S1: Welcome in San Diego , it's Jade Hindman for today's arts and culture show , the legacy of Clara Breed , the new production at diversionary Black Box Theater and your weekend preview. This is KPBS Midday Edition. Connecting our communities through conversation. Each year , the San Diego Public Library honors children like children's librarian Clara Breed through its annual Clara Breed Civil Liberties Lecture. Breed is known for advocating for Japanese-American youth who were incarcerated during World War Two. In honor of that legacy , children's and young adult author Maggie Tokuda Hall will be delivering this year's address. Her books include the best selling love in the Library and The Mermaid , The Witch and the sea. She is also the president of the organization Authors Against Book bans. And Maggie joins me now. Maggie , welcome to the show.
S2: Thank you so much for having me.
S1: So glad to have you here. Um , so Claire Breed is an icon in San Diego for her advocacy. Can you talk more about who she was and how you're thinking about her legacy right now ? Absolutely.
S2: I'm so honored and proud to be able to speak in her name. I think having been a children's librarian already would have been enough for me to be proud to speak in her name , but knowing that she was one of the people who advocated for Japanese-Americans in a time when that wasn't just unpopular but also professionally dangerous , means a lot to me.
S1: Well , you first gained national attention for your book love in the library , and it's based on your own grandparents love story. Walk me through the experience of exploring that era of incarceration through your family's history. Right.
S2: Right. Well , you know , the story of how my grandparents met in Minidoka is a story I've known for as long as I can remember. Like , it's just part of how I understand the world. Like , the sky is blue. Grandma and grandpa met in a prison camp. It was all just sort of a piece of how I understood the world around me. And in 2017 , when President Trump took office , in his very first executive order was to sign the traveler Muslim ban , I realized that he was going to be using his time in power to enact a white supremacist agenda , and is both a Jew and a Japanese American person. That was deeply frightening and upsetting to me. And so I tried to evaluate what I had to offer kids in that period of time that maybe only I could offer. And I realized I had this story in my own family , not only about the cruelty of those kinds of policies , but about the incredible resilience and joy of the people that they target. Hmm.
S1: Hmm. You know , there's a line in the book that reads , to fall in love is already a gift , but to fall in love in a place like Minidoka. A place built to make people feel like they weren't human. That was miraculous.
S2: This , my grandparents story is that my grandmother , Tama , was one of the camp librarians in Minidoka , and my grandfather , who I am pretty sure had never read a novel in his entire life. Um , would go into the library every day and check out huge stacks of books that he had no intention of reading so that he could flirt with her , and they fell in love. And that is such a sweet and romantic story , and it would be so easy to tell that story in isolation. But what makes it impactful ? And I think one of the reasons that story means so much to me is that it happened in spite of this incredibly cruel policy that they were subjected to. My grandfather had scraped and hustled to build two pharmacies before he was incarcerated , and he lost them both. And my grandmother was a senior in college. A second semester senior in college , and she didn't receive her degree until the 2000 , when they handed out honorary degrees from the University of Washington for people who'd been incarcerated. And as they were calling the names , it was clear that they had done it too late because most of the names that were called no longer had living people to receive those degrees anymore. And it to me , it is so essential to understand the world in its complexity and to present children with the opportunity to understand the world in its complexity. And part of that is there is incredible injustice in the world , and also incredible beauty and affection and love. And these things coexist at times where it feels like that doesn't make sense. Yeah. And that to me is sort of the crux of the story.
S1: You know , and in your , your effort to sort of , um , explain these complexities in your writing. Um , Scholastic demanded that you remove all mentions of racism in your author's note for love in the library. You refused. So take me back to the moment when you were first told to make those edits. I mean , what went through your mind ? Yeah.
S2: I mean , the book had already been out for a year and was published by a small press called Candlewick Press , who I love working with. And I am sure that if parents audited their bookshelf , a lot of their children's favorite books come from Candlewick Press. They make beautiful books. They're really thoughtful in the way that they put them together. And , um , you know , it had been out for a year , and Scholastic came in with a licensing agreement for me , which is a perfect opportunity for an author like me who wrote love in the library , with the explicit goal of it being used within curriculum. To me , I was writing a book that was an entry point for teachers and librarians to talk about the incarceration by grounding it in a human story and not letting it feel abstract. Because when you let it feel abstract , it doesn't. You don't understand how impactful and how painful of a history it was. So I wanted it grounded in a way that kids could feel safe entering into this history , but still hear about it honestly. And when the licensing offer came in , I was so excited because I was like , perfect. This is like exactly what I wrote this book for. And then I saw the terms of the offer , and I was so offended and so disappointed. And I remember that evening I started crying , talking to my husband about it , because I was just so mad that it had happened. Like I would have rather not received an offer from them at all than to have received one where they were essentially asking me to choose between my solidarity with the people who were incarcerated and my own career. And to me , that was a very easy bit of math to do. Obviously , I was going to stand with the full truth of this story and say no , but it was a really painful moment in my life because it felt like a cruel prank in some ways of you can have this great opportunity , but it comes at this like unfathomable and just unforgivable price.
S1: Yeah , I mean , it is such an offensive demand.
S2: In 2023. We were already well into the swing that we've seen since 2020 of book bans , really defunding many of our public institutions of learning. And they were worried that if there was incendiary language in my book or language that anyone might consider offensive , that the book wouldn't sell. And in other words , they were concerned that they couldn't market this story about Japanese American incarceration.
S1: Maggie , I think you muted muted yourself.
S2: I I'm so sorry. When did I start meeting. I'm so sorry.
S1: You you were muted. You were just saying that you know in their justification they didn't want to run the risk of someone finding the language in the book offensive. Yes.
S2: Yes. And basically they were courting the market of people who would ban books. Mhm. That's what they were afraid of. It was that they would not be able to sell this book to people who banned books , who pull books from the shelves , from speaking honestly about American history and what is particularly galling about that justification is books about Japanese American incarceration that don't contain any of the same kind of language that I use in my author's note are already commonly banned. Books like They Called Us The Enemy by George Takei is already banned. Baseball saved us. Banned , uh , you know , and so there was there is nothing you can do to make that story safe for people who are unwilling to look. White supremacy and its history in the United States in the eye. And so , to me , it was an indication that Scholastic had chosen their sides in in this argument and it wasn't mine. Mhm.
S1: Mhm. There's so many have done. I mean because more broadly , how do you see similar attempts at censorship playing out today.
S2: Oh gosh. I mean yeah I was like what's the the most expeditious way to explain this. I mean , many people have co-opted the term that was coined by the legal professor , Doctor Kimberly Crenshaw of Critical Race Theory as sort of a catch all term to refer to anything that doesn't sugarcoat American history. Like , if anything , that acknowledges that there may have been systemic pressures that marginalize certain groups of people is a way of thinking that has allowed dark moneyed interests that do not want to fund public education and don't believe that there should be any public education to sort of deputize easily inflamed bigots to do the dirty work for them. And whether or not that has to do with something like critical race theory , which is how love in the library is attacked or it's attacked for being un-American , or books that are just about a kid who's trans , and that's just a piece of their story under , you know , they call that like gender ideology or transgenderism. Um , they use these sort of like easily angered bigots to do the work of going to the schools demanding that these things get banned , going to the state legislatures and writing bills that say , you can't have any of these things in schools. I mean , just last week in Congress , the National Congress , for all that would this would be for all public schools in the United States. House Bill 7661 was introduced , which would bar books with what they call any sexually oriented material , which that's such an unclear term. Who knows what that means ? But in one of the subsections of the bill makes it clear that no public school in America would be allowed to carry a book with any trans characters in them. Mhm.
S3: Mhm.
S2: And that was just introduced. And the goal of these bills , I think in these people are twofold. Like one , there's the naked bigotry of it , but two , it is about creating this huge amount of institutional sway and fear that costs schools and libraries an inordinate amount of money , and it causes people to quit their jobs. It causes people to operate from a place of fear. And it is a really dark moment for intellectual freedom in our country.
S1: Yeah , and it also has a cost on young people. Talk about that. Yes. And the consequence of this for them. Yeah.
S2: Yeah. I mean , if I can personalize it a little bit , I would say when I was growing up , I knew my grandparents story , but I didn't know other stories about the time the government targeted certain groups of people because of who they were , not anything that they had done. And so I naturally wondered what we did wrong. I was like , what is it about Japanese Americans ? Like , why are we so scary ? Why are we so weird ? How did we fail ? And I internalized the shame of , like , something must be wrong with me. And it wasn't until I got older and started realizing that we were part of this incredible history of people that I realized , well , no , there's nothing wrong with us. There was this incredibly racist apparatus at work that targeted us because it was politically expedient , and it had nothing to do with who we are , just the same , as it didn't have anything to do with who lots of different groups of people have been. It has been about political expedience and power and money all along , and that just breaks my heart to think about other children suffering under the apprehension or misapprehension that there's something wrong with them. And I think that this is exponentially true of queer children who are seeing their identities weaponized for political expedience and watching a state legislators take away their ability to do things as basic as play sports or go to the bathroom in peace. It is so hurtful and I cannot countenance , and I cannot forgive people who target vulnerable children for political expedience. Hmm.
S1: Hmm.
S2: I would love for people like that to be shamed out of public.
S1: Well , I mean , as you know , these efforts to ban books grow and such.
S2: So , you know , most regularly I'm speaking to Californian schoolchildren who do not have a sense of this happening the same way as if I talk to school children in Texas or Florida or Utah or South Carolina might have a sense of it. Um , and they're usually just shocked by the list of books that I can tell them are banned. Sometimes I play a little fun game with them where I hold up two books at the same time and I say , guess which one is banned ? And we talk about the reasons why , you know , that people have justified banning these books. But really what we all come away with is that this is arbitrary and absurd , and this is a very silly thing to do , and it should not , in fact , be , you know , the purview of the most easily offended adult in the room to make decisions about universally what children should have access to read. And the thing that I really try to instill in them , that I think that they respond to , is that the freedom to read is , in effect , the freedom to speak. It's the freedom to pursue what you are most interested in and then to be allowed to speak on those things. And if people were not afraid of the power of speech and of literature , they would not be trying so hard to keep it from us. Mhm.
S1: Mhm. Well , and you'll be giving your lecture next Tuesday at the San Diego Central Library.
S2: I think that this country is a group project , and we all have homework to do right now. I personally have chosen book bands as a fight that I felt equipped not only to participate in , but to potentially lead within. But that doesn't mean that's the only fight that exists in our country right now. If you're a person who believes that we should all have equal rights under the law , there are a lot of different issues you can take up and be passionate about. And I hope that people who come and listen to me speak feel empowered to do exactly that.
S1: I've been speaking with Maggie Tokuda Hall , children and young adult author and president of the group Authors Against Book Bands The Clara Breeds Civil Liberties Lecture will take place Tuesday , March 10th at the San Diego Central Library. The event starts at 6 p.m. and you can find more details on KPBS. Maggie was really great talking to you today.
S2: Thank you so much for having me.
S1: Still to come on Midday Edition playwright Richard Foust looks back to the night in 1969 , when the Nixon administration launched the Vietnam draft lottery. Here about his play first day in December when KPBS midday edition returns after the break. Welcome back to midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman , compulsion Dance and Theatre's latest production , First Day in December , looks back to the night. The Vietnam draft lottery was launched. The play arrives just after the U.S. launched strikes on Iran and just ahead of the 50th anniversary of the draft. KPBS arts reporter Beth Accomando speaks with playwright Richard Foust and director Michael Mizrahi , along with one surprise guest. Take a listen.
S4: I am here at diversionary Black Box Theater. I'm with Michael Mizrahi , the director , and Richard Fouts , the playwright , as well as Richard's dog , Aaron. So if you are hearing some whimpering and whining while we are talking.
S5: It's Aaron is not me.
S4: Michael , you are on the eve of the opening of First Day in December. This is a new production for you.
S6: Entering this night.
S4: And Richard , you are the playwright.
S6:
S7: The draft lottery. A live report on tonight's picking of the birth dates for the draft. Pursuant to the executive order , the Director Selective Service is going to establish tonight a random selection sequence for induction for 1970. September 14th September 14th , 001.
S6: And on that night , each day of the year was put in a blue capsule , 366 capsules thrown into a Big Ben and mixed up. And then Colonel Ulmer , Daniel Ulmer from the Army withdrew , you know , capsule one by one. And that was your draft number. So it determined the order in which you go to Vietnam September 14th.
S8: First one drafted. You are looking at numero uno , the big kahuna , and Breakfast of Champions.
S6: So it was over about a 90 minute period. Just an excruciating 90 minute period of finding out when you were if you were going to war.
S7: April 24th April 24th is 002.
S4:
S6: You know , it wasn't publicized. It was Nixon made the decision on like November 28th and then wanted to implement it quick to avoid letting the antiwar movement protesters organize. So I was 18 years old. I was a freshman in college. I walked into my fraternity house , and all these guys were crowded around the TV , and I say , what's going on ? And they're like , dude , it's the draft lottery , you know ? And they explain it to me. And so , you know , you sit there and every time one of those capsules is drawn , you're like , oh , please let it not be my birthday. And then it would be my roommate was like , number five.
S8:
S6: So it was just a it was just a horrific event. And it became a national event because all over the country , people were crowded in their living rooms , their dorm rooms , you know , student unions , fraternity houses , sorority houses , all listening to this draft lottery. Because if you weren't affected , you knew somebody who probably was.
S9: The main information we have this evening , of course , is the order of the birthdays. And those will determine how the 19 year olds of next year. 17.
S7: 17.
S9: Those from 19 to 26 , will be subject to the draft.
S7: February 14th is zero zero for the lottery. Honey.
S10: Honey. They called February 14th.
S4: And Richard , we have a lot of people who have grown up without ever having to face a draft. And one of the things about the draft at that point was it really did affect everyone. It seemed like it affected a wide berth of people. Yeah.
S6: Yeah. In fact , that's interesting. You asked that because the up until then the draft had been sort of favored , like any draft. They had drafted people in lower economic classes and racial minorities. And so there were a lot of complaints that the draft was unfair. So Nixon came up with this idea that everyone would be eligible based on your age and no college deferments. So there were colleges , but they would your college would end in whatever current semester you were in. And he ended grad school deferments. So the idea was to make it completely equitable and make it really fair. But what happened is it just kicked the antiwar movement into high gear after that.
S4: And Michael , your most recent play , also dealt with the war in kind of a indirect way with veterans.
S11: But as the numbers are called , the friendships start to fracture because one is the football star and he feels like I don't have to go because I shouldn't , because I'm a football star. So. So you don't go because you're a football star. But I have to go because I'm not one. And so it becomes a thing about privilege and race and entitlement.
S4:
S11: Uh , what's really odd ? There's a line in it that says it wasn't approved by Congress. I'm like , I'm like , that is totally what's happening now. This war was not approved by Congress.
S4: And Richard.
S6: You know , that's the first thing I thought of. And when I went on social media , I found a lot of veterans saying that very thing. Here we go again. And as Michael was saying , you know , one of the there's a line in the play where , you know , this wasn't a this draft wasn't approved by Congress , it was done by executive order. And Congress didn't push back. And here we go again. You know , Congress not involved.
S4: And we currently don't have a draft.
S11: I love that the younger people will come and see it and will have a reflection point , a little bit about the horrors of war , of waiting to go to war and going to fight in a place you don't even know where it is on a globe or a map.
S4:
S6: And he had written this book about he and his fraternity brothers and coming of age during the Vietnam War. And chapter one of his book begins December 1st , 1969. So he was interviewed on Fresh Air about his book , and as he told his story , it paralleled my own. And I just kept picturing it on the stage. And I thought this would make a really good stage play. So the rest is history. And then I went through several staged readings and finally got onto the stage in in December of 2017.
S4:
S6: But that night it was pure drama. But , uh , one of the guys , you know , was curious about how do we get out of this ? So those conversations began and they became kind of funny because people were like , well , you know , if you're involved in , in religious studies , you know , you can get out of it. Oh , I'll just go to rabbi school. Another guy said , you know , if you if you flunked your medical exam , you don't have to go. Well , how do you do that ? Well , you know , you can drink coffee. You can.
S11: Blood pressure. Spike.
S6: Spike. You can , you can , you know , you can just get eat and become obese. Which which somebody did. You can , you know , cut off a finger. You could. There's all kinds of things you can do to flunk your medical. And so these crazy conversations started to occur. And so I put a lot of that in the play. Yeah.
S4: How has it been directing this ? What are some of the challenges been.
S11: Finding the humor in it and the way they react and some of the things that they say into each other , and about how to get out of it are pretty outlandish. Things that happen in the play will shock people. I think having the actors find the pathos without going over the top as well. And so it's grounded in real , real emotion and not in overacting or being overly emotional.
S4: You're at Diversionary Black Box Theater , which is a very intimate space. So for this particular play , it feels like you are almost in the room with them watching that TV.
S11: You are in the room with them and that's what what makes it powerful. I think it's powerful anyway. And but if you're far away and you're watching it and taking it in , if you're close , you're in it. You see the faces and the desperation. One guy tries a , b , c , d , e to get out of it and they all fail. They all fail for him. And so his desperation is is real.
S4:
S6: And I get so emotional because , I mean , we're talking over 50 years and I watch them and each each of these characters based on my own fraternity brothers. And there they are , you know , and a couple of them didn't come back. So , uh , I told Michael , is there some switch you can so that I can turn off when I watch this play ? Because it just takes me back.
S4:
S6: I'm a draft dodger. My I got a low number. But my I remember my father's attorney said , well , just keep moving and don't leave a forwarding address. And , you know , there was no internet , there were no databases. So he said , just keep moving. Don't ever get a phone or register for utility. Just go off the grid because it was pretty easy in those days. So I just kept moving. I probably got an induction notice , but it was returned and they didn't really spent a lot of time looking for people that they couldn't find.
S4: And Michael , you've done a lot of work with fringe and produced a number of plays and premiered a number of plays there.
S11: Um , a lot of the shows I wrote , I also directed , and I was fortunate to work with and Robbie Levy at Signet for like ten shows. I learned so much from him. I would say if you want to direct , study with someone , work with someone who knows how to direct and whether they fail or are brilliant. You learn so much.
S4:
S11: In Richard's play , I always have to. Well , I delayed each character. Each character arc and what they said and the subtext beneath it. Because what they say isn't always what they mean.
S4:
S6: I joke with him and I say , you get this play more than I do , because he will take me through the character arcs. And he I mean , he gets this play so well. He understands these characters so well. And the actors , I saw them a couple nights ago and I said , guys , you have just you have no idea. You were like channeling the people that you are based on. You are so good. So it's been extraordinary watching this thing come alive again.
S11: I want to add so. So it takes a village. It takes everyone. So it's Richard , the actors , me , the set , all of them. And also I just want to shout out to Kay McMillan , who had such good ideas , such good ideas. And she was my right arm , my left leg and my right eye socket. She was just her eye is just extraordinary. And she helped so much. And how the play looks and how the play feels so Kay Kay. Yeah.
S6: Yeah.
S11: Well it helps.
S6: That the actors like this play and that helps. They've all said to me , I really , really love this play. I love the story , I love my character. You don't have to love it play to to be in it. Actors will tell me that. But they all they all really do. They , they , they really enjoy the play and they're doing an amazing job. I'm so proud of them.
S11: Yeah , I think because our characters are so fleshed out and deep and three dimensional , and that's what's fun and that's what's fun for them and fun for me.
S4: And what do you hope that audiences are going to take away from this.
S11: I hope they can feel. And for these men , these young boys , I hope they can channel it into something in their life that they have no control over , and handle it with grace and thoughtfulness.
S6: I just hope people have a good night at the theatre. I don't really have a message. I'm not really trying to be political at all in this play. I when people say , who will enjoy this play , I say , anyone who likes just a fun night at the theatre or and that likes serious drama peppered with some humor. Will will have a will have a good night , I do. When we did this in San Francisco , when we premiered it , I got such a kick out of all these vets showing up and then bringing their kids and their grandkids. So one of the , one of my friends said , oh my , my playwright instructor came and she said , wow , you have cracked the age bar. You've got people from 17 to 77 in this audience. That's really fantastic.
S4: All right. Well , I want to thank you both very much for talking about first day in December.
S1: That was playwright Richard Foust and director Michael Cesarini speaking with KPBS Beth Accomando. First day in December. Opens tomorrow night and runs through March 22nd at diversionary Black Box Theater. Up next , the events happening this weekend and more. Midday edition is back after the break. Welcome back. You're listening to KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman. For our weekend preview , we have surreal visual art by women , the ballet , and a look at our options for San Diego Theater Month , plus a look at a rare and legendary record collection. Joining me with all the details is KPBS arts reporter and host of The Finest. Julia Dixon Evans. Julia. Welcome.
S3: Hey , Jade. Thanks for having me.
S1: Always good to have you here. So first , let's look at visual arts. There's a new exhibition of work by women at the front in San Isidro.
S3: It's at the front. It's called Exquisite Potential. It's curated by Ariana Torres. And she wanted to see work that was using surrealism and what she referred to as collective mythmaking. And there are a handful of invited artists in the show. And then the majority of the exhibit is work that was chosen from an open call. And some of the people I'm particularly interested in seeing their work for this show are Akiko Shirai , Carrie Ann Quick , Helena Westra , Ava Rose Ram , Alexandra Carter and Elizabeth Rutledge , all amazing artists and even the poet laureate is involved with this Paula Garcia. It opens with a reception on Saturday night from 5 to 7 , and it will be up on view through May 9th.
S1: All right. And a couple of options in North Park too. Let's start with art produce gallery. Yeah.
S3: Yeah. So this one is a collaboration between space for Art and Art produce. It's curated by the folks from Material Projects in Los Angeles. It's called The Medium is the Message. This is a group exhibition. It's themed around material and thinking about how the materials would define a work of art. The opening receptions from 5 to 8 to night Thursday , and it's on view through April 2nd at Art Produce on University.
S1: All right. And also in North Park in art exhibit at a cedar tree. What can you tell us ? Right.
S3: This is at Bivouac Cider Works. It's their new adventure lodge space. It's an exhibit with two women whose work is directly in conversation. It's called Ungrounded. It's a painter and a photographer. Maha Basar and Jen Marie Landeck. They're both interpreting these really , like architectural scenes , bridges , roof lines. And the opening reception is 630 to 930 on Friday. And the art will be up through the end of the month.
S1: All right. And it's cider. Cider , cider.
S3: Cider is good.
S1: It is. It very much is. All right. Moving on to some performing arts. March is San Diego theatre month. So what does that mean ? And which shows are involved ? Right.
S3: So Theatre Month is a project of San Diego Performing Arts League. It's basically discounted tickets all month for participating shows. There's something like 30 shows involved in this plays , musicals , dance , even improv. And they're divided into four price points. 15 , 30 , 45 and then two for $45. And all you need to do is enter the discount code. It's STM 26. So San Diego Theater Month 26 when you're buying your tickets.
S1: All right.
S3: And this is Edward Albee's 1962 play. It's about like a small New England College faculty party. It quickly spirals into drunken chaos. And that's on stage at 10th Avenue Theater downtown through March 21st. There's North Coast Rep's The Maltese Falcon. That's also or that's $45 , and it's a comedy adaptation of Dashiell Hammett detective novel , like the hardboiled detective novel. Kind of launched that whole genre and Broadway San Diego. The notebook , The musical if you want a musical , that's $45. If you want a musical or a tear jerker. Yeah. And then cygnets. Somewhere Over the Border is another highlight for me. That one's $45 to you.
S1: All right , well , City Ballet of San Diego has performances this weekend. Tell us a little bit about what they'll perform. Mhm.
S3: They're doing Rhapsody in Blue. Um , it's choreographed by their own resident choreographer , Jeffrey Gonzalez , and set to the very familiar Gershwin music. And they first debuted this ballet in 2021. It's super athletic , super expressive. And they're going to perform a couple more pieces. Anabel Lopez Ochoa as Ecliptic , which involves giant golden hoop props and the local premiere of Christopher Wheeldon The American. And these performances are Saturday night and a Sunday matinee at Balboa Theatre downtown. And then Wednesday evening they'll do a show at California Center for the Arts , Escondido.
S1: All right. Well , and today there's a new episode of The Finest about folk arts , rare records and local music legend Lou Curtis. Tell me about that. Yeah.
S3: Yeah. So Lou Curtis , he founded Folk Arts in 1967. The record store is still going strong. He passed away in 2018 , and Folk Arts acquired the entirety of Lou Curtis's personal collection. Like thousands of records that they weren't just going to archive it somewhere , they actually wanted to put them out into shelves to sell. So basically anyone can own a piece of this amazing collection. And I mean , I personally just spend a lot of time thinking about the way we listen to music today. Like streaming culture , not actually owning or even like choosing things. And so we've dug into this quite a bit on the finest in the past. And it was interesting to today , look at how record collecting and vinyl plays into this. And we also learn a ton about local music lore. Like we found records from a couple artists who I think San Diego should be really proud of.
S1: All right , please , let's take a listen to this.
S3: Lou Curtis spent his life rescuing forgotten music. Now after his death. Thousands of items from his personal collection are being unboxed and sent back into the world at Folk Arts Rare Records in the City Heights neighborhood of San Diego. That time capsule of music history is slowly being opened up for the first time. There are boxes upon boxes of records , CDs. Ephemera.
S12: Ephemera. Thousands of reel to reel tapes , cassettes , mix tapes.
S3:
S12:
S3: Lou collected all of this and built something even bigger. He founded Folk Arts over 50 years ago and became a legendary figure in American folk and blues circles , with a music collection as singular as the man himself.
S12: He was big. He had a big beard. He was an original West Coast American folk lifestyle. Everything.
S3: That's Brendan Boyle. He runs the store now and has been coming here since he was a teenager. For months , he and his team at Folk Arts have been sorting through Lou's personal archive. Basically a mountain of music. And inside that mountain is one record , one story that offers a glimpse into Lou's life's work.
S12: You never see this record.
S3: The artist is Thomas Shaw.
S12: Thomas Shaw was probably the most impressive local San Diego blues musician of all time.
S3: Today , Thomas Shaw's music isn't on Spotify. He's not alone. Thousands of recordings have never made it onto a streaming platform and likely never will. That's the kind of music you can find at places like Folk Arts. And if not for Lou Curtis , Thomas Shaw's music might not be here at all. In the early 1970s. Thomas Shaw was a preacher who ran a church in southeast San Diego.
S13: War , drug. War baby.
S12: But all his profession was , uh , running his church. And , uh , just like cruising around alleys looking for stuff to pick up and sell.
S3: And when he met Lou , he was in his 60s. He was still playing guitar , but had long set aside hopes of doing anything serious with his music.
S12: He had never recorded before , and he walked into folk arts. Asked Lou if he had guitar strings , he was still guitar strings. And of course , Lou was like , have a seat.
S13: I'm broke. Haven't got a dime.
S3: Lou didn't sell guitar strings , but he did help make Thomas Shah a legend. Lou wrote about his friendship with Tom Shaw for his long running column in San Diego Troubadour. He said Tom cut his teeth playing in the Texas blues clubs where , quote , most all of those guys got to record. But while Tom Shaw often beat those guys in guitar contests , he was still passed over by the recording companies.
S13: I'm thinking of a friend.
S3: Tom moved to San Diego in the 1930s , never having recorded anything. He spent his time running his church and also a few clubs like the Little Harlem Chicken Shack , known for its good food and great music.
S13: To know.
S3: After they met in his record shop , Liu acted as his unofficial manager. He helped Tom finally get that record deal , and Lou's wife , Virginia even snapped the album cover photo in their living room. After Tom returned from touring Europe , nobody believed him that he'd done it. But Lou had proof for the naysayers. A poster from one of Tom's shows in Germany , and that poster that Lou used to prove Tom's sanity. It's still on the walls here at Folk Arts. That , uh , Tom shore tour poster in Germany. Yeah.
S12: Yeah. Nice.
S3: Nice.
S12: Pretty cool.
S3: The walls in the record shop are plastered with posters , snapshots and notes , like a sort of makeshift museum of local music history. That's.
S12: That's. That's Thomas Shaw with his priest robe. There's a lot to say about all this stuff.
S1: And you can hear the rest of this episodes. This week's episode of The Finest rather. Wherever you get your podcast and you can find details on these and more arts events on our website at pbs.org. I've been speaking with KPBS arts reporter and host of The Finest , Julia Dixon Evans. Julia. Thank you.
S3: Thank you. Jade.
S1: That's our show for today. I'm your host , Jade Hindman. Thanks for tuning in to Midday Edition. Be sure to have a great day on purpose , everyone.
