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Story Subject Category: Champaign
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For 6,000 years people have been practicing yoga. Its roots are religious, but outside of India, most people practice it as a form of exercise. Producer Virginia Steffen examines this ancient practice and learns that it’s something anyone can do.
Segment duration: 08:49
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Producer: Virginia Steffen
This segment is filed in these categories: Hobbies • Champaign
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Yuki Okinaga Llewellyn of Champaign, Ill., spent three years during World War II interned at the Manzanar Assembly Center in California. Llewellyn and her 23-year-old single mother were evacuated from Little Tokyo in Los Angeles, to Manzanar in Lone Pine, Calif. The now famous 1942 National Archives photo, taken by Clem Albers and showing Yuki sitting on a suitcase in the train station, became representative of that period. A retired assistant dean of students at the University of Illinois, Llewellyn returned to Manzanar last fall for the first time since she and her mother left it in October 1945 with $25 and a pair of government-issued bus tickets. Producer Denise La Grassa talks to Llewellyn about living in Block 2 inside the internment camp where she shared a 20 x 20 room with her mother and another family.
Segment duration: 07:55
Producer: Denise La Grassa
Editor: Eleanore Stasheff
This segment is filed in these categories: Ethnicity/Culture • History • World War II • Champaign
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John O’Connor of Champaign served in the U.S. Air Force during World War II. He was chosen as lead pilot with the first experimental flying unit aboard the B-24 Liberator. He flew 50 missions and also used his skills as a trumpeter and band director. Flying back from a mission, John and his crew would often pull out their instruments and play. O’Connor later became a member of the Medicare 7, 8 or 9 Jazz Band, performing around the country.
Segment duration: 04:46
Producer: Denise La Grassa
Chief Camera - Segment: Julius Bolton
This segment is filed in these categories: History • Music • World War II • Champaign
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The mission of 40 north/88 west is to nurture artists in Champaign County by fostering collaboration, and keeping them informed about opportunities and events. Producer Virginia Steffen introduces some of the artists who are part of 40 north and the work they are creating in central Illinois.
Segment duration: 06:45
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- 40 north/88 west
- David Raila
- Adriana Smith
- Georgia Morgan
- Deborah Fell
- Kim Allison
- Hyon Joo Kim
- Christine Main
- Burcu Okay
- Athan Chilton
Producer: Virginia Steffen
Chief Camera - Segment: Julius Bolton, David Noreen, Henry Radcliff, Virginia Steffen
This segment is filed in these categories: Arts/Culture • Champaign • Champaign County • Urbana
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By producer Alison Davis Wood
I first met Chad Dunn when I was producing a story on another band that he plays with called Desifinado. After talking to him, I quickly realized that Chad should be his own story for Prairie Fire. His talents include hand crafting instruments that are used by Sting and members of Paul Simon’s band, and he teaches Brazilian percussion to young and old. But Chad is also a lover of trash. He looks at old bottles and paint drums and hears music. What also is incredible is that he inspires others to do the same.
Chad’s musical mission of keeping things out of landfills led to him forming Recycled Rhythms. The band is unlike anything you’ve seen before. It is part musical group, part perfomance art, part environmental activism. But most of all the band is fun to watch. You can’t help but move to the beat and maybe even join the band on stage with a pair of “dancing hands” (empty boxes with scrap paper attached).
Chad’s vision for the future of the band is that Recycled Rhythms will do extensive workshops within communities across the country. The group would help organize a community “clean-up” with a local school. Then Chad would work with school children to turn the items collected into musical instruments. They would teach the kids how to play tradtional Brazilian rhythms on the new instruments. All the work would result in a performance between the school children and Recycled Rhythms after which the instruments would be donated to the school.
I hope this story inspires people check out a performance of Recycled Rhythms or possibly make their own instruments. Maybe you will think twice before you throw something away ... there could be music in that old cereal box or coffee can. You just have to let it out!
Segment duration: 09:19
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Producer: Alison Davis Wood
Chief Camera - Segment: Julius Bolton, Brian Paris, Virginia Steffen
This segment is filed in these categories: Arts/Culture • Music • Champaign
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The goal of Habitat for Humanity’s Champaign ReStore is to keep gently used furniture out of the landfill and also help people in need.
Segment duration: 06:49
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Producer: Virginia Steffen
This segment is filed in these categories: Business • Environment • Housing and Urban Renewal • Champaign
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Yuki Okinaga Llewellyn of Champaign, Ill., spent three years during World War II interned at the Manzanar Assembly Center in California. Llewellyn and her 23-year-old single mother were evacuated from Little Tokyo in Los Angeles, to Manzanar in Lone Pine, Calif. The now famous 1942 National Archives photo, taken by Clem Albers and showing Yuki sitting on a suitcase in the train station, became representative of that period. A retired assistant dean of students at the University of Illinois, Llewellyn returned to Manzanar last fall for the first time since she and her mother left it in October 1945 with $25 and a pair of government-issued bus tickets. Producer Denise La Grassa talks to Llewellyn about living in Block 2 inside the internment camp where she shared a 20 x 20 room with her mother and another family.
Segment duration: 07:55
Producer: Denise La Grassa
Editor: Eleanore Stasheff
This segment is filed in these categories: History • World War II • Champaign
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Jill Pitts Knappenberger of Champaign, Ill., was one of three women serving on the front lines during the Battle of the Bulge. Working for the Red Cross operating a refitted truck dubbed a “clubmobile,” she passed out donuts, coffee and cigarettes to weary soldiers. She talks to WILL-TV producer Denise La Grassa about being trapped for eight days during the Battle of the Bulge, surrounded by the enemy. Her brother, John Joseph Pitts III, an Army captain, was in the heat of battle only a few miles away. Knappenberger, shown at left with the clubmobile, said she joined the Red Cross effort because she was itching to get into the action of World War II. The soldiers taught her how to use a gun and she even got a few shots off at the Germans.
Segment duration: 09:11
Producer: Denise La Grassa
Editor: Eleanore Stasheff
This segment is filed in these categories: History • World War II • Champaign
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When World War II broke out, Iris Nigg Lundin of Champaign left her small town in Minnesota and joined hundreds of other women in the newly formed Marine Corps women’s Reserve. She became one of the first four female navigation instructors.
Producer Denise La Grassa said that in her conversations with Lundin, she was impressed by the strength of this woman who left a secure life in Minnesota to join the ranks of the Marines, the toughest of the tough. “This was the first time many of these men who were her students had encountered a female instructor and she really held her own,” said La Grassa. “When I listened to her stories, I was moved by her description of how she went to bat for African-Americans on the military bases where she worked. She was brave enough to tell a higher-ranking officer that he shouldn’t be treating a steward in a demeaning manner. Later in her life, equality was very important to her.”
Segment duration: 07:39
Producer: Denise La Grassa
Editor: Eleanore Stasheff
This segment is filed in these categories: History • Military • World War II • Champaign
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When the USS Indianapolis was sunk by Japanese torpedoes in 1945, only 317 of 1,196 men on board survived. Three of those survivors live in central Illinois. Art Leenerman of Mahomet, Don McCall of Champaign, and Earl Riggins of Oakland got together with WILL-TV producer Denise La Grassa to talk about how they survived four and a half days in the water waiting to be rescued while battling sharks, cold and hunger. About 600 men died in the water after the ship sank. All three central Illinois survivors were brought up on farms, and were accustomed to hard work, long days in the sun and difficult conditions. They think it was a factor in their survival. “They had grown up learning to keep plowing along, no matter how tough things got. And that’s basically what they did in the water,” said La Grassa.
Segment duration: 08:40
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Producer: Denise La Grassa
This segment is filed in these categories: History • Military • World War II • Champaign • Mahomet • Oakland
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