I’ve been a big fan of NPR for many years, probably going back to college. There wasn’t a TV in my room, but a radio tuned to the NPR station in Binghamton, NY.

Today, I volunteered at WABE, Atlanta’s NPR station, to answer phones for the first morning of fall fund drive. On my way there in the darkened Atlanta highway, I heard a local public figure talk about what she got out of listening to NP.

In the same vein, here are three memories I have of listening to NPR news:

3.  Listening to the vice presidential debate in 1994.  I remember thinking this as an interesting point to make.

2. Listening to the Iraqi War unfold on the radio in the early 1990s.  There is something about radio, good radio, that can transport me to another time and place by listening to it. It has a different effect than TV.

1. 9-11-2001. I woke up late from a night shift at The Telegraph, NH. As was my usual m.o., the first thing I did as I stumbled between my bedroom and my coffee pot, was flip on the radio. That morning, I was stunned into thinking this event was not real. Could not be real.  Even as the announcers were saying the towers were falling, I couldn’t fathom the event.

Go here for an archives of the event.

I spent Friday at an all-day conference hosted by Investigative Reporters and Editors organization. Unlike many conferences, where the final speaker cannot come soon enough, this conference ended too soon. The 50 or so people got all sorts of tips help dig deeper in stories and learn from the best.

I found these speakers very encouraging:

• T. Christian Miller, ProPublica: He had an interesting take on FOIA requests, along with how to organize complicated stories.
• Tisha Thompson, Fox5 News, Washington, D.C.: She talked about her love of documents to make stories stand out from competitors.
• Alison Young, USA Today: The former Atlanta reporter, she talked about working hard to get interviews by working from outside the circle of decision makers for a story to gather more information before approaching folks on the inside.

I’ll be posting more links from the conference in the days ahead. I want to figure out how I can use the ideas for The Jefferson Park Hub.