Video Essays & Interview Podcasts

Send us a text (https://www.buzzsprout.com/twilio/text_messages/2027801/open_sms) Norman Bryant is a former President of Flint Board of Education. At 85 years of age, he shares the history of the Flint Community Schools and high school athletics. Norm is the founder of the Flint African American Sports Hall of Fame. Norm provides a wonderful oral history of African American life in a northern US industrial community in the 1950's, 1960's and 1970's. During the interview Norm Bryant discusses the people and activities around Flint, Michigan becoming the first U.S. major city to adopt an Open Housing Ordinance.  Flint also became the first major city in America to have an African American Mayor, Floyd J. McCree. Visit Flint African-American Hall of Fame. (https://aashof.org/) --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/radiofreeflint/message Subscribe to the Radio Free Flint Podcast (https://www.radiofreeflint.media) mailing list free of charge. Follow us on Facebook, I…

Send us a text (https://www.buzzsprout.com/twilio/text_messages/2027801/open_sms) Local news anchor Joel Feick stepped down from local television news after 35 years. He left familiar seat as "The People's News Anchor". Joel shares stories about his life as a reporter.  In this podcast, Joel shares his memories of the characters whom he covered as a journalist.  He also shares memories of colleagues and other reporters in the Mid-Michigan area.  He worked 27 years for ABC-12 and then 8 years at NBC25/FOX66 where concluded his career in broadcasting. In November 2020, Joel was elected to the Grand Blanc Township Board of Trustees.  He is now working for Disability Network of Greater Flint where he is following his passion to help others. In 2005, he won an Emmy Award for Best Consumer News. He won the Emmy for a series of reports on how to insulate a home. Joel has also won UPI and AP Awards along with the National Golden AMI Award. He's enjoyed hundreds of interviews: from Pr…

Send us a text (https://www.buzzsprout.com/twilio/text_messages/2027801/open_sms) Flint, Michigan, has long been touted as a hotbed for high school basketball. Indeed, Flint has produced some of the top basketball talents in the nation. Many Flint athletes are playing in the National Basketball Association (NBA) and at major colleges and universities. Flint basketball players have had lucrative careers playing internationally. Flint area residents are accustomed to watching high school talents honing their skills in high school gyms against their favorite teams. However, watching those most likely to be the next NBA All-Star or college All-American player may be a thing of the past. A new trend has emerged in which teenagers as early as 10th-grade ship off for Prep Schools that promote basketball and play games against the best competition in America. These Prep Schools position themselves to show off all those talented players to college and professional scouts.  Brandon Green,…

Send us a text (https://www.buzzsprout.com/twilio/text_messages/2027801/open_sms) Emily Doerr is a candidate for the Flint Community Schools Board of Education. The election will be on November 8, 2022. She joined a slate of four other individuals running to serve the Flint Community Schools. These candidates agree on core principles governing their service on the Board of Education should they be elected on November 8, 2022. The other candidates on the slate are Dylan Luna, Terae King Jr, Melody L. Relerford, and Michael Clack. The Flint Community Schools are at a crossroads facing dwindling student enrollment, financial deficits, and decisions about rebuilding school buildings. In recent years the Flint Board of Education has experienced dysfunction of its governing board. Those seeking election in Flint will face enormous challenges in fixing the school district.  For the first time in recent memory, five respected and accomplished residents have joined together to seek to br…

A snowbird is a person who migrates from a colder climate to a warmer place, typically in the southern United States, for the winter months. Many snowbirds are retirees who own homes in both the colder and warmer locations and alternate between the two places to escape the harsh winter weather. Snowbirds often lead an active and social lifestyle, participating in activities such as golf, tennis, and social clubs. They may also volunteer or work part-time while they are in the warmer location. Millions of American "Snowbirds" seasonally migrate from the Rust Belt to the Sunbelt. They seek more comfortable, warmer climates during the cold winters "up north." Many of the Snowbirds also come from Canada. What is a "Snowbird," and why do they want to move around the country chasing the sunshine? Is there something this lifestyle says about us and our culture? Have our patterns of life mimicked the ducks and the geese? In this video podcast essay, Arthur Busch explains why he became a …

Our guest is musician Howard Ryan, a native of Wisconsin who now lives in San Francisco, California. Ryan, also known as Hauras composed a song, "Flint, Michigan," intending to make a social statement about the problems of the beleaguered rust belt city. Ryan is a musician and composer who is known for his work in the drone music genre. He has released several albums and EPs that showcase his unique style of electronic music, which often incorporates elements of experimental and ambient sounds. Ryan is known for his ability to create immersive and atmospheric soundscapes that draw the listener in and transport them to another world. In addition to his solo work, Ryan has collaborated with other artists in the drone music scene and has performed at various music festivals worldwide. Drone music is a subgenre of electronic music characterized by its slow, repetitive rhythms and sustained tones. It often uses synthesizers and electronic instrumentation to create a meditative and ambie…

In The Poisoned City: Flint's Water and the American Urban Tragedy, Anna Clark examines what happened to poison the water in Flint, Michigan. She digs into the public policies that need reform and drinking water policy decisions by the Flint and Michigan governments. Anna Clark lives in Detroit. She is a reporter for ProPublica, a nonprofit newsroom dedicated to investigative journalism with moral force. Ann Clark's book won the Hillman Prize for Book Journalism and the Rachel Carson Environment Book Award. It was also named one of the year's best books by the Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, the New York Public Library, Audible, and others. Visit the author's website for more information about Anna Clark.

Johnny Cash and the Carter sisters were loved performing in Flint, Michigan. The fans in Flint were largely southern migrants who came to work in the Flint auto factories. Dave Norris, former WKMF Broadcaster and long-time friend of the Carter & Cash families, recounts a wild story about Johnny Cash performing at Whiting Auditorium in Flint, Michigan. Listen to the full interview with Dave Norris, The Country Capitol of the North @ https://www.radiofreeflint.media/country-music-capital-of-the-north-ft-david-norris

On a recent walk in Ogemaw, County, Michigan I discovered Bud. he is a turtle. the lake side is his home as is mine. In May and June, we in Michigan experience these ancient creatures ending up on the road. often with deadly results.

Video Podcast: Part 1 of 3 Episodes The Flint Water Crisis has what many prosecutor's find in a racketeering case: cover-ups, purposeful law breaking to reap more profits, shadowy backroom deals that make absolutely no sense. Poisoning the drinking water supply of an American city is unthinkable. What is even more baffling is that the dishonesty, greed and arrogance could create a human disaster on the scale of a large natural disaster. The Flint Water Crisis and its contaminated water was a man-made disaster. Its consequences of poisoning children with lead are not fixable. The Poisoned City: Flint’s Water and the American Urban Tragedy by Anna Clark, the 2018 best selling book delves into the people, policies and the problems faced in post-industrial Flint, Michigan. Her book is a a masterpiece in explaining the incompetence of government, the deep and troubling racism and greed deindustrialized cities face from the State governments that oversee them. Clark is a world cl…

Songwriter and bluesman Matt McDermaid is one of many songwriters to put Flint, Michigan in the title of their songs. We interviewed him about his song "The Flint City Blues" a hometown song. We explore why and what Flint, Michigan means to him, then and today. Matt first performed music at St. John Vianney School talent contest at age 11. He performed twice at Davison's Sherwood Forest. Matt has been a performer in Detroit and southeastern Michigan along with his band the Motor City Injectors for decades.

This century, the Sharee Miller case is one of Michigan's most notable true crime murder cases. This case is believed to be one of the first internet murder trials in America. The love triangle that Ms. Miller fostered with a police officer resulted in the death of her husband, Bruce Miller. The Millers lived in Clio, Michigan, a suburb of rust belt Flint, Michigan. Sharee engaged in a torrid affair over the internet with a rank and file Kansas City cop. She convinced her internet boyfriend, Jerry Cassady, to come to Michigan and murder her husband, Bruce. Nearly all the evidence of the heinous crime was recorded in some fashion digitally over chats and videos. Thus, the case got the label "Internet Murder Case" Bruce and Sharee Miller were middle class people. Bruce owned a small scrap yard in blue collar Clio, Michigan. His customers were primarily factory workers who fixed their own cars with parts from the Miller scrap yard. Ms. Miller lured the murderer by using a lita…