Traveling with Twain

In Search of America's Identity

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Ihsan Bagby: Islam in the United States is Islam’s Future Worldwide

An African-American born in Cleveland who “grew up in the ‘hood,” Ihsan Bagby says he had rejected Christianity by his junior year in high school. “I thought I had rejected God,” he adds, but in 1969, … Read more >>

Lexington Herald-Leader columnist Merlene Davis pessimistic about true equality

On a Friday afternoon, Merlene Davis is playfully cussing out John Carroll, her former editor. We’re in a cold first-floor conference room of the Lexington Herlad-Leader, and Carroll had recommended we talk to Davis during our … Read more >>

Former Lexington Herald editor John Carroll: ‘It was really bad what the paper did’

Though best known for his ten years as editor of The Baltimore Sun and five years as editor of the Los Angeles Times (during which the staff won 13 Pulitzers), John S. Carroll can speak about … Read more >>

Cincinnati: A city of immigrants and free African Americans

For the two hours we have to spend in Cincinnati we focus on food and a photo. The photo, an amazing 1848 daguerreotype view from across the Ohio River, details two miles of the Cincinnati waterfront … Read more >>

A long drive—but with stops for an old friend, a memorial, and a dying industry town

Today’s Washington-to-Pittsburgh drive is a typical dawn-to-dusk Twain-tripper—drive three hours, interview someone, drive half an hour, visit a national memorial, drive two hours, walk a town, drive an hour, stop for the night. But the someone … Read more >>