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Fergus Stone worked with community radio station KGNU in many capacities from its early years on, including as a sound engineer, program and production coordinator, and a DJ. He gives a detailed account of the station’s history and the philosophical underpinnings of its programming. He discusses many of the people involved in running the station over the years and recounts some of the ups and downs experienced as the station made its way from infancy to maturity.

Marge Taniwaki was involved with KGNU radio station: bringing Latin-American news to the listening audience and, with her husband Leo Griep-Ruiz, producing the program “La Lucha Sigue.” Marge also served two three-year terms on the board of KGNU. This interview touches on KGNU but details Marge’s personal and family history. Her maternal great-great grandfather arrived in the U.S. from Japan in 1860; he was part of a delegation to establish commercial trade. Because of his diary, which was translated into English, Marge has insight into specific stories and her grandfather’s private thoughts. Speaking about her father, Marge describes his arrival in the U.S., jobs, and even an association with Charlie Chaplin. Much of the oral history focuses on the time following Pearl Harbor and the outbreak of World War II, when her family—being of Japanese descent—was imprisoned at Manzanar, near Death Valley in California. Marge was seven months old when her family was placed there for a duration of four years. She describes her specific memories and the extreme conditions of that existence. She also talks about relatives’ experiences in WWII; for example, a cousin was drafted into the Japanese imperial army and was in Hiroshima when the atom bomb was dropped. After Manzanar was closed, in the fall of 1945, the Taniwaki family was not allowed to return to their Los Angeles home; they traveled by train to Denver because a family friend had started a soy-sauce factory in the city. Marge goes into her upbringing, issues that have galvanized her time and attention, and her involvement in radical groups. Marge has been active in many areas of progressive action, and she has worked with the Friends of Amache on reconstruction of the Camp Amache site Granada, Colorado.

One vertical file that contains information clipped from newspapers, magazines, and other publications on: the history of telecommunication in Boulder, including telephone service, and local radio and television stations. Included is information about radio stations KBOL, KBVL, KBCO and KGNU and television station Channel 54, Channel 4-KCNC as well as the radio program E-town.