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It?s been suggested that the two things New Hampshire grows best are stones and poetry. It may be an exaggeration, but it?s not much of one. In fact, the state has been home to a disproportionate share of poets and other writers for many years. Kevin Gardner decided to try and find out why.

Also, Donald Hall reads a story from his latest book, Willow Temple. "The Ideal Bakery" is a reflection on a sweeter life and time.

Gerry Williams makes functional pieces and high art from the humblest of raw materials- clay. He's also the editor of Studio Potter, a magazine for serious potters. He'll talk about his childhood in India, learning his craft from some of the legends of New Hampshire pottery, and reflecting value in his art.

In 1859, Harriet Wilson, a black servant from Milford, New Hampshire, published an auto-biographical novel called Our Nig; or Sketches From the Life of A Free Black. It's the story of a black woman in the north who suffered great mistreatment at the hands of her employers. It was the first book to be published by a black woman in the United States. The book fell into obscurity almost immediately, but was resurrected by Henry Louis Gates Jr. of Harvard in 1983. The Harriet Wilson Project is now celebrating Wilson- trying to get a memorial built in Milford and holding an event on May 2nd featuring a keynote speech by Gates among other things. Dr. Gates joins us to talk about how he re-discovered the book and its importance. Barbara White, Professor Emerita from UNH, also joins us to talk about pre-Civil War Milford and Harriet Wilson's life.

The whiter the bread, the quicker you're dead. Beatrice Trum Hunter may not have coined that phrase, but she'd certainly agree with it. Long before Diet For a Small Planet and the Moosewood cookbooks, she was writing about food safety and nutrition. Her first book, The Natural Foods Cookbook, was published in 1961 and she's published over 20 since. Beatrice promotes natural, unprocessed foods above all else- think butter, not margarine, and stay away from the white flour and sugar. She was also an early activist against pesticides and helped Rachel Carson with research for Silent Spring.
Beatrice was also the daughter-in-law of the famous photographer, Lotte Jacobi. She met Lotte's son, John Hunter, in New York City during World War Two. All three of them moved to a parcel of countryside in Deering NH in 1955 and she's lived there ever since. These days she's still writing, helping organize the Jacobi archives at UNH, and she's taken up photography. Her pictures of ice crystals have been shown at many of the state's leading galleries.

Scott Brown's work as a negotiator and mediator has taken him around the world and to the heart of great conflicts; but none perhaps as intense as the ones faced on a daily basis in the average family. Scott's new book, How to Negotiate with Kids; Even when you think you shouldn't, applies lessons he's learned at the bargaining table to everyday disputes around the dinner table.