Blanket Fort Radio Theater: Recent Episodes
Amy Etcheson
SIU Press and WSIU present Blanket Fort Radio Theater, a project highlighting works published by SIU Press. This series includes work from students in the SIUC Creative Writing Program, who have taken SIU Press books and brought them to life. Join us each Thursday for a new installment of Blanket Fort Radio Theater.Inside the Blanket Fort features special segments: Meet the producers, get previews and reviews of episodes, and get a special glimpse behind the blankets.
This week on Blanket Fort Radio Theater, it's the final installment of "The Undaunted Women of Nanking." In this final episode, we witness the aftermath of the Japanese occupation of Nanking and explore the lives of the Undaunted Women as they attempt to find peace after the horrors they have witnessed.
This week on Blanket Fort Radio Theater's production of "The Undaunted Women of Nanking," fresh water and beautiful weather lift spirits at Ginling as Bible classes and group prayers continue. More refugees arrive from the country, and efforts continue to reunite them with their families. Ginling begins mass vaccination of its refugees, but some are resistant.
Fresh water and beautiful weather lift spirits at Ginling as Bible classes and group prayers continue. More refugees arrive from the country, and efforts continue to reunite them with their families. Ginling begins mass vaccination of its refugees, but some are resistant.
This week on Blanket Fort Radio Theater's production of "The Undaunted Women of Nanking," Bible classes resume, and Minnie obtains books for her students. Tsen worries about illness in the camp and the distribution of vital supplies, but her caregiving efforts are rewarded. Meanwhile, more refugees arrive at Ginling, having escaped Japanese soldiers.
Efforts to dissolve the safety zone and its protections begin, and the closure of other camps brings a new influx of refugees to Ginling. Increased sanitary measures are instituted to help prevent the spread of disease. Meanwhile, Minnie Vautrin tracks the aircraft activity overhead.
With the arrival of spring, the women must confront the problem of waste disposal at Ginling in order to avoid the spread of disease. As Vautrin and Tsen say goodbye to a beloved foreign humanitarian, they recall the initial occupation of Nanking and discuss their hope for future projects at the College.
Continued good weather and the arrival of mail and food from Shanghai lift the women’s spirits. However, the bombing and looting continues, and Tsen Shui-fang surveys the destruction in the southern part of Nanking. Meanwhile, Minnie visits a prison and collects more stories.
Vautrin oversees the coming and going of refugees, some of whom have returned to Ginling after being assaulted in their homes by Japanese soldiers. Tsen focuses on logistical work, documenting the stockpile of food and the recent births and deaths in the camp.
Efforts to return to normalcy abound, Vautrin and Tsen find it difficult to reckon with their trauma. The beauty of the coming spring clashes with accounts of ongoing brutality. Meanwhile, the women hear rumors of Chinese nationalist troops approaching Nanking.
This week on Blanket Fort Radio Theater's production of "The Undaunted Women of Nanking," on the date refugees are ordered to leave Ginling, Minnie, though ill, oversees their departure while Tsen continues her work to acquire more medicine, and to document the births and deaths in the camp.
Vautrin and Tsen prepare, against their wishes, to send refugees away from Ginling. Tsen laments the women’s malnutrition, while Vautrin, witnessing continued attacks by Japanese soldiers, wonders what can be done to protect the women after they leave.
In the days leading up to the Lunar New Year, more arrangements are made for when the refugees will be ordered to return to their homes. Church services continue. Minnie still awaits mail from home as she and Mrs. Tsen prepare for New Year celebrations.
Vautrin and Tsen survey the horrific conditions of the city and campus, and Minnie worries about vendors selling looted goods in the safety zone. Refugees plan to celebrate the approaching Lunar New Year, andmore mail arrives.
Former abductees return to the city, bringing stories of their treatment at the hands of Japanese soldiers and their harrowing escapes. Minnie Vautrin continues her efforts to locate the missing families of refugee women, who have continued to return home despite conditions remaining unsafe.
The refugees continue to find comfort in church services as the weather worsens. Minnie assists refugee women in attempting to locate their missing husbands and sons. She and Shui-fang have a disagreement, but unexpected mail brings joy.
In the midst of an eerie calm at Ginling, Minnie struggles to cope with and move past the horrors she has witnessed. Meanwhile, Mrs. Tsen recovers from her illness. Church sermons bring fragile hope to the refugees and administrators alike.
Ginling College continues its cautious transition into peacetime, but Mrs. Tsen remains ill. We learn more of Minnie’s experience during the Nanking Incident and the impact of the Incident on Ginling.
A tenuous peace settles in the safety zone as more refugees return to their homes, hoping to salvage what they can. Tsen Shui-fang falls ill, and Ginling deals with food shortages.
As continued cold weather threatens occupied Nanking, Minnie and Shui-fang rejoice at the arrival of foreign diplomats. However, they are reminded that life has not returned to normalcy.
Minnie and Shui-fang manage to receive word of some of the horrors that continue to occur outside the safety zone, and they hope that their correspondence will reach its destination. Meanwhile, the residents of Ginling College attempt to recover from illness and exhaustion.
Religious services are revived in Nanking, just in time for the residents of Ginling College to celebrate the Chinese New Year. Chinese civilians continue to register themselves with the Japanese army, under the impression that it will protect them. Meanwhile, the Chinese government begins bombing the city. Minnie finds comfort in religion, while Shui-fang struggles to see past the ongoing horrors.
The registration of Chinese civilians continues as the first discussions of a postwar government take place. Japanese soldiers continue to block the entrances of the city and cut off communication. Meanwhile, the refugees at Ginling College do their best to celebrate the New Year.
Two weeks after the invasion, the Japanese army begins its effort to register all refugees in an attempt to identify and capture Chinese soldiers. Refugee numbers at Ginling continue to shrink, but the fires burn on, and bodies fill the streets. Minnie Vautrin and Tsen Shui-fang fear the purpose of the registration of women.
A period of relative peace settles over Ginling College in the days following Christmas. Refugees begin to leave the camp, but it remains overcrowded and unsanitary. The stress of protecting the camp takes a physical toll on Minnie.
Minnie negotiates with the Japanese military advisor, on Christmas Eve, about the ongoing abductions of women from the refugee camp. While the numbers of soldiers invading Ginling is slightly reduced, communications are still impossible and the growing cold worsens living conditions. Minnie finds a sliver of hope on Christmas Day.
As Christmas approaches, the atrocities continue and food becomes more and more scarce. We learn of Minnie Vautrin’s harrowing experience during the Nanking Incident in 1926 and her role in the preservation of Ginling College.
Minnie Vautrin describes the horrors she witnesses on the streets of Nanking as she continues to report the atrocities of the soldiers to the Japanese consulate. She and Tsen Shui-fang attempt to restore some order in the Ginling camp, which now holds thousands of refugees and remains without a method of communication with the outside world.
Food scarcity, looting, and daily incursions on Ginling College by the Japanese soldiers and military police enrage and demoralize Minnie Vautrin and Tsen Shui-fang as they attempt to protect their refugees and resources. Minnie Vautrin meets with the Japanese consul and shows him the inhumane conditions in the Ginling camp.
We hear Tsen Shui-fang’s account of the previous episode’s events. Having failed to prevent the assault of Ginling College by the Japanese soldiers, she and Minnie Vautrin take stock of the camp in the aftermath. They hope to expand the camp to make more room for the overcrowded refugees as the Japanese soldiers abduct yet more women.
The days following the fall of Nanking see the the city become a shell of its former self. Japanese soldiers enter the safety zone and conduct a thorough search of Ginling College campus under the pretext of searching for Chinese army deserters. Despite the best efforts of Minnie Vautrin and Tsen Shui-fang, the soldiers take food, money, and clothing from the refugees, and abduct several young women.
Nanking has fallen and Japanese soldiers invade the city, looting and burning as they go. At Ginling College in the safety zone, communications with the outside world are limited. Tsen Shui-fang receives yet more refugees who have been forced out of their homes, while Minnie Vautrin attempts to guard the gates of Ginling against growing numbers of Japanese soldiers searching for young women to abduct.
We hear from both Minnie Vautrin and Tsen Shui-fang in the days leading up to the Japanese occupation of Nanking. Overwhelmed by refugees, they must adapt their original plans for the camp at Ginling College under the constant threat of artillery. As the city burns around them, they care for wounded refugees and fortify their camp against the encroaching enemy army.
We are introduced to Tsen Shui-fang, a nurse and administrator of Ginling College during the Japanese occupation of Nanking. While other college and government officials fled the city, she remained at her post, opening the college campus to refugees and assisting humanitarian Minnie Vautrin in caring for thousands of women and children.
In this first episode we learn about Illinois native Minnie Vautrin and Tsen Shui-fang as they provide shelter to thousands of women and children in the aftermath of the 1937 Japanese occupation of Nanking, China.
In this concluding episode Tom Odle offers his final reflections on his past, his present, and his future.
Tom Odle describes life after the death penalty moratorium, and the process of working, getting an education, and interacting with other inmates in prison.
Tom Odle describes life after the death penalty moratorium, and the process of working, getting an education, and interacting with other inmates in prison.
Tom Odle endures the appeals process and the Illinois death penalty comes under fire after a series of wrongful convictions.
Tom's mental status at the time of the murders is discussed during the pretrial hearings.
Tom Odle briefly enters the army before being discharged, an act that sets his downward spiral in motion.
Tom Odle describes his senior year of high school and meeting a girl that would have a big impact on his life.
The Illinois Department of Children and Family Services removes Tom’s brother Sean from the Odle family home.
In Episode 1, Tom Odle contemplates memories of his early childhood and his relationship with his mother.
Author Gary DeNeal reveals his inspiration for writing A Knight of Another Sort—in particular, the way in which his family’s personal connection to the Birger gang sparked a lifelong fascination with southern Illinois’ history.
Author Gary DeNeal reveals his inspiration for writing A Knight of Another Sort—in particular, the way in which his family’s personal connection to the Birger gang sparked a lifelong fascination with southern Illinois’ history.
The stories of Charlie Birger, the Sheltons, their men, and their adversaries don’t end after the trials, the sentences, or even the hangings. Several men outlast their years in prison. Some fall to enemy bullets. Some vanish into obscurity or old age. But a few—like Charlie Birger—leave us with a legacy that has survived a hundred years and may well survive a hundred more.
The murder trial of Ethel Price concludes, Arlie O. Boswell and other prominent officials stand trial for violating the Volstead Act, and members of the Birger gang set the record straight who was responsible for the destruction of Shady Rest.
On April 19th, 1928, Charlie Birger is executed for his crimes, marking the last public hanging in Illinois. After his death, the trial of the accused murderers of Ethel Price begins.
Until the day of his hanging is upon him, Charlie Birger spends the last months of his life behind bars.
On October 21st, 1927—a year after the murder of Ward “Casey” Jones—Birger gangman Rado Millich mounts the gallows, reads aloud his final words, and is hanged.
The testimony of Jesse Cremer, a witness to the murder of Joe Adams, results in the conviction of Harry Thomasson. In August 1927, Sheriff Coleman arrests Fred “Butch” Thomasson and Joe Booher for the murder of Lyle “Shag” Worsham. Meanwhile, Arlie Boswell is again fired upon by, he believes, members of the Birger gang.
At trial, Art Newman’s schemes are expected to ensure convictions for Charlie Birger and Ray Hyland, leading the men’s attorneys to mount a weak defense. While Newman and Hyland receive life imprisonment, Birger’s hanging is scheduled for October 14th.
Charlie Birger’s trial unfolds, captivating the entire town, from reporters to small children. Witnesses to the gangsters’ crimes tell story after story of their harrowing ordeals.
After a brief trial full of conflicting testimony, two Birger gang members, Eural Gowan and Rado Millich, are convicted of killing Ward “Casey” Jones.
Birger and his gang members confess to numerous crimes and murders, including the gruesome killing of an innocent witness, Ethel Price. As the truth comes out, shaking Southern Illinois to its core, Birger attentively watches the trials’ outcomes, aware of his own precarious fate.
The Thomasson brothers confess to the murder of Joe Adams and recount the details of the crime, revealing the roles of Charlie Birger and Art Newman.
All three Shelton brothers are sentenced to 25 years in prison for the mail robbery in Collinsville; meanwhile, the body of patrolman Lory Price is found. Charlie Birger is arrested at his home, and Arlie Boswell is attacked and threatened by an anonymous letter.
Shady Rest is destroyed in an explosion and four bodies are found at the scene. Soon after, state highway patrolman Lory Price, who remarked that he had seen Charlie Birger, Art Newman, and Connie Ritter driving toward the scene that night, goes missing along with his pregnant wife Ethel. Charlie Birger testifies against the Sheltons in the trial for the Collinsville mail robbery.
With the murder of Joe Adams and the theft of a local reverend’s brand new red Chevrolet, the Birger gang’s criminal disruptions have pushed the law to its limit, and authorities devise a plot to arrest Charlie for good.
A bank robbery, attacks on Shady Rest, home bombings, and even the murder of a mayor: the squabbles between Birger’s gang and his enemies grow increasingly violent as Birger’s notoriety spreads.
When Birger and his gang have scores to settle, dressing in drag might be their best option to take care of their dirty business. Meanwhile, Birger resorts to threats of violence to keep the doings of his gang under wraps.
The war between the Birger and Shelton gangs rages on, with Charlie Birger desperate to get his hands on the Sheltons’ prized tank. In October, the bodies of two gangsters are discovered, with no culprits in sight.
Summer and fall of 1926 sees several attacks and murders in quick succession between the Birger and Shelton gangs. The Sheltons’ attack on their former friend Art Newman and his wife Bessie causes Newman to reconsider his allegiances.
Relations between Birger and the Sheltons break down, owing to a variety of circumstances, including Birger’s refusal to pay the Sheltons their cut of the proceeds from local slot machines. Tensions in Williamson County are nearing a breaking point.
New Illinois Supreme Court rulings force Attorney Arlie Boswell to dismiss dozens of liquor cases. In 1926, a Herrin election sparks another battle between the Klan and bootleggers, which spells the ending of the Klan’s influence in Southern Illinois.
One of a string of burglaries south of Harrisburg in 1925 leads to the arrest and trial of one of Birger’s most notorious gangsters, a man known by the pseudonym “Steve George.” In 1926, Birger marries his new wife, Bernice.
A shootout ensues when Earl Shelton’s bulldog kills Charlie Birger’s in a dogfight, one of the common forms of entertainment at the bootlegger’s hideout, Shady Rest.
After escaping suspicion in the investigation of a bloody shootout, Charlie Birger serves a month in jail for possessing intoxicating liquor and then, a free man again, builds his most notorious entertainment complex, Shady Rest.
As dangers mount, Beatrice Birger draws away from her husband, but Charlie is obsessively desperate to keep her.
On March 26, 1924, Charlie Birger is found guilty on several bootlegging-related charges and sentenced to a year in prison. Meanwhile, Carl and Earl Shelton ambush S. Glenn Young and his wife and take part in a Herrin shootout.
In December of 1923, a war sparks between bootleggers and law enforcement, many of whom are prominent Klan members. When Carl and Earl Shelton are indicted for the murder of one of these members, they seek out an alliance with Klan-connected Marion attorney Arlie O. Boswell.
After escaping another murder conviction, Charlie Birger is injured in a fight but recovers in a hospital in Herrin, where his wife Beatrice encounters one of his mistresses for the first time.
A complicated man to say the least, bootlegger and murderer Charlie Birger gains a reputation among locals for extreme acts of kindness. However, his deadly temper always lurks beneath the surface.
After Charlie Birger establishes the profitable “Near Bar” in town, Beatrice recalls her husband’s ability to “operate with minimum of interference” due to his weekly payoffs of certain local law enforcement.
In the summer of 1919, Charlie Birger meets and marries 18-year-old Beatrice Bainbridge in Harrisburg, much to the dismay of her parents. Beatrice becomes the reluctant stepmother of Charlie’s daughter Minnie, and the three of them take up residence in Harrisburg.
When police raid a local saloon, Charlie Birger uses it as an opportunity to take down one of his competitors in the liquor business, but not everything goes to plan.
In 1913, southern Illinois bootlegger and former cowboy Charlie Birger moves to the small mining community of Ledford, where he quickly ingratiates himself by selling liquor to the locals and providing them with employment.
In this episode, we meet Charlie as he emigrates from Russia to America, escapes a murder conviction, and settles in southern Illinois, his home for the rest of his life.
WSIU's Jennifer Fuller talks with SIU Press Interim Co-Director Amy Etcheson and SIU Senior Fiction Writer Pinckney Benedict about the new Blanket Fort Radio Theater - a new podcast collaboration between WSIU, SIU Press, and SIUC's Creative Writing Program.