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East Tennessee is home to many beautiful lakes, rivers, and streams. As the Memorial Day weekend approaches later this month, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency wants to make sure these waterways are safe for all who seek recreation. The TWRA’s Matt Cameron shares some vital information about keeping safe on the water.

In part two of our interview, Odessa Woolfolk, Founding Director of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, recalls how the city has documented its past while embracing its future.

We visit with Lloyd Schwartz, who, along with his father Sherwood Schwartz, created and produced such television classics as “The Brady Bunch.”

Our topic is a recently published book entitled Appalachian Epidemics: From Smallpox to COVID-19. Our guest is one of the book’s co-editors, Dr. Chris White, from Marshall University. The book is published by the University Press of Kentucky.

Peter O’Leary, Mayor of Chimney Rock Village in Western North Carolina, talks with us about restoration and recovery efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene’s destruction. O’Leary’s business sustained heavy damage during the storm, but like many others in his community, he is rebuilding and reopening.

In part two of our interview with Marshall University’s Dr. Chris White, we look at how epidemics have affected the Appalachian region, including a comparison between the so-called “Spanish “ flu pandemic of 1918 and the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. White is co-editor of the new book Appalachian Epidemics: From Smallpox to COVID-19, published by the University Press of Kentucky. The photo here comes from what became known as the “Summer Without Children,” in 1950, when Wytheville, Virginia, had the highest per capita rate of polio in the nation.

In the first of two programs on the subject, we discuss prostate cancer, the most common cancer among men. Our guest is Dr. Kristen Scarpato, Associate Professor of Urology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

We visit the tiny community of Broylesville, in Washington County, Tennessee, to talk with Cheryl Bennett. She and her husband Dwight own and live in the old Broylesville Mill, and they are documenting the history of mills throughout the region.

Dr. John Shelton Reed, an authority on all things Southern and a retired University of North Carolina sociology professor, returns to “Vital Voices.” This time his subject is a classic New Orleans cocktail, created in the 1890s. Dr. Reed’s book, The Ramos Gin Fizz, was recently published by the Louisiana State University Press as part of its Iconic New Orleans Cocktails series.

We travel to Hiltons Memorial United Methodist Church in Scott County, Virginia, to witness the fall ritual of making apple butter, with members of the congregation.