Twenty-five years ago, Art Spiegelman created his Pulitzer Prize-winning book Maus. In this documentary-style book trailer, Spiegelman talks about the creation of this classic and we get to preview the soon-to-be-released MetaMaus which explores the materials that he used to write Maus and answers some of the most commonly asked questions about the author's creative process. Metamaus will be sold with a companion DVD that contains a digitized reference copy of The Complete Maus featuring audio interviews with Spiegelman's father, historical documents, and generous excerpts from the author's notebooks and sketches.

MetaMaus will be available on October 4th. Until then, you can find more material from the book on Spiegelman's Facebook page.

Beloved public radio host and past Sound of Young America guest Bob Edwards is releasing a memoir about his long and distinguished career as a broadcaster called "A Voice in the Box: My Life in Radio." Although the print edition isn't due until later this month, his publisher has released a free, downloadable version that will be available until September 9th from multiple e-book retailers including Amazon's Kindle store, Barnes & Noble's Nook store and the Google ebookstore.

I grew up listening to Edwards host "Morning Edition" every weekday as I rode to school in the car with my father. So I'm already intrigued. But for anyone who isn't as intimately familiar with his work, the memoir's publisher, the University Press of Kentucky, has released this video mashup of highlights from Edwards' career.

Edwards has already published two earlier books that are bound to be a hit with any fan of broadcasting history. The first is Fridays with Red, which chronicled his radio friendship with legendary sportscaster Red Barber, and the second is Edward R. Murrow and the Birth of Broadcast Journalism.

This is the latest from my non-MaxFun project, Put This On.

In 1964, Lyndon Johnson needed some pants, so he called Haggar to ask for some. The call was recorded, and later became one of the most beloved White House tapes of all time. For the reason why, you'll have to watch.

Animator Tawd Dorenfeld helped us create this short.

Watch! Enjoy! Share!

Robert Hicks, PhD is the director of the Mutter Museum at the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. It's a legendary collection of medical history, and more than a few medical oddities.

If Fresh Air's rock historian, Ed Ward, didn't live in Berlin, I'd say he was a national treasure.

His pieces are consistently insightful and full of great music. If NPR's treatment of baby boomer stuff was always this good, I'd be on board 1000%. I think the greatest sign of the quality of his pieces is how much I enjoy the ones on kinds of music I don't care for at all. And the ones on music I *do* like are double awesome.

Check out this recent piece on Westbound Records, the Detroit label that spawned Funkadelic, among others.

And of course, anyone who dedicates eight minutes of national radio to the great Swamp Dogg is a national treasure in my book!

PS: Dear NPR web gurus, I presume based on reviews that your API is super cool and all, but can we get an embeddable audio players? Love, Jesse

I can't begin to tell you how cool this is to me. Film shot in London in 1904. A bit of background on metafilter.

Steven Berlin Johnson is a writer and entrepreneur who writes on the history of ideas. His books have included Everything Bad is Good for You, which suggested that contemporary popular culture is more challenging to the mind than it's accused of being, and The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic--and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World, which tracked the spread of cholera in London in the mid-19th century as a way to understand the networked modern city. His newest book, The Invention of Air: A Story of Science, Faith, Revolution and the Birth of America tracks the life of the 18th century writer and scientist Joseph Priestley, and how his story can help us learn about the growth and development of ideas. Johnson also created the news discussion site plastic.com and the hyper-local site outside.in.

If you enjoyed this show, try these:
John Hodgman
Sarah Vowell
Chip Kidd

Sarah Vowell is the New York Times Bestselling author of books including Assasination Vacation, Take the Canoli and now The Wordy Shipmates. Her most recent is the story of the settlement of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and the religious and political world of the Puritans.

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We continue our journey into The Sound of Young America's vast audio archive with this program from The Sound of Young America Classics.

Devin The Dude is well known amongst the hip hop elite and has worked with many of them. The laid back emcee talks about his philosophy, his influences, and unique approach to hip hop. Rob Bowman is one of the world's foremost experts on Stax Records. The unusual history of Stax is also a compelling one. Not only did the label define southern soul music, it was also an example of "racial sanity" at the height of segregation.

My friend Jules Tygiel passed this week.

Jules was a cultural historian, focusing on California and baseball. He was my professor at San Francisco State University, and wrote one of my college recommendation letters. When I hastily applied to graduate school, he came through with a letter on short notice without even a hint of complaint. He was an inspirational teacher who shared his passion for both history and baseball unreservedly.

In addition to his research, Jules was a wonderful writer. I read his book "Baseball's Great Experiment: Jackie Robinson and his Legacy" before I'd ever met him. In my childhood and teenage years, I read literally hundreds of books about baseball, and "Baseball's Great Experiment" was one of the best. Then as now I was impressed at its combination of academic depth and lucid, exciting prose. It's certainly the best book about Robinson, and when I sold my baseball books a few years ago, it was one of the dozen or so that I kept -- my special favorites. I have often recommended it to friends, both fans and non-fans. In Jules' San Francisco Chronicle obituatary, I was moved to read that it was Rachel Robinson's favorite book about her late husband. I'm not surprised.

Jules was also a friend, particularly close with the Weinstein-Zitrin family, with whom I spent many hours as a young teenager. He and Richard Zitrin, my childhood friend Gabe's father, would engage in heated discussions of baseball subjects -- I remember Richard having particularly strong opinions on whether Jack Morris was overrated, though I can't remember which side he was on and which side Jules was on. Jules was the commissioner of the Pacific Ghost League, the first fantasy baseball league on the West Coast, which was founded in 1981. I'm sure all the owners of the PGL have Jules in their hearts today.

Jules struggled long and hard with cancer, and his illness in recent months was very severe. I will be thinking of him, and of his family. I hope they can find peace in his passing. I also want to thank Jules Tygiel for all he did for me. He will be missed.