There's More to That

After Hurricane Ike destroyed thousands of homes and inflicted an estimated $30 billion in damages in 2008, engineers hatched an ambitious plan to protect southeast Texas and its coastal refineries and shipping routes from violent storms. The $34 billion collaboration spearheaded by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is a harbinger of the type of massive public works projects that could be required to protect coastal cities like New York and Miami as sea levels rise and hurricanes become less predictable and more severe due to climate change.Smithsonian magazine contributor and Texas native Xander Peters reflects on his experiences growing up in a hurricane corridor and tells us how the wildly ambitious effort came together. Then, Eric Sanderson, an ecological historian, tells us how the project could be applied to other low-lying coastal cities.Read Xander Peters' Smithsonian magazine story about the Ike Dike here.Let us know what you think of our show, and how we can make it better, by completing our There's More to That listener survey here.Find prior episodes of our show here.Listen to the New York Botanical Garden podcast "Plant People" here.There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions.From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly.From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Rye Dorsey, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales.Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson.Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz Music by APM Music.

Have you ever felt embarrassed by the need to carry a towel, or even a fresh shirt, with you during the most sweltering months of the year? You shouldn’t. Sweating is one of the most remarkable ways our bodies protect themselves when the mercury heads north.With summer temperatures spiking around the world as the sweat-filled Olympic Games begin in Paris, we’re joined by Sarah Everts, a Smithsonian contributor and the author a marvelous book called The Joy of Sweat: The Strange Science of Perspiration. She explains why the body’s thermostat is so ingenious, and how it cools athletes—and the rest of us. Plus: A series of snack-sized anecdotes about the Olympics!Let us know what you think of our show, and how we can make it better, by completing our There's More to That listener survey here.Find prior episodes of our show here.Read Smithsonian magazine's coverage of the Olympics, past and present, here, here, here, and here.There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions.From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly.From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Rye Dorsey, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales.Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson.Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz Music by APM Music.

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The past hundred years have seen more than one high-profile prosecution branded as the “crime of the century.” The shocking 1924 crime that was among the first to carry the title turned out to be a harbinger of how public mania around criminal cases could influence the legal system, and how psychiatry would be used and abused by prosecutors and defense attorneys alike as the 20th century wore on and gave way to the 21st.Smithsonian editor Meilan Solly introduces us to teens Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb and their botched, but still deadly, effort to perpetrate “the perfect crime.” What happened next was also surprising: After confessing to the abduction and murder of 14-year-old Bobby Franks, they were spared capital punishment thanks to their famed attorney Clarence Darrow. True-crime historian Kate Winkler Dawson then tells us how public interest in Leopold and Loeb’s fate helped solidify true crime as a durable subject of fascination. She also tells us about the tools used by the prosecution that were in their infancy during the famed case.Read Meilan Solly's Smithsonian story about Leopold and Loeb here.Learn more about Kate Winkler Dawson, her books, her podcasts, and her work at her site.Find prior episodes of our show here.There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions.From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly.From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Rye Dorsey, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales.Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson.Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz / photography by Katherine Kimball, Joshua Brasted, and Jeremy TauriacMusic by APM Music.