Remember when we wrung our hands over the World Wide Web? That was quaint. Now it’s social media.

And I’m reminded that as tumultuous as these times are, it’s become clearer and clearer with age that really, the times that are not tumultuous are the exception. That we never get there, wherever “there” is or how you define it. And that, in a real way, we humans are in a constant struggle to understand what’s good and to make sure it wins.

The technology doesn’t matter. The character—the good faith, courage, and values of the people who use the technology—does. Same as it ever was.

Alicia (left) and Joe (right)

My young friend Alicia and her boyfriend Joe will celebrate their third anniversary this week by traveling on their own from Northern Illinois University to downtown Chicago for a romantic dinner and a night of live music at Andy’s Jazz Club on Hubbard Street. Ali and Joe are both blind, and while they’ve had experience taking commuter trains in the suburbs, the two of them have never taken a train ride to have a date in Chicago before. Ali wrote me this week for information, and I thought her questions — and my responses — might give you an idea of some of the things people who have visual impairments have to consider when traveling somewhere new.

• From your experience with Flash Cab, how much time in advance should I be calling them? Keep in mind it’ll take us a little while to get out of the station.

Answer:  You can either call them before you leave (even from DeKalb, if you’d like) and give them a time you want to be picked up at the station, as in, “Pick us up at 4:15pm today” or you can call them when you’ve finally arrived outside the station and are at a spot where they can pick you up. Either way, tell them that both of you are blind and that the driver will need to call out to you so you know she or he is there.I’d take the first option, as you will be so busy negotiating the train station that you won’t want to stop and call for a cab. Just schedule the pick-up at a time that allows you and Joe with lots of leeway to get through the station and outside to meet the cab.

• Is there only one exit?

Answer: I think there is only one. It lets you out on Madison Street. A lot of people will be going to Chicago so I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to give you directions if you need them. You could ask the conductor, too, but its unlikely the conductor can leave the platform to guide you all the way through the station to the exit.

• We’ll be taking a cab back from the jazz club to the train station, too. In your experience taking a cab to the train station, was the driver kind enough to lead you inside and to an agent to request assistance?

Answer: No. Too dangerous to leave their cab outside unattended that long. If it’s Flash Cab, though, I bet you the driver will at least lead you to the door to get into the train station. Last night I had to take a cab to WGN Radio station, it’s located in the huge Tribune Tower and the Flash Cab driver left his cab to lead Whitney my dog and me right to the correct door to the lobby there.

• What has been your experience with getting back to the train station? Give me as much detail as you can.

Answer: If the cab driver lets you out at the train station, there will be lots of commuters coming in and out. I’d say there are a bunch of revolving doors, and then wayyyyy to the left of all that swishing noise of those doors swirling around you can find one handicapped accessible door (if you are afraid of revolving ones) with a button on the right hand side of it that you need to push so it opens for you. My experience is that lots of people will ask you if you need help, they always notice me if I’m there, especially if I make a point to look a little bewildered. The inside lobby is pretty huge, I’d ask for help in there, too. Ask them to get you to the ticket office, do this even if you already have a ticket for the train. When you get to the window where people buy tickets, tell them you need assistance to get on the train. They’ll have an official worker get you on the train, it’s very reassuring to do it that way because then you know for absolute sure that you are on the train you want to be on.

• When should we schedule our ride back to the train station? I don’t know how loud Andy’s is, so I’m not sure they’d hear meAnything is helpful!

Answer: This is another reason I like Flash Cab. In addition to their well-deserved reputation for welcoming — and understanding some of the needs of — riders with disabilities, you can book a round trip with them when you call in the first place. So let’s say you call from DeKalb to arrange your ride from the western suburbs, and you tell them you need a ride from 500 W. Madison (that’s the address of the Ogilvy Transportation Center) at 4:10 pm, and you’re going to 11 E. Hubbard (that’s the address of Andy’s Jazz Club). Once they get all that information written down, you can tell them you’ll need a ride back to the train station later that night. They’ll book that ride right then, too. the jazz club isn’t terribly far from the train station, but its likely traffic will be heavy on a weekend night. I know you prefer getting somewhere extra early (over fretting about being late), so I’d say book the cab ride back to the train station so that the cab picks you and Joe up at Andy’s 45 minutes before your train leaves from Chicago back to the western suburbs. Bonus: Flash Cab will phone you to let you know when they’ve arrived and are waiting outside for you. That means you and joe could put your coats on and all that stuff and then just stay inside listening to jazz until you get their phone call.

Back to me. I can’t promise this, but my guess is Ali will be more than happy to write a guest post here about how she and Joe fare on their big adventure once it’s over. Stay tuned.

…you can link here to hear our interview on The Download now.

Audrey Mitchell, Justin Kaufmann and moi

Reviews are already in from fellow writers in our memoir-writing class at the Chicago Cultural Center. Sharon says Audrey “sounded quite confident and natural,” and Andrea reports that “the segment was great radio.” Here’s how our interview was described on the WGN Radio site:

Writing Out Loud with award-winning author Beth Finke
Posted 11:39 PM, April 11, 2018, by peterzimmermanwgnam

In this ongoing series on The Download, award-winning author, teacher, journalist and NPR commentator Beth Finke joins Justin to discuss her work teaching people how to write their memoir. Tonight’s featured guest is Audrey Mitchell who talks about what made her interested in taking Beth’s class, what she’s learned from researching her genealogy, her life growing up in Bronzeville, graduating from college with honors in her 60’s and how she’s made the transition to teaching a memoir-writing class herself.

Host Justin Kaufmann was great, as always — we got a lot in during one short half-hour segment. Tune in and see (okay, hear) for yourself. Cheers!

Tonight, April 11, 2018, at 9 pm Central Time, memoir-writer Audrey Mitchell and I will be interviewed by Justin Kaufmann, host of The Download on WGN Radio 720. Audrey is one of the many writers from my memoir-writing classes whose stories intertwine with mine in my latest book, Writing Out Loud.

What will we talk about? Who knows? It all depends on the questions Justin Kaufmann asks us, and when it comes to Audrey’s life story, he has a lot of material to choose from.

Justin might ask her about the Great Migration — her parents came to Chicago from Edgefield County, South Carolina. Maybe he’ll ask about the years of genealogy work Audrey did before enrolling in my memoir-writing class — the 1870 Census was the first U.S. census to list all persons, including former slaves, as individuals. “I don’t have their slave records, but I do know my great-grandparents lived in Edgefield County in 1870,” she told me once, reasoning that they’d stayed there after the Emancipation Proclamation. “I have oral history and written data to back that up, but what I’m missing is the voice of my older relatives, what they were thinking, what they were feeling and like that. That’s why I keep taking your class. So my stories don’t get lost like theirs are.”

Audrey Values family history so much that she volunteers to lead a memoir-writing class at the Wrightwood-Ashburn Branch of the Chicago Public Library in her southwest side neighborhood of Chicago. Maybe Justin Kaufmann will ask her about that, too, or who knows, Maybe he’ll ask about getting up extra early with her two kids on Saturday mornings in the 1970s to make absolutely sure they’d finish their errands by noon. That’s when Soul Train was on! Tune in to WGN Radio tonight, April 11, 2018 at 9 pm central time and see what Justin Kaufmann — and Audrey and I — come up with.

A couple years ago we ran a guest post by our one-of-a-kind neighborhood friend, Steve Ferkau. Steve is, well, I think his message, written yesterday, will tell you more about him that I can. I hope you’ll give it a read, and when you’re done, you explore the links at the bottom of this post. 

Eighteen years ago today, Kari passed away. In the month before she passed, she told her family how strongly she felt about organ donation. Twice. Eighteen years ago tomorrow, Kari and her family saved my life when they gave me both of her lungs.

Kari, who donated her lungs to Steve. Courtesy Steve Ferkau.

“Saved my life” is such a trivial phrase for what they did. I lived 39 years with crappy, cystic fibrosis lungs that had been slowly suffocating me their last three years. I never, ever, ever-ever imagined my life could be this amazing – that just breathing could feel this amazing. For 39 years I never understood that there could be something beyond exhaustion. I do now. And aside from me — Kari gave me another eighteen years to be with my Laura. (Sometimes, much to her dismay! I can be a handful….)