Focus

Focus, or Focus 580, was WILL Radio's flagship talk program from 1981 until 2014. David Inge was the host from 1981 until his retirement in 2012. Always engaging, the program acted as a resource for citizens to directly question politicians and candidates as well as keep up on the arts, science, health, and even the latest from well-known novelists.

The Focus archive below offers thousands of great interviews and serves as a time capsule and a great resource for researchers and those just curious about how influential people spoke of important topics as they were happening.

Bill Kemp

Torii Moré

September 30, 2013 - Focus

Pages From the Past: Stories from the Sunday Pantagraph

What do Adlai Stevenson, the Underground railroad, the Orphan Train movement and the old-time radio program Vic and Sade have in common?

Bill Kemp recently penned his 400th article for the Pantagraph newspaper based in Bloomington-Normal. He’s been writing about history for nearly a decade and says even though we’re in a pretty rural part of the Midwest, he’s never been at a loss for an interesting tale to describe in his history column.

This hour on Focus, host Jim Meadows talks with him about his book “Pages from the Past: Stories from the Sunday Pantagraph.”  We’ll learn more about Adlai Stevenson II, former Governor and 1950’s democratic Presidential candidate, and we’ll talk with Kemp about his accounts of myths surrounding the Underground railroad in Central Illinois and the Orphan Train movement.


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The Champaign County Republican Party’s annual Fall Festival included a straw poll for each of the candidates seeking the GOP nomination for governor of Illinois.

(Sean Powers/WILL)

September 26, 2013 - Focus

Illinois Politics Roundtable

Are Illinois lawmakers making progress on pension reform? Why do all the lively races for statewide office next year only involve republicans?


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visitors at Curtis Orchard

Flickr

September 25, 2013 - Focus

Agri-Tourism a Boon for Central Illinois Farms

Have you been to a pick your own apple orchard or tried to solve a corn maze at a local orchard or farm? Why did you go, and would you go back? What did you like or dislike about visiting? This hour on Focus, we’ll talk about farms as tourist destinations.


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Anne Balsamo

September 23, 2013 - Focus

Designing Culture

Technology is constantly changing the way we organize everything. Despite the pace of change, we’re still in control. This hour on Focus, Jim Meadows talks with Anne Balsamo about the ways she says it’s possible for us to design the culture we want through the way we use the technologies we create.


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a dollar with some cents

Wikimedia Commons

September 20, 2013 - Focus

Personal Finance

Today on Focus, host Jim Meadows talks with Kevin Waspi, a chartered financial analyst and Jake Kuebler, a certified financial planner with Bluestem Financial Advisors in Champaign. We welcome your calls and questions!


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Nicole Eason, who adopted several children through "private re-homing," even though she had her two biological children taken by social services.

Reuters

September 18, 2013 - Focus

Private Re-homing

When you can’t take care of a dog or a cat, it seems perfectly reasonable to go online to try and find them a new home. But would you ever even think to do that with a child?


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