#capitol squash

The month began with a sandwich. This is no ordinary sammy, either; Michelle Tyrene Johnson brought us the story of a Kansas City pork tenderloin sandwich that was introduced by a Japanese-American couple in the 1950s. Decades later, you can still find it at Kitty’s Cafe. 

As a local food critic put it: “It’s hard to find the perfect pork tenderloin that is soft and not too chewy and perfectly seasoned and a little bit crunchy, and this has all those things.”

Next,Vanessa de la Torre brought us squash--not the kind you eat. She met two Hartford teens who, thanks to their prowess with the sport, have earned full scholarships to prestigious prep schools. For Julissa, who is Mexican-American, and Ku, a refugee from Thailand, their skills made possible what they once never dreamed of. 

Hartford teens Ku Paw, left, and Julissa Mota celebrate after getting accepted to Connecticut boarding schools.

The media is replete with reaction and commentary about the movie “Crazy Rich Asians” from people on the coasts and even overseas.

As guest host of the KCUR show Central Standard, Michelle invited three Kansas City residents who are Asian American to talk about the film–its impact, its resonance, even its “Easter eggs.” 

Sticking with the movies, across the state of Missouri, Ashley Lisenby interviewed filmmaker Cami Thomas about her documentary series “Smoke City.”  

The native St. Louisan developed the series to understand the region’s racial and socioeconomic divides in the wake of the unrest sparked in the region by the shooting of Michael Brown in 2014. Thomas says she hopes the episodes encourage people to get to know neighborhoods besides their own. 

Cami Thomas, producer of the “Smoke Screen” documentary series, with fellow filmmaker Calvin Tigre.

Toward the end of September, Ashley was part of “Beyond the Ballot,” a four-station story collaboration that asked: “What do Missouri voters really want?” ahead of the mid-term elections in November.

Here’s the full series

Ashley’s reporting looked at how grassroots activism among African-American voters helped cause an upset in the August primaries and asked whether the same approach could work in November. 

ACLU volunteer Dean Kpere-Daibo knocks on doors in July at homes near Kirkwood to talk about the St. Louis County Prosecutor’s race.

There was a new incident to add to the “Shopping and Dining While Black” tracker: It involved the H&M store at a Pembroke Pines, Florida store. This brings the 2018 total of cases we know about to 29. 

Check out the map here

Amid our news coverage for the month, the Sharing America team gathered at Connecticut Public Radio in Hartford for a couple of days of training and meetings. We got tech and storytelling tutelage from Kerry Donahue of PRX as well as writing and voice coaching from Sora Newman, a longtime NPR pro. It was good stuff! 

We spent the better part of a day brainstorming about a team project that will drop in early 2019. Stay tuned for more on that!