History

In 1965, Muhammad Ali and Lincoln Perry (Stepin Fetchit) teamed up in pursuit of a legendary boxing technique: the anchor punch.

Sports
Arts

'Fetch Clay, Make Man': Ali, Fetchit And The 'Anchor Punch'

6:38pm October 11, 2013

by Mike Pesca

The play Fetch Clay, Make Man explores the sense of identity through the eyes of two significant figures in black history — Stepin Fetchit (Lincoln Perry) and Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali).

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A marriage made in New York, though both partners came with plenty of baggage.

Arts

No Schmear Job: A Brief History Of Bagels And Lox

5:35pm September 23, 2013

by NPR Staff

The origin of the bagel "is somewhat mysterious," says a writer who recently explored the topic. What is unquestionable is that bagel met and married lox in New York. But as in so many modern unions, both partners came to the marriage with plenty of baggage.

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Jeff Guinn's previous books include The Last Gunfight and Go Down Together: The True, Untold Story of Bonnie and Clyde.

Books
Arts

Bio Credits Manson's Terrible Rise To Right Place And Time

4:10pm September 18, 2013

California parolee Charles Manson arrived in San Francisco in 1967, when the city was full of young waifs looking for a guru. In Manson, Jeff Guinn argues that if the cult leader had instead been paroled in a place like Nebraska, he likely would not have been so successful.

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Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking cover

Kitchen Time Machine: A Culinary Romp Through Soviet History

9:38am September 17, 2013

Author Anya Von Bremzen's new memoir, Mastering The Art of Soviet Cooking, is a tragic-comic history of a family and a nation as seen through the kitchen window. Everything we ate in the Soviet Union was grown ... by the party state," she says. "So, with the food, inevitably, you ingested the ideology."

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Billie Jean King, seen here in 1977, learned to play tennis on the public courts near her Long Beach, Calif., home.

Sports

Pioneer Billie Jean King Moved The Baseline For Women's Tennis

5:03pm September 12, 2013

A new PBS documentary looks at King's legacy as both a tennis champion — she has a record 20 Wimbledon titles — and the leader of a female player uprising that demanded fairer treatment and pay. She tells Fresh Air about the challenges of being a female player before there was a women's league.

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Books
Arts

Woodrow Wilson Brought New Executive Style To The White House

4:41pm September 10, 2013

No. 28 was the first president to team up with America's legislative branch, and he used a groundbreaking moral argument to get the U.S. involved in World War I. A. Scott Berg's new book, Wilson, fills in missing pieces of the president's life.

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Until the FBI re-opened the bombing case in the 1990s, much of the evidence surrounding the bombings was misplaced or withheld. Critical evidence in the 2001 conviction of Thomas Blanton was found in a discarded box.

National

Congress Honors Victims Of Infamous Alabama Church Bombing

10:32am September 10, 2013

by Debbie Elliott

The Congressional Gold Medals for Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley come 50 years after the black girls were killed by a Ku Klux Klan bomb. Just as the federal recognition is long in coming, so was justice.

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The U.S. Brig Niagara is a replica of the ship Oliver Hazard Perry sailed to victory. The Niagara carries four carronades, or short-range cannons. The original ship was outfitted with 18 carronades that could shoot a 32-pound ball about half a mile.

National

Remembering A 'Brave,' 'Lucky' Hero In The War Of 1812

7:08am September 10, 2013

by Jeff St. Clair

That war gave us our national anthem and a stable border with Canada, but otherwise, not much is remembered about that conflict nowadays. This changed over Labor Day when the largest sailing re-enactment ever attempted in the U.S. marked the anniversary of a remarkable victory in that war.

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Members of S. A. Andrée's 1897 journey survey their downed vessel. This photo was recovered from a camera when their remains were found 33 years later.

From The Fall Of Failure, Success Can Take Flight

6:26pm September 08, 2013

by NPR Staff

Risking and embracing failure is part of the job for explorers and adventurers like aeronaut Salomon August Andrée. His fatal attempt at reaching the North Pole motivated others to push their own limits. The September issue of National Geographic investigates "famous failures" and why they mattered.

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Tlacoyos can be filled with beans, potatoes, mushrooms or cheese and are often topped with grilled cactus, onions, cilantro, and salsa.

Tlacoyos: A Mexican Grilled Snack That Tempted The Conquistadors

2:10pm September 04, 2013

by Carrie Kahn

Tlacoyos are a doughy corn tortilla of sorts that's cooked on a grill. Whether enjoyed on a plastic plate as street food or fine china in a high-end restaurant, it's been a favorite snack for centuries.

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