Search results for

The Philadelphia A’s were the first Major League Baseball team to spring train in Fort Myers, beginning in 1925. Over the decades were followed by teams from Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Kansas City. The Minnesota Twins arrived in 1991, and the Boston Red Sox moved their spring training operations here two years later in 1993. We dig into the City of Palm’s rich baseball history with two men who just love digging into rich baseball history. They’ll be two of the presenters at the upcoming fundraiser for the Southwest Florida Historical Society called “What it was, was baseball. An evening of Fort Myers history as told through the prism of diamonds…baseball diamonds.”

Bertha Vasquez spent most of her career in the classroom teaching science to middle schoolers in Miami-Dade County. She’s a passionate advocate for the scientific method and the many ways it’s made life better for humanity. And she’s a strong believer in skepticism when it comes to understanding the world around us, especially when extraordinary claims are made. These days Ms. Vasquez has taken on the role of Director of Education at the The Center for Inquiry, and Director of its Teacher Institute for Evolutionary Science. The CFI’s roots go back to the 1970s when Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, and other critical thinkers began seeing the need to mitigate growing belief in pseudoscience and paranormal claims using rational means and methods.

The Midwest Food Bank was founded on a farm in Illinois in 2003 and has grown ever since, adding branches around the country including one that covers Florida. The Midwest Food Bank Florida branch opened in Fort Myers in 2014 and has been providing food to its more than 200 partner agencies ever since. These days they’re providing tens of thousands of meals every month. They pretty much runs on volunteers — they had about 2000 last year — and they only have six paid employees so they’re able to turn every dollar donated into 34 meals. We meet their new Executive Director to get to know him and better understand what they do.

Albee made his debut as a Broadway playwright in 1962 with Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf,which went on to win a Tony Award. He died Friday at the age of 88. Originally broadcast in 1984.

Originally from Montana, Marci grew up near the mountains and can't get enough of them. She began in broadcasting in Missoula, Montana where she anchored Montana Public Radio's local Evening Edition news program. She then picked up a camera and tripod and worked for Missoula's local CBS television station as a reporter. Shortly after that, she returned to radio and became the Assistant News Director at a radio station in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Marci began at Aspen Public Radio in 2007 as the station's morning host and reporter. Although you can occasionally hear Marci in the mornings, she is now quite content to be sleeping in and reporting all day. When not at the station, Marci is on her road bike, meeting people, or skiing.

Sarah Schneider comes to Pittsburgh by way of the prairie state of Illinois. She spent the summer of 2014 getting to know Pittsburgh as a reporting and photography intern with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. She now collaborates on special projects including the Life of Learning Initiative as the station’s PULSE - Pittsburgh Urban Leadership Service Experience - fellow. Sarah graduated from Southern Illinois University’s Journalism School in May. During her four years there she worked as a reporter and editor at the school newspaper, the Daily Egyptian. She has previously interned at newspapers in eastern Idaho and central Illinois. You can often find Sarah behind a camera documenting people she meets and discovering new places. She also enjoys reading, crocheting and National Geographic documentaries.

Steve Carmody has been a reporter for Michigan Radio since 2005. Steve previously worked at public radio and television stations in Florida, Oklahoma and Kentucky, and also has extensive experience in commercial broadcasting. During his two and a half decades in broadcasting, Steve has won numerous awards, including accolades from the Associated Press and Radio and Television News Directors Association. Away from the broadcast booth, Steve is an avid reader and movie fanatic.

Atlantic writer Clint Smith grew up surrounded by Confederate iconography, being told that the Civil War wasn't about slavery. He shares a poem from his forthcoming book, How the Word Is Passed.

A survey from the nonpartisan group Freedom House finds that democracy and human rights have lost ground in 80 countries — and even calls the U.S. to task. But there are bright spots.

Russia's central bank sharply raised a benchmark interest rate to combat steep losses in the ruble's value as sanctions crimp Russian economic activity.