Points North

Kenny Pheasant first became a teacher of Anishinaabemowin at 14 years-old, teaching customers from behind the meat counter at a grocery store. Now, it's his life mission to get more people speaking the Great Lakes’ original and endangered language.

This is a tale of two cyclists, one legendary race, and an unlikely rivalry.

One minute David Holtfreter was kayaking on Lake Michigan; the next he was in the water, fighting for his life. A fisherman saw David struggling from the shore and swam out about 200 yards to rescue him. But in the rescue commotion that followed, David wasn’t able to give the stranger a proper “thank you.”

One family’s visit to a famous Indiana sand dune turns into a wild tale of a missing boy and mysterious tunnels.

In 1998, a hunter named Mitch Rompola claimed he’d shot the biggest whitetail in North America. It was all over the news, and people waited in anticipation for it to be entered in the record books. But then Mitch just went silent. And instead of becoming a famous hunter, he became an infamous one.

Last December, Theresa Eischen was watching the news when a story caught her attention. The original Star Wars film was being translated into Anishinaabemowin, an endangered language. Theresa had zero voice acting experience, but she loves Star Wars and is fluent in Anishinaabemowin. So she auditioned to voice Princess Leia. It was a long shot.

A researcher in Ohio was surrounded by hundreds of dead ash trees. They had been wiped out by this beetle called the emerald ash borer. But then, in that same forest, she found a lone tree thriving. Could this tree be the key to saving ash from extinction?

For more than 20 years, Nic Theisen has spent his days on his hands and knees in the dirt farming. It’s a tough way to make a living, and for years Nic didn’t always know if the farm would make it. Until something big changed.

Peter Quakenbush’s dream is to create a conservation burial forest – a place that would both preserve the woods and give people the option to be buried in nature. But not everyone is on board with that idea.

Lake trout are on life support in Lake Michigan. Every year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spends tens of millions of dollars raising and stocking them. But what if there was another way: genetic engineering. Could it be used for conservation?

Two guys are hunting coyotes in Michigan. All of a sudden, they say they lure in the biggest coyote they’ve ever seen and kill it. But, it turns out, it’s not a coyote at all; it’s a federally endangered gray wolf about 300 miles from its normal habitat. So, how did the wolf get there? And did the hunters play any role in it?

There’s this biker in the Upper Peninsula. Seems like everybody knows him or knows of him. He competes in some of the most challenging mountain bike races, but he doesn’t even ride a mountain bike. He competes on a single-speed BMX bike. Why does he do it?

We think of the Great Lakes as shark-free, but as legend has it, a young boy named George Lawson was attacked by a shark while swimming in Lake Michigan near Chicago in 1955. Is this story true or just a bunch of bull shark?

Copper is a key metal for renewable energy, and experts say we’re going to need a lot more of it to transition to clean energy. Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is Copper Country. Some see copper mining as an economic boon for the region, but others worry it could come at the cost of some of the Great Lakes’ most pristine wild spaces.

It’s a dry spring – 1984 in Wisconsin – and all these suspicious fires are popping up. A conservation warden named Dave is pretty sure it’s arson, but he can’t catch a break. So, he and a pilot decide to get creative.

More than 120 years ago, a Native American village in northern Michigan was burned down at the behest of a white land speculator. Now, the descendants of that village want the federal government to know they’re still here.

Donna Martino stuck a photograph from the newspaper of a handsome kayaker on her fridge. A few months later, Donna matched with the guy on a dating website, and they decided to go out. This story is about what happens when two strangers take a chance on each other.

Iceland has figured out how to use almost 100% of every fish caught – not just the filet. By making things like durable leather, beauty products, and skin graft bandages, it’s increased the value of an Atlantic cod from about $15 to over $5,000. Can this approach help the struggling Great Lakes fishery?

Small, silvery fish called kiyi used to roam the deep, cold waters of nearly every Great Lake. Remnant populations still exist in Lake Superior, and scientists are wondering: Can we find them? And bring them back to the other Great Lakes? CREDITS: Producer: Ellie Katz Host: Dan Wanschura Editor: Morgan Springer Additional Editing: Dan Wanschura, Peter Payette, Michael Livingston Music: Dozer as a Young Man, Cases to Rest, Cherie’s Polvo, The Crisper, Taoudella, by Blue Dot Sessions Sound: Underwater_HullCreaking by OhNoBones, underwater ambience by akemov For more stories from around the Great Lakes, visit our website at www.pointsnorthpodcast.org

When hunter Ben Karasch sees something move out of the corner of his eye, he assumes it’s a deer. But as Karasch gets a better look, he realizes it’s not a deer, it’s a cougar. And it’s slowly creeping towards him.