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The AIH Transcript for February 16, 2021

Hosts: Carol Off and Chris Howden

Prologue

CAROL OFF: Hello. I'm Carol Off.

CHRIS HOWDEN: Good evening. I'm Chris Howden. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

CH: Tonight:

CO: Sent packing. An Alberta slaughterhouse is finally shutting down after hundreds of COVID cases and one death. One employee tells us that decision was long overdue.

CH: Hypodermic hyperdrive. After a freak winter storm that knocked the power out, a county hospital in Texas finds itself racing to get a thousand COVID vaccines into arms before the doses expire.

CO: Over a lot of barrels. The Trudeau government says it will pay people to hand over their newly illegal assault rifles. But Public Safety Minister Bill Blair can't say exactly how much that will cost.

CH: A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. In India an online toolkit of information for people who want to support protesting farmers leads to a young activist's arrest for crimes against the state.

CO: Up for the jab. A Canadian student living in the UK survived a horrific case of COVID last year, and that's what motivated her to become a volunteer vaccinator.

CH: And this little piggy played Wii Wii Wii and then switched to the Playstation. New research overturns the long held belief that pigs can never play video games by proving they can be trained to operate a joystick with their snouts. As It Happens. The Tuesday Edition. Radio that warns of a pig gets obsessed with a racing game it becomes a crashing boar.

[Music: Theme]

Part 1: Bill Blair says new gun bill will help keep handguns off the streets without a federal ban

Alberta Slaughterhouse Closed

Guest: Voice

CH: It took hundreds of COVID cases and one death to finally shut down an Alberta slaughterhouse. The Olymel plant in Red Deer has agreed to voluntarily wind down operations after reporting 326 positive cases amongst workers there since the pandemic began. Last month, a 35 year old employee at the plant named Darwin Doloque died after contracting the virus. We reached an employee at the plant, and we have agreed to withhold her name because she fears she could lose her job for speaking out.

CO: How does it feel to know that the plant will finally be shut down?

VOICE: We are all happy and relieved that Olymel eventually is shutting down.

CO: What has it been like for you to go to work every day knowing that there were so many cases, just hundreds of positive cases of COVID in that plant?

VOICE: Of course, there's the fear and they are all like paranoid already. And it's kind of like, yeah...it's very stressful because we don't know that when we go to the plant (if) we're probably going to get it eventually, we're going to give it to our own family too.

CO: What did the plant have in place? What were the rules, the protocols for staying safe? How did you do your work and follow the COVID safety rules?

VOICE: Well, in fairness, Olymel had done their best to enforce protocols and rules to follow. But my observation is the company failed to enforce one of the important safety measures, that I think, and that is when workers are required to get tested, especially in this outbreak, they should have asked workers to not to come to work until they received their test results. If they are negative, then they can come to work and if they have tested positive then just stay home. So why I'm saying this is we don't know if we already carried the virus or not because some people are asymptomatic or some will have a little headaches, but they will just ignore it.

CO: As far as you know, at the plant, were people being told to come to work even as they waited to get the results of their COVID tests?

VOICE: Yes, because the company needs workers. So there is one instance before when one of my co-workers passed away -- the company nurse came and checked our temperature to see if we have a fever. And they handed us a paper to get tested. And I asked this company nurse and I asked her if while waiting for our tests, are we still coming to work? And she said, yes, because you guys need money.

CO: That's what the nurse said?

VOICE: Yes.

CO: So you had to get tested after your co-worker and your friend, Darwin Doloque, he died right after he got COVID?

VOICE: Yes.

CO: How did you react when you learnt that he had passed away?

VOICE: Well, of course, we are very saddened of him passing away. He was pretty young and he was the only breadwinner in the family in the Philippines because he is also a jolly good fellow...what do you call it?

CO: Jolly good fellow.

VOICE: Yeah. He always makes everyone laugh and smile. That's what we miss.

CO: And who is he supporting? You said he is from the Philippines and he's the main breadwinner. Who was he supporting with his money from the plant?

VOICE: Well, he's supporting his parents and siblings, that's what I heard.

CO: Back in the Philippines?

VOICE: Yes.

CO: There were probably a lot of people like that because apparently the workforce in the plant, more than half of the people there have another job outside the slaughterhouse. And so what does that tell you about how much these people, the people you work with and yourself probably as well, need this money in order to put food on the table?

VOICE: Yes. Not only that, because we have our own family here and especially me -- I'm a single parent and of course, I need a second job. Working in Olymel alone is not enough. And especially in the afternoon shift, we always almost every day finish early. It is like our part time job -- sometimes only six hours, sometimes seven hours. We seldom get like eight hours. So we need to get a second job in order to survive.

CO: The plant, they voluntarily shut down. And Alberta's labour minister had said that the plant had been inspected 14 times and didn't find anything, any reason to close it. Do you think the government should have stepped in earlier?

VOICE: Yeah, they should have stepped in earlier where they probably didn't know about some safety measures that needed to be done for the safety of the workers. But these measures that they should have done.

CO: The company should have done?

VOICE: Yes, company should have done.

CO: I understand you're still going to work today.

VOICE: I'm going to work today because I need money. And I heard it's only like probably the company will just let the workers finish the product that was in the cooler, probably two days or three days and they probably were going to shut down. And they're asking for -- pleading for help for workers. And there's not much workers going there anymore, even though I'm scared right now because...I also want to have some money. And I know that there's not much people there. It's not congested. So I probably will be fine.

CO: How many people do you support?

VOICE: I have two children and I support some of my siblings because of also this pandemic. You know it's a hard...life is hard.

CO: I hope you stay healthy and safe. And I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

VOICE: Thank you so much.

CH: That's a worker at the Olymel slaughter house in Alberta. We've agreed to withhold her name. The company told CBC it would investigate allegations that a nurse told workers to continue to work while awaiting test results. Olymel also said it's taken many steps to protect workers, including testing regular information updates, and maintaining a list of employees close contacts. The company says its policy states that employees who are showing or declaring symptoms are not allowed to work.

[Music: Guitar Music]

UK Vaccine Rollout

Guest: Natasia Kalajdziovski

CH: A little over 1.2-million COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered in Canada so far. Which leaves a lot to be desired. But in the UK, it's a different story. This weekend, Prime Minister Boris Johnson celebrated what he called a significant milestone: over 15 million people have now received their first shot. Across the UK, hundreds of thousands of people are being vaccinated every day. That's a major success story, given that it has been criticised for many other aspects of its handling of the pandemic. Natasia Kalajdziovski Calligraphic is a Canadian living in London, and she just finished her training as a volunteer vaccinator.

CO: Natasia, what made you want to train to become a volunteer vaccinator?

NATASIA KALAJDZIOVSKI: It's completely rooted in my own experiences having had COVID. I had COVID right at the beginning of the pandemic in March of last year. I did not have a good time of it, as I'm sure lots of people can sympathise with. And honestly, I would do anything in my power to prevent anyone else from going through the same thing. I've donated plasma. I've tried starting my own history project for survivors and this seemed like a natural next step.

CO: So you've just completed your training this weekend, and so what will you be doing? Have they told you?

NK: Yes. Being a volunteer vaccinator, you will actually be vaccinating people within London anyway. There's a bunch of different locations set up, vaccination hubs, and as shifts come up, you can volunteer for them and you'll spend, I think, it's six to eight hours per day doing vaccinations. You can also do some facilitator roles as well. But generally, you'll be vaccinating people as they come in.

CO: Have you ever given someone a needle before?

NK: I've given a fake arm a needle in training. That's about it. [Chuckles]

CO: [Chuckles] So what do you think is going to be like when you've got a real person there and a real arm?

NK: I think there's going to be a lot of adrenaline rush. One thing I've been thinking about kind of from a kind of figurative standpoint for me is -- one of the other reasons that I decided to do this, it is a bit selfish in the sense that for me to have gone from having had the virus myself to we as a society coming up with a vaccine in less than a year and then being in a position to individually to try and combat it feels very full-circle to me in that respect. So I think I'll sort of feel quite emotional when I do my first vaccination, which I am looking forward to.

CO: So the UK has now administered 15-million vaccine doses to people, which puts the UK third after Israel and UAE as far as vaccinating their populations. It is just a huge success program. So why do you think that's the case? What's the secret to the United Kingdom's success on this vaccination program?

NK: I think there's a couple of things. I think, honestly, the top reason has to do with what the UK strategy was overall. I mean, I think if you ask anybody who's spent their time during the pandemic in the UK, there's a lot to be said about some of the failures of the government over the last year. But I think one of their kind of key strategies was always a long term reliance on a vaccine coming into the fore. And that's a gamble. That's ultimately a gamble. And it seems to be a gamble that has paid off. Ultimately, this additional strategy of making the decision to delay the second dose of people's vaccinations also means that the number of 15-million was attainable because it didn't mean that only 7-million people or 7.5-million people were getting their full dose of the vaccine. It was allowing as many people as possible to at least have some form of immunity against the virus.

CO: What type of vaccine -- do you know what kind of vaccine you're going to be administering? It is AstraZeneca, I think, is it?

NK: Yeah. So the UK currently has approved AstraZeneca and Pfizer. And so those are the two vaccines that I've been trained on how to inject.

CO: Okay. But you mentioned that it has a tremendous track record now for the vaccine, not so good on most of the past year as far as dealing with the virus, right. What was your experience? What did you observe about how the UK dealt with the coronavirus?

NK: Well, I mean, I can speak personally, having been infected in a period when the UK should have gone into lockdown and didn't. I mean, I became symptomatic on March 24th and the UK went into lockdown on March 23rd. This is a trend that happened throughout the entire pandemic where there seemed to be an overreliance on political strategy rather than the scientific strategy, You know, particularly during the summer, there was an impetus to kind of decide, 'Okay well, is our priority to save lives or is it to save the economy?' And I think for a long time, the UK couldn't make up its mind as to which it preferred to save, which resulted in both having dramatic consequences. And I think over the summer it ultimately decided that the economy was going to be the prime thing that they, "wanted to save." And that had disastrous ramifications as well. As you know, we're now in our third lockdown. So it's been a bleak ten months and a lot of ways. But the vaccination program at least is finally this wondrous light that we're able to see in the moment.

CO: As you point out, though, back when you had the virus -- well, that last spring, the British government had one of the highest national death tolls in the world. You have had 117,000 deaths, more than 4-million coronavirus cases to date. So that's the bleaker side of the record, I guess.

NK: Yes, absolutely. And I don't think that's something that we can kind of forget in this rush of euphoria of what's happening with the immunisation program. Of course, it's so important to focus on these wonderful milestones of 15-million people having been vaccinated. But there's still the shadow of what's come before that. And we're in a critical moment where, yes, it's wonderful that this is happening, but I think if the government chooses to step in the wrong pathway at such a critical moment to open up to early, all of that effort could go to waste ultimately.

CO: You mentioned your own COVID-19 case. How are you feeling now?

NK: I do still have some long COVID symptoms. But comparatively to a lot of other people, I know that I'm quite fortunate in terms of the sort of niggly things that I have or not, they're not a detriment to my life. They don't affect my day to day. But they do come up occasionally. But there is -- I think one of the things that is going to come out of sort of the shadows of the pandemic once it's done, is there is a huge, you know, emotional and mental toll of being a survivor of COVID. For the first few months after I started feeling better, I was in constant fear of becoming infected again. And it took a long time to kind of let go of that fear and to feel safe in public spaces to not veer out of the way when someone walked too close to me on the sidewalk. And I wasn't hospitalised. I can't even imagine what that kind of impact would be on somebody who was ventilated or even people who are adjacent to people who unfortunately didn't survive the virus. There's going to be a huge toll in that respect. Absolutely.

CO: When will you get your vaccine?

NK: So I've actually had my first dose, but that was purely by a stroke of luck because a nearby vaccination centre had doses of Pfizer that were going to spoil if they weren't used by the end of the day. So they kind of opened it up to anyone who was around and I heard through the grapevine. So I feel very fortunate in that sense.

CO: Well, Natasia, I wish you success with your new volunteer job, vaccinating people. It sounds rewarding. And I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

NK: My pleasure.

CH: Natasia Kalajdziovski just finished training to become a volunteer vaccinator in the UK. We reached her in London.

[Music: Calm Music]

Bill Blair on Guns

Guest: Bill Blair

CH: Bill Blair is looking to buy some guns. Canada's public safety minister joined the prime minister today to introduce the government's new gun legislation. It includes new penalties for weapons trafficking and a provision to allow cities to ban handguns. And Minister Blair also promised a program in which the government will buy guns that were purchased legally by Canadians, but that are on the list of roughly 1500 assault style weapons that were banned last year. He did not say how much that buyback program would cost. We reached Public Safety Minister Bill Blair in Toronto.

CO: Minister Blair, why can't you tell Canadians how much the gun buyback program is going to cost?

BILL BLAIR: Well, Carol, it's an important question. I can give them an estimate. And the estimate is it really depends on how many of these weapons are out there. Unfortunately, we don't have a precise understanding of who has them and what they are simply because there is no registry for many of these guns. But if there are, for example, about 200,000 of these guns and we've done some work that determines the average brand new retail price would be about 1,300 dollars. And so if that number is correct and it's an estimate at this point in time, we're probably talking somewhere in the neighbourhood of 300 million dollars to facilitate a buyback. And through this legislation, we are eliminating all legal use of these prohibited firearms. They can't be legally discharged, can't fire them, you can't take them hunting or to a range, they can't sell them or transport them. They can't bequeath them or trade them in any way. They will be required to store them in a very secure in a safe or a vault. And we will prescribe what that safe or vault needs to be. They'll also have to acquire a licence to possess those firearms, and provide us with registration information about the firearms they possess. And that's important, Carol, because we want to make sure that we can control and that none of these guns end up in the hands of criminals. And so through this legislation, we're going to gather that information and exercise very strong restrictions against all future use. And then we'll offer a buyback. And I think the vast majority of people who bought these guns to use as firearms, now that there's no legal way to do that, they'd be highly incentivised to surrender them for disruption and then we'll have a fair compensation program available to them.

CO: Okay. But if they have to stay under lock and key, if they can't be used, if they're basically out of the system and it breaks the law to take them out and use them for any purpose, what's the point of Canadians paying 300 or 400 million dollars to buy these back?

BB: Yeah, well, I will tell you, I think these guns represent a very significant risk is why we've prohibited them. They really have no place in our society and they have been used in countless jurisdictions, including in Canada, to kill very many people. And we also know that Canadians who purchased these guns did so legally when it was legal to do so. And so by taking the action of prohibiting them so that they cannot be used and by introducing legislation we introduced today to basically create a very strict, non-permissive regime so that they cannot be discharged, they can't be sold, we are creating the circumstances where the vast majority of people who bought these guns to use as firearm now that that's no longer legally possible, they'll be highly incentivised to surrender them. And we also think out of fairness that because they were purchased legally that we should offer fair, not overly generous, but fair compensation for these guns. And for those who may choose to keep them, they'll be fully responsible in the criminal law for their misuse. And, in fact, if any of those guns are discharged or sold or transferred or violates any of the conditions we put in place, serious criminal charges can be made.

CO: And yet you're not banning handguns. You're allowing municipalities to ban them, but only one the provinces allow for it. And Saskatchewan has already put a ban on banning handguns. Alberta and Ontario don't like the idea. So is it a bit gratuitous to say, yes, we'll have them banned by cities knowing that the provinces won't let them do that?

BB: Carol, I think there is no greater responsibility for all three orders of government than the protection and safety of their citizens. And so we will work with disabilities and the provinces to ensure that Canadians are kept safe. But let me be very clear...

CO: Well, can we just stick on this for a second? How is it possible for municipalities to ban these weapons that are a great threat, and you know from having been the police chief in Toronto, how can they do that if the province won't let them?

BB: Well, we will enable them to implement additional regulations. And, yes, under the constitution of the provinces can stop them. And some of them have indicated, that frankly, they're far more influenced, I think, sometimes by the gun lobby than they are by public safety. But we know that there are jurisdictions where the provinces have indicated strong support for the municipalities to take additional measures. And for example, we've heard from the Mayor of Vancouver, and I spoke to the minister of public safety, my counterpart in British Columbia -- and they are strongly supportive of additional measures to restrict the use of handguns, and that includes their possession, their storage, and their use in their municipalities. And so we'll continue to do that work. But you asked me about banning handguns Carol -- and just to be clear, the only lawful use of firearms in this country are for hunting and sports purposes. And then I will indicate to you, there's nothing in this legislation that interferes with those legitimate activities that the vast majority of Canadians engage in responsibly, lawfully, and quite conscientiously.

CO: Right. But minister, you saw the value of banning the assault style weapons. So you see the value of putting bans on weapons. I'm asking you, why not this category of weapons that has caused so much damage with gang-related activities in cities like Toronto?

BB: Carol all firearms are dangerous and therefore they need to be strictly regulated. Some firearms, like handguns, are far more dangerous because of there concealability and therefore they need to be restricted. And we impose very rigorous restrictions. And we've made those restrictions even more rigorous by the legislation we've introduced today. And then finally, there is a number of weapons that have absolutely no legitimate hunting or sporting purposes, assault rifles -- that were designed not for hunting, not for sport shooting. They were designed to kill people. They've been used to kill people and those we have prohibited. And I think that's the appropriate application of the law. I believe that the measures that we've introduced to more severely restrict handguns, to stop them being smuggled into the country to prevent their theft and to prevent their criminal diversion can be effective measures to reduce the availability of handguns in our cities and communities right across the country.

CO: Minister Blair, we'll leave it there. I'm sure we'll be talking about this again. But thank you for your time.

BB: Thank you Carol.

CH: Bill Blair is Canada's minister of public safety. We reached him in Toronto. And you can find more on that story on our website: cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Synth Music]

Pig Gaming

CH: There are a lot of sounds that immediately evoke the 80s: Molly Ringwald's voice, the opening notes of Van Halen's "Jump," shoulder pads rustling in a velour blazer, and the sound of a video arcade. [VIDEO ARCADE SOUND] Which notably did not sound like this. [VIDEO ARCADE SOUND WITH PIG SOUND IN THE BACKGROUND] There were very few pigs in arcades at the time. We knew it was hard for them to get or hold a quarter. But we mostly figured they weren't there because they couldn't use a joystick. Hence the popular 80s expression "You're as useless as a pig trying to play Donkey Kong." Well, decades later, two American researchers from Purdue University have shown that was unfair. In their new study, entitled "Acquisition of a Joystick Operated Video Tasked by Pigs," they proved definitively that pigs can acquire a joystick-operated video task. They trained four pigs to play a game you might call blup wall -- the objective was for the pigs to manipulate a cursor using a snout operated joystick to hit a wall, resulting in a bloop sound. For every bloop, the pigs were given a treat. Now none of the four pigs was what you'd call "good." But all of them got better at bloop wall over the course of the experiment. And one in particular seems to understand the game conceptually. Whereas I, a human, still don't understand the video game joust where you were a knight riding a flying ostrich. Anyway, it turns out we were wrong. Pigs can use joysticks. So I guess it behoves us to have more respect for the behoved.

[Music: Synth Music]

Part 2: Texas Storm Vaccines

Texas Storm Vaccines

Guest: Roberta Schwartz

CH: First, it got cold and then it got dark. On Monday, Texas was hit by a major snowstorm that froze up electrical plants. As a result, millions of people across the state are without power, and places with electricity have quickly become safe havens for people to run to for warmth. A winter blackout is stressful for everyone. But for health officials in heavily populated Harris County, it was a serious crisis. When the power went out, the public hospital's generator failed to kick in, which meant freezers that stored temperature sensitive vaccines weren't working. County health authorities had to call in other medical professionals in the area for help. Roberta Schwartz got one of those calls. She's the executive vice president at Houston Methodist Hospital. We reached her in Houston, Texas.

CO: Roberta, what did they tell you about the urgency when the Harris County Public Health called you up?

ROBERTA SCHWARTZ: So we got a call about 9:30 in the morning to let us know that there had been an excursion in the freezers at Harris County, and that they needed to get the vaccine out and into people by noontime. So this is 9:30 in the morning, and we knew that we had to have the vaccine into people's arms at noon.

CO: Yikes. How many vaccines are we talking about?

RS: Well, we knew the county had 8,400 that they had to distribute. They were asking each hospital to consider seeing if they could vaccinate a 1,000 people. Now, over the course of a few hours, they were able to figure out that some of it could be saved and refrigerated for the following week. And they were able to place some of it at the jails or at Rice University. But we were still asked to see whether or not we could vaccinate about a 1000 people.

CO: And so you jumped into action. Did you have to get to the hospital on bad roads?

RS: No, I was at the hospital already, so that was great. And we were able to get our nurses into action. I will tell you that the people who lead our vaccine efforts and our physician organisation actually got in their cars, drove to the hospital, to set up, do wayfinding. Our pharmacy downstairs got ready to basically draw up the doses. They had the tables all set out. And then it took us a little while to actually figure out the population that we were going to vaccinate because we knew that couldn't be a driving population. We needed them to be within walking distance or a very short distance -- we didn't put anybody in jeopardy.

CO: Wow. So how did you find all the people that were going to get vaccinated?

RS: We were able to work with Rice University. We were able to work with our physicians that knew they had people within a short distance from the hospital. We also worked with a community, actually, one of the Jewish communities nearby that we knew had a series of physicians, nurses and a walking distance community that was able to help us out in some of the vaccination efforts. So as these things often do, Facebook had a life of its own and people were able to find out about the vaccination effort very quickly. And we had a line out the door in short order.

CO: And so it was basically all hands on deck and people showed up. And you went to work?

RS: Yeah. One of the most amazing scenes was our physicians, that were bringing a family member, an elderly family member or a spouse or somebody because they had heard about this vaccine when we emailed out to our physicians and we said, "Oh, it's so sweet that you've brought that family member. Now we're putting you to work in the vaccine area." We just grabbed him out of line and basically put their gloves on and they were amazing. They just set up a table. We got them educated within about 10 minutes about all the questions they needed asked. And they went to work vaccinating and they vaccinated for the next three hours.

CO: And what do those doses represent? I mean, is that liquid gold where you are? If they had gone bad, what did that represent as a loss?

RS: You know, for us, we live under the rule of "no drop will be wasted." And we live that every single day. And we vaccinated over 200,000 people at this point. So we have become really skilled at vaccinating, at knowing how many people, getting to the right population's, really working very hard. So when we had this opportunity to work with our community and our county to make sure these drops weren't wasted and we really set about getting them into arms very quickly.

CO: You say 200,000. Is that in Harris County?

RS: So the 200,000 people that we have vaccinated are, for the most part, in Harris County. Across Texas, you are able to cross county lines to come in to different counties to get vaccinated. I will say our hospitals are also in Fort Bend County and Montgomery County. And so we vaccinate in the larger Houston area.

CO: Wow. So I have to say, we're jealous if you're getting you getting your vaccine program up and running like that, even in the middle of bad weather, which I am going to ask you about. How bad were weather conditions?

RS: You know, being from New York, I grew up in ice and snow. But in those places, there was infrastructure really to match to the weather. And these conditions were much like the New York conditions -- with ice on the ground, a pretty good thick amount of ice and in some cases snow on the ground. That for people in Houston driving over those conditions is very treacherous. And around the state, there have been numerous multi-car pileups which really were dangerous.

CO: When did you get electricity back or did you I should ask you?

RS: Over 50 percent of Houston still does not have electricity. I think the latest figures I saw is that 46 percent of the city has electricity. And it really is very cold down here. We are still below freezing temperatures in the city. Lots of locations where pipes are bursting because, again, our weather was not quite anticipating this type of event. So I think we're going to be dealing with weather-related issues for quite some time.

CO: And at the hospital, do you have your electricity back?

RS: At the hospital, we have not lost. Some of our buildings as the city has requested are on emergency type power. We are trying to conserve power wherever we can to support the power grids. But most, I would say, of our employees are affected by power or water. And two of our hospitals do not have water at the present time and are working on emergency water provision. So really, there are some difficult conditions under which we're working.

CO: Roberta well done to all of you. And thanks for telling us the story.

RS: Thank you for reaching out to us. It is our honour to basically share what's happening and the incredible work that's happening down here at Houston Methodist.

CO: Stay warm.

RS: Thank you so much. You too.

CH: Roberta Schwartz is the executive vice president at Houston Methodist Hospital. She's in Houston, Texas.

[Music: Drum & Bass Music]

David Monias

CH: Cross Lake Cree Nation is in the grips of its third wave of COVID. But Chief David Monias says that if the government had listened, the outbreak could have been prevented. There are more than 80 positive cases in the northern Manitoba First Nation. That number is double what it was last Friday. And with the testing of hundreds of close contacts still in progress and the fear that the UK variant is in the community, that number is expected to rise today. Chief Monias spoke at a press conference to talk about how overcrowding is spreading the virus.

DAVID MONIAS: When one family gets affected, the numbers are normally high because it spreads to number of people in the homes. So we've been stating this for a long time. When this first started, we said it's going to be devastating for First Nations in the long run because of the overcrowding and the lack of housing in the community. You're faced with one house having one washroom most times. And it's hard to isolate or social distance when you're with a large number of people in the home. So that's the message we relayed at the very beginning and it's come to fruition now. And it's difficult for our people. It's very tiring for our team trying to protect people and keep them safe and working late hours -- even up to two o'clock in the morning, we're still meeting, getting calls at six, seven a.m. and we start from there again because it's always somebody needing help whether it would be a COVID-positive or contact or homelessness. Because that's one of the other things that COVID does, it creates homelessness. When people are out from their homes and their families telling them, "Well, you can't come home because you'll risk our children, our grandchildren, you'll risk our grandparents and so forth," -- and it's hard. And it's not that they're being unloving or stuff like that , they're trying to keep themselves safe. And so we are faced having to house a lot of homeless people in our community. Normally we don't see that because everybody takes everybody in. And you won't see anybody on the streets and stuff like that or on the road. But nowadays our school gymnasium is full.

CH: That was Cross Lake Cree Chief David Monias speaking to reporters today.

[Music: Calm Music]

India Farmer Protester

Guest: Leo Saldanha

CH: On Saturday, a young climate activist was arrested by New Delhi police at her home in South India. Disha Ravi had shared information with people to let them know how they could support the farmers who are protesting in the country. And now she's been charged with sedition. And the Indian government has arrest warrants out for two other people connected with Ms. Ravi. Her arrest has set off a wave of outrage across India. Leo Saldanha is a longtime social activist. He's part of a coalition lobbying for Disha Ravi's release. We reached him in Bangalore, India.

CO: Leo, why do you think that the Indian authorities are going after this young climate activist, Disha Ravi?

LEO SALDANHA: I think it's a response in many ways to the type of ideology the Indian government is oriented towards, which is to basically use a majoritarian view to crush any dissent.

CO: So what has Disha Ravi been accused of doing?

LS: Well, she's been, in a really disturbing way, accused of being seditious merely because she shared a toolkit with Greta Thunberg had shared and also for having participated in a Zoom conversation. But that really is not the issue. The issue really is that she spoke out in favour of the farmers protest, as have thousands of other youngsters and millions of other people. But I guess she became a target because she was part of Fridays For Future, which is an international organisation.

CO: And Fridays For Future is an organisation started by Greta Thunberg. There are wings of it around the world, including in India. And so this toolkit you mentioned, this is key. This is the sort of key piece of so-called evidence that the Indian government is using to prove this case of sedition against Disha Ravi, what does that toolkit?

LS: It's basically a set of, let's say, a couple of pages of information in which basically people are asked to support the farmers protest because it's been widely considered that the farm laws, which were passed several months ago, are against the interests of farmers and therefore against the interests of people of India. And Disha Ravi is a climate activist, and she is just 22 years old. And I believe from school and through college, she's been following Greta Thunberg's actions which are inspiring youth across the world. And she got inspired. And I don't think that's a crime.

CO: And so this toolkit that was designed to show ways of helping the farmers and help the climate activists, environmentalists become part of that farmer's movement in India -- it is so extraordinary we've been covering it as well. And then that was tweeted -- that toolkit was tweeted -- by Greta Thunberg, so this is evidence of what? What exactly are they saying that proves?

LS: Well, the Delhi police, which has charged Disha has essentially said that that defames India and therefore that is an act of sedition. Which, according to thousands and thousands of us completely disagree with. But I mean, India cannot be defamed simply because somebody spread a toolkit or somebody participated in some conversation.

CO: Have you seen the toolkit?

LS: I've seen the toolkit. And there's nothing I can consider to be at all seditious. And not just me -- a Supreme Court judge who recently retired just yesterday has, how can anyone imagine that this is seditious?

CO: Okay. One of the ways they're saying that is seditious is that they're connecting this toolkit to a movement called the Khalistan movement. This Sikh separatist movement with associations of people in Canada and British Columbia that they're saying are part of this. Can you explain to us what is the connection that they're making between this toolkit and Disha Ravi and the Khalistan movement?

LS: So according to the Delhi police that Disha Ravi participated in a Zoome conversation in which there was a representative of the Poetic Justice movement in Canada.

CO: That's a BC movement, yes.

LS: Yeah. Which according to the Delhi police, again, is pro-Khalistan. Now the government of India has never baned the Poetic Justice Foundation. So it is not a terror organisation as the government of India has held many other organisations to be. Now, that said, the point is that Disha Ravi is a young woman. She is invited to participate in a Zoom conversation. If somebody else is there, who, according to the government, is not agreeable to the government's point of view, the government could have enquired, "why did you talk in that Zoom conference?" Instead, it came and that is the Delhi police came to Karnataka state, which is a totally different state into the city of Bangalore, walked into Disha Ravi's house when she was alone with her mother, picked her up, put her on a plane without absolutely any warrants, took her to Delhi, kept her overnight there and produced her before a magistrate court and secured an arrest and custody where she is now for five days. That has never happened before. That means every woman, everyone is vulnerable to the terror of Delhi police coming and picking them up on all sorts of charges. And this should never happen in any country.

CO: And they're tying this to this idea that somehow with sedition charges, because she was on a Zoom call, that included someone from a pro-Khalistani group that is not on any terrorist list. So that's the connection for all of that.

LS: That is what the police say.

CO: And what's the penalty that she might face for sedition?

LS: Well, it's not a trivial charge. And it has been used against this young woman as it has been used against many others -- journalists, senior advocates, academician -- on grounds which are so flimsy that it can never be considered to be material for a chargesheet, which is a term that we use to charge a person with anti-national and seditious activity. So, yeah, it is a fairly serious charge and the government seems to be using it rather recklessly.

CO: What is it about Disha Ravi joining the farm protests, becoming a key part of that farm protest, what is it about that, do you think has rattled the Indian government?

LS: I think it's probably because she is part of Fridays For Future, which has got an international presence. I wouldn't say Disha Ravi is a key part of the movement of the farmers because the farmers are well grounded in their logic, in the rational, and they don't need any international support. And Disha Ravi campaigned to support the farmers movement, I think that's the kind of bravery that we should all really be proud of in the young person across the world. So she is being made out as an example that the youth of India should just shut up and listen to the government.

CO: And what kind of reaction -- you've got a petition going -- what's the public reaction to Disha Ravis' arrest?

LS: I think it's overwhelmingly outrage, the fact that she can be grabbed out of her house and taken across the country. I mean, as I said before, it has never happened. That this has happened -- cannot be a precedent and we are not going to allow the precedent. And so the petition has already been subscribed by 28,000 to 30,000 people. And that's astonishing because we have never had this kind of causes being supported in such a dynamic and fantastically so. That means it is reflecting the mind of the people -- that petition.

CO: Leo we'll be following this story. And I appreciate you telling us about this tonight. Thank you.

LS: Thank you so much.

CH: Leo Saldanha is a social activist in India. He's part of a coalition lobbying for the release of Disha Ravi. We reached him in Bangalore.

[Music: Guitar Music]

Quizzers

CH: If you play Scrabble, you know the mixed blessing of getting the high scoring letters. Qs and Zs are great. But if the rest of your tiles are junk, those 10 pointers are worth pretty much nothing. Betty Kuchta knows that. She's an avid Scrabble player who's presumably spent years getting stuck with a Q and no U or Z and six consonants. But on Friday, something magical happened and Ms. Kuchta was able to play a word that earned her more points than most of us score in an entire game. A single word score, she believes, ties a North American record.

BETTY KUCHTA: Every Scrabble player hopes for a good set of letters to show up on the tile rack. And I got a unique set of letters last Friday. I had Q, U, I, a blank, a Z, an E, and an F. So the first thing you do as a Scrabble here is look to see if you have a complete word. So I recognise that fairly quickly. The word "quizzes." And I look for a place to put it on the board and I couldn't see any right away. But then I noticed there was an R on the board and I could make the word "quizzers" and it straddled two triple word scores, which means you get times nine points. And I managed to put the ten on a double letter score, so it was worth 20 points and I played all my letters. So you add 50 points that added to 365.

TONY DOUCETTE: So what did you think when you saw that score?

BETTY KUCHTA: I just went, "wow!" And so did my husband, Stephen, "wow!" And we thought maybe this is some kind of a record. I mean, 365 is more points than you generally get in a whole game. The highest scoring games that we get on a regular basis are just sort of in the mid-300s.

TONY DOUCETTE: And just to review -- once you got everything down there, you used all seven tiles, you get a 50 point bonus.

BETTY KUCHTA: Yes.

TONY DOUCETTE: 365.

BETTY KUCHTA: Yes. Incredible.

TONY DOUCETTE: Indeed. Do you know if it's a record?

BETTY KUCHTA: Well, we did an Internet search and found that a carpenter in Massachusetts had claimed a record for a 365 point word, and he had claimed a North American record. So I'm happy to claim a Canadian record at 365 points for the highest single scoring word in friendly competition.

CH: That was Betty Kuchta speaking with CBC Windsor Morning host Tony Doucette. And that word that made it happen again was "quizzers." On Friday, while playing Scrabble, she racked up 365 points for that single word, which she believes is a tie for the North American record.

[Music: Guitar Music]

Varinder Bhullar

CH: Last year, early on in the pandemic, Varinder Bhullar knew people were nervous. He also knew they were hungry. So he came up with an idea he would offer them free meals. Mr. Bhullar is the president of the Edmonton non-profit Green Scholars of Alberta. And to handle the cooking part, he partnered with Imran Javaid, the owner of the restaurant Dil-E-Punjab. That was 10 months ago. And the project is going strong. They're handing out hundreds of meals per week. Mr. Bhullar spoke to the CBC about it.

VARINDER BHULLAR: When you see a client coming in here and said, "I really appreciate what you guys are doing, I saw this on the social media, I saw this on the news," -- and that is energy for people to keep it going. And this is not limited to this project. It has started expanding even. People say, I want to do some meals and I want to give it away. And I thought, how can we do it? So then we worked together and we people have started cooking 25 meals at home and giving it to people on the street. So here we are giving about 100 meals a day for seven days a week. Anybody who needs it, they will come and pick it up. But on the other hand, we will take 25 meals onto the downtown street and distribute to the people standing on the street. And there is a group of friends who said they wanted to donate 150 meals a month -- first Sunday of every month -- and I said, we will love that. And I talked to Hope Mission and they said they'd love to have the meal. So this is something that's a growing concept and growing idea. And I think this is very nice that it's happening that way. And there is something positive coming out of this whole thing.

MIN DHARIWAL: You started out initially -- how much was it? How many people were you trying to do and how many days a week? And now you're saying seven days a week, 100 meals a day, right?

VARINDER BHULLAR: Yeah. Last month we gave 3,400-plus meals a month. So when we started from first week, it was 35 meals or 40 meals. But then it started picking up as the media started covering it, as social media started picking up. The message started to spread on both sides. It was spreading to people that need it as well as it was spreading to people who want to help. So this is not me and Imran doing it. This is the community who is doing it. This is a community project. And we have become a bigger family. Now, there's a lot more members in the family who want to help, and there's a lot more members in the family who need help.

MIN DHARIWAL: Any kind of anecdotal stories that you can share about maybe some positivity of someone getting help when they needed it and now they're able to kind of get back or they're thankful for you guys for being there.

VARINDER BHULLAR: Yes. There was a lady who called me Monday and said I wanted to see you. And I said, well, what is it about? She said, I wanted to meet you at the restaurant. I said, sure, I'll come around 6 p.m. when it is meal time. I thought, first, maybe the person needed some meal or something. So I came in. She came up with an envelop. She said I was not working and I was coming every day and having five meals. And today I'm working. I want to pay that back. So she handed me maybe not a lot of money, but whatever she could do...that touched my heart. No one wants free stuff. People want to earn money and earn a meal and have their own meal. But when they are in that situation and they cannot get it, it's our responsibility and we feel everyone should have a right to a meal and a right to eat. And then that's what we provided and people are coming and paying it back.

CH: That was Edmonton community activist Varinder Bhullar speaking with the CBC's Min Dhariwal.

[Music: Hip-hop Music]

Part 3: Hundreds of rare New Zealand seagulls take over earthquake-damaged building

Christchurch NZ Gulls

Guest: Vanessa Mander

CH: New Zealand's black-billed gulls have made an amazing comeback. But some of their human neighbours in Christchurch would rather they not come back. The birds went from being nearly extinct to being categorised as near threatened, which is great news for them, but not so great for development. About 300 of the gulls have taken over a demolished building in Christchurch which is to be the site of the new Christchurch Cathedral, which was destroyed in the 2011 earthquake. And that thriving gull colony is impeding construction. Vanessa Mander is a ranger with New Zealand's Department of Conservation, the department responsible for protecting the birds. We reached her in Christchurch, New Zealand.

CO: Vanessa, what did you think when you saw these birds nesting in an earthquake-damaged building?

VANESSA MANDER: Well, I'd have to say that we're all a little bit surprised. There's no real precedent for these birds breeding in man-made structures, let alone in the middle of arguably New Zealand's second largest city. We knew that they were residing within the centre city, but we didn't expect them to breed there.

CO: And this is a gull species that at one time was considered to be the most threatened of gull species in the world. And how large is this colony?

VM: So the colony that is residing there is a mixture of red-billed gulls and black-billed gulls, so there were around over 300 individuals within that colony, but some of those are the red-billed species. So it's a smaller colony than what you might expect in more natural things. And the reason that they are nationally critical is actually because their populations have crashed 80 percent over the last 30 years or more than 80 percent, which by anyone's metric is actually an extremely worrying trend.

CO: So they don't normally breed, though, in the middle of a big city. And so they perhaps don't want to be there. But I guess the residents in that area don't want them there either. What's the story there?

VM: Well, I think that there are two stories there. A lot of people with in New Zealand don't even realise that black-billed gulls exist. They kind of lump them in with the larger population of red-billed gulls and they kind of look at these as the one that steals their fish and chips while they are at the beach. But this has been a great opportunity to open the eyes of New Zealanders that we had this endemic species. So endemic just means that it's only found here in New Zealand. That is a special bit for us, but it's also in real trouble. So I think great from that aspect. There are also the people that live around the colony or working around the colony that may think that this is not the greatest idea for them because the colony does produce some smells that are really unpleasant for a lot of people. So there are two sides to every story. So some people have really come in and embrace them. So they've actually come in specifically to look at the site because I've never seen these birds before or never actually realised that they existed. And they've used this opportunity to educate themselves or to educate their friends. And I think any opportunity along those lines is great. But we really want these birds to move to a more natural fit in the future because we think that those colonies will have a better chance in those places.

CO: Now, I guess the biggest complaint that you're hearing is that this is the site around the area where the cathedral, that wonderful and beautiful building in Christchurch that was so badly damaged during the earthquake and construction is supposed to start on Christchurch Cathedral and they can't because the birds are too close. Is that the case?

VM: So you're right, they can't do anything about the construction on the site while the birds are there because they're absolutely protected under our Wildlife Act. And so we can't disturb the birds, we can't move the birds, and we can't discourage them from being there once they've started nesting. We really just have to play the waiting game and wait for them to see out their breeding season, move on because they've all dispersed from that place at that point. And then construction can begin.

CO: But it can't begin until then -- is that the case?

VM: That's true. Yes, because they're an absolutely protected species we need to allow them to continue and finish the nesting season or their breeding season there before anything can happen at that site.

CO: The building where this colony is breeding isn't in the church, right, it's in another building, the PricewaterhouseCoopers building. So why do you think they chose that building? Is it a good place to roost?

VM: Well, I guess, we can't pretend to understand the decision making processes of these birds. But if you understand where they usually belong, so they belong in abraded river systems, bodies of water that are quite wide, they are meandering their supposed streams and they have these gravel islands in the middle. So if you took a bird's eye view of this particular site -- so the birds had been hanging around the centre city. They see this site. There's a lot of rubble in the site because it's a building that has been partially demolished because of the earthquake we had here about a decade ago. And there was water underneath of it. And from a bird's eye view, it probably looked a little bit similar to what they were used to as a proper breeding site. We believe this colony has come from a nearby stream, which is quite close to the centre city. For whatever reason, they've decided to take this site. And this is the second breeding season they've had to go at the site, which is really interesting in itself. And all we can do is just wait for them to finish and hopefully we can make this site a little less palatable for them in the future, one way that they can prevent nesting in future years if the site is still not in use is to continue to have the water pumped out, so it looks a little bit less like what they're looking for in a river and also to put netting over the site so that'll discourage them from nesting if they can't reach those kind of gravelly pillars that they are currently nesting on.

CO: How much of Christchurch is still in rubble? How much still hasn't been recovered and rebuilt yet?

VM: But I mean, obviously, this is personal opinion rather than where the department would come from -- but I think Christchurch city has come a long way in a decade. There were certainly a few years there where the centre city did look very derelict and there was a lot of rubble because it takes a long time to get infrastructure in place to build a new city, which is essentially what we were doing in the middle. And a lot of new buildings have come up and being built in that space. It's a lot more vibrant than it used to be, but there are still a few places that haven't quite been dealt to since the earthquake.

CO: Well, hopefully when it is built or is being rebuilt, there's room for both birds and buildings.

VM: Well, we love having them in the centre city for people to be able to enjoy along the Avon River. But we do want them to breed in a better site because this site is not very good for them. But the fact that they are nesting on pillars is a really big problem because they are used to be nesting on the ground. And so the chicks, if they move away from them and they don't have the opportunity to fall out quite like they do here and it is a good, I think, three or four metre drop. So that's a big problem for them. There's no predator control at the site, but there is human disturbance. So there are quite a lot of problems with the site, which is why we would like them to move on in the future.

CO: All right. We'll leave it there. Vanessa thank you.

VM: You're welcome.

CH: Vanessa Mander is a ranger with New Zealand's Department of Conservation. We reached her in Christchurch, New Zealand. And you can find more on that story on our webpage: cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Jazz Music]

Dennis King

CH: The coronavirus variant first found in the United Kingdom has now reached every province in Canada. On Saturday, Dennis King, the premier of Prince Edward Island, announced that province's first case of the variant. The National Microbiology Lab in Winnipeg, found the B117 variant in a positive case P.E.I. confirmed earlier this month. The case is a man in his 20s who had recently travelled internationally. He's currently in isolation. Here's Premier Dennis King speaking at a news conference on Saturday.

DENNIS KING: Each time we hear of one of these COVID firsts, it's difficult news to digest. It does make your heart skip a beat. But also, each time we have met the moments with courage, with determination, and we have worked with a tremendous group of professionals and experts to lead this province through. We are joining you today on this unscheduled briefing today to announce another difficult COVID first. And that is that we've received confirmation that one of our existing and previously announced COVID-19 positive cases is of the UK variant. This isn't a new case. And our active case total remains at two. We've been bracing for this reality. This news is not unexpected. And in fact, we're the last province to confirm a case connected to the UK variant. This is a great reminder for us not to take our fortunate and unique P.E.I. situation for granted. As we have seen in other provinces, things can change quickly. To keep doing the things that we need to be doing is of utmost importance. This case is also an example of the importance of why we need to follow protocols properly. And by doing so, we're not only protecting ourselves, we're protecting those closest to us and the entire Island public as well.

CO: Prince Edward Island Premier Dennis King speaking at a press briefing this weekend after announcing the province's first confirmed case of the UK variant strain of coronavirus.

[Music: Calm Music]

Jan Shadick

CH: There's an old curling rink in the town of Unity, Saskatchewan. During the pandemic, it's been pretty quiet down on the ice. But on the roof of the old building, there's been a flurry of activity. Earlier this month, contractors discovered bats hibernating in the attic. At first, it was just a few dozen, but now more than 350 bats have been removed from the building, and counting. Jan Shadick is the executive director of Living Sky Wildlife Rehabilitation, which is currently caring for the bats. Yesterday, Ms. Shadick spoke with CBC Saskatchewan about the colony and how her team of volunteers is managing, even though their go-to bat expert is currently off work.

JAN SHADICK: We usually have a woman who is dedicated to the bats and that is what she rehabilitates and takes care of, are the best. She had the unique wisdom to be away. And so she's away at the moment. And so the wonderful company that is actually certified in roofing and bat removal contacted her to say that he was doing a really large job on a large building and that he had started to find bats. And he had about a dozen. But he figured, based on the size of the building and the numbers he was finding, that he was going to end up with quite a few more. He was concerned that he might get hundreds. So she called me on Monday and warned me. We promptly tried to figure out where we would hibernate them. And I bought some tubs on Tuesday. And so then on I think it was Thursday or something, he called and he said that he had gotten as many out as possible and we could go pick them up, but it was two hours away. So he brought them in on Friday morning. And he said, well, we have two tubs worth. And he said somewhere between 200 and 400. Unfortunately, I was hoping he was overestimating -- pardon me. But he was right on target. We had 386. We set up a system, thankfully, I have a few volunteers that have their rabies shots and they were able to come in and help us. And then after the work hours, because we started about noon and later in the day we had a few more extra volunteers coming in, which was fantastic. And things turned because we had to process every single bat. Because it sounds like he's only gone through sort of one section of this building and there's like another like ten or eight sections or something. And so there's a potential for a lot more.

CH: Jan Shadick is the executive director of Living Sky Wildlife Rehabilitation. The Saskatoon animal rehab centre is currently caring for hundreds of bats that were found hibernating in the attic of an old curling rink.

[Music: Pop Music]

African American Music Museum

Guest: Henry Beecher Hicks III

CH: One of B.B. King's Lucille guitars, a fur coat worn by Ella Fitzgerald, one of George Clinton's rainbow wigs. There's no shortage of incredible artefacts and memorabilia on display at the National Museum of African-American Music in Nashville, Tennessee. But when Henry Beecher Hicks III first came up with the idea to start the museum, he wanted to showcase more than the famous artists that everyone already knows. He wanted to celebrate generations of contributions from the Black artists that American history forgot. That was a dream that started decades ago. And last month, it finally came to life when the museum had its grand opening on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. We reached Henry Beecher Hicks III in Nashville, Tennessee.

CO: Henry, it seems like a no brainer that there should be an African-American music museum. But can you take us back to that initial moment when you first came up with the idea?

HENRY BEECHER HICKS III: Well it actually started -- before the original idea was a museum of African-American music, art, and culture to really be focussed on the significant contribution that African-Americans in Nashville and Middle Tennessee have made to this part of the country. But as we began to work as a board on that project, it became clear that there was a national story to be told, a bigger story to be told, and that focussed on American music and its origins. And really, we looked around the country and realised that there was no such place. There was no place where Black music had a home. So we wanted to see if we could go about getting that done.

CO: It took you a very long time. But on Martin Luther King Day last month, you finally opened the museum, right?

HENRY BEECHER HICKS III: We did. We did. That was an exciting day and a moving day of the year to be able to do it and celebrate it on that day -- on Martin Luther King Day. And as I was fond of saying, Dr. King said that, we all have to learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools. And certainly, in this day and age, here in the United States, it's important that we keep that admonition in mind. And we think that this museum can really help with that.

CO: This museum, this is a major accomplishment because it's 56,000 square feet of museum. Can you just give us a sense of what time does it span? Where does it begin? Where does it lead to?

HENRY BEECHER HICKS III: Sure. It really begins in the 1600s around the time when Africans were first brought to these shores in North America. And it goes right on up almost to the present day. It really covers everything from Field hollers and Negro spirituals all the way up through Hip-hop. And it make stops and deals with the Blues and Jazz and Gospel music and Rhythm and Blues and even a little bit of Disco and some other derivative genres before making its way to Hip-hop. But one of the things that's also unique about the museum is that I look at it as much as a history museum as it is a music museum because we really have tried to tell a chronological story that places Black music in context of what was going on in America and even around the world at the time when certain forms of music became popular.

CO: And it is broken into sort of categories to give it context to different eras. Can you tell us a bit about -- how would I walk through these 400 years?

HENRY BEECHER HICKS III: Yeah, sure. So you would start in our Roots Theatre. As you leave the theatre, you walk into our Rivers of Rhythm pathway. And so there, there's a lot of technology that has a timeline of American history and American music. And then you would enter into our five permanent galleries -- each of them are named after a song which hopefully gives the visitor a sense of time and place as well as genre. So you would go into Wade In The Water and you would learn about religious forms of music from the 1600s to the present day. And then you would go into The Crossroads -- and The Crossroads deals with the Great Migration and the emergence of the Blues. And then you would go into a Love Supreme and that takes you to Harlem, maybe in the middle of the Harlem Renaissance when Jazz was the music of the day. And then you go into One Nation Under A Groove, and so you're starting in the late 50s and in the 1960s, moving into the 70s and 80s, when R & B and Funk and Soul and Disco were so popular. And then you go into The Message -- and The Message picks up in the late 1960s at a time when the Bronx was burning and there was urban renewal underway and Hip-hop emerged as a dominant form of music. And that brings us right on up to the present day.

CO: I know that you're featuring, of course, the greats, B.B. King, Bessie Smith, Chuck Berry, Little Richard. But are there singers or musicians, composers that people would not know much about, that they would learn about your museum?

HENRY BEECHER HICKS III: Sure. And that's one of the things that we tried to do as we go throughout the museum. Number one is we've made it a point to highlight women. And the second thing, yes, is to highlight folks who were very influential but many people may not know. And one of those people is a woman by the name of Helen Woods Jones. And I love to tell her story because Ms. Woods Jones grew up in Mississippi and left home, I believe, it was in the 30s or 40s to join an all-female multiracial Jazz band that travelled the country performing. And how brave and how innovative that must have been to leave her home -- I think she even ran away from home -- to leave her home to go join a group of women travelling the country performing Jazz.

CO: Do you have a favourite place -- do you have a favourite exhibit or showcase?

HENRY BEECHER HICKS III: Well, I think it's actually the lobby of the museum. That's where I get to see the people congregate. And in this time, when we're just recovering from COVID-19, it's been heartening to see people come out to want to see this museum, to want to safely join friends and family to go through the museum. People still want to be together. And so I've enjoyed seeing that since we've opened.

CO: Henry it sounds terrific. And I hope I get to see it. And I appreciate speaking with you.

HENRY BEECHER HICKS III: I appreciate talking with you. Thank you so much.

CH: Henry Beecher Hicks III is the president of the National Museum of African-American Music. We reached him in Nashville, Tennessee.

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February 16, 2021 Episode Transcript

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