Meet Joe Palca: A Radio Story About Making Radio Stories

Joe Palca is one of the best science storytellers out there. In his 20 years as an NPR science correspondent he’s covered all sorts of obscure topics, from soccer-playing robots and oyster glue to turtle paleontology. He finds the humor in the serious and the thoughtful in the funny, usually by focusing on the human elements of stories. “Stories are usually about people, those are the ones we remember. We don’t remember stories about transuranic elements,” Palca says. We took this episode of Distillations on the road and visited Palca at NPR headquarters in Washington, D.C., where we got a behind-the-scenes tour of his program, Joe’s Big Idea. CREDITS: Hosts: Michal Meyer and Bob Kenworthy Reporter, Producer & Editor: Mariel Carr MUSIC: “Converge To Some Centre”- We Are All Alone   “Where the Magic Happens”- THERE “Teletransportation” - Coma Stereo “Elsewhere” - Phonotrash “Solutions” - Lee Rosevere “Tragic”- Semyon All songs from the Free Music Archive, freemusicarchive.org    Check out Distillations magazine at distillations.org, where you'll find articles, videos, and our podcast.