Considering the Voices of a Nation...

I just discovered the coolest thing. Surfing around checking out interesting news stories on the national public radio website, I happened upon a sidebar titled “Voices of NPR”, complete with detailed biographies of each and every NPR host and more importantly, their photographs. I am happy to report that Robert Siegel looks just as he should, learned and accomplished with a twinkle of humor lurking somewhere behind scholarly glasses and suit.

I am very satisfied. How often have I wondered who housed the familiar, familial voices of my childhood. Indeed, I grew up listening to my local NPR station, from “ Morning Edition” on the way to bus each morning, to “All Things Considered” playing in the kitchen as my parents prepared dinner in the evening. NPR has changed very little over the twenty years I’ve been listening to it for, and that is probably the primary reason that I love it so. The voices of the radio’s most noted hosts are also voices of my past that can still be found in my present…and such is a rare and happy occurrence.