Roundup

A WW II Memorial for Germans Rankles Some [5min]

A controversy has grown over plans for a memorial center dedicated to the 12 million Germans who became refugees after World War II. Many were forced to flee the Soviet army or were expelled from homes in Eastern Europe. The planned center has raised questions about whether it's appropriate for Germans to remember their own victims of the war, given the atrocities inflicted by the Nazis on other nations.

Sleuthing for Rock Art in New Mexico [3min]

Some anthropologists now believe that more human beings lived in Southwest New Mexico 1,000 years ago than live there today. How do they know? Because the region is covered with thousands of archaeological sites. Some areas are positively littered with rock art and artifacts from long-gone ancient cultures. Reporter Doug Fine went on a trek through the desert back country with a local man who sleuths out hidden "rock art" sites.

Settling the Score [38min]

The daughter of a Holocaust survivor travels to Poland to meet the family that saved her mother's life. They were still in the building they'd lived in during the war. She expected the kind of warm, nostalgic reunion they make PBS documentaries out of, and feel-good specials on A&E. What she got was very different. The family asked her to make good on a 60-year-old promise.

Ozymandias [30min]

Biographer Richard Holmes and BBC world affairs correspondent Rageh Omaar are among contributors who explore the background, effect and lasting appeal of the poem "Ozymandias" by Percy Bysshe Shelley.

Supreme Court Mysteries and Minutiae, Revealed [3min]

NPR's Scott Simon talks with writer and editor A.J. Jacobs -- who has read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica -- about Supreme Court trivia.

'America on the Ropes' [10min @ 37:40]

The 1910 heavyweight fight between Jack Johnson and Jim Jeffries was remarkable for several reasons. Jeffries, who had retired undefeated five years previously claimed he was still the legitimate champion. Johnson had won the championship in the ring. Jeffries only took the fight because author Jack London and much of the public at large so energetically beseeched him to remove the heavyweight crown from the Black champion's head. The fight itself was terrible in its brutality and significant fo

Montserrat & Venice [30min]

Sandi Toksvig welcomes social anthropologist Jonathan Skinner and Montserrat's Minister of Tourism, Ernestine Cassell, to assess ten years' impact of the explosion of the volcano on the Caribbean Island; then she discusses geography and culture of Venice with social anthropologist Garry Marvin and America author John Berendt. [1] Ten years ago Montserrat's volcano erupted without much warning. The entire capital, Plymouth, once one of the prettiest towns in the Caribbean was drowned by rivers of

Early British Bandleaders, 3rd of 3 [30min]

Humphrey Lyttelton presents a series exploring the world of the early British Bandleaders. After the Second World War, times were changing. Many bandleaders had lost their musicians to the ranks of the armed services, vocalists were becoming the new celebrities and the advent of television would take people away from the dancehalls. By the mid fifties many bandleaders had managed to adapt to these changes, but that was before a man from Michigan by the name of Bill Haley, and others of his ilk,

The Nuremburg Trial [2hrs]

This docudrama is an overview of the most significant trial of the 20th century -- from the opening words of Chief US Prosecutor Justice Robert Jackson, the indictment, and the not guilty pleas of the Nazi leaders, to the summing-up 11 months later by the Chief British Prosecutor Hartley Shawcross, and the verdicts and hangings that followed. Enacted extracts from the trial transcripts reveal the horrors of Hitler's Third Reich, the actions of the instigators of major crimes, and weaknesses in t

Access Holy Wood [5min]

The Washington saga that has gripped journalism watchers for many months has taken another unexpected turn. Seems that storied scribe Bob Woodward may have been the first journalist contacted by the notorious Valerie Plame leaker. And he kept mum until this week. Brooke Gladstone reflects on the transformation of Watergate Bob into White House Bob.

Free Preach Rights [8min]

Preaching politics is protected speech in America ... unless you do it from the pulpit. Religious organizations that get involved in electioneering risk getting stripped of their tax-exempt status. The debate over that rule, recently revived by an IRS audit in Pasadena, has united activists of many political stripes. Bob Garfield takes a closer look at one contentious intersection of church and state.

Daughters of Britannia, 5th of 20 [15min]

Stories from Mary Shiels as she enters Tehran, and Jennifer Hickman experiences feelings of homesickness as she enters New Zealand, in Katie Hickman's Daughters of Britannia: The Lives and Times of Diplomatic Wives.

Gettysburg Cyclorama Restoration [7min @ 15:56]

In its heyday, more than a hundred years ago, the Gettysburg Cyclorama was said to have been so grippingly real that it could bring veterans of the American Civil War to tears. The massive painting covered the walls of a round room, four stories high and bigger than an olympic-sized swimming pool. But now the Cyclorama hangs in tatters at the Gettysburg National Battlefield Museum. So it's about to undgergo a two year, ten-million-dollar facelift. Sunday will be the last day you can see the pain

Sarajevo Ten Years Ago [5min]

This Monday marks the 10th anniversary of the Dayton accord. That's the peace agreement that put an end to the brutal civil war in Bosnia. Some of the worst fighting was in the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo. The World's Jennifer Glasse reports from there on how the city has changed and adapted.

Richard Holbrooke Interview [6min]

Former US ambassador Richard Holbrooke helped broker the Dayton peace accord which ended the war in Bosnia ten years ago. Host Lisa Mullins talks to Richard Holbrooke about that achievement.

'Walk the Line' Walks a Straight Line [4min]

Movie critic Bob Mondello says Walk The Line, the new bio-pic about the country music legend known as"The Man in Black," boasts terrific performances from Joaquin Phoenix as Johnny Cash and Reese Witherspoon as June Carter, while the film itself is rather conventional.

Darwin Exhibit Makes N.Y. Opening [42min]

This week, a major exhibition on the life and work of Charles Darwin opens at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. The curator of the exhibition talks about the scientist's work.Guests: Niles Eldredge, author, Darwin: Discovering the Tree of Life, curator, Division of Paleontology, curator, Darwin Exhibition, American Museum of Natural History in New York, New York; and Edward J. Larson, author, Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America's Continuing Debate Over S

Museums, Evolution and Creationism [6min]

A look at how natural history museums respond to challenges to the theory of evolution. Guest: Warren Allmon director, Paleontological Research Institution; associate professor, geology and biology, Cornell University.

The Cash Story: 'Walk the Line' [6min]

Walk the Line is the new biopic about music icon Johnny Cash, starring Joaquin Phoenix as the Man in Black and Reese Witherspoon as his wife, June Carter. The film traces Cash's career from his early days singing as a boy on the local radio station to his touring days as one of America's most popular singers. His long, and eventually successful, courtship of June Carter Cash is also depicted, offering viewers a look at the private side of a man whose public image was that of a brooding an

Sen. John Kerry on Iraq War, Rosa Parks [12min]

Former presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) talks about the latest efforts on Capitol Hill to get a clear Iraq war strategy from the White House. He also discusses new legislation to place a statue honoring civil right pioneer Rosa Parks in the capital.