Ben Napier is the co-host of HGTV’s Home Town, Home Town Takeover, and Home Town Kickstart along with his wife Erin. In his third appearance on this podcast, Ben discusses the work he and Erin are doing with Osprey, a group they co-founded in 2023 that helps connect parents who want to limit screen time and social media access for their kids. Ben a…

Ashley Fairbanks is an Indigenous author, artist, and activist. Ashley is Anishinaabekwe from the White Earth Nation. She was raised in Minnesota and now lives in Texas. Her new children’s book This Land: The History of the Land We’re On serves as a great jumping off point for early readers, older kids, and even adults to begin to question who used…

Farah Assi was born in Southern Lebanon under Israeli occupation. Her family fled to Canada for some of her childhood, but returned to Lebanon during her teenage years. Farah’s father and extended family are still living in Southern Lebanon, often a few hundred yards from the sites of bombings. In this conversation, she shares about her childhood m…

Audrea Lim is the author of Free the Land: How We Can Fight Poverty and Climate Chaos. The issues of climate change, gentrification, racial inequity, and corporate greed are often treated as unrelated issues, but Audrea argues that they all share a common root: the commodification of land. She not only looks at how the American system of private pr…

Akilah Hughes is a comedian, author, and podcast host, known for her book Obviously: Stories from My Timeline, her YouTube channel, her amazing Twitter/X and Instagram feeds, and her nearly two year run hosting the daily news podcast What a Day for Crooked Media from 2019-2021. Akilah's latest podcast Rebel Spirit, investigates the history of how h…

Author Austin Frerick's new book Barons: Money, Power, and the Corruption of America's Food Industry looks at seven sectors of the American food system, profiling the company that dominates each of those markets. Some are familiar names like Cargill, Wal-Mart, and Driscoll’s. Others are foreign companies or giant conglomerates that are hardly house…

J.B. MacKinnon is a Vancouver-based author, journalist, and professor. His book The Day the World Stops Shopping operates on a simple thesis: gaming out how society, economies, and our lives would change if consumer culture disappeared overnight. When the global pandemic shutdown happened in 2020, suddenly the thesis had a real world example. J.B. …

Amanda Gelender is an American Jewish writer and poet currently based in the Netherlands. Amanda was raised in a progressive Jewish community, yet she was still only taught some of the truth about Israel and Palestine. It wasn’t until college that Amanda began to deconstruct what she had been taught and question her Zionist education. Amanda joins …

Tracie McMillan is a journalist and author of the new book The White Bonus: Five Families and the Cash Value of Racism in America. In the book, Tracie charts her own family’s history, plus follows the stories of four other white American families, to see how explicit government policies and implicit biases have led to massive amounts of wealth for …

Jenan Matari is a Palestinian-American content creator known for her popular Instagram page. She has amassed a large audience with her videos that explain the struggle of Palestinians before and since October 7. Jenan joins Heath to discuss the challenges of teaching children about a genocide, navigating capitalism, and what it means to have deep t…

Sarah-SoonLing Blackburn is an author, educator, and speaker. She is the author of the new young reader book Exclusion and the Chinese American Story, part of the Race to the Truth series. In the book, Sarah dives into the histories of Chinese Americans who contributed to the gold rush, the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad, and sharecr…

Dennis Kucinich is an Ohio politician who has served as Cleveland city councilor, mayor of Cleveland, Ohio state senator, and U.S. representative from 1997-2013. He was a presidential candidate in the democratic primary in 2004 and 2008. He is currently running for U.S. representative for Ohio’s 7th district as an independent. Dennis joins Heath to…

Sarah McCammon is NPR national political correspondent, co-host of The NPR Politics Podcast, and covered the 2016 Trump campaign for the White House. Her new book The Exvangelicals: Loving, Living, and Leaving the White Evangelical Church chronicles her personal faith journey, and similar paths of former Evangelicals who have since parted ways with…

Richard Rothstein is the author of The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America and Just Action: How to Challenge Segregation Enacted Under the Color of Law, which he cowrote with his daughter Leah Rothstein. Richard joins Heath to discuss some of the historical background of how we became such a segregated country…

Sarah Mock is a seasoned agricultural reporter and author of two books: Farm (and Other F Words): The Rise and Fall of the Small Family Farm and Big Team Farms: Growing Farms Differently. She is also the host and producer of the new podcast from Ambrook Research: The Only Thing That Lasts. Sarah was raised on a farm in Wyoming and has had agricultu…

Francisca Gajardo is a Chilean fashion designer who specializes in upcycling old clothing into new garments. She grew up in Northern Chile, near one of the largest clothing dumps in the world. She joins Heath to discuss what she's seen first-hand at the clothing dumps, how the second hand markets of Chile inspired her career in fashion design, and …

Richard Frishman and B. Brian Foster, Ph.D. are the duo behind the incredible new book Ghosts of Segregation: American Racism, Hidden in Plain Sight. Rich is an award-winning photojournalist who spent several years traveling the country, photographing signs of American racism in our built environment. Brian is a professor of sociology at the Univer…

Vishaan Chakrabarti is a New York based architect, the founder and creative director of PAU, the Practice for Architecture and Urbanism, and the author of the book A Country of Cities: A Manifesto for an Urban America, and the upcoming book The Architecture of Urbanity: Designing for Place, Pluralism, and Planet, scheduled to be released later this…

Director Melinda Maerker and producer David Clayton Miller are the duo behind the new Hulu documentary We Live Here: The Midwest, which looks at how Midwestern LGBTQ+ families are faring after increased discrimination in the Heartland. Melinda and David join Heath to discuss some of the behind the scenes stories from the film, including the origins…

Patric Richardson, also known as the Laundry Evangelist or The Laundry Guy, is back for his second appearance on the podcast. Patric joins Heath to discuss his new book House Love, which contains advice and ideas for sustainable cleaning methods. The book also helps timid homeowners and renters embrace using vintage items for decorating their homes…

Andrew Leland, a writer, journalist, audio producer, and podcast host. His new book The Country of the Blind: A Memoir at the End of Sight is a thoughtful and deep exploration of blindness, looking at both the personal and the societal implications of what it means to be without vision. In the book, Andrew visits a blind convention in Florida, a tr…

Brian Ruhlmann founded Craic Sauce as a side business in 2017. By 2020, he was able to focus full time on hot sauce. Brian's sauces are unique because he sources some of the best ingredients from local farms in Massachusetts and his sauces often involve more ingredients than in a conventional sauce, resulting in a ton of flavor. Brian joins Heath t…

Rebecca Clarren is a journalist who has spent the last 20 years documenting stories of Indigenous Americans. Rebecca’s reporting collides with her personal history in her new book The Cost of Free Land: Jews, Lakota, and an American Inheritance, which explores how her Jewish immigrant ancestors were gifted land by the U.S. government that had previ…

Kim John Payne is an educational consultant and author of several books including Simplicity Parenting: Using the Extraordinary Power of to Raise Calmer, Happier, More Secure Kids. For nearly three decades, Kim has served as a family counselor, consultant, and trainer for more than 200 public and independent schools. He believes that reducing the t…

Larissa FastHorse is a member of the Sicangu Lakota Nation and the first known Native American female playwright to have her work produced on Broadway. She wrote The Thanksgiving Play, a farcical look at four white people attempting to tell a culturally sensitive version of the Thanksgiving story to elementary students, which ran at the Hayes theat…

Taylor Lorenz has been chronicling digital culture and social media for The Daily Beast, The Atlantic, The New York Times, and her current role at The Washington Post. She has made her name as an expert and well-sourced documentarian of the latest trends and cultural relevance of platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Vine, and TikTok. Taylor j…

Beth Hoffman is an author, journalist, and farmer. She spent much of her adult life in the San Francisco area as a journalist focused on writing about food and agriculture and a professor at the University of San Francisco. In her late 40s, Beth and her husband John decided to return to his family farm in Iowa to work as full time farmers. From tha…

Saira Rao is an author, filmmaker, and activist. Along with Regina Jackson, Saira founded the group Race 2 Dinner in 2019, which encourages white women to have radically honest conversations about race. The dinners were so popular that Saira and Regina distilled their essence into the book White Women: Everything You Already Know About Your Own Rac…

Jane Wong is a poet, author, and professor of creative writing and literature at Western Washington University. Her new memoir Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City is a series of essays about her life experience. She joins Heath to discuss the strained relationship she's had with her father after he left the family because of a gambling addiction, the …

Sandra Goldmark is a theatrical set and costume designer, professor of sustainability at Barnard College, and the author of the book Fixation: How to Have Stuff Without Breaking the Planet. She joins Heath to discuss how owning things is part of being human, how her work as a theatrical designer informs her relationship to stuff, the parallels betw…

Jeff Jenkins is a travel blogger and influencer who founded Chubby Diaries after he noticed that there was a lack of content catering to plus size travelers. He has spent six years traveling the world now looking at ways to make travel more inclusive for all people. His new show Never Say Never premiered on Nat Geo and is now streaming on Disney+ a…

Luke Russert is the son of legendary Tim Russert of NBC News. When his father passed away unexpectedly in 2008, Luke followed in his father's footsteps, becoming a Capitol Hill reporter for NBC News. But it took him 8 years to realize that he wasn't fulfilled in that line of work. He then spent 3 years as a world traveler, visiting six continents t…

Christian Cooper began birding when he was a young child and it's been a lifelong passion. Based in New York City, he frequents Central Park to watch for migrating species. After a viral incident in 2020, Christian was thrust into the spotlight, which he has turned into positive projects. His new show Extraordinary Birder recently premiered on Nat …

Mark Ellison has been a New York City based carpenter for more than 40 years, working on some of the most custom renovation projects for some of the wealthiest people on the planet. He joins Heath to discuss his new book Building: A Carpenter’s Notes on Life & the Art of Good Work, which describes his philosophy on building and life and recounts th…

Ben Napier is the co-host of HGTV's Home Town and Home Town Takeover. He joins Heath to discuss the work that he and his wife Erin have done to make their hometown of Laurel, Mississippi a thriving city. He also talks about how he's taken the lessons learned in Laurel and translated them to Wetumpka, Alabama and Fort Morgan, Colorado. In addition t…

Nick Offerman is an actor, woodworker, author, and touring humorist. On the 100th episode of the podcast, Nick joins Heath to discuss his approach to comedy in his live stage show, his scholarship of the works of Wendell Berry, and why he thinks nearly all of our problems can be solved with love. Get full access to Willoughby Hills at heathracela.s…

Matt Sexton is a landscape and drone photographer who began taking pictures of landmarks around his hometown of Cleveland during the pandemic. He has gained a fast following on social media for the optimistic portrait that he paints of the city as well as for how he looks to other world cities to make Cleveland a better place. Matt joins Heath to d…

Bethanee Bemis is a museum specialist at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and the curator of the new exhibit Mirror, Mirror: Reflections of America in Disney Parks. She’s also the author of the book Disney Theme Parks and America’s National Narratives, Mirror Mirror For Us All. She joins Heath to discuss how Disney has reflecte…

Architect Sarah Susanka is the author of the Not So Big House series of books, which advocate for building smaller homes of a higher quality, rather than focusing solely on square footage. She joins Heath to discuss 25 years since the publication of her first book, the parallels between a Not So Big House and the New Urbanist movement, and her own …

Architecture and design critic Alexandra Lange is the author of “Meet Me By the Fountain: An Inside History of the Mall.” She joins Heath to discuss the problems malls tried to solve, strange modern malls like New Jersey’s American Dream, and why malls hold so much potential for our future needs. Get full access to Willoughby Hills at heathracela.s…

Alejandra Ramos is a chef, food writer, and television personality who hosts the new PBS competitive cooking series The Great American Recipe. Alejandra joins Heath to discuss the filming of her new show during the pandemic, the evolving definition of American food, plus her journey to sharing recipes on TV and her work as a contirbutor to TODAY. T…

Elizabeth Almeida is the founder and owner of Fat Moon Mushrooms, a certified organic grower in the Boston area. She joins Heath to discuss how she kept her mushroom farm afloat during the pandemic, the importance of a resilient local food system, and the wisdom waiting to be discovered in the forest. This is a public episode. If you would like to …

Jennifer Reitman founded DAME Magazine as a woman-owned and operated online publication with smart features about contemporary issues. She joins Heath to discuss the challenges of running an independent media company, how she finds and cultivates talented writers, dealing with the exhaustion that many readers feel from the news, and the role of soc…

For more than 30 years, Wally Feresten has played an important role in iconic comedy shows like Saturday Night Live, Late Night with Seth Meyers, and the Amber Ruffin Show, where he leads the team that writes and holds the cue cards for every episode. Wally joins Heath to discuss the technical aspects of the job, what it's been like appearing in fr…

Dr. Steven Gundry was a cardiothoracic surgeon before focusing his practice on how diet can cause or prevent certain autoimmune diseases. He joins Heath to talk about Heath's experience with the Plant Paradox diet over the last sixth months and he also shares research from his new book Unlocking the Keto Code. This is a public episode. If you would…

UK-based puppeteer Warrick Brownlow-Pike is best known in the US for playing Gonger on Sesame Street, but he's also had a long career on CBBC playing Dodge the Dog and other characters. Warrick joins Heath to discuss puppeteering at home durng the quarantine, plus how he developed his craft from an early age, and how he got to Sesame Street. This i…

After a long hiatus, Heath returns for a conversation with maker Jimmy DiResta to discuss his new Netflix series Making Fun. Jimmy talks about how the show originated with an Instagram post, the challenges of getting it made during the pandemic, and his thoughts on being his own boss and living on a farm in Upstate New York. This is a public episod…

In today's episode for sixteenth Gregorian calendar month 2021, we have a tendency to discuss the acquisition of SolarCity and see why Musk is being created to testify in court.

House flippers and renovators Jon Pierre and Mary Tjon-Joe-Pin return to HGTV this month with their new series Two Steps Home. They join Heath to discuss filming the show during the pandemic, giving up their full time jobs to become house flippers, their path to HGTV stardom, and working with Erin and Ben Napier on Home Town Takeover in Wetumpka, A…

Richard Lui has covered breaking news as both a reporter and anchor for NBC News, MSNBC, and CNN. He's also taken on the role of caregiver to his father in San Francisco, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. Richard joins Heath to discuss juggling a career and family obligations, being one of the few employees allowed at 30 Rock during the p…