Susan Stamberg
Nationally renowned broadcast journalist Susan Stamberg is a special correspondent for NPR.
Stamberg is the first woman to anchor a national nightly news program, and has won every major award in broadcasting. She has been inducted into the Broadcasting Hall of Fame and the Radio Hall of Fame. An NPR "founding mother," Stamberg has been on staff since the network began in 1971.
Beginning in 1972, Stamberg served as co-host of NPR's award-winning newsmagazine All Things Considered for 14 years. She then hosted Weekend Edition Sunday, and now reports on cultural issues for Morning Edition and Weekend Edition Saturday.
One of the most popular broadcasters in public radio, Stamberg is well known for her conversational style, intelligence, and knack for finding an interesting story. Her interviewing has been called "fresh," "friendly, down-to-earth," and (by novelist E.L. Doctorow) "the closest thing to an enlightened humanist on the radio." Her thousands of interviews include conversations with Laura Bush, Billy Crystal, Rosa Parks, Dave Brubeck, and Luciano Pavarotti.
Prior to joining NPR, she served as producer, program director, and general manager of NPR Member Station WAMU-FM/Washington, DC. Stamberg is the author of two books, and co-editor of a third. Talk: NPR's Susan Stamberg Considers All Things, chronicles her two decades with NPR. Her first book, Every Night at Five: Susan Stamberg's All Things Considered Book, was published in 1982 by Pantheon. Stamberg also co-edited The Wedding Cake in the Middle of the Road, published in 1992 by W. W. Norton. That collection grew out of a series of stories Stamberg commissioned for Weekend Edition Sunday.
In addition to her Hall of Fame inductions, other recognitions include the Armstrong and duPont Awards, the Edward R. Murrow Award from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, The Ohio State University's Golden Anniversary Director's Award, and the Distinguished Broadcaster Award from the American Women in Radio and Television.
A native of New York City, Stamberg earned a bachelor's degree from Barnard College, and has been awarded numerous honorary degrees including a Doctor of Humane Letters from Dartmouth College. She is a Fellow of Silliman College, Yale University, and has served on the boards of the PEN/Faulkner Fiction Award Foundation and the National Arts Journalism Program based at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Stamberg has hosted a number of series on PBS, moderated three Fred Rogers television specials for adults, served as commentator, guest or co-host on various commercial TV programs, and appeared as a narrator in performance with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra. Her voice appeared on Broadway in the Wendy Wasserstein play An American Daughter.
Her late husband Louis Stamberg had his career with the State Department's agency for international development. Her son, Josh Stamberg, an actor, appears in various television series, films, and plays.
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On the Left Bank of the River Seine, directly across from the Louvre museum, a crowded little shop has provided supplies to artists for more than 100 years. Cezanne bought oil paints there. Picasso liked their gray pastels. The shop, Sennelier, is a Paris repository of art history and commerce.
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Museums throughout the world are observing the 400th anniversary of the birth of Rembrandt. The 17th-century Dutchman was the leading portrait painter of his day, and is celebrated for his unsparing look at the human experience.
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The Supreme Court rules against President Bush on his administration's handling of war crimes trials for Guantanamo Bay detainees. The ruling says the proposed trials for Guantanomo detainees were illegal under U.S. law and international Geneva conventions.
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Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Moscow to discuss the West's nuclear standoff with Iran. She's meeting with foreign ministers from the G8 -- the group of eight leading industrial countries. They'll also go over the agenda for next month's G8 summit in Russia's second city, St. Petersburg.
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In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court upholds most of the Texas congressional districting map engineered by former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. The court, however, did find that the map infringes on the minority voting rights of some Hispanics.
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Philip Wilcox, president for the Foundation for Middle East, talks with Susan Stamberg about efforts to free an Israeli soldier held by Palestinian militants. Does the Israeli incursion make a bad situation worse?
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Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrives in Afghanistan to show support for President Hamid Karzai, whose popularity has slumped in the face of a resurgent Taliban. Susan Stamberg talks with journalist Ahmed Rashid about the current state of affairs in Afghanistan.
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"I lean and loafe at my ease," poet Walt Whitman wrote, "observing a spear of summer grass." But when you get tired of watching the grass grow, you might want to pick up a good book. Susan Stamberg gets suggestions from three independent booksellers.
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Charles Sheeler tried to explore the path between photos and paintings. Much admired for his meticulous, carefully composed photography, he put down his camera and picked up paintbrushes instead. His works are on exhibit in Washington, D.C.
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One of the world's greatest private art collections is expected to get a big funding boost this week. The Barnes Foundation is receiving more than $100 million to help move its collection of masterworks from the suburbs to downtown Philadelphia.