StoryCorps Southwest Florida

Alberita Johnson grew up in Queens, New York where she was bussed to white schools and says she experienced racial violence in the 1970’s. At the Story Corps mobile booth in Fort Myers, Johnson speaks with her friend Genelle Grant about that time, as well as what it was like moving to a still segregated Fort Myers in 2002.

Seventeen-year-old Mari Jimenez talks to her family friend Genelle Grant in this week’s StoryCorps about the pride she has of being Mayan. Her parents are from Guatemala. They spoke indigenous languages and Spanish at home. So Jimenez first learned English when she went to preschool. She’s now trilingual and she uses her skills and her cultural ties to help others. Last year she was named a Mayan Princess.

First Generation Asian Americans, Nina Chen Langenmayr of Bryn Maur FL, and her sister, Stacey Cannington of Fort Myers, talk in this week’s StoryCorps of southwest Florida about their parents immigrating to the United States from China in the 1940s, assimilating to American culture, and moving to Kissimmee before Disney.

36-year-old James Pickett of Labelle interviews his friend, 30-year-old Stephanie Serrano of Fort Myers in this week’s StoryCorps of Fort Myers. They share their faith in God, their friendship, and their experiences with cerebral palsy.

In this week’s StoryCorps of southwest Florida, 70-year-old Anne McCrary Sullivan talks to her domestic partner, 64-year-old Lynn Webster, about the profound sense of emotions she experiences when visiting certain places. Sullivan was an artist-in-residence at Everglades National Park.

71-year-old Martha Bireda speaks with her son, 43-year-old Jaha Cummings, in this week’s StoryCorps of southwest Florida about their ancestry and their roots in what was then a segregated Punta Gorda.

65-year-old Jim McCracken talks with his wife 60-year-old Karen Feldman about the death of his brother David McCracken from AIDS in 1992 at the age of 36. He remembers David's bright spirit and their complicated relationship in this week’s StoryCorps of southwest Florida.

Sixty-one-year-old Razak Dosani and his daughter, 28-year-old Farah Dosani, talk in this week’s StoryCorps of southwest Florida about him growing up in Bombay, moving to the United States to practice medicine, being a father, and his love and optimism for the United States as an Indian Muslim. Full disclosure – Farah worked for WGCU News for 3 years.

Sixty-year-old Lawrence Voytek and his friend, 57-year-old Mark Loren, talk about their friend and renowned artist, the late Robert Rauschenberg. Voytek worked as Rauschenberg's fabricator. They remember the great times they had together at his home on Captiva.

Fifty-three-year-old Mark Riccio talks to his friend, Erica Lynne in this week’s StoryCorps of southwest Florida about having Williams Syndrome and his love for singing and sailing. Riccio says he knows his parents are scared of letting him go but he also fears being lonely.

In this week’s StoryCorps of Southwest Florida 85-year-old Abraham Coleman of Punta Gorda speaks to his friend Jaha Cummings about serving in the Korean War as an African-American, segregation in the military, and being active in the civil rights struggle alongside Malcolm X.

Martha Bireda interviews her friend 70-year-old Eunice Wiley about being the first black teacher in her school, East Elementary, in Punta Gorda in 1970, resisting with dignity during Jim Crow, and becoming the principal at Neil Armstrong Elementary in Port Charlotte despite the prejudice she faced. She retired from there in 2005.

James and Rachel Bass of Cape Coral talk about their interracial marriage, moving to Florida, James's fears as a black man in a mostly white community, and Rachel's response to her once naive perception of race in the United States in this week’s StoryCorps of southwest Florida.

47-year-old Jeffrey Peterman of Alva remembers his father Jerome Peterman, who passed away recently from ALS. The elder Peterman was a pilot and a larger-than-life character who Jeffrey did not always get along with, until the end.

Kristin Ritts memorializes her late husband Roy Ritts, a notable immunologist in this week’s StoryCorps. The Purple Heart recipient had his hand in early AIDS Research and worked closely with Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackman on Roe v. Wade. Ritts was one of the first to be awarded patents on monoclonal antibodies – which are antibodies made in a lab rather than by a person’s immune system. And he was involved in some of the first transplants in the United States.

17-year old Lisa Gitau interviews her father Martin Ndungu about his upbringing in Kenya, his passion for his work transporting the medically disabled in southwest Florida, his proudest moments, and his dreams for the future.

Donna Buckley of Brooksville and her son Shawn Williams of Fort Myers came to the StoryCorps booth to talk about their relationship from birth to present day and the things they’ve learned from each other along the way.

Friends and "sand sisters" 65-year-old Deb Gleason of Sanibel and 67-year-old Diane Schwartz of Englewood share memories of growing up on Sanibel and Captiva in the 1950s. They both collected and sold sea shells to stores and exporters. They both lived through Hurricane Donna in 1960. And they both moved there in the second grade and attended a one-room schoolhouse.

Twenty-eight-year-old Seth Monaco interviews his wife, 31-year-old Simone Monaco about their relationship, her life, and her thoughts about their daughter with whom she was pregnant when they went into the StoryCorps mobile booth in Fort Myers. Simone talks about overcoming abuse and other things that led her to a career helping other people.

In this week’s StoryCorps of Southwest Florida, Melinda Masters tells her husband David Carnes about her evolution from being a child who was bullied to finding her calling as a social worker determined to help stop the abuse of power. She specializes in working with male sexual predators. Masters has been a feminist for as long as she can remember.