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Can you tell me how the bluegrass group Nickel Creek got its name?
—Sara K., West Virginia

Sara Watkins, her brother Sean, and Chris Thile got the name from the Byron Berline fiddle tune Nickel Creek when they formed the band more than a decade ago after they met at a weekly bluegrass show. Sara and Thile were 8 and Sean was 12 at the time. Their debut album, Nickel Creek, sold more than 800,000 copies. The band is technically a trio, with fiddle player Sara, Sean on guitar, and Thile on mandolin. Various bass players join them on stage. Nickel Creek won the Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album for the 2002 album This Side. “Musically, this band never stays the same,” Thile says. “We love to grow.” Sean and Thile, who do most of the writing and composing for Nickel Creek, have each recorded solo albums. Although they formed as a bluegrass band and are widely accepted in that circle of musicians, the trio says the the group is a conglomeration of everything they listen to—from Bach to Radiohead.

I’d like to know about Loretta Swit, the nurse on the TV M*A*S*H series. What have some of her post-M*A*S*H roles been?
—Frank D., Montana

While Loretta Swit is best known for her portrayal of Maj. Margaret Houlihan on M*A*S*H, she has had a long stage and film career. Films include Freebie and the Bean, Stand Up and Be Counted, and Race with the Devil. Most recently, she played the title role in Shirley Valentine, a play about an English housewife who runs away to Greece in search of adventure and romance. She’s made more than 25 television movies, including playing Detective Chris Cagney in the pilot for the hit detective series Cagney and Lacey. Her wildlife series, Those Incredible Animals, ran for five years on the Discovery Channel and still airs on Animal Planet. Swit, 65, is active in many animal causes, including Actors and Others for Animals, and has served as spokesperson for the Humane Society of the United States. A Polish-American, she was born in Passaic, N.J.

What can you tell me about actor Wes Studi? Is he an American Indian and what’s his background?
—Linda R., Texas

The 55-year-old actor and director is a Cherokee Indian, born in Nofire Hollow, Okla. He grew up speaking the Cherokee language, learning English when he started grade school. A veteran of the Vietnam War, Studi returned home in 1969 to a divided country and no idea about what he wanted to do with his life. After drifting for a while, he decided to attend college under the GI Bill, and there he got involved with the American Indian Movement and began working for the Cherokee Nation. It wasn’t until 1981 that he decided to become an actor, after joining a community theater group. He appeared onstage in Tulsa and Los Angeles, wrote and performed his own play, and got his first movie role in 1989’s Pow Wow Highway. He followed that with Dances With Wolves and The Last of the Mohicans, two high-profile parts that earned him both critical acclaim and a degree of fame. He’s also written two children’s books for the Cherokee Bilingual/Cross Cultural Education Center, plays in a band called Firecat of Discord, and carves artworks out of soapstone. He has an official fan club, which can be joined by visiting his website, www.thestudigroup.com. He now makes home in Sante Fe, N.M. He and his wife Maura have one child, Kholan, and he has two other children, Daniel and Leah, from a previous marriage. Next up for him in the movies: The Alamo.

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