CoastLine

A Fond Farewell to Rachel Lewis Hilburn Apr 22, 2024

CoastLine: David Gessner and daughter Hadley on what climate science reveals about the earth in 2063 and why it's personal (rebroadcast from January 16, 2024) Mar 18, 2024

A Traveler’s Guide to the End of the World: Tales of Fire, Wind, and Water, is the newest book from nature writer and New York Times bestselling author David Gessner. His daughter, Hadley, is an undergraduate at New York University. They join us to explore what climate science tells us about the prospect of a hotter, drier, more storm-prone, less livable planet by 2063, the year she turns 60.

CoastLine: Orrin Pilkey on surviving climate change catastrophes Mar 15, 2024

Climate change is coming for life on earth – in the form of floods, more severe and destructive storms, drought, ocean acidification, marine and terrestrial heat waves, water supply problems, air pollution. The list goes on, but humans can adapt, mitigate, and maybe even survive.That's the focus of Dr. Orrin Pilkey's newest book, Escaping Nature: How to Survive Global Climate Change.

CoastLine: Remembering Lenny Simpson (1948-2024) and his "pay it forward" credo Mar 12, 2024

When Lenny Simpson was just 5 years old, tennis great Althea Gibson handed him a tennis racket and called him "champ". That moment changed his life. He went on at age 15 to play his mentor Arthur Ashe in the U.S. Open. Lenny Simpson returned to Wilmington in 2013 and launched One Love Tennis in honor of the mentors who did so much to help him live into his potential.

CoastLine: Artist Thomas Sayre, musician Tift Merritt explore sacred space in Four Walls at the CAM Mar 06, 2024

Singer / songwriter Tift Merritt and visual artist Thomas Sayre explore the unorthodox making of an upcoming show at the Cameron Art Museum called Four Walls.In this episode, Sayre raises questions about the sacred structures that undergird society, Tift Merritt interrogates the form of concert, and CAM Executive Director Heather Wilson explains why the ongoing challenge to previously-accepted concepts is part of her job.

CoastLine: How Peace Corps service influenced four volunteers who worked in Ukraine, Namibia, Armenia, and Tonga Feb 26, 2024

Since 1961, the Peace Corps, envisioned and created by President John F. Kennedy, has sent volunteers around the globe to help developing countries. The obvious aim is to meet the goals identified by the host country – not the Americans. But just as important are the relationships that develop from this work, promoting world peace and friendship.

CoastLine: Palestinian-American on his culture and why he started rescuing animals in the West Bank (Rebroadcast from December 19, 2023) Feb 20, 2024

"Mahatma Gandi said the way you measure a society is how they treat the weakest in the society."Maad Abu-Ghazalah says this is why he started rescuing abused and abandoned dogs and donkeys in the West Bank. As a Palestinian-American with family still there, he explores his culture and his hopes for peace.

CoastLine: Appearing on The Voice transformed the way musician Carlos Rising saw his "weaknesses" (Rebroadcast from December 19, 2023) Feb 12, 2024

He won a spot on Blake Shelton's last team in 2023, after caving to family pressure to audition for the NBC show. And that's when the way Carlos Rising thought about his musical talent began to shift.

CoastLine: Breaking the News is a study on inclusivity for both film team and the news team at The 19th* Feb 07, 2024

Breaking The News was supposed to be a documentary about a new nonpartisan, nonprofit newsroom called The 19th*, started by two women who wanted to cover news at the intersection of gender, politics, and policy. But when The 19th* launched in early 2020, so did an international pandemic. The way the filmmakers had to film changed. And the story they thought they were telling also changed.

CoastLine: Disappearing grasslands major threat to biodiversity in coastal plain of SE NC Jan 30, 2024

UNCW restoration ecologist Amy Long is rehabilitating local tidal marshes, grasslands, and savannahs. Strategic restoration can bring back biodiversity that was nearly lost, as evidenced by the New Hanover County Landfill property. Two dramatic examples: diverse butterfly populations and regular sightings of bald eagles.

CoastLine: UNCW Study raises questions about mental health and disconnect from nature Jan 23, 2024

Research clearly shows that spending time in nature is critical for mental, physical, even cognitive health. Can our mental health crises make a stronger case for conservation?

CoastLine: David Gessner and daughter Hadley on what climate science reveals about the earth in 2063 and why it's personal Jan 16, 2024

A Traveler’s Guide to the End of the World: Tales of Fire, Wind, and Water, is the newest book from nature writer and New York Times bestselling author David Gessner. His daughter, Hadley, is an undergraduate at New York University. They join us to explore what climate science tells us about the prospect of a hotter, drier, more storm-prone, less livable planet by 2063, the year she turns 60.

CoastLine: Invasive plants are changing NC wetlands; soundscapes are helping scientists figure out how Jan 09, 2024

Evolutionary Ecologist Stacy Endriss of UNCW’s Environmental Sciences Department is exploring how invasive plants are affecting North Carolina wetlands. She’s also looking at creative approaches – including biocontrol – for dealing with the impacts.

CoastLine: Racial healing activists of all races need to interrogate themselves first, says Dr. Catherine Meeks (rebroadcast from August 30, 2023) Jan 02, 2024

“A fundamental question that each of us must answer is: Who are the victims of racism? Upon careful investigation, it seems quite clear that the answer is ‘everyone’.” Dr. Catherine Meeks, Exec. Director, Absalom Jones Center for Racial Healing

In the Wild Coastal Plain with surprisingly wild suburban ponds, amid pervasive pollution (rebroadcast from Oct. 17, 2023) Dec 27, 2023

Andy Wood: Bullfrog tadpoles have an alkaloid in their skin. It’s a chemical compound that tastes a little bit like rotten lemon and Ajax. It’s a horrible taste, so very few things eat them.RLH: Have you tried this? It’s a very, um, specific description.AW: I would never admit that.In the wild coastal plain of southeastern NC, Andy Wood and I explore the wildness of suburban stormwater management ponds. What we find is, no surprise, quite a surprise.

CoastLine: Palestinian-American on his culture and why he started rescuing animals in the West Bank Dec 19, 2023

"Mahatma Gandi said the way you measure a society is how they treat the weakest in the society."Maad Abu-Ghazalah says this is why he started rescuing abused and abandoned dogs and donkeys in the West Bank. As a Palestinian-American with family still there, he explores his culture and his hopes for peace.

CoastLine: Needs of vulnerable people, animals, and plants escalated in 2023, say advocates Dec 12, 2023

The most vulnerable populations around the region struggled during 2023 – including humans, animals, and even native plants. What does the state of these groups say about us?

CoastLine: Justin Catanoso on Enviva crisis, wood pellet industry, why environmental reporting doesn't always have two equal sides Dec 05, 2023

Enviva company officials assured critics that wood pellets are mostly made of waste: treetops, limbs, even sawdust. Not true, according to reporting from environmental journalist and WFU Professor Justin Catanoso, who also says the science shows wood pellet burning contributes more to the climate crisis than burning coal.

CoastLine: Darien Brooks says treatment changed profound autism to high-functioning (Rebroadcast from July 25, 2023) Nov 28, 2023

Alice Brooks says when she learned that her son, Darien, had profound autism spectrum disorder, she cried on the front porch all night. Today, she says Darien and his diagnosis are the greatest blessings of her life.

CoastLine: Female military veterans on standing up for their own rights while serving Nov 24, 2023

Cooking food, working as nurses, working in maintenance and repair units, dressing as men: for millennia, women have worked near and actually on the battlefield. But they still make up less than a quarter of the active U.S. military force, and they still face career barriers.Despite fear of retaliation in the face of misogyny, three local female veterans, Deborah Dicks Maxwell, Marcia Morgan, and Veronica Carter, say they're proud of the times they spoke up for their rights and dignity.

CoastLine: Black Barbie, the film, celebrates Black women, reveals deep cultural influence (Rebroadcast from August 22, 2023) Nov 14, 2023

Black Barbie, the documentary film by Lagueria Davis, explores the way the doll shapes culture, and ultimately the way people think about themselves. It’s a close look at representation, starting with the filmmaker's aunt, Beulah Mae Mitchell, who was on the original Barbie manufacturing line with Mattel and played a key role in bringing Black Barbie to life.

CoastLine: Military veterans on life in the service and why it's strange to talk about it Nov 07, 2023

"Everybody that goes to combat, it touches them in a certain way. It's hard to talk about some of those things."Marine Corps veteran Steven Shortt says so many like him want to connect with civilians, especially given the growing divide between the military and civilian communities. But when one of your core values is serving a mission larger than yourself, it gets weird.

CoastLine: Fear-based political agenda led to 1898 Wilmington massacre, says LeRae Umfleet Oct 31, 2023

What makes history come alive? When you can see repercussions, for good or for ill, in the present day. It’s why North Carolina state historian LeRae Umfleet, the author of the state’s official report on Wilmington’s 1898 massacre and coup d'état, keeps talking about it.

CoastLine: Who are the OGs of standup comedy? It's complicated. Oct 24, 2023

The history of standup comedy is so difficult to separate according to culture, that it becomes surprisingly transcendent of race, ethnicity, and cultural background. But does that equate to being a model of diversity, equity, and inclusion? That’s a work in progress and one of the questions we explore.

In the Wild Coastal Plain with surprisingly wild suburban ponds, amid pervasive pollution Oct 17, 2023

Andy Wood: Bullfrog tadpoles have an alkaloid in their skin. It’s a chemical compound that tastes a little bit like rotten lemon and Ajax. It’s a horrible taste, so very few things eat them.RLH: Have you tried this? It’s a very, um, specific description.AW: I would never admit that.In the wild coastal plain of southeastern NC, Andy Wood and I explore the wildness of suburban stormwater management ponds. What we find is, no surprise, quite a surprise.

CoastLine: Blues musician Robert Lighthouse says tour of war-torn Ukraine fundamentally changed him (Rebroadcast from May 2, 2023) Oct 10, 2023

Blues musician Robert Lighthouse may have grown up in Sweden, but as soon as he turned 18 he came to the United States to live with a native American family on a Hopi reservation and learn about his beloved Mississippi Delta Blues. He had no idea that decades later, he'd travel to a war zone to make music for people living with daily terror. He also had no idea how profoundly that trip would affect him.

CoastLine: Michelin star chef Iliana Regan on gender, fear, and foraging (Rebroadcast from April 11, 2023) Oct 06, 2023

Iliana Regan is owner and chef of The Milkweed Inn – a rustic, woodsy, and hard-to-reach getaway in the Hiawatha National Forest on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. She’s also a Michelin starred chef and the author of two books. On this episode, how she thinks about gender – especially her own, how she deals with fear and why people are scary, and what she found on a foraging trip through the saltwater marshes of southeastern North Carolina.

CoastLine: Comedians Cliff Cash and Nancy Witter on touring and finding the funny Sep 26, 2023

Both Cliff Cash and Nancy Witter are professional comedians, have played to sold-out houses across these United States, and call the Cape Fear region home. On this episode they explore the craft of comedy and how it's evolved for them.

In the Wild Coastal Plain with carnivorous plants Sep 12, 2023

In each episode of In The Wild Coastal Plain, we meet a plant or an animal endemic to the southeastern North Carolina biodiversity hotspot – so we can better understand our coastal plain ecosystem and who lives here with us.Today, we’re exploring Holly Shelter, a nature preserve and game land in Pender County that boasts tens of thousands of acres -- one of the last great pieces of connected natural area in southeastern North Carolina. That’s because humans are rapidly building all around it.

CoastLine: Soil scientist Britt Moore: Environmental Justice should guide culturally-responsive science Sep 05, 2023

Environmental justice can be complicated. The way studies are set up, the way the researchers communicate with the subjects of the study, and what the scientists do with the results – all those protocols are part of what Dr. Britt Moore calls “culturally-responsive science”.

CoastLine: Soil scientist Britt Moore: Environmental Justice should guide culturally-responsive science Sep 05, 2023

Environmental justice can be complicated. The way studies are set up, the way the researchers communicate with the subjects of the study, and what the scientists do with the results – all those protocols are part of what Dr. Britt Moore calls “culturally-responsive science”.

CoastLine: Racial healing activists of all races need to interrogate themselves first, says Dr. Catherine Meeks Aug 29, 2023

“A fundamental question that each of us must answer is: Who are the victims of racism? Upon careful investigation, it seems quite clear that the answer is ‘everyone’.” Dr. Catherine Meeks, Exec. Director, Absalom Jones Center for Racial Healing

CoastLine: Black Barbie, the film, celebrates Black women, reveals deep cultural influence Aug 22, 2023

Black Barbie, the documentary film by Lagueria Davis, explores the way the doll shapes culture, and ultimately the way people think about themselves. It’s a close look at representation, starting with the filmmaker's aunt, Beulah Mae Mitchell, who was on the original Barbie manufacturing line with Mattel and played a key role in bringing Black Barbie to life.

CoastLine: How retired Marine Grady Kurpasi landed in a Ukraine war zone and the long journey home Aug 15, 2023

Kevin Maurer, an award-winning journalist and New York Times bestselling author has written extensively about and inside war zones. When he heard of the mysterious disappearance of retired Marine and Wilmington resident Grady Kurpasi during a Russian ambush in Ukraine, he started investigating. That led to an article about the extraordinary life and death of Grady Kurpasi in Rolling Stone Magazine. Former Marine and close friend Don Turner also joins us to shed light on Grady's disappearance and the efforts to bring him home.

CoastLine: Sara Johnson Allen on writing her first novel and how place shapes us Aug 07, 2023

Down Here We Come Up, which took more than fifteen years to write, started as an exploration of the jarring class differences between the northern and southern United States. But the novel Sara Johnson Allen actually completed, set just outside of Wilmington, NC, raises even deeper questions about what defines family and a home place, and whether ancestral ties are enough.

In the Wild Coastal Plain of SE NC with the red-cockaded woodpecker and longleaf pine Jul 31, 2023

As natural areas disappear, we’re taking a closer look at what we’re losing, species by species, in a new series called In The Wild Coastal Plain. In this second episode, we explore the intertwined fates of the red-cockaded woodpecker and longleaf pine.

CoastLine: In The Wild Coastal Plain with Andy Wood, the red-cockaded woodpecker, and longleaf pine Jul 31, 2023

As natural areas disappear, we’re taking a closer look at what we’re losing, species by species, in a new CoastLine series called In The Wild Coastal Plain. On this edition of CoastLine, we explore why the intertwined fates of the red-cockaded woodpecker and longleaf pine are important harbingers of the area's fate.

CoastLine: Darien Brooks says treatment changed profound autism to high-functioning Jul 25, 2023

Alice Brooks says when she learned that her son, Darien, had profound autism spectrum disorder, she cried on the front porch all night. Today, she says Darien and his diagnosis are the greatest blessings of her life.

CoastLine: Wildlife rehabilitators on caring for animals and how to avoid doing harm Jul 18, 2023

Summer is a busy time in southeastern North Carolina for wildlife rehabilitators. It is against the law to take a wild animal into captivity unless you have a license from the state. But well-meaning people do this, often without understanding how they're probably doing more harm than good.

In the Wild Coastal Plain of SE NC with the American Beaver Jul 03, 2023

Andy Wood: "Beavers are an ally for maintaining water quality, air quality, biodiversity, and flood protection. One beaver pond can retain millions of gallons of stormwater, slowly releasing it into the stream so that downstream homes aren't suddenly flooded with a rush of water."There's so much to learn about this animal that many developers consider a pest.

CoastLine: In the Wild Coastal Plain SE NC with the American Beaver Jul 03, 2023

As natural areas disappear in southeastern North Carolina, we’re taking a closer look at what we’re losing, species by species, in a new series called In The Wild Coastal Plain. Andy Wood is our guide, and in this edition of CoastLine, we explore how it came to be and why the American Beaver is a keystone species (not a pest).

CoastLine: Filmmaker Montana Cypress on growing up in the Florida Everglades and Miccosukee alligator "wrestling" Jun 27, 2023

When most Americans see a large alligator, they see a menace. When filmmaker Montana Cypress sees one, he respects the potential danger. But he grew up seeing his fellow Miccosukee Tribe members work with alligators in front of audiences in the Florida Everglades. Tourists call it wrestling, but Montana sees a profound connection between human and animal.

CoastLine: Birding ethics and helping backyard birds thrive Jun 20, 2023

When birds started dying from known and mysterious diseases, biologists told us backyard bird feeders pose risks to birds that include disease, collision, and predation. Jill Peleuses of Wild Bird & Garden and Cape Fear Bird Observatory explains how to mitigate those risks and actually help our local and visiting birds.

CoastLine: Jamir Jumoke on surviving recidivism Jun 13, 2023

What does it mean to get sucked into the school-to-prison pipeline? Jamir Jumoke describes traumatic early years and what it took to break the cycle.

CoastLine: NPR Founding Mother Susan Stamberg on the changing rules of journalism, understanding modern art, and Mama Stamberg's cranberry relish Jun 06, 2023

NPR Special Correspondent Susan Stamberg visited Wilmington, NC in late May 2023. Two interviews, one in front of several hundred people, one in WHQR's CoastLine studio, reveal the origins of the NPR sound, a fiercely rigorous journalist, and a voraciously curious woman who injects humor into almost anything.

CoastLine: Photojournalist Alexander Rivera, Jr., descendant of 1898 victim, influenced U.S. civil rights May 23, 2023

One photojournalist from North Carolina influenced the civil rights struggle in the United States, enjoyed a friendship with President Richard Nixon, was a member of the first African American press delegation on an official U.S. diplomatic trip overseas, and descended from one of the victims of the Wilmington 1898 coup d’etat. Alexander Rivera, Jr. also lit a fire in the imagination of UNCW History Professor Glen Harris, who wrote his biography: Social Justice and Liberation Struggles: The photojournalistic and public relations career of Alexander McAllister Rivera Junior

CoastLine: Dana Sachs on joining the volunteer effort to help migrants suffering in Greek refugee camps May 09, 2023

So many who brave dangerous treks across unfriendly terrain and tumultuous oceans to escape war, violence, and poverty find themselves stuck in camps that do not satisfy the most basic human needs: sanitation, enough food, dry clothes. Author Dana Sachs explains how a grassroots volunteer effort has sprung up where governments and NGOs have failed.

CoastLine: Blues musician Robert Lighthouse says tour of war-torn Ukraine fundamentally changed him May 02, 2023

Blues musician Robert Lighthouse may have grown up in Sweden, but as soon as he turned 18 he came to the United States to live with a native American family on a Hopi reservation and learn about his beloved Mississippi Delta Blues. He had no idea that decades later, he'd travel to a war zone to make music for people living with daily terror. He also had no idea how profoundly that trip would affect him.

CoastLine: Roger Shew on the Seven Natural Wonders of SE NC Apr 18, 2023

He calls them the Seven Natural Wonders of southeastern North Carolina. Can you guess what they are? We live in a biodiversity hotspot – for now, anyway — and environmental scientist Roger Shew is hoping that the more people learn about these natural wonders, the more they’ll care about saving them.

CoastLine: Michelin star chef Iliana Regan on gender, fear, and foraging Apr 11, 2023

Iliana Regan is owner and chef of The Milkweed Inn – a rustic, woodsy, and hard-to-reach getaway in the Hiawatha National Forest on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. She’s also a Michelin starred chef and the author of two books. On this episode, how she thinks about gender – especially her own, how she deals with fear and why people are scary, and what she found on a foraging trip through the saltwater marshes of southeastern North Carolina.

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