Tacoma is a pretty special place. We don’t want to romanticize it — it’s complicated, like anywhere. But it does have this quality of openness, a willingness to let people in.
That’s exactly what the Sound Effect team did on Saturday. Gabriel Spitzer hosted a special, live show from KNKX Public Radio’s new downtown Tacoma station, while strangers wandered around on self-guided tours of the space.
And the doors will stay open long past Saturday's grand opening. The new station offers a place to convene community conversations, share culture and just meet up.
In honor of our debut at 930 Broadway, the latest episode of Sound Effect is all about Tacoma.
First, a KNKX colleague takes us inside Tacoma's most romantic hidden gem. Then, we meet the Northwest's friendliest raccoons and the park ranger tasked with teaching Tacomans to love them from a distance. We hear from a Tacoma earthquake survivor who remains grateful to a boy who died saving his life decades ago. We discover the family affair that is Tacoma’s alcohol service industry. Tacoma’s first African-American mayor discusses the heartbreak of racism. Finally, we’ll learn about a Tacoma-based newspaper that was part of the GI underground movement.
If you missed Saturday's broadcast, catch up on the stories we aired about arborists searching for Washington’s tallest trees, a refugee who finds family in Tacoma, a man whose life was saved by a typo, and a singer whose "crisis of faith" transported him to a new — but familiar — platform.
