Added 9.25.18. Architecture can make our souls soar, or sink. At the same time, in big cities it is bound up in the economics of land development and the politics of preservation and zoning. In recent years, sustainability, landscape integration and practical functionality have all become more important in the practice of the craft. Or is architecture – can it be? – less a craft or industry than an art? If so, when and how does it rise to that level? Certainly, Chicago has a rich tradition of enduring, classic architecture in the city’s many vibrant neighborhoods and in its downtown. Milt in this 2011 episode explores the world of modern-day architecture, with a Chicago focus. His guests are the Pulitzer prize-winning architecture critic writing for The Chicago Tribune, Blair Kamin; and John Ronan, principal of the Chicago firm John Ronan Architects.

Added 9.18.18. Milt in this vintage 1980 broadcast talks with noted philosopher, educator and author Mortimer Adler about his then-new book, “How To Think About God: A Guide For The 20th Century Pagan.” His central contention is that “there are rational grounds for believing that God exists.” Milt, a self-admitted “20th Century Pagan,” spars in a friendly but probing manner with Adler about how non-believers should approach the idea of God, if at all. Adler was a prolific writer and influential popular intellectual of the 20th Century. Early in his career he was appointed a professor of the philosophy of law at the University of Chicago Law School. Among many other pursuits, he later co-founded the Great Books Of The Western World program, and served as an editorial director for Encyclopedia Britannica. Among his dozens of other books were, “How To Read A Book,” “The Capitalist Manifesto,” “The Idea Of Freedom,” “Reforming Education,” and “How To Think About The Great Ideas.”

Added 9/10/18. Milt in this 2012 episode interviews popular science author Dava Sobel about the subject of her then-latest book, “A More Perfect Heaven: How Copernicus Revolutionized The Cosmos.” The Renaissance mathematician and astronomer played it cagey on proofs and details after in 1510 issuing notice that the universe revolved in fact, around the sun, not the earth, as had been long supposed. Frustratingly, he kept the details private for several decades thereafter. So how was it that he eventually came to “show his work” in 1542? Sobel in her book sandwiches a provocative fictional treatment of the subject in the form of a play, in between nonfiction sections. She and Milt explore the life and times – and informed speculation surrounding – the man behind the Heliocentric breakthrough.

Added 9/4/18. Milt in this October, 1997 episode interviews noted historian Michael Beschloss on what he learned writing the first of two volumes based on once-secret White House tapes made by President Lyndon Baines Johnson in the first two years of his presidency – starting with the hurried taking of office by the former Vice President after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas in November, 1963. The episode also includes the playing of some fascinating excerpts from the LBJ White House audio cache utilized by Beschloss. Listeners will gain insider insights to LBJ’s relationship with Lady Bird, as well as big topics faced by the administration such as civil rights, poverty, Vietnam and LBJ’s impending challenge from Republican Barry Goldwater.

Added 7.26.18. Milt is joined in this 2010 conversation by Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson, who had just authored “The Warmth Of Other Suns: The Epic Story Of America’s Great Migration.” It brings to life the travails, hopes and dreams of more than six million African-Americans who moved from the U.S. South to the cities of the north between 1915 and 1970. Wilkerson calls it one of the most under-reported stories of all time. She earlier won the Pulitzer while serving as the Chicago bureau chief for The New York Times, for feature articles on the great Midwest floods of 1993, and one about a 10-year-old boy who had to take a single-parent role to care for his four siblings.