Powering the civil rights movement, one plate of soul food at a time

Georgia Gilmore's underground network of home cooks sold food across Montgomery, Ala., then funneled the money to Martin Luther King Jr. and others running a boycott of the city's buses – all without raising the suspicions of their white employers.

Jane Arraf/NPR After ISIS took dozens of his relatives prisoner, this Yazidi beekeeper became a search-and-rescue specialist Abdullah Shrim worked first with cigarette smugglers, then built up a network of bakeries. The door-to-door saleswomen they hired were able to get into homes, identify kidnapped women and children, and help them make a plan to escape. ISIS killed six of his operatives and the group regularly threatens to kill him. "But I think my life is worth nothing compared to a tear from the eye of a 12-year-old girl who has been raped," he says. Olivier Douliery/Pool/Getty Images A failure, a divider, a friend to the rich: how Americans see Trump after one year in office Respondents to a new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll had mostly harsh things to say about the president, disapproving of his tax plan, his tweets, and his impacts on U.S. race relations, health care and much more. His base is still solidly behind him, but likely can't carry many Republicans to wins in November. Courtesy of BMJ Case Reports Don’t stifle that sneeze No, your eyes won’t pop out, but you can really injure yourself — as this instance of a man rupturing his throat shows. The air that sneeze would have blasted forth instead made its way into his soft tissue as tiny bubbles. It’s not surprising, given that our sneezes spray out at 40 miles per hour AP A civil rights-era bus boycott required a new transit network — and a way to pay for it. That’s where Georgia Gilmore came in. Selling pound cakes and sweet potato pies, fried fish and stewed greens, pork chops and rice, Gilmore and her secret cell of home cooks funded the cars that kept Montgomery’s black residents moving until buses were officially desegregated. And all under the noses of their white bosses and landlords. That is, until Gilmore’s bold testimony at boycott leader Martin Luther King Jr.’s trial John Minchillo/AP At first it was a struggle to keep her alive, but today this prematurely born hippo is fat and happy When Fiona was born at the Cincinnati Zoo a year ago, she weighed 29 pounds. Most newborn hippopotamuses weigh two to four times as much. But she survived, thrived and became an Internet sensation. Today she weighs a healthy 650 pounds. She proves right the hundreds of young letter-writers, themselves born premature, who told Fiona: "I made it, and you will, too." You received this message because you're subscribed to our Best of NPR emails. |  Unsubscribe  |  Privacy Policy | NPR 1111 N. CAPITOL ST. NE WASHINGTON DC 20002