Reel History: My Green Earth and Spiders

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Al Asuncion/KMXT
Hello, I’m Al Asuncion, an intern here at KMXT are part of the station’s summer archiving project. This week, I listened to “My Green Earth” hosted by Stacy Studebaker, also known as Leila Liverwort.
“Hi there, Nature fans! Welcome to My Green Earth, a weekly radio show about our environment for kids and their parents. I’m your host, Leila Liverwort; and today’s creature feature is about a relative of the insect that can be found nearly everywhere from deserts to bathtubs. Instead of having six legs like insects, these creatures have eight legs. You’ve guessed it! Spiders!”
This episode titled “Spiders” aired on KMXT in December of 1994. Leila illustrates the body structure of a spider in this show.

Reel History: Fish For Food Banks

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Marina Cummiskey/KMXT
Hi, I’m Marina Cummiskey, an intern here at KMXT as part of the station’s summer archiving project. This week I listened to an Alaska Fisheries Report, produced in November of 1993 by Laine Welch. One of the stories on the reel was about a way to put Alaskan by-catch to good use.
“It’s no secret that the amount of waste in the nation’s fisheries is raising the ire of an increasingly aware public, but the experimental by-catch food bank program, headed by Terra Marine and participants of the Bering Sea Troll Fleet, has holiday meals of salmon being served to the hungry and homeless in Seattle.”
A story the new menu at a low-income housing unit in Seattle, written by Leslie Bennett of KUOW, was aired on NPR’s morning edition.
“St. Martins’ serves three meals a day, seven days a week. Most of its food comes from Food Lifeline, a distribution service for shelters, meal programs, and food banks. James Dale opens the freezer door, and points to the 50 pound boxes of salmon, which have been processed, and frozen. The money for storage, transportation, and processing came from individual donations and contributions.”

Reel History: Top News From 1982

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Marina Cummmiskey/KMXTHi, I’m Marina Cummiskey, an intern here at KMXT as part of the station’s summer archiving project. This week I digitized a reel containing summaries of the top ten news stories reported from Kodiak in 1982. The top ten list was hosted by John Fifer, and number five was a story about a drug bust in the North Pacific.
On June 20th, 1982, the US Coast Guard cutter Boutwell seized a sailboat halfway between Hawaii and Adak, carrying 1.5 tons of marijuana. The story was aired on KMXT two days before any newspaper printed it, and was later aired nationally containing more details about the event.

Reel History: Email for Crabbers

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Yasent Oliver/KMXT
Hello, I’m Yasent Oliver, a summer intern at KMXT as part of the stations summer archiving project. Throughout the summer, I have been listening to various Alaska Fisheries Reports from the 1980s and early 90s. The shows were hosted by Laine Welch, current producer of Fish Radio, which airs daily on KMXT.
While listening to these, one story struck me as quite interesting. The story was about a new technology that could help crab fisherman get closer to the catch quotas: E-Mail. Here are some sound bytes from the news story. Keep in mind, when she says “Morrison,” she is referring to:
“Fish and Game management biologist Rance Morrison at Dutch Harbor.”

Reel History: Benny Benson and Live Mariachi

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Al Asuncion/KMXT
Hello, I’m Al Asuncion, an intern at KMXT as part of the station’s summer archiving project. This week, I listened to Sand Castle, stories for young adventurers, all read by Jean Vanderford.
“Today, our stories are “Benny’s Flag”, written by Phyllis Krasilovsky in 1960. It is a true story by Benny Benson and the Alaska flag design, and Sophie’s Bucket, written by Catherine Stock in 1985. Sophie takes a beach bucket to the seashore; and “Eeps Creeps, It’s My Room!” written in 1984 by Martha Whitmore Hickman. Jeffrey has to clean up his room.”

Reel History: NPR’s Horizons and Project Dream

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Yasent Oliver/KMXT
Hello, my name is Yasent Oliver, a summer intern at KMXT as part of the station’s summer archiving project. Over the past two weeks, I was able to listen to quite a few tapes, but the one that stood out to me the most was an NPR program on suicide among Native American youth.
“From National Public Radio, this is Horizons. I’m Vertamae Grosvenor.”
“Sometimes, living is so painful, that we’ve all felt like we just want to die. But what is it that makes some of us commit suicide, especially young people? The suicide rate for Indian teenagers is almost twice the national average. Indian and non-Indian, those who have lost their children feel the same pain.”
Throughout the tape, many people told stories of their experiences with suicide.