NightSide News Update

This Nightside News Update started with Ladder Safety Month- each year, tens of thousands are injured and hundreds die in accidents caused by improper ladder usage – both at home and at work. With Mike Van Bree.

We welcomed back Kathy Alpert to discuss a Passion for Postcards event. 

Next up, A solar eclipse is coming next month – What you need to know, with Patricia Reiff –Astronomer at Rice University.

And, Maria Lenhar, co-author of "Secret Cape Cod and the Islands: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure". 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
It's nice eyes Dan Ray Austin's newsradio. All right, Madison Rogers,
thank you very much. My nameis Dan Ray. Indeed, I am
the host of night Side, andwe will wrap up another week tonight.
Take her all the way, welljust a couple of minutes, all the
way till about eleven fifty eight tonight, two minutes or so away from your

(00:21):
Saturday morning. I have some goodnews and I got my cell phone and
my Facebook account fixed, so Iwill be able to do a Facebook postgame
tonight and on Nightside with Dan Rayon Facebook. So we have lots to
talk about tonight. We have verymany subjects that we're going to get to

(00:41):
after the eight o'clock I'm going totalk about the no smoking band of tobacco
and in Brookline pots still okay,it doesn't matter, but you can't smoke
cigarettes if you were born anytime inthis century. I'm going to talk about
safety on the public transportation system.See what they're doing in New York with
them members of the military, someof them toting sixteen's. Will follow up

(01:03):
on the President's State of the Unionaddress last night, and we'll have a
twentieth hour at eleven o'clock. Notexactly sure what topic we'll cover, but
it'll be a fun topic, Ipromise. Now, first we have four
guests this hour. We're going totalk about postcards. Big postcard event this
Sunday over at Reaches College. Isgoing to talk about the solar eclipse that
is coming next month with people thatare astronomer at Rice University and Secret Cape

(01:26):
Cod and the Islands. A guideto the weird, wonderful and obscure.
But first, but first, letme tell you Rob Brooks is back in
the control room. He has allsaid, all of you are so buckle
up. This is, amongst otherthings, March is latter Safety month,
and each year we're told tens ofthousands of people are injured and hundreds die

(01:49):
in accidents caused by improper ladder usage, both at home and at work.
With me is Mike van Brie.He's the director of product safety and injury
Engineering with a major US ladder manufacturer. Mike Vanbury, welcome to Night's that.
How are you, Dan? I'mdoing well. Thank you so much
for letting us have an opportunity totalk tonight. What is the company?

(02:12):
If it says here on my notes, A major US ladder manufacturer. I
wasn't sure if you are allowed tomention the name of the company, but
if you'd like to feel free,sure, I worked for Louisville Ladder and
that's that's the local pronunciation. LouisvilleLadder is maybe the way some people would
say, yeah, I was atI was at the bat factory in Louisville.

(02:36):
I don't know, ten years agofrom when they played the Super Bowl
game up in Indianapolis. Hillarck andBrad's, brad Brides, brads Bradsby,
right, Bre's Brakley, Yeah,yeah, care Rich and Bradsby. It's
a long standing company in the Louisvillearea that that makes a lot of the
bats for Major League Baseball players.I swung some of those bats in my
youth, trust me on that.So tell me about ladders. I'm a

(02:59):
guy, I'm a boomer. I'ma baby boomer, okay, and I
climb ladders. My wife thinks I'mnuts, but I do climb ladders.
So tell me, Mike, youwe really don't know each other that well.
But if as a baby boomer,I'm still climbing ladders on my house,
how nuts am I? Well?I wouldn't say you're nuts. If

(03:22):
you're following the rules, I willcaution you that the statistics would bear out
your wife's concern. You know,there's a lot of other things, by
the way, that will bear outhere concerned if you knew me a little
bit better. But go ahead,I'm only these well. It is.
It is something that our balance isimpacted by age and other factors, so

(03:43):
we always want to be attentive tothat. As far as things that you
should maybe be aware of in additionto making sure you're in good health.
Is I guess just starting out.Anytime you're going to use a ladder,
you want to make sure that you'vepicked the right ladder for the job.
You don't want to be tempted tostand too high on a ladder or reach

(04:05):
too far, so selection is apretty key first step in doing any work
from a ladder. You've made havementioned earlier that a lot of accidents,
injuries, and even deaths with ladders, So you're one hundred percent correct.
That's exactly why we have the AmericanLadder Institute, our industry trade association,

(04:30):
hosts National Ladder Safety Month every March. This is our eighth year and we
try to get that word out thatwell, it's a ladder, and everybody
thinks that it's very easy and commonplaceand you don't really need to think much
about it. You just climb up. There are some safety steps that we
want you to think about, soI'm happy to run through those. One

(04:54):
of the things that I have toI make sure of that my ladder is
on solid balanced ground. I wantto before I take that first step,
I want to make sure that ladderis going to hold me and it's not
going to swing one way or theother. As I send the steps,
tell me what else I should bedoing so you're spot on. You want

(05:15):
to make sure you're attentive to yoursetup before you get to that though,
Dan, I you know, asI said, selection is key, So
you want to make sure you havethat right size. You want to make
sure you're using the right style.Is this a self supporting step ladder or
a leaning ladder like an extension ladder? Is it made out of the right
material? You know, Even doingthings like working in your home changing light

(05:38):
bulbs, a non conductive ladder cancan be the right tool for the job.
And then duty rating is also important. You want to make sure you're
using a ladder that has been designedto carry your weight. And now that
you've got that correct ladder, youwant to make sure you inspect it the
feet. I like to tell peoplestart out at either the top or the

(06:00):
bottom, it doesn't really matter,but just do it systematically. Look over
the ladder, make sure that it'sin good repair, that any moving parts
are moving appropriately, that any partsthat shouldn't move are firmly affixed. You
know your feet, your rubber isin good shape on the on the feet
so that you don't have any slippage. And then the setup you hit the

(06:23):
nail on the head. You wantto set your ladder up on firm level
ground. Make sure that you don'thave anything that's where a leg of the
ladder would be sinking into the ground, or if it's not level, where
the ladder might tilt. And thatincludes your driveway. Sometimes we can set
a ladder up in our driveway that'smaybe got a little bit of a slope

(06:43):
to it for the water run offor just down to the street, and
you want to make sure that you'reattentive to that and don't get yourself into
trouble. Now, when you goto one of the you know, wherever
you go to buy a ladder,Obviously they're a peace people who are in
great shape physically. Who could throwa seventy five foot ladder up against the

(07:04):
house and scoot up that ladder tothe roof? Most of us can't do
that. What's the highest ladder heightthat you would suggest people safely can use,
particularly those of us who are,as I like to say, on
the wrong side of fifty. Well, I'm right there with you, Dan,

(07:25):
I understand the question. It's muchlike the age question. Everybody's conditioning
level is different. But you wantto make sure that you're comfortable. I
think that's the key. Rather thana specific size or length of ladder.
It has to be something that youare comfortable handling. If you feel that
this is stressing your limits of strengthand ability to manage that ladder, that's

(07:50):
not the right place to be.So we don't want you to overextend in
that regard with the weight of aladder. You know, that's that's something
you certainly want to be able tomanage. Well, look, if I
answer your questions, yeah, youknow I've done You've done a great job
for us. Mike and I thinkthe main thing we like to say in

(08:11):
this program we like to make peoplethink when we're talking politics or current events,
but we like to make people thinkon something like this because there are
people who are listening tonight. It'sgetting not spring up here yet, but
it's getting there, and that'll bethe time when people want to get out
and go up and check out somethingon a roof or check out something on
a gutter. And that's when weget into trouble. So maybe we'll bring

(08:35):
you back a couple of months fromnow when we get when we really get
into the to the good weather uphere, and just remind people again to
no one is as young as theyused to be a couple of years ago.
That's that's a rule of thumb Ithink that we can live by.
I don't think we can avoid that. I'd be happy to come back anytime
at all and chat with you atyour convenience if I could. There's a

(08:56):
couple of resources that I and Ilike to Okay, I got to do
it quickly because I got someone standingin line behind you. You'll right ahead
very quick. Laddsafetymonth dot com orLadder Safety Training dot Org. Okay,
great resources just to remind everybody ofthe basics. Those are great, great,
great, great options, that's forsure. Mike, thank you so

(09:18):
much. I really do appreciate yourtime tonight on a Friday night, and
have a great weekend and be carefulon the ladder. Thank you much.
Okay, so we're gonna go fromladders to postcards. We'll be talking with
a guest, Kathy Albert. Shewas with us a few weeks ago,
and there's a big postcard event.If you're into postcards, you need to
stick with us. And even ifyou're not, you may want to do

(09:41):
this on Sunday. I think you'llfind it to be enjoyable. We'll be
back with Kathy Albert right after thisnight side Dan Ray on Boston's news Radio.
Well, a few weeks ago wehad a very interesting guest on and
bring you here back tonight, KathyAlbert. Kathy, welcome back to NIGHT'SID.

(10:03):
How are you fine, Thank you, thanks for having me good.
I'm looking at a postcard at FenwayPark. Uh uh huh, you got
it. Huh yes I did,And trying to entice you to come to
the show. Well, you neverknow. The event we're going to plug
here happens on Sunday, So we'llmention this at the beginning and also at

(10:24):
the end. But Sunday, Marchtenth, This coming Sunday from ten am
to three pm. And of courseit's a good reminder Sunday's the first day
of daylight Savings time. It's atthe Spellman Museum of Stamps in Postal History,
and it's in it's in Weston.It's on Wellesley Street in Weston.
But is it not on the campusof Regis College. Yes, it is.

(10:48):
Yeah, Okay. For some reason, the the publicity that I see
doesn't mention Regi's College. It doesmention three two one Wellesley Street in Weston.
So how big is this event goingto be? Everybody loves postcards.
These that you were a couple ofyou were kind of enough to send me.
I'm going to try to figure outwhat year they were. Probably about

(11:11):
the turn of the twentieth centuries,when the Golden Age of postcards. There
were billions of them that were exchanged. It was. It was absolutely wild.
People would order food on buy apostcard, or they'd say meet me
under the apple tree at noon.There were three mail deliveries every day and
there were no telephones, so peoplewould exchange postcards to communicate. Well,

(11:33):
the one of the park was alittle later than that, because I see
automobile that later. That's the midcentury postcard. That's getting guessing that's that's
in the fifties. But so tellus about the event on Sunday. How
many folks are going to be there? What can people do who either have
postcards and would like to bring themto sell or change or trade? Uh?

(11:54):
And what can people do who don'thave any postcards but would like to
get involved in the in the hobby. Well, it's really a fascinating hobby
because there are so many different categories. Whatever it is you're interested in,
you can find postcards. And we'regoing to have twelve different postcard dealers there
with a selection of postcards from Actuallythe dealers will be from all over New

(12:15):
England, so they'll be dealers fromMaine and Rhode Island and even one from
New York State, New Hampshire andof course Massachusetts. So they'll have a
view cards. If you wanted to, for example, find you know,
what your town or city looked likeone hundred years ago, you could you
could look it up because they havefiled you know, they file them by
town, so Massachusetts by town,New York by town, or if you're

(12:37):
interested in topicals, topicals or youknow that baseball card I sent you of
the couple that's it's the baseball cards. You look under baseball and that's where
you'd also they sometimes they have acategory called Stadiums where you can find all
kinds of But each dealer has itsown his own or her own system,
which is really cool because it's verycreative. It's a creative, unexpected fine

(13:00):
experience and respect and probably you know, I think we're a couple of hundred
people. I mean, I'm reallyWe've people started coming to the museum.
We had an article in the Globeon Wednesday, and a lot of people
thought and they started coming into themuseum and joining. I was there today
with Brian Howard, the executive director. We were setting up the tables and
people were coming into the museum joiningand saying they were going to come to

(13:22):
the postcard shows. So that waspretty exciting. Well, I'm hoping that
some of my listeners, particularly inthe Metro West suburbs here in Boston,
will take this opportunity again it's Sunday, March tenth. This is coming Sunday
from ten to three. Is therean admission charge? No, it's free,
it's free. And this gets betterevery question I ask is better?

(13:45):
Is there pretty? Is there agood amount of parking up there? We
have a huge parking lot, andyeah, there's plenty of parking, and
it's yeah, we're going to havea food truck. The problem is,
I'm not sure what the weather isgoing to be, like that's the only
thing. But I think it's goingto be okay. Yeah, well,
no, actually to be I've watchedthe weather forecast night. I said it's

(14:05):
going to rain beginning tomorrow evening,probably six or so, and it's going
to be a heavy rain over nighttomorrow night. I'm in an event in
Boston tomorrow night, so I'm probablywhen I walk out of that at eleven
o'clock at night, it's going tobe quite quite rainy. However, I
think by morning they say the rainis going to have let up, if
not already disappear. So I thinkyou're going to have a fantastic Yeah.

(14:28):
It's a beautiful campus, a beautifulregis. You know, it's just rolling
hills and trees. It's beautiful.It's just a lovely place. And the
museum itself is it's a lovely museum. And it has exhibits of stamps and
postcards that people can look at,where they can go and buy postcards or
just talk to dealers about the postcards. Well, I think what is great

(14:50):
about it is that everybody loves,at some point in their life getting an
actual letter, you know, handwrittenletter or a postcard. And I remember
I was fascinated as a child withthe and I I remember I had a
couple of those children's books talked abouthow a letter gets mailed here, and

(15:11):
it goes to the post office,and it gets sent to the to the
sorting center, and then it getson an airplane. And so the whole
idea about being able to put astamp on either an envelope or a postcard
and send it across the country ina few days. Uh. It's it's
a very romantic concept in you know, in a classical, classical sense.

(15:33):
And international postcards you went around theworld, and actually they started in Europe
before they before they were in theUnited States, they only allowed people to
send picture postcards in the mail.After the turn of the century where they
were doing it in Europe for yearsbefore. So the one that I'm looking
at now that the one that istitled a sacrifice someone standing, two people

(15:54):
standing at the base. It's aone cent stamp, so not like do
you learn them a little bit abouta little bit about postcards, but a
little bit about stamps. So youhave an event that is free to the
public, conveniently located not too farfrom one twenty eight I'm sure, on

(16:14):
the campus of Regis College on Sunday, which would be a great day.
So if you were sitting around onSunday, and by the way, there's
very little sports going on this weekend. You have the Patriots are done.
I don't think the Bruins are playingon the Celtics whatever. So it's a
great day to actually go out anddo something. So if you have a
passion for postcards, we have theshow for you. Kathy. I'm so

(16:37):
happy that we're able to get youon twice here and I hope a few
of my listeners to you. Kathy. Ask for Kathy Albert a l P
E RT like Herb Alper, thesame spelling as Herb Albert and the Tijuana
brass, and I want them totell them, Hey, I heard you
on Night Side with Dan Ray.That's right. In fact, somebody told

(17:00):
me today when I was at themuseum that that she heard it on Danry
and that's why she went over there. Oh that that makes my day.
That warms my heart. Remember rememberRon from Wisconsin That Yes, Ron from
wiscon in touch. Yeah, he'sbeen. He and I have been in
touch, and I'm going to puthim in touch with the Wisconsin postcard people.

(17:21):
I have followed that Ron hasn't calledin in a while, but yes
we we actually. By the way, Ron actually listens on a radio,
a terrestrial radio. He's not listeningto us on the internet when he when
he listens, and uh, it'sit's it's amazing the people around the country.
And I just hope some of mylisteners over over the weekend tomorrow on

(17:42):
rather excuse me, on Sunday fromten to three, and I might show
off there, Kathy. To bereally honest with you, I've got kind
of a couple of things I gotto do on Sunday. But don't be
surprised if I if I waltz inthere after going to the gym, so
this is you don't have to befull, you have to be dressed,
but there's no formal there's no dresscode at this event, right. No,

(18:03):
these are it's a very casual groupand will have prize too. We're
trying to capture the information so wecan keep people informed of future shows that
we have some prize we're going togive away. You can just give us
your emails. And you said thisis going to be a food truck there
of some sort, so people therewill be allot algen Park Restaurant and there
they're down in Plymouth and Walt Wonderis the owner, just a wonderful man,

(18:26):
and he's been bringing a big foodtruck with all kinds of food.
You have to buy it. TheGlobe course article said that food would be
provided, but I guess the persondidn't realize it. Yeah, no,
no, no, no, you'renot You're not going to feed them.
You're not going to feed two orthree hundred people. No, absolutely to
have a sign, no cost intent. You might bump into someone, you

(18:49):
know, you might bump into me. Whatever. Uh, feel free to
stop by and ask for Kathy AlbertA L P. E. R.
T. Kathy, thanks so muchpostcards. Thanks for both of your appearances,
and I hope you have a smashingsuccess on Sunday at Regis College at
the Spelman Museum. Gracious to haveme on twice and I really appreciate it.

(19:11):
I look forward to meeting you eitherSunday or some other times soon.
Sounds great, Kathy, Thank youvery very much. I appreciate it,
and thank you Dan. I'm You'remore than welcome. So you can stop
buy and explore, purchase postcards ofall kinds. I mean, they're not
going to be that expensive, folks. This is a great way to spend
in early or late winter Sunday afternoonat Regis College. When we come up,

(19:37):
when we come back, I shouldsay right after, when we come
up, right after the news atthe bottom of the hour, we're going
to be talking about an astronomer fromRice University about the solar eclipse that is
coming next month. I am notgreat on science, but I want to
understand how frequent these occur. Isthis going to be a good one for
us here in New England? Ihave lots of questions. We'll be talking

(20:00):
with Patricia Reef. We'll get thecorrect pronunciation of that name in astronomy at
Rice University. Right after the newsat the bottom of the hour, Dan
Ray, I'm Boston's News Radio.Thank you very much, Madison. Well,
next month all of us will beable to, I guess, see

(20:25):
a solar eclipse. I know nothingabout solar eclipses. I know nothing about
lunar eclipses. I was not goodin science in high school. That were
not one of my strong areas.But I'll tell you who was very strong.
My next guest, Patricia Reef,an astronomer at Rice University. Folks,
Rice University is like Harvard, okayin terms of it's a great school.

(20:49):
Patricia, Welcome to Night's Out.Are you a professor there? Yes,
sir, well, I want touse the proper appellation and address you
as professor Rife. I hope I'vegot and the last name fairly close to
its pronunciation. Yeah, it's GermanRife. Okay, Rife Okay. So
a solar eclipse, why don't youexplain to us? I think I know

(21:11):
what we're talking about, But let'stalk about the relationships between the orbs in
space that actually create the effect ofa solar eclipse, and then when will
it occur? And will it begood for all of us up here in
New England. Okay. So asolar eclipse occurs when the Moon gets exactly

(21:36):
in line between the Earth and theSun, and so the moon shadow falls
on the Earth, and the Moonexactly blocks out the Sun. Now,
if you're on the exact line andthe center of that shadow, you'll get
a total eclipse. But if you'renot on the path of totality, you'll

(21:59):
get a part eclipse. Okay.So there will be a total that will
go across fifteen states one month fromtoday, but it won't be total in
Boston. I'm sorry. Uh okay, So how what what are the Lucky
States geography? I was good inSo give me the westernmost state where it
starts, or whichever in the easternmoststate and let me figure it out.

(22:22):
Okay, Well, it goes fromfrom Mexico through Texas, cuts a little
bit of the corner of Oklahoma,goes Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Ohio,
Pennsylvania, a little bit of upstateNew York. It goes right down

(22:44):
Lake Erie actually yeah, okay.Then it gets up in Canada. Yeah,
a little little of Vermont and NewHampshire and Maine and Canada. So
we're gonna see, we're gonna havea pretty good We're gonna have a pretty
good partial eclipse then here, andyes, you will have a good partially
clipse. And partial eclipses are cool, but totland clipses are, oh my

(23:07):
god, awesome. Okay. Sotherefore, if they're in Vermont or New
Hampshire, people from Massachusetts, youknow, folks out west, they'll travel
three hundred miles to go to lunch. Up here, we call three hundred
miles a week long vacation. Butthere are some up here who would still
drive. So it's with it's it'swithin driving distance, and it's on April

(23:30):
eighth. Since you said it's Aprileighth, yep, just a month from
today. And what time time isthis? What time of days? Okay?
So it takes about an hour acrossthe United States. So when it
crosses tex when it starts across theborder from Mexico, it's about one thirty

(23:53):
in the afternoon, perfect, andthen by the time it's in Maine it'll
be three thirty local time in theafternoon. Way, there's a time change
there in the course of how frequentdo we have again, this is a
solar eclipse. So it will lookas if is this one of those what

(24:15):
they call the ring of fire withif you're in the spot with where the
total eclipse occurs, the moon isbig enough that it that there's then a
circle of light still around the Sun. Or is that a different one?
Okay? The ring of fire eclipseis generally what you call an annular eclipse,

(24:37):
and an annular eclipse we had lastOctober October fourteenth, and that's the
ring of fire because the moon isnot quite big enough, so it leaves
a little strip of the Sun notcovered. Okay, so that's that's interesting.
And I went to Corpus Chrissy soI could be in the center line

(24:57):
of the path of that eclipse,and it got pretty dark. But the
difference between an annular and a totalthe moon is a little bit closer to
the Earth, so its apparent sizeis bigger, and so it covers all
of the Sun. And since itnow covers all of the Sun, what

(25:18):
you get to see is the corona, which is amazing. It is the
ghostly plasma outside the edge of theSun that's the birthplace of the solar wind.
And you can only see that withyour naked eyes during total eclipses,

(25:38):
and they're pretty rare in the UnitedStates. So when was the last one?
I assume these things go on afairly regular cycle, meaning every so
many years or well twice a yearthe Moon an Earth lineup. But you
might get a solar eclipse, geta partial solar clips you might get a

(26:02):
lunar eclipse. So you get agood total clips maybe once every eighteen months,
but it's various places around the country, around the world. Okay,
So in the United States, wehad a total eclipse in nineteen seventy nine
that just went through a little bitof the northwest of Pacific, northwest Real.

(26:25):
And then from seventy nine to twentyseventeen, thirty eight years there was
not a total eclipse in the UnitedStates. And then after twenty seventeen,
here's the next one only seven yearslater. Yay. The next one after

(26:45):
this is twenty more years. Wow. Wow. So this is a rare
event, no matter how it's nomatter how you you describe it. I
mean, if you're a sports fan, you can you know. Look,
the Detroit Lions haven't been in achampionship game. We found out last year

(27:06):
since nineteen fifty seven, so thatthat's a real dearth of playoff opportunities and
this is going to be the same. So this, this is one we
have to celebrate and take advantage of. Last question, is this one of
those that you have to have somesort of the gadget up for your eyes?
Can your eyes be hurt if youlook up? Or is absolutely?

(27:27):
Absolutely? You can't just use regularsunglasses. You have to use special eclipse
glasses. Or you can punch ahole in the cardboard look at its shadow,
or look under the shadow of trees, or take out a colander and
look at its shadow. So anythingthat makes a small hole will make an
image of the eclipse on the onthe ground or on a piece of st

(27:51):
I do not want to look directlyat it, even through you know,
through that hole. Make sure peoplearen't going to say I'm going to look
through that hole in the calendar,because they could deter eye that way as
well. No, no, ifyou're looking directly at it, you have
to have special eclipse glasses, specialfilters, or maybe a welder's helmet which

(28:12):
is you know fourteen let fourteen welder'shelmet. But yes, you to look
directly at the sun. You'd needeye protection, but you can also look
at it shadow with pinhole projection.Another fun thing you can do is is
uh is take a mirrored ball froma from a from a go go dancing

(28:37):
ball there. Yeah, well,everybody has one of those disco balls.
So you get the disco ball andwhat do you do. You let it.
You let it reflect off of itand shine onto a wall or to
the ground or something. And nowthey're all these little eclipses that it's that
it's reflected off your disco ball.And that's kind of fun to look at
it. And there will be pictureson new on newscasts and the newspapers too,

(29:02):
but we don't want to have peopledamage their eyes. It's as simple,
absolutely, Pross. You make sciencefun. You make science fun.
I always had grumpy science professors incollege. They made it is They wanted
me to memorize the periodic table whateverit was, and I said, what
you know, anyway, thank you, thank you very much. I want

(29:25):
to have you back on any scientificrelated subject. You're my favorite professor at
Rice University. I want you toknow that. Great. Well, listen,
let me just say one thing.Sure, people travel around the world
to go to eclipses. Right,they'll spend five thousand dollars, ten thousand
dollars to go to an eclipse.Here's one that's in your backyard. Go

(29:48):
to it. Okay, don't missit. Sounds great, sounds great,
Professor Riche, Thank you very verymuch. We'll talk again whenever it's anything
from science comes up. We're goingto We're going to give you a call.
Thank you very much, No problem, no problem, thank you.
All right, we're gonna get alittle closer to home when we get back.
Right after this break, we're goingto talk about Secret Cape cod and

(30:11):
the Islands, A Guide to theWeird, Wonderful and Obscure. Maria Lenhart
will be with us, one oftwo authors of this new book, coming
back on night Side. This isWBZ, Boston's news radio right here in
Boston ten thirty and your am Don. My name's Dan Ray and the host
of Nightside here every weeknight from wellfrom eight to midnight Monday through Friday.
That's every weeknight. Back after this, it's night Side with Dan Ray on

(30:38):
Boston's news radio. All right,welcome back. I want to introduce you.
Introduce you to Maria Lenhart. Mariais the co author of a book
that deals with an area that mostof us are very familiar with in one
former fashion, and that is Capecod in the Islands. The book is

(31:00):
Secret Cape Caught in the Islands,A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful,
and Obscure. This is one thatinterests me. Maria, Welcome to Night's
Side. We think we're all herein Massachusetts, and I can't tell if
you're from Massachusetts. It looks tome like your phone number might be from
Pennsylvania. Are you actually I'm inSan Francisco. Oh, actually, you're

(31:23):
right, for one live in SanFrancisco. I mixed that up. I'm
sorry. I was looking and Iwas thinking I am. I'm a former
Bostonian and also Kit Caught is kindof a second home to me and my
co author, Linda Humphrey has livedthere part time and full time for probably
about twenty five years now, andso I visit her every chance I can.

(31:47):
And so some of the some ofthe things that we need to know
about, and you can break itout in any way you want here because
most of us think, yeah,we know the Cape, we know the
islands, but all of a suddenwe got a guide to the weird,
the wonderful, and the obscure.Well, we thought we knew a lot
about the Cape, and there's somuch to it. The layers of history,

(32:12):
the h different cultures that are there, the literary and artistic history,
the the weird things that are there, and even the familiar places have backstories
that not everyone may know about.So there's this an endless variety of things
to explore on the cape, andeven if you live there, you may

(32:35):
not know all there is to know. So when did the book come out?
If I could ask, it's justout now. It's just like within
the past two weeks. So it'sgoing to be it's going to be required
summer reading for a lot of mylisteners. Give me a couple of examples
that the book I don't want.I don't want you to tell all the
stories we one don't have time,and I don't want you to give give

(32:58):
that away. But give us afew weeks samples that maybe we will be
surprised by. Well, one thingthat surprised us is uh Kurt Bonnegut,
the novelist, was a longtime residentof Barnstable, but before he became famous
as a novelist, he had aSOB. He had the first SOB car

(33:20):
dealership. This is back in thefifties, and it failed because the early
sobs required you to change the oilevery time you got gas. That could
be a problem. And by theway, sobs, of course no longer
a manufactured. I think that thatthat company's gone belly up. If I'm
not mistaken, I believe so.But they were quite a big thing when

(33:44):
they first came out. They werevery innovative. I saw it back in
the early eighties. I did.I did too. In the snow,
but you can see the you cansee the stone building on the old King
Highway where he had the dealership.And he later complained because he never did

(34:04):
win the Nobel Prize, and hesaid the Swedes wouldn't give him the prize
because he'd failed with their SOB dealership. So anyway, well, there's always
stories obviously. Right now, thoseof us who spend some time in the
cape in the summertime know about allof these shock activity. We know about
the migration of the seals. Tellus something about Martha's vineyard that we don't

(34:29):
know. Well, what I wasfascinated by Martha's vineyard is just how it's
attracted so much of the intelligentsia andthe celebrities over the years. And I
love Hollywood history, and Martha Vineyardhas sort of become known as Hollywood East.

(34:50):
I didn't realize that the actual firststart to have a summer place.
So one of the first was JimmyCagney in the nineteen thirties had a big
farm there, and we took atour with the Oak Bluffs Land and Wharf
Company, and our driver was justa treasure trove of really interesting little tidbits,

(35:10):
you know. And and if yougo to the Chilmark General Store,
that's you can see a lot ofpeople. It's it's for Larry David and
Alan Dershowitz Gott and kind of anargument there and that made headlines. I'll
tell you something about the venue thatyou should be in the book. The
Beach Boys reported recorded a lot oftheir albums on Martha's Vinyard out on what

(35:32):
was called just now called a quinna. Mm hmm. There's a tremendous musical
history on the cape, you know. And uh, you know, and
of course the history with a lotof the media stars of the older days
like Mike Wallace, Art book Waldand of course the novelist William Stirn were

(35:54):
great friends and they ad the capeon Martha's Vineyard. I don't want to
I don't want to drop a nameon you, but I remember one day
I was on the cape and Iwas working on a sixty minute piece with
Mike Wallace and called me up inthe afternoon said, hey, Dan,
Mike Wallace. Oh, hey,mister Wallace. Wow, let's let's let's

(36:15):
do a little work on the project. He was living in Kingman Brewsters old
home, the former president of Yale. You'd haven and went over and had
a lovely afternoon. I brought myfourteen year old son at the time,
and he got to meet Mike Wallace. He's a little older. Oh great,
well, well, he and Styreneand Bookball all suffered from depression from
time to time, and so theycalled themselves the Blues Brothers. Yeah.

(36:38):
And of course, when you're talkingabout the Blues Brothers, John Belushi is
buried on Martha's vineyards. Yes,yes, we have an item about that
and the grave I think we've moveda couple of times. Yeah, a
lot of people were going there andthen a lot of people would go there
and actually, you know, poorbeer in the grave or something just you
know, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, it's na is a special

(37:01):
place real quickly, real quickly herebecause at the end of my time and
one of the things that you talkabout is the weird, the wonderful,
and the obscure. Give me oneof the weird things about the Cape of
the Islands that you have under thatcategory. Well, one of the weird
things is there's this place called theJenny Lynn Tower, which is like this

(37:22):
medieval tower from a castle out inthe middle of nowhere, surrounded by the
scrub brush, and it's very hardto even get there. But that was
originally taken from a concert venue inBoston where Jenny Lynn, the Swedish Nightingale,
performed and there was a riot becausethey'd oversold the concert. She was

(37:44):
kind of the Taylor Swift of herday. And anyway, years later,
the owner of the venue transported oneof the towers to this spot that he
on the cape that he that heowned and stuck it there and it's just
been a curiosity there for years.A lot of people don't know how it

(38:05):
got there with the story behind it, but it's kind of this book,
that book written by all New Englanders, particularly those that love the Cape and
the Island's secret Cape cart and theIslands, A guide to the weird,
wonderful and Obscure. Maria Lenhart,thank you very much for joining us tonight
and we'll see you down the Capethis summer. Okay, great, well,

(38:27):
thank you so much. Thanks MariaTukson. All right, we come
back, going to get to thenine o'clock hour, and tonight during the
nine o'clock hour, we're going tostart off tonight talking about a no smoking
band and we're talking about tobacco.Pot is still allowed in Brookline, Massachusetts,
was upheld today by the Massachusetts StateSupreme Court, and we're going to

(38:51):
be talking with Peter Brennan, who'sthe executive director of the New England Convenience
Store and Energy Marketers Stores. We'retalking about convenience stores and gasoline stations who
are going to take quite an economichit as a consequence of this. We'll
be back right after the nine hereon Nightside.