On The Record

On the Record reflects on the last nine years of our radio show and the interviews with — and insights from— artists, scientists, community leaders, and others that we spoke with along the way.

Sheilah Kast talks with former UMBC President Dr. Freeman Hrabowski about empathy, dialog, and forgiveness in this fraught political moment.

The Lumbee Indian community has had a longstanding presence in Baltimore. They arrived after World War II when thousands of people came looking for work, migrating up from North Carolina. When they arrived, many of the families centered around East Baltimore Street. Community-based artist and folklorist Ashley Minner Jones, a member of the Lumbee community, has used her talents to preserve, document and educate people about the community for years. She talks with us about her latest project: 'Beyond Baltimore Street: Living Lumbee Legacies.' We also talk with Jill Fannon Prevas, a Baltimore-based artist and photographer who collaborated on the project. 'Beyond Baltimore Street: Living Lumbee Legacies' opens at Eastpoint Mall on Indigenous Peoples Day, October 13, 2025. There is a reception, open to the public, at 6:30pm.

When you think of Ancient Egypt, what comes to mind? Sand, the Nile, pyramids, the Sphinx? Maybe, even mummies. If you’re thinking about mummies, you’re probably thinking about human mummies. But millions of animals were also mummified; they’ve been found at burial sites across Egypt — cats, dogs, birds and more. Those animal mummies are the focus of 'Soulful Creatures: Animal Mummies in Ancient Egypt,' a new exhibit at the Walters Art Museum and for a closer look, we turn to Lisa Anderson-Zhu, the Walters’ Curator of Ancient Mediterranean Art and the Curator of Provenance.

If you find “Lawyer Oyer” on TikTok or Instagram, the voice is calm and the demeanor steady. It can feel like a 3-minute tutorial on the law. But listen, and you realize it’s not at all passive. Before Liz Oyer was in charge of pardons at the U.S. Department of Justice, she was a federal public defender in Maryland for ten years. She was fired by the Trump administration six months ago, and started posting as Lawyer Oyer in April. We ask her about the 'Five-Alarm Fire' at the justice department, and more.

Tense financial times. Since January, 15,000 federal workers in Maryland have lost their jobs, more than in any other state. Looking ahead, policy changes in the federal 'One Big Beautiful Bill' are likely to knock tens of thousands of Marylanders off food assistance or health insurance, or both. A week before the last day of On the Record, Gov. Wes Moore joins us to take stock of where things are and what Maryland can do.

Part of success is looking back at the path that got you there. On the Record is in its homestretch -- ending October 3. We’re using some of our last shows to listen back to guests from whom we’ve learned a lot, and to talk with them again. Like the acclaimed cellist Amit Peled -- a professor at Johns Hopkins Peabody Institute and founder and conductor of the Mount Vernon Virtuosi. In 2018 Peled told us how it came to be that he plays the cello of Pablo Casals, and later, how he collaborated with Marni Fogelson and illustrator Avi Katz to publish “A Cello Named Pablo,” a book that exhorts children to pursue their dreams. Now Peled joins us to talk about the Mount Vernon Virtuosi, The Music House and what has come next!

On the Record will end October 3. I’m indebted to you, our listeners and to all those who spoke with our small team during these nine years--to all who explained what they’re pouring their energies into and why others in Baltimore and Maryland should listen and care. I wish I could re-interview and catch up with everyone who joined us On the Record. But time is short. Just a few shows left. Sharing insights about Maryland’s history--from people who have lived it and from people who have studied it with rigor--has been a priority, On the Record. In 2019 Richard Bell, a history professor at the University of Maryland, published a book titled 'STOLEN: Five Free Boys Kidnapped into Slavery and Their Astonishing Odyssey Home.' It grabbed me like a Laura Lippman suspense novel, but the tale is precisely documented. Five kids, 8 to 15 years old, each walking free on the streets of Philadelphia in August 1825 and, with the promise of an odd job, lured onto a ship — onto Maryland’s Eastern Shore — to Virginia — to a barefoot thousand-mile trek to Mississippi where their captors sold them to sugar and cotton planters. So common was this human trafficking, Bell calls it “the reverse Underground Railroad”. An exciting story -- and Professor Bell has an ear for the exciting. He’s a fan-boy of 'Hamilton,' Lin-Manuel Miranda’s exuberantly popular hip-hop-soul-Rhythm & Blues adaptation of Ron Chernow’s biography of founding father Alexander Hamilton. In 2020 Bell shared with us his unabashed praise for the show and his historian’s critique of how Miranda airbrushed slavery and immigration. Now Richard Bell is about to publish another historical page-turner: 'The American Revolution and the Fate of the World.' It looks at the war American rebels declared in 1776 as a global conflict -- basically a world war, even if it wasn’t called that. We talk to him about it.

From before the dawn of recorded history, people have come together to tell stories. Whether it’s the oral traditions and folk tales of yore… or simply folks chatting around the campfire or watercooler… there’s one thing that’s true: everyone has a story. And for nearly 20 years, the Stoop Storytelling Series has featured true stories, told live in Baltimore… on stage, in podcasts, and here on the radio. The series' co-founders, Laura Wexler and Jessica Henkin, tell us how it got started, and what live storytelling means to them. This radio story featured excerpts from three Stoop Stories: one told by Elijah Cummings, another by Mimi Dietrich, and a third by Petula Caesar.

For this week's Stoop Story, we hear from Sophia Garber... about a butterfly named Nathaniel who never got to spread his wings. Information about upcoming live storytelling events , more stories, and the Stoop podcast is at StoopStorytelling.com.

For more than a century, the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center -- called BARC -- has generated scientific discoveries that improved farmers’ productivity, food safety and human nutrition. That would end under the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s plan to close BARC and to downsize USDA’s Washington-area staff, sending more than half its 46-hundred employees from the DC region to four other states -- or laying some of them off. BARC sits on 65-hundred acres in the same area of northern Princes Georges County as NASA and the Patuxent Research Refuge. Joanne Wilson, who lives in Laurel, worked as a support scientist at the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center for 33 years, until twelve years ago. We ask her about it.

Betsy Fox Tolentino calls her new gig -- heading Maryland’s Department of Juvenile Services -- her dream job. She was named acting secretary in early June after Gov. Moore decided her predecessor, Vincent Schiraldi, wasn’t making progress fast enough. Fox Tolentino already had worked 11 years in leadership roles at DJS, before leaving three years ago to manage juvenile-justice initiatives at the Roca Impact Institute. What is she changing at DJS? What are her priorities?

Description to come.

The Panamanian Golden Frog holds major cultural significance in their native Panama. "They are one of the symbols of Panama, similar to the Bald Eagle in the US," says Ellen Bronson, Senior Director of Animal Health, Conservation, and Research at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore. The frogs haven't been seen in the wild since 2009, but the Zoo is working to keep them alive; it was the first institution to successfully breed the frogs in captivity. We talk with Bronson about that, and about hopes to repatriate to their Central American home. And we get a tour of the Zoo's "Panamanian Golden Frog Conservation Center" from Kat Mantzouris, Conservation Programs Manager at the Maryland Zoo. If you go to the zoo, you'll find some of them on display at the Chimpanzee Forest.

With other states, Maryland is suing the Trump administration over transportation, healthcare and other cuts. Republicans warn those lawsuits put federal funds for the Key Bridge at risk. We ask Attorney Gen. Anthony Brown.

If you’ve heard of Cory McCray, you’ve most likely picked up that he’s a state senator, from East Baltimore. And maybe you’ve also been told-- and thought: “Huh, that’s kinda surprising ..” -- that McCray is an electrician. What you may not have heard is that a week before his 18th birthday he was charged as an adult with possession of multiple firearms and distribution of narcotics. And that was far from his first arrest. How all this ties together is the gripping plot of the book McCray is publishing at the end of the month: 'The Apprenticeship that Saved My Life: Guidebook to Navigating the Earn-While-You-Learn Opportunity of a Lifetime.' We talk with Sen. McCray about his book. Sen. McCray will be featured at the Baltimore Book festival 6pm Saturday, presented by Urban Reads, and 1pm on Sunday, presented by the Ivy Bookshop. More info here.

A photograph captures a moment in time, and when you string many of those moments together, it paints a detailed picture of what once was. That is the case of the decades-long work and keen eye of photographer I. Henry Phillips Sr. From the mid to the late twentieth century, he chronicled everyday life in Baltimore’s Black communities for the Baltimore Afro-American Newspaper and as a freelancer. His work is featured in 'The Daily Hustle,' a new exhibit at the Baltimore Museum of Industry that opens Saturday, Sept. 13. There are dozens of images, with a focus on the vibrant spirit and the important contributions of Black workers, entrepreneurs, and community leaders in Baltimore’s rich industry history. We talk with Webster Phillips, the grandson of I. Henry curated 'The Daily Hustle.' He also founded and directs the I. Henry Photo Project, and with Beth Maloney, BMI director of curatorial affairs to get a preview. If you are interested in networking or resources, stay in touch with @ihenryphotoproject and @bmiatwork.

It’s the biggest verdict ever against a gun dealer in the U.S., Baltimore says: $62 million dollars. In late August a jury sided with the city in its lawsuit alleging an Anne Arundel gun dealer had flooded Baltimore with ghost guns, evading gun laws and wreaking violent destruction. Baltimore plans to use the $62 million in three violence-reduction programs. We talk with JHU Bloomberg professor of American Health Daniel Webster to discuss the implications of the jury’s verdict.

The National Education Association, the nation’s largest teacher’s union, published a handbook with new guidance that omitted the mention of Jews when teaching Holocaust history. They said they’ve updated the handbook … but it’s still not available on their site. We ask Jeffrey Herf, Distinguished University Professor Emeritus in the University of Maryland College Park Dept of History, what are the ramifications. Plus, John Carroll Catholic High School teacher Darrion Siler talks about why teaching Holocaust history can promote moral courage.

Labor Day is Monday… and for a bit of an early celebration, we bring you a couple stoop stories about jobs. The first: a tale from Naomi Cross, about her first foray into the working world… the second, from author Laura Lippman, featuring reflections on her final days at the Baltimore Sun. Laura Lippman recently spoke with Sheilah Kast about her latest novel; you can listen to that conversation here. The Stoop Storytelling Series’ next live show is on September 12th; it’s called “From Scratch: Stories about the messes, memories, and magic of making food.” Information about the event, more stories, and the Stoop podcast is at StoopStorytelling.com.