"Letters: Manitowoc; Cooper's Hawk"

MICHELE NORRIS, host:

President Obama traveled to Wisconsin today.

MELISSA BLOCK, host:

And he went to...

Mr. JACK CASHMAN(ph): Manitowoc.

BLOCK: Manitowoc. That was Jack Cashman this morning in that very city, about 80 miles north of Milwaukee.

NORRIS: We take you there because of letters such as this one that we received yesterday from Sue Vliet(ph) of Milwaukee.

BLOCK: Being a lifelong Wisconsinite, I am accustomed to living with many unusually-named towns and cities that often utilize the original name given to a location by the Native Americans who first lived here. However, please do your homework by preparing for a story, particularly something as auspicious as a presidential visit.

NORRIS: Sue Vliet and a few more of you shook your fingers at us because yesterday, we mispronounced the name of that Wisconsin city. So our correspondent Don Gonyea paid a morning visit to a diner there, Warren's Restaurant, for some help.

Ms. LEANNA LEONOWICZ(ph): The city is Manitowoc.

Mr. MIKE PEARCE(ph): Manitowoc.

Ms. LEONOWICZ: M-A-N-I-T-O-W-O-C.

Mr. PEARCE: Manitowoc, Man-it-o-wok.

BLOCK: That's Mike Pearce and Leanna Leonowicz in Manitowoc.

NORRIS: Manitowoc, got it.

BLOCK: Moving on, some of you were annoyed by our interview yesterday with two small business owners.

NORRIS: I asked them what letter grade they would give President Obama from the perspective of a businessperson. Lowell Miles, the CEO of Miles Fiberglass and Composites, responded this way:

Mr. LOWELL MILES (Chief Executive Officer, Miles Fiberglass and Composites): I would give him a F.

NORRIS: An F?

Mr. MILES: Yes.

BLOCK: From the other small business owner, better, but not by much: a D.

Well, William C. Johnson of Lake Forest Park, Washington, found that frustrating. He writes: It became apparent to me that both of these small business owners were quite likely Republican. I would have found the story far more interesting and informative if you had managed to juxtapose a Republican business owner with a Democratic business owner.

NORRIS: Ann Tiplady(ph) of Wallingford, Vermont, sent in this defense of the president. She writes: I am a struggling small business owner, and I agree that things are very hard right now. But please, we could have lost everything. And he is one of many captains driving this ship.

BLOCK: Now we have a happy ending to a story we brought you yesterday. The Cooper's hawk that was stuck in the dome of the main reading room at the Library of Congress has been rescued.

Yesterday we heard yesterday about the hawk, a young female, from the Library's Tori Hill.

Ms. TORI HILL (Library of Congress): She is just sitting on a perch, looking down at us. And then every so often, she takes a circle swoop around the mural of the figure of human understanding.

NORRIS: Well, with the help of two starlings in a trap as bait, the hawk was rescued this morning. Kennon Smith is a volunteer raptor bander, and he was one of three people with extensive knowledge of hawks who climbed high up into the dome of the reading room and laid the trap.

Mr. KENNON SMITH (Raptor Bander): The starlings were motionless. They were like statues because they knew the hawk was there. So we waited and waited and, you know, finally one of the starlings - you can actually hear some street noise all the way up there. And there was some noise, and one of the starlings moved his beak and lifted his neck a little bit, and I says: Oh, good, he finally moved. I said that's all it's going to take.

BLOCK: Sure enough, the hawk swooped down and landed on the trap, at which point she was caught. No starlings were harmed in the rescue. The Cooper's hawk is in OK shape but hungry. She'll spend a few days in rehab getting fed, and then she'll be released.