August 24, 2010 - A weekly series of essays on a poet's everyday life and a national documentary on the growing importance of mushrooms have been chosen as the 2010 recipients of funding from Nevada City noncommercial community radio station KVMR's National Radio Program Production Grants.
The awards, totaling some $10,000 and entirely funded from the station's Corporation for Public Broadcasting allocation, went to:
-- Molly Fisk of Nevada City, to market her essays (currently heard Thursday nights and Friday mornings on KVMR 89.5 FM) to national and regional public radio stations.
-- Anna McHugh of Wimberly, Texas, and formerly of Nevada City , to produce a national special called "Mushroominations: Conversations With Fungus Fanatics."
"From the very first grant that helped fund the late, great U. Utah Phillips' 'Loafer's Glory' show, these awards have consistently helped KVMR share our creative talents on a national stage," says Program Director Steve Baker. "Molly and Anna's ambitious projects continue in Utah's distinguished tradition. It's cool he was a great personal friend to both women."
Funding for the grants comes entirely from a restricted fund awarded annually to eligible Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) stations. The money is required to be used to purchase, produce or promote national radio programming.
Almost all CPB grant recipient stations spend their entire allotment -- and more -- purchasing National Public Radio or other national programming. Not so at KVMR.
"We're a rare exception to that practice," says Baker. "Outside of our reasonably priced affiliations with BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) News and the Pacifica Radio Network, we can use the money for special projects and programming, as well as these annual grants."
KVMR is "so far out ahead of the rest of community radio" for its investment in locally-produced original national programming, according to Catherine Stifter, a Nevada City-based longtime public radio producer, editor and instructor. She also has served three years as a member of the station's grant review panel.
Molly Fisk has written personal essays under the theme Observations from a Working Poet for the past four years on KVMR and produced two CDs of essays: Blow-Drying a Chicken and Using Your Turn Signal Promotes World Peace. Several of her essays have aired on KQED's California Report. She is also KVMR's official "Poet Laureate," smiles Baker.
Fisk plans to use grant monies to market her 4-minute broadcasts to community and public radio stations in Oregon, Washington, Nevada, and other parts of California. Says Fisk, “I'm very grateful to KVMR for its on-going support, including this chance to send my work farther out into the world. Writing for radio has improved my skills enormously, forcing me to hone sentences to meet exact time constraints, use language that can actually be spoken, and stick to a clear point.”
Fisk is a National Endowment for the Arts fellow in poetry and has been nominated for Poet Laureate of California. Her two collections are The More Difficult Beauty and Listening to Winter. She teaches on-line at poetrybootcamp.com and voiceofyourown.com, and helps cancer patients boost their immune systems through writing at Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital.
Meanwhile, as a Nevada Union High School senior, Anna McHugh produced the Golden Reel-winning documentary, "The Public Defender," which traced the history of the profession and spotlighted Anne Moore in her role as part of the county's public defender staff at the time. The radio special first aired on KVMR and was named the outstanding locally produced documentary of the year by the National Federation of Community Broadcasters for 1999. McHugh has also worked with her father, Joe McHugh, on various radio theater and documentary productions, including the KVMR grantee, "The Telling Takes Us Home: A Celebration of American Family Stories."
She plans to interview a variety of national experts on mushrooming, including leading Nevada County experts, and highlight the trends and innovations in the fungi world, including possible uses in oil spill scenarios. "I'm thrilled that I'll be able to use the grant to gather top notch material for a national audience."
In past years, the grants have been used to help fund the original "Loafer's Glory" episodes, an award-winning women's history series "Herstory," the historic same day national broadcast of Michael Franti's concert at New Folsom Prison. Elisa Parker's continuing series "See Jane Do" of "everyday women doing extraordinary things to save the planet" and Estrella Acosta's documentary on the regional Maidu tribe ("Bood, Gold & Medicine"), among other programs.
By submitting a comment you consent to our rules. Please use your real first and last name, not a nickname or alias. Thank you.
