The
Public Media Foundation, a tax-exempt, non-profit
organization, was founded in 1979. In 1991 the PMF
began producing The Radio Play in cooperation
with New Voices. This was a series of new plays
and dramatizations of classic American literature
for broadcast on National Public Radio and on the
BBC World Service.
In
1993 the organizational mission changed and the
PMF began producing dramatizations of short stories
by American women writers of the 19th and early
20th centuries entitled Scribbling Women
- a title taken with intentional irony from a letter
a resentful Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote to his publisher
in 1855. The plays are distributed nationwide by
National Public Radio.
In
1997 the PMF published the Scribbling Women
Multi-Media Education Kit,
ten of the dramatizations packaged in an album accompanied
by a user and teacher guide
written by Lucinda H. MacKethan and James A. Miller.
Professors Miller and MacKethan worked closely with
our high school teacher advisors on the preparation
and design of the curriculum materials.
In
January 1999, with funding support from the Corporation
for Public Broadcasting, the PMF created this web
based Scribbling Women distance learning
program.
In
2001 the web site was selected by the National Endowment
for the Humanities as one of the "best online resources
in the country for education in the humanities."
In December 2001, The New York Times selected the
web site as "Web Site of the Day." The Radio
Play and the Scribbling Women project
have received two awards from The New York International
Festival's Award: a Silver Medal for Best Drama
Special for its production of '89
by Stanley Richardson and a Bronze Medal for Best
Sound for its production of "Life in the
Iron Mills" by Rebecca Harding Davis, dramatized
by Karen Cronacher. The sound engineer for "Life
in the Iron Mills" was Jeff Whitehead.
Funding
for the Scribbling Women dramatizations
and for the preparation of curriculum
and lesson plans has been awarded by state humanities
councils in Connecticut, Iowa, Louisiana, Maryland,
Massachusetts, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina
and South Carolina.
From
the beginning of the project the PMF has been ably
supported by a distinguished Advisory
Committee. As will be seen, the members of this
committee come from a wide range of states bringing
diversity as well as valuable advice to the Scribbling
Women project.
Valerie
Henderson
Executive Producer
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