STL on the Air 📻

Danny Wicentowski conducted lots of different interviews for his latest Riverfront Times cover story digging into the status of a proposed $190 million Novus redevelopment near Interstate 170 and Olive Boulevard. The same word — limbo — kept popping up in his conversations with various sources, as he mentions in his piece. The proposed development was publicly unveiled more than a year ago. Yet residents and business owners in the path of the Costco-focused "University Place" are still waiting to find out whether it's definitely moving forward. That's left their future in the neighborhood uncertain. Host Sarah Fenske talks with Wicentowski about his reporting on the saga. The conversation also includes comments from longtime U City homeowner Letha Baptiste, who has thus far declined to accept Novus’ offer of an option contract on her house.

Thirteen-year-old St. Louisan Tarek Husseini spent four weeks in Los Angeles this past summer competing for a $25,000 prize. Now, for the last six weeks, viewers of the Food Network’s “Kids Baking Championship” have watched Husseini and other up-and-coming bakers impress the judges with one kitchen creation after another. The Ladue resident made it through the semifinal episode that premiered on Monday. In this talk show segment, he chats with host Sarah Fenske ahead of next week's final episode.

In this interview, Dr. Jessica Gold, an assistant professor of psychiatry at Washington University in St. Louis, talks with Sarah Fenske about the danger of a perceived link between mental illness and gun violence.

A multitude of truncated earthworks — more commonly known as mounds — once dotted the St. Louis landscape. For the ancient Mississippian people who constructed them many centuries ago, these structures were full of meaning and purpose. The mounds also drew the interest of European newcomers to the region long after the mounds were built. But by the late 19th century, most of these sacred Native American places had been destroyed — the Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site in Collinsville, Illinois, being a significant exception. In this conversation, host Sarah Fenske talks with Patricia Cleary, a St. Louis native who is currently working on a book about the mounds that she plans to publish leading up to Missouri’s bicentennial celebration of statehood in 2021.

In April of 1968, Jane Elliott was a third-grade teacher in the small town of Riceville, Iowa. On the day after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, she felt compelled to shift her lesson plans. She decided to teach her young white students about discrimination by telling the children that brown-eyed people were superior to their blue-eyed peers. She watched as the students turned on each other. Then, the next day, she reversed the script. The exercise highlighted the arbitrary and irrational basis of prejudice, an issue that Americans continue to grapple with more than five decades later. In this episode, host Sarah Fenske explores that topic and others with Elliott ahead of the internationally known lecturer’s address at the Washington University School of Medicine on Monday evening. Also joining the conversation is Rachelle D. Smith, a Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Leader for the School of Medicine.

In this conversation, we hear from an UMSL researcher who analyzed seven years of arrest data to see whether the so-called “Ferguson effect” caused an increase of crime in St. Louis. The “Ferguson effect” refers to the idea that when police face a high level of scrutiny, law enforcement activities are stifled, and that leads to a spike in violent crime. Lt. Colonel Ronnie Robinson of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department also joins the discussion.

Did the spokesman for a group exploring privatizing St. Louis' airport call into St. Louis on the Air under a fake name? An audio forensics expert who listened to the recording says it's "very likely." In this segment, Sarah Fenske talks with St. Louis Public Radio reporter Corinne Ruff, who looked into this story.

Host Sarah Fenske checks in with the team at Sauce Magazine to discuss the latest restaurant additions — as well as upcoming concepts and some closings — within the St. Louis region’s food and beverage community. Joining the discussion are managing editor Catherine Klene and art director Meera Nagarajan.

The Contemporary Art Museum in St. Louis is using art to engage history and contextualize the present. chief curator Wassan Al-Khudhairi joined St. Louis on the Air with artists Stephanie Syjuco and Bethany Collins to discuss the CAM’s fall exhibitions.

In January 2018, the Impossible Burger first arrived in the St. Louis market. The meat-free patty was just like the real thing – it even bled. It became an immediate sensation. But it was soon snapped up by Burger King for its “Impossible Whopper.” After a hugely successful rollout right here in St. Louis, its popularity made the Impossible patties too popular for many locals to obtain. But they still had plenty of options. Some have experimented on their own to create tasty meat-free concoctions. Others are turning to more local alternatives. In this episode, Sarah Fenske talks with Todd Boyman, CEO of Hungry Planet, and with Chris Bertke, executive chef of the newly opened vegan-focused restaurant Utah Station. The segment includes comments from other food and restaurant industry professionals as well.

The legacy of George B. Vashon. The history of the St. Louis Browns. The special moments that took place at the Top of the Tower. A handful of local authors and historians revisited all of this and more during last week’s STL Storytelling Live event at the Missouri Athletic Club in downtown St. Louis. This episode features highlights from the evening, with stories running the gamut from the humorous, to the surprising, to the hopeful. The storytellers include Bill Clevlen, Carol Shepley, Amanda Doyle, Ed Wheatley, Calvin Riley and Cameron Collins.

Host Sarah Fenske talks to CommUNITY Arts Festival founder Paige Walden-Johnson and Rain Stippec, the dancer who was shot eight times in the back two years ago. They discussed Stippec’s journey to recovery and how the arts festival has grown to be an asset to the city by addressing gun violence.

All the world’s a stage, Shakespeare instructed us in his beloved romantic comedy “As You Like It.” And in its new production of that very show, Shakespeare Festival St. Louis plans to put that to the test in both the streets of Pagedale, Missouri, and the farmland of Calhoun County, Illinois. Its remix of the classic play, titled “Love at the River’s Edge,” transports audience members across the Mississippi River to examine the urban and rural divide. In this episode, host Sarah Fenske discusses the new production, which kicks off September 13 as part of the Shakespeare in the Streets initiative, with executive producer Tom Ridgely and director Kathryn Bentley.

Host Sarah Fenske explores the religious obligation of Hajj, the annual Islamic pilgrimage, and what it all entails. Joining the program were St. Louisans Shahab Mushtaq and Faiza Mushtaq. The husband and wife duo were among the millions of Muslims who traveled more than 7,000 miles to attend Hajj this year. Also joining the conversation was Faizan Syed, executive director of Missouri’s Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR.)

"We Live Here," the podcast that St. Louis Public Radio launched in the wake of the Ferguson uprising, is entering its fifth season this fall – with new voices at its helm. Co-hosts Ashley Winters and Jia Lian Yang, as well as associate producer Lauren Brown, are preparing to release a series of new episodes in the coming weeks. In this episode of "St. Louis on the Air" they join Sarah Fenske to discuss where "We Live Here" is headed and how they’re hoping to engage with listeners near and far.

In this segment, host Sarah Fenske talks with St. Louis Public Radio reporter Sarah Fentem about her reporting into the experience of Medicaid eligible families across the state who say they’ve been arriving at doctors’ appointments to learn their children have been unwittingly dropped from the program.

Lamar Johnson has been in prison for 24 years. A St. Louis jury found him guilty of murder in 1995 – and he’s been serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole ever since. St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner now says prosecutors in her office engaged in serious misconduct. Saying her Conviction Integrity Unit has found new evidence that Johnson is actually innocent, she sought a new trial. St. Louis Circuit Judge Elizabeth Hogan denied that request. She says Gardner’s motion came “approximately 24 years” past the deadline. Tricia Bushnell, director of the Midwest Innocence Project, isn’t buying it.

Fentanyl has become an international scourge. It’s been blamed for a spike in drug overdose deaths in Missouri as well as around the world. It’s both contaminated many recreational drugs and become a substitute for heroin in many American cities. And yet the Chinese factory responsible for manufacturing most of its precursors has received funding and lucrative tax breaks from the Chinese government. Through years of research, St. Louis journalist Ben Westhoff has become one of the foremost experts into the international fentanyl trade. In this episode, he discusses his new book, “Fentanyl, Inc.: How Rogue Chemists Are Creating the Deadliest Wave of the Opioid Epidemic.” Westhoff talks about how his investigation followed the drug from its manufacture in China to the streets of St. Louis – and the terrible impact that synthetic, laboratory-made drugs are having on communities around the world.

As a St. Louis-based designer, burlesque performer, artist and more, Maxi Glamour’s personal and professional brand is a multifaceted one. But one particular title does stand out, and that’s Glamour’s drag performer identity as the “Demon Queen of Polka and Baklava.” That persona comes to life in a new way in the new season of the “Boulet Brothers’ Dragula” reality TV series, which features Glamour. The first episode premiered on Amazon Prime Video on Tuesday, and in this episode of the talk show, host Sarah Fenske talks with Glamour about their experience on “Dragula” as well as other topics. Glamour, who identifies as queer and non-binary, is believed to be the first drag performer from St. Louis to appear on a major televised drag competition. They became a fan of the show long before being cast in it.

Glyphosate, the active ingredient in the weed killer Roundup, is manufactured by Monsanto-Bayer. Depending on who you talk to, it’s either a safe, highly effective herbicide, or, it’s a dangerous substance linked to cancer cases from use by farmers and landscapers. In this interview, Sarah Fenske talks with journalist Carey Gillam, who is coming to St. Louis to talk about her investigations into the topic of agrochemical safety and corporate interests.