NPR Staff

On May 13, 1985, after a long standoff, Philadelphia municipal authorities dropped a bomb on a residential row house. The Osage Avenue home was the headquarters of the African-American radical group MOVE, which had confronted police on many occasions since the group's founding in 1972.

The resulting fire killed 11 ...

Amid the across-the-board budget cuts known as sequestration and a general belt-tightening mood among many on Capitol Hill, the Pentagon is being asked to reduce its spending after a decade of increases.

Some argue that even with cutbacks, the U.S. spends far more than other countries on defense, and that ...

Some believe that there are only four Rolling Stones, but then some say there's a fifth: keyboardist Chuck Leavell. He's been on tours with the band for more than 30 years — but that hasn't been his only gig. At 20, he was asked to join The Allman ...

In the Mercer County Courthouse in Trenton, N.J., John Saunders, a jury manager, spends his weekdays shepherding potential jurors. Much of what he tells them regards the paraphernalia of 21st century life: cellphones, tablets and laptops. These are OK to use in the waiting room, he tells them. "We realize ...

Macy Gray says the whole point of being an artist is not having any limits or constraints — unless you put them on yourself. Many people know Gray for her unique voice and the 1999 hit single "I Try." Now, 14 years later, she's gone multiplatinum, won a Grammy Award, ...

Louise Monaghan's journey to Syria to rescue her kidnapped daughter begins years ago at a club in Cyprus. It was there she met a Syrian man named Mostafa, whom she would marry.

"I was smitten from the first second," she tells NPR's Jacki Lyden. "I felt he was what I ...

DJ Betto Arcos joins weekends on All Things Considered once again to share the music he's been spinning on Global Village, a world music program out of KPFK in Los Angeles. Picks this time are from Brazil, and include some socially conscious samba, a bilingual reggae tune, a hometown anthem ...

This week, we've been immersed in news about mobs both real and fictional, with the death of Sopranos star James Gandolfini and the continuing trial of James "Whitey" Bulger.

The Sopranos gave us a primer on mob language like "clipping" a "rat." But Bulger's Winter Hill Gang and his Boston ...

Each week, Weekend Edition Sunday host Rachel Martin brings listeners an unexpected side of the news by talking with someone personally affected by the stories making headlines.

Entrepreneur Dame Stephanie Shirley started a software company in 1962. FI Group, now known as Xansa, was "a company of women, a company ...

The Supreme Court is expected to rule this week on a case that may shake up race-conscious admissions in higher education. The justices could change the shape of affirmative action or even strike it down altogether.

California is one of eight states that have already scrapped affirmative action. That means ...

Most NFL punters spend the majority of their time focusing on one thing: kicking the ball, and kicking it well. But Chris Kluwe — the most successful punter the Minnesota Vikings ever had and now signed to Oakland — has a few other things on his mind. Like bad drivers, ...

Back in 2005, Norwegian musician Jarle Bernhoft was known for a hard rock sound: His band at the time, SPAN, was sort of like Norway's Foo Fighters. But Bernhoft, who plays multiple instruments, in addition to singing and composing, had a nagging feeling he wanted to make a ...

One hundred and fifty years ago this week, West Virginia became the 35th state in the union.

Born in in 1863, the middle of the Civil War, the state was created by patriots who didn't want to join the Confederacy — no mean feat considering the political climate of the ...

Working its way through the Ohio Legislature is a state budget bill that has major implications for the way family-planning services are provided. The Ohio budget contains language that puts family-planning clinics at the bottom of the list to receive funding.

Family Planning Association of Northeast Ohio operates several independent ...

Jimmy Eat World is perhaps best known for its hit "The Middle." The peppy tune, released in November 2011, may have been just what an America recovering from the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, needed. But the band's timeline extends for years in both directions; this year it ...

Sofia Coppola is no stranger to filmic explorations of fame, privilege and self-loathing in the modern age. In her newest movie, The Bling Ring, she considers the case of a gang of well-off L.A. teenagers whose obsession with celebrity took them to some unexpected places — including the homes of ...

The great Nat King Cole had many firsts. He was the first African-American musician to have his own show — on network radio, then television. He was also one of the first, if not the first American artist to record an album in Spanish: Cole Español. It was a huge, ...

Grown-ups, if you've read a thriller recently, there's a good chance it was written by James Patterson. One in 5 adult thriller hardcovers sold these days carries his name on the cover.

But younger readers are likely to find themselves paging through a Patterson, too — and not because they've ...

In July, NPR's Backseat Book Club is heading to Hanging Moss, Miss., and boy, is it hot. Hanging Moss is the setting for Glory Be, by Augusta Scattergood. The time is 1964, and this coming-of-age story intersects with the country's own coming of age during the civil rights ...

In 1963, civil rights activists wanted to recruit more of the city's young people to the cause. The way to their hearts was often through DJs and music. These days, Shelley "The Playboy" Stewart is the head of a major marketing firm, but in the 1950s and '60s, he was ...