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2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
4 episodes with Arkansas Delta
2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
2 episodes with Arkansas Delta
Father Stephen Gadberry is a priest in the Diocese of Little Rock, Arkansas, ordained on May 28, 2016. Born and raised on a farm in the Arkansas Delta, he enlisted in the Air Force after high school, serving in Texas, Germany, and Central Iraq during the mid-2000s. With degrees in philosophy and theology from St. Joseph Seminary College and Rome's Pontifical Gregorian University, he's a scholar and a shepherd. As Word on Fire Institute fellow, he's also hosted EWTN's Breaking Bread and tackled obstacle courses on American Ninja Warrior. When he's not leading Mass at St. Theresa Church in Little Rock, he's lifting weights or coaching CrossFit, he spends time with his dogs, Murph and Shorty. Shawn Ryan Show Sponsors: https://www.tryarmra.com/SRS https://www.betterhelp.com/SRS This episode is sponsored by Better Help. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/srs and get on your way to being your best self. https://www.boncharge.com/SRS https://www.meetfabric.com/SHAWN https://www.shawnlikesgold.com https://www.helixsleep.com/SRS https://www.lumen.me/SRS https://www.patriotmobile.com/SRS https://www.ziprecruiter.com/SRS Father Stephen Gadberry Links: IG - https://www.instagram.com/fatherstephenjgadberry “The Making of a Catholic Priest” documentary - https://youtu.be/HumCsGbVAp4 Ministry with Bishop Robert Barron and Word on Fire IG - https://www.instagram.com/bishopbarron IG - https://www.instagram.com/wordonfire_catholicministries Mayhem Hunt IG - https://www.instagram.com/mayhemhunt Saint Theresa Catholic Church IG - https://www.instagram.com/sainttheresalr YT - https://youtube.com/@sainttheresacatholicchur-kb8cn Saint Theresa School IG - https://www.instagram.com/stscougars Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Grandon Gray, real estate developer, visionary, and proud son of West Memphis, sits down with host Larry Robinson on The Journey to talk about making the most of every opportunity before the lights go out. From growing up in the Arkansas Delta to becoming a respected leader in public-private partnerships, Grandon shares powerful stories of faith, family, and the fight for equity. He opens up about the pivotal moment he realized he was a Black man in America, how a childhood lesson in land ownership sparked his purpose, and why “making hay while it's day” is more than a motto—it's a way of life.
On today's show, we learn how more than $2 million in grant funding will combat maternal and infant deaths in the Arkansas Delta. We also investigate work to restore bottomland hardwood forests across the state. Plus, the story behind the Johnny Cash statue at the U.S. Capitol Statuary.
This is the 5th and final episode in a series of episodes dedicated to a network of incubator farms that Yara North America. These farms are dedicated to find innovative ways to improve farm productivity balanced with sustainable practices that can be implemented by growers to improve their on-farm profits. In this episode the focus is on the Arkansas Delta incubator farm and its efforts to enhance nutrient and water use efficiency, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and increase yields. The standout feature of this farm is the tailwater recovery system, which recycles excess irrigation and rainwater and meters nitrogen application on a demand basis. The collaboration between Yara and the University of Arkansas has led to significant improvements in nutrient use efficiency, water use efficiency, and carbon footprint reduction. The farm has also seen a reduction in labor output and disruption of soil health. The tailwater pump technology is available to farmers, and they can receive incentive payments to implement it on their farms. Guest experts on this episode are: • Curt Knight, Soil Health Agronomist at Yara, • Neil Mayberry, Yara Regional Market Development Manager of the Easter US • Dr. Christopher Henry, Associate Professor and Water Management Engineer at the University of Arkansas. He is a specialist in irrigation system design, scheduling, and efficiency. • Dr. Tim Burcham, Director of the Northeast Rice Research and Extension Center, or NERREC, for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture.
In 1931, 18 year old Helen Spence became a household name, and Arkansas folk hero, after she sought vengeance for the death of her father and stepmother. Over the next three years, the media followed Helen's trial, imprisonment, second murder charge, prison escapes, and her murder at the age of 22. Want more Southern Mysteries? Hear the Southern Mysteries show archive of 60+ episodes along with Patron exclusive podcast, Audacious: Tales of American Crime and more when you become a patron of the show. You can immediately access exclusive content now at patreon.com/southernmysteries Connect Website: southernmysteries.com Facebook: Southern Mysteries Podcast Instagram: @explorethesouth Email: southernmysteriespodcast@gmail.com Episode Sources Encyclopedia of Arkansas: Helen Spence (1912–1934) People's River History Project: A Secret History of American River People Denise White Parkinson: Daughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta Only In Arkansas: River of Redemption: The Helen Spence Story The Daily World: Decisions of the Arkansas Supreme Court, January 13, 1930 The Shreveport Journal: Wounded Man is Thrown in River, April 24, 1930 Hope Star: Body of Timber Worker, Drowned in River, Found, June 5, 1930 The Columbus Ledger: Girl Kills Accused Slayer of Father in Courtroom, January 20,1931 The Barre Daily Times: Young Woman Didn't Trust Jury with Trial, January 20, 1931 Sun Herald: Courtroom Slayer Gets Five Year Term, April 2, 1931 Reading Times: Arrest Trusty for Killing Girl Who Fled Prison, July 13, 1934 Daily News: Tragedy of Helen Spence Eaton, July 22, 1934 Hope Star: Martin Acquitted in Eaton Slaying, September 28, 1934 Arkansas Times: The river people, August 17, 2006 Fox 16 TV: River Justice: pardon sought for Delta folk hero Malvern Daily Record: Helen Spence: An Arkansas Folk Hero for the Ages, March 6, 2023 Episode Music Impromptu, Traveler and Unanswered Questions by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
In this episode Matthew and Kirsten have a wonderful conversation with Dr. Cherisse Jones-Branch, Dean of the Arkansas State Graduate School, and Professor of History. We dive into her work around the work and advocacy of Black Women in Rural America, particularly in the Arkansas Delta. Join us to learn more about her work and the unknown heroes like Miss Annie. To reach Dr. Jones-Branch you can find her via Arkansas State University via email at crjones@AState.edu You can also find her on Instagram @cjbranch1 Listeners please share your thoughts and ideas with us on our social media accounts on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook @thebulldogedu You can also follow Matt on instagram @CastIron or X (formerly Twitter) @MatthewCaston and Kirsten on Instagram or X (formerly Twitter) @teachkiwi, or Facebook or LinkedIN as Kirsten Wilson. Please subscribe to The Bulldog Educator to continue listening on your favorite podcast platform.
Can you imagine turning a struggling local music festival into a half-billion-dollar enterprise? That's the compelling story of our guest today, Daniel Sims, a consultant, author, and a true leader in developing funding systems. Raised in Helena, Arkansas, Daniel's journey from his modest roots in the nonprofit world to his current work in philanthropy and organizational change is nothing short of inspirational. He gives us an in-depth view of his innovative Allen Sims Transformational Model, a tool designed to revamp systems in organizations, making them more mission-focused and revenue generating.Daniel recounts the gripping tale of how he breathed new life into a local music festival in Helena, transforming it from a floundering event into a successful enterprise. This feat not only testifies to Daniel's uncanny ability to understand community needs but also his talent for building equitable strong relationships for fundraising. He also emphasizes the significance of creating safe, equitable community programs, and the need for collecting data and engaging in frank dialogues with community members to ensure the right use of funds.We wrap up by discussing the important, and often tricky, issue of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Daniel shares his thoughts on Gallup's Inclusion Index and why he believes it's a must for organizations. If you've ever thought about how you could bring about transformation and positive change in your organization or community, this episode is a goldmine of practical advice and inspiring examples. It's a revealing exploration of the transformative power of community engagement and organizational change. So join us, and let's learn together.Daniel Sims is a highly accomplished consultant, speaker, trainer, researcher, and author who has dedicated his career to promoting equity and social justice. He is a recipient of numerous awards and has an unparalleled ability to optimize organizational culture, increase fundraising capacity, and create strategic cultures with a JEDI (justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion) lens. Sims hails from a small, impoverished area in the Arkansas Delta, and he uses his upbringing as a guide to promote justice-led advocacy for all.Sims is an influential figure with an unwavering commitment to equity, and he has a remarkable track record of driving transformative systemic change in philanthropic, corporate, and social landscapes. He delivers captivating speeches that inspire action towards creating a more just and equitable world. Daniel has trained and spoken at multiple conferences and events, and his work has been featured on various podcasts, including Lead with Levity, Human Capital Innovations (HCI), and Better Humans at Work. Outside of work, Sims enjoys trivia (he even competed on Jeopardy!), playing Magic: The Gathering, and watching Lucy Worsley documentaries. He residesSupport the showThanks for listening! If you enjoyed this episode, please support us on Patreon. For more leadership tools, check out the free workbooks at KylaCofer.com/freestuff. Book Kyla to speak at your event here, or to connect further, reach out to Kyla on LinkedIn and Instagram.All transcripts are created with Descript, an amazing transcript creation and editing tool. Check it out for yourself!Leadership School Production:Produced by Kyla CoferEdited by Neel Panji @ PodLeaF ProductionsAssistant Production Alaina Hulette
On today's show, the continued dialog around teacher pay in Arkansas. Plus, stories of the Arkansas Delta courtesy of the Listening Lab, the band Dial Up heads to Tulsa with their very 90s sound, and much more.
On this episode of the Ducks Unlimited podcast, repeat guest John Stevens discusses Callapalooza, an event that celebrates the art of duck and goose calling. Stevens, a three-time world duck-calling champion, talks about the hard work that goes into organizing the event and making it a first-class experience for all attendees. Listeners who enjoy duck hunting or the world of duck and goose calling will find this episode to be informative and entertaining.
In this episode of the Ducks Unlimited podcast, host John Gordon welcomes guests Chase Gartner, the owner-operator of Nomad Outfitters and Kristian Lilley, of Aberdeen Wild Wings from Scotland. The conversation centers around snow goose hunting in the Arkansas Delta, with the guests sharing their past experiences, what they love about the snow goose hunting challenge and this season's completely unpredictable weather.www.ducks.org/DUPodcast
In Fall of 2021, Miles Farms installed drainage tile on 35 acres as a trial with ADS. Drainage tile isn't used in the Arkansas Delta where Matt and Layne Miles farm. However, they didn't stick plastic pipe in the ground just to be different. Their objectives: Faster farming by being able to get on the field earlier. Changing their practices to allow no-till planting on 15” rows versus raised beds. Better irrigation by reversing the flow of water when the Delta heats up (and it always does!). Matt and Layne explain the early results of their drainage and irrigation install. Presented by ADS with support from Loveland Products.
You'll recognize the name of my guest today on Up In Your Business with Kerry McCoy because he is a long-time activist, businessman, and political figure in Arkansas; Mr. Sheffield Nelson. Born in the Arkansas Delta, Mr. Nelson studied and worked hard to overcome his geographic and socioeconomic station in life and became the president of ARKLA Gas by the age of 32. After a decade as CEO, Nelson resigned from his position at ARKLA and began to dabble in politics. In 1990, he switched from the Democratic Party to the struggling Republican Party to oppose Bill Clinton for the governorship. Unsuccessful at this first attempt, he ran again in 1994 against incumbent Jim Guy Tucker, who became Governor when Bill Clinton resigned for the Presidency of the United States. Though Nelson never held an elected office, he continued to work in Arkansas politics through appointments. He also proposed an increase to the natural gas severance tax to fund highway improvements and opposed the Game and Fish Commission's attempts to exempt itself from the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act in regard to fiscal matters.
This week the Bear Grease Render is coming at you from camp in the Arkansas Delta on the Cache Bayou. Your fearless host, Clay Newcomb, is joined by the incomparable Brent Reaves as well as render veteran and owner of Sunspot Outdoors, Michael Rosamond. Cameramen Loren Moulton and Dave Gardner flew in for the render as well and decided to stick around and shoot some Coon and Squirrel Hunting for an upcoming Bear Grease project. As the river level rises, the crew discusses relevant topics like how river gauges work, where to hunt when your prime woods get flooded, and the importance of a good, bright coon light. The gang then dives into the last Bear Grease episode called "Tecumseh's Death," where they discuss the nuanced implications of the great orator and Shawnee leader's life and death. Stay tuned cuz you're not gonna wanna miss Clay's announcement for a special event... Connect with Clay and MeatEater Clay on Instagram MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Bear Grease MerchSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Photographer, writer, and filmmaker, Eugene Richards, was born in Dorchester, Massachusetts in 1944. After graduating from Northeastern University with a degree in English, he studied photography with Minor White. In 1968, he joined VISTA, Volunteers in Service to America, a government program established as an arm of the so-called” War on Poverty.” Following a year and a half in eastern Arkansas, Eugene helped found a social service organization and a community newspaper, Many Voices, which reported on black political action as well as the Ku Klux Klan. Photographs he made during these four years were published in his first monograph, Few Comforts or Surprises: The Arkansas Delta.Upon returning to Dorchester, Eugene began to document the changing, racially diverse neighborhood where he was born. After being invited to join Magnum Photos in 1978, he worked increasingly as a freelance magazine photographer, undertaking assignments on such diverse topics as the American family, drug addiction, emergency medicine, pediatric AIDS, aging and death in America. In 1992, he directed and shot Cocaine True, Cocaine Blue, the first of seven short films he would eventually make.Eugene has authored sixteen books and his photographs have been collected into three comprehensive monographs. Exploding Into Life, which chronicles his first wife Dorothea Lynch's struggle with breast cancer, received Nikon's Book of the Year award. For Below The Line: Living Poor in America, his documentation of urban and rural poverty, Eugene received an Infinity Award from the International Center of Photography. The Knife & Gun Club: Scenes from an Emergency Room received an Award of Excellence from the American College of Emergency Physicians. Cocaine True, Cocaine Blue, an extensive reportorial on the effects of hardcore drug usage, received the Kraszna-Krausz Award for Photographic Innovation in Books. That same year, Americans We was the recipient of the International Center of Photography's Infinity Award for Best Photographic Book. In 2005, Pictures of the Year International chose The Fat Baby, an anthology of fifteen photographic essays, Best Book of the year. Eugene's most recent books include The Blue Room, a study of abandoned houses in rural America; War Is Personal, an assessment in words and pictures of the human consequences of the Iraq war; and Red Ball of a Sun Slipping Down, a remembrance of life on the Arkansas Delta.Eugene has won just about every major award that exists for documentary photography including a Guggenheim Fellowship, the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Award, the Leica Medal of Excellence and the Leica Oskar Barnack Award, among many others.His new self-published book, In This Brief Life, due for release in September 2023, features over fifty years of mostly unseen photographs, from his earliest pictures of sharecropper life in the Arkansas Delta throughout his lifetime as a photographer. On episode 196, Eugene discusses, among other things:The recent political landscape in the USA.In This Brief Life - his forthcoming, Kickstarter funded book.Why he self-publishes books.His change of heart about the value of InstagramWhy going through his archive was an ‘obsessive experience'Being ‘out of touch with what journalism is'The Knife & Gun Club: Scenes from an Emergency RoomTips on getting to know people on a storyBelow The Line: Living Poor in AmericaThe Blue RoomReturning to ArkansasDocumentary project Thy Kingom ComeCemetery projectExploding Into LifeMany VoicesWhy he left MagnumReferenced:Ed BarnesPeter HoweEugene Smith AwardDorothea LynchCornell CapaJohn MorrisHoward ChapnickJim Hughes, Camera ArtsMinor WhiteRoy DeCaravaWalker EvansFSABill BrandtWilliam KleinMike NicholsTerence MalickKoudelkaLeonard FreedReni BurriMary Ellen MarkNachtweySalgado Website | Instagram| New book“You're sitting there with thirty or forty contacts books all over the floor, and you find yourself staying up late into the night thinking ‘there has to be something there' and finding nothing at all. And the people on Instagram write to you and say, ‘oh my God, I'd love to look at your contact sheets' and I tell them quite honestly, probably not, because they're gonna disappoint the shit out of you!”
On this episode of the Broadband Bunch, we speak with Elizabeth Bowles, a highly respected speaker, attorney, and CEO with a passion for bringing broadband connectivity to unserved and underserved communities in the Arkansas Delta one of the poorest areas in the United States. As the CEO of Aristotle Unified Communications, Elizabeth has dedicated her career to delivering broadband services to communities that have been overlooked by traditional providers. Under her leadership, Aristotle has made significant strides in bridging the digital divide and providing access to the communities she serves. Click the link below to hear her story. Also, subscribe to the Broadband Bunch podcast on your favorite podcast platform so you never miss an episode!
Duck hunting is big business in this tiny Arkansas Delta town that’s host to the annual Wings Over the Prairie Festival, a week-long celebration featuring duck gumbo cookoffs, duck-calling competitions, even a Queen Mallard beauty pageant. Tens of thousands descend upon Stuttgart for the event, which coincided this year with the start Nov. 19 of waterfowl hunting season. Stuttgart, and the Arkansas Delta, are famous nationally for renown waterfowl hunting grounds. Private jets fly into the local airstrip carrying celebrities, politicians and business moguls who stay in expensive hunting lodges around the town. Local businesspeople estimate the industry generates about $1 million in economic benefits per day during the hunting season. But there is concern the seasonal hunting economy could be in jeopardy because the trees that provide the acorns and seeds ducks feed on are dying in droves. The wetland habitat in the Delta has been under threat or mostly disappeared over the past century. Those flooded bottomland hardwood forests were chopped down to make way for farms. Around the middle of the 20th century, local landowners and conservationists began re-creating the flooded forests, resulting in wooded areas where trees are covered with water almost year-around instead of only a couple of months per year. What was once a boon for duck hunting emerged as problematic as tree species not adapted to year-around flooding have been dying – tree species that produced the food ducks and geese fly hundreds of miles for annually to feed on throughout the winter. There are efforts to turn back the tide and save the wetlands. Arkansas Game and Fish Commission is mitigating flooding in the Delta’s green tree reservoirs, or GTRs, while working to bring back habitat that’s been declining. There’s hope that it is not too late to reverse the damage. On this week’s Capitol & Scott, host Lara Farrar travels to Stuttgart to meet with organizers of the Wings Over the Prairie Festival and learn about they’re concerns about wetland preservation. Arkansas Game and Fish Commission’s Luke Naylor, head of the agency’s Wildlife Management Division, also joins the show to talk about efforts to save some of the most valuable waterfowl hunting habitat in the country. Background reading: https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2022/nov/27/tennessean-captures-duck-calling-title/ Let us know what topics would you like to hear about in future episodes: arkansasonline.com/capitol-and-scott/
In the 1930s, there was Bonnie Parker, Al Capone, Dillinger, and Baby Face Nelson. But one character from the South has garnered the attention of a filmmaker and a storyteller, and many more people who are interested in this true crime tale. Today we have questions about the 1930s killer Helen Spence.We're joined by our esteemed Denise Parkinson. Who is from South Arkansas and has created quite a bit of content about it.Daughter of the White River Depression Era. Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta.Visit Denise Parkinsons SiteS. J. Tucker Official: Audiobook Trailer, Daughter of the White RiverDaughter of the White River, a documentary film projectSee Paul's Photography and FilmsAndrea and I need your help! Wherever you get your podcasts, go and rate our show with five stars and leave a review! It helps us reach more peopleHelp us out with a five-star rating on whatever platform you're listening to us on. Support the showWant to host a Podcast? Buzzsprout can help! Use this link to Find out More.Check out Paul's Website
In 1931 a young woman named Helen Spence, part of a houseboat community along Arkansas' White River, shocked everyone when she stood up in a local courtroom and shot to death the man on trial for murdering her father and step-mother. What followed for Helen would be a nightmare journey of incarceration, torture and more murder. My guest, Denise White Parkinson, has made it her mission to tell Helen Spence's story, and she shares details of it this week on Most Notorious. Her book is called "Daughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta". The author's website here: http://dwparkinson.com/Her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/HelenSpenceofArkansasThe audio book version of her story here: https://tinyurl.com/RiversistersThe teaser trailer for her documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90R312WmghAThis episode is sponsored by the Generation Why Podcast. Go to Amazon Music or listen early and ad-free by joining Wondery Plus on Apple Podcasts, or the Wondery app.
Today's guest is Dr. Tim Burcham, the director of the Northeast Rice Research and Extension Center in Greenfield, Arkansas. This center – a part of the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture – has a focus on research, community outreach, and educating all generations on agriculture in the Arkansas Delta. You can visit their website or find them on Facebook at UofA Northeast Rice Research and Extension Center. Dr. Burcham can also be reached via email at tburcham@uada.edu or phone at 870-586-6236. “I know the Lord's in control and that's what I lean on every day.” -Dr. Tim Burcham That Farm Life Podcast is a resource of Agri Health Network. For more information and to find more resources, check out AgriHealth.net. Questions or comments? Email us at info@agrihealth.net.
Martin and Kara Smith, residents of Birdeye, Arkansas, share their vision of revitalizing the Arkansas Delta through a network of gravel bike routes along Crowley's Ridge and throughout the delta region. Cultural immersion by bicycles and backroads.
Y'all! We got to virtually hang with a very cool country boy from Arkansas, Fr. Stephen Gadberry, or as we will now lovingly refer to him, Fr. Flex. If an American Gladiator and M'Lynn from Steel Magnolias had a baby, it'd be this guy! What a journey he takes us on! From being raised on a farm in the Arkansas Delta to the first priest competing on American Ninja Warrior, we got all the stories to share. No stranger to brotherhood, Fr. Stephen enlisted in the Air Force where he would eventually feel called to the priesthood while on tour in Germany.Fr. Stephen is a lover of beautiful things, cheap beer, hunting, and fitness. His joy is found in the GRIND of life, recommitting himself to his calling every.single.day. You will leave this back porch chat feeling inspired to drop your nets and follow Jesus in a new way.
As much-needed rainfall blankets Arkansas this week, farmers across the state are still dealing with one of the worst droughts in recent history. More than a dozen counties were classified as disaster areas because of weeks of dry conditions paired with scalding temperatures. Conditions this summer have not been this dire since a drought in 2012. Farmers will begin assessing the toll of the extreme weather in coming weeks as they prepare to harvest crops. Yields will determine the impact not only on the crops but also on farmers' bottom line. The estimated loss for livestock farmers is already coming it at around $100 million. In Capitol & Scott’s two-part series on the impact of climate change on agriculture in Arkansas, our second episode centers on the economic impacts and risk assessment of droughts. University of Arkansas agricultural economist John Anderson joins host Lara Farrar to talk about how the sector has been affected so far and projections for the second half of 2022. Check out last week’s episode featuring Hallie Shoffner, a sixth-generation farmer in the Arkansas Delta, who shares the story of how extreme weather conditions are changing the way her family’s farm does business.
Representative David Tollett is a career educator, beginning in a rural district in the early 2000s. He served as the Superintendent for the Barton-Lexa School District for six years overseeing the development of a system for learning and technical opportunities for students in the Arkansas Delta. Though his most recent bid for re-election in May's primary was not successful, he continues to be an advocate for public education and rural communities throughout the state.
Earwolf Presents Hot Doc Summer with Beautiful Anonymous host Chris Gethard introducing you to one of our summer audio documentaries from our Stitcher colleagues at Witness Docs. Witness Docs presents Unfinished, an investigative anthology series digging into America's unfinished business. Season 1, Deep South, produced in collaboration with Market Road Films, brought us on a journey into the Arkansas Delta to investigate the lynching of Isadore Banks. Season 2, produced with Critical Frequency, takes us to Short Creek, a community on the Utah/Arizona border divided by much more than a state line. Season 3, produced with Scripps, explores dual loyalties and hidden histories via the story of Ernest Withers, one of the most important photographers of the 20th century -- who was both a Civil Rights Movement photographer and a FBI informant. Ernest Withers shot timeless photos covering the civil rights movement- Dr. King on that integrated bus in Montgomery, Alabama, Emmett Till's uncle pointing an accusing finger and striking garbage men in Memphis wearing I AM A MAN placards. His loyalty and dedication earned him the trust of movement leaders King, Young, Lawson. But what if that trust was misplaced - what if Ernest was leading a double life? For more audio documentary podcasts go to our Witness Doc friends here:www.witnesspodcasts.com/ Or find your usual faves at www.earwolf.com
Earlier in July, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced it would wait another six months before declaring the ivory-billed woodpecker extinct. While the last confirmed sighting of the bird was about 80 years ago, a kayaker floating through bottomland hardwood forests in the Arkansas Delta collected evidence of the woodpecker’s existence in 2004. The footage was credible enough that researchers from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology traveled to the Delta to continue the search. Many believe the species still exists. Since then, ornithologists, scientists and bird watchers have continued to search for the ivory-billed, which has assumed a somewhat mythical status in the South. Despite recordings, photos and videos of supposed sightings, evidence produced has not been enough to convince U.S. Fish and Wildlife that the ivory-billed is alive. As the window closes to find more evidence to prove the bird is endangered rather than extinct, those who’ve been searching for the woodpecker are doubling down efforts to stop it from being relinquished to the pages of history books. As part of a 30-day public comment period, The U.S. Fish and Wildlife is accepting “evidence of the presence of the ivory-billed woodpecker” that is received or postmarked on or before 11:59 p.m., Aug. 8, 2022. Long-time ivory-billed searcher David Luneau joins Capitol & Scott host Lara Farrar to discuss the legacy of the search for the ivory-billed, current efforts to prove it’s still alive and what it would mean should it officially classified as gone. Special thanks to the Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for granting permission to Capitol & Scott to include the 1935 recording of the ivory-billed woodpecker’s “kent” — a distinct nasal tooting sound made by the species — collected in Louisiana by ornithologists Arthur A. Allen and Peter Paul Kellogg. Allen founded the Laboratory of Ornithology at Cornell University. Kellogg was a professor there. The use of material from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology is protected by copyright. Use is permitted only within stories about the content of this release. Redistribution or any other use is prohibited without express written permission of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology or the copyright owner.
A bright future for the nation depends on the health and prosperity of rural America, and unfortunately, we are at a moment in time where life is not ideal in the rural heartland. Although most rural Americans are generally satisfied with the overall quality of life and see their communities as safe, we are reaching a crisis when it comes to financial insecurity, trouble accessing affordable, high quality health care, a lack of high-speed internet access, housing problems, and isolation/loneliness. When it comes to health care, even though most rural Americans have health insurance, about one-quarter say they lack adequate health care access, as they have not been able to get the care they needed at some point in the past few years. Consequently, potentially preventable deaths from the five leading causes are consistently higher in rural counties, especially with heart disease. (Nearly half of deaths from heart disease in rural counties are preventable, compared with 18% in large metropolitan areas.) All of this has culminated into a mistrust of the traditional, fee-for-service dominated healthcare system and created a “shadow population” of underserved minorities and the socially isolated who are dealing with significant cardiovascular metabolic disease. The Arkansas Lincoln Project is an important population health program focused on improving cardiovascular health in highly underserved, under-resourced areas of the Arkansas Delta Region where economic and health disparities have life altering consequences for rural residents. Joining us this week, we have two population health leaders sharing their insights about their work in deploying community-based cardiovascular health interventions led by community health workers. Chip Purcell is the director of cardiology research at the University of Arkansas Medical Sciences and the principal investigator of the Arkansas Lincoln Project. Joining him is Dr. Jessica Barnes, the co-founder and CEO of 20Lighter, LLC – an award winning cardiometabolic health program, delivering dramatic reductions in inflammation and visceral fat. Together they are winning the “Race to Value” by fighting cardiovascular metabolic disease in the Arkansas Delta, the worst region in the nation for healthcare quality and population health outcomes. Episode Bookmarks: 01:30 The challenges of obesity and cardiometabolic disease disparities in Rural America 02:00 Rural Americans facing financial insecurity, poor healthcare access and hospital closures, a lack of high-speed internet access, housing problems, and isolation/loneliness 02:45 “Nearly half of deaths from heart disease in rural counties are preventable, compared with 18% in large metropolitan areas.” 03:30 Introduction to Dr. Jessica Barnes (CEO of 20Lighter, LLC) and Chip Purcell (UAMS Cardiology Research and the principal investigator of the Arkansas Lincoln Project) 05:00 “Rural Americans tend to have higher rates of cigarette smoking, hypertension, and obesity, and report less leisure-time physical activity than their urban counterparts.” 06:20 The US News & World Report ranks Arkansas 50 out 50 states for overall healthcare quality with higher-than-average obesity rates and overall preventable hospital admissions 07:00 “Arkansas is the worst of the worst in health outcomes, and that is where we can make a difference.” 08:00 Mistrust of the healthcare system is pervasive in the Arkansas Delta Region 09:30 The exponential growth curve in building trust through improvement in individualized patient outcomes 10:00 Studying out-of-hospital, premature natural deaths as a proxy for determining population health needs in Eastern Arkansas (how the Lincoln Project began) 12:30 The use of geospatial mapping to identify the highest risk communities to target with cardiovascular health interventions led by community health workers 16:30 The economic challenges of Phillips County,
Join author Denise Parkinson for an intimate look at a Depression-era tragedy. The once-thriving houseboat communities along Arkansas' White River are long gone, and few remember the sensational murder story that set local darling Helen Spence on a tragic path. In 1931, Spence shocked Arkansas when she avenged her father's murder in a DeWitt courtroom. The state soon discovered that no prison could hold her. For the first time, prison records are unveiled to provide an essential portrait. The legend of Helen Spence refuses to be forgotten--despite her unmarked grave. Denise Parkinson is a freelance writer living in Hot Springs, Arkansas. A graduate of Hendrix College, Parkinson's writing appears in a range of publications, including the Arkansas Democrat, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Arkansas Times, Little Rock Free Press, Memphis Flyer and Cooper-Young Lamplighter. Since 2008, she has been the lead writer for Hot Springs Life and Home magazine. Dale Woodiel was born and raised on the banks of the White River in Crockett's Bluff, Arkansas. He teaches humanities at the University of Hartford. Daughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta
Join author Denise Parkinson for an intimate look at a Depression-era tragedy. The once-thriving houseboat communities along Arkansas' White River are long gone, and few remember the sensational murder story that set local darling Helen Spence on a tragic path. In 1931, Spence shocked Arkansas when she avenged her father's murder in a DeWitt courtroom. The state soon discovered that no prison could hold her. For the first time, prison records are unveiled to provide an essential portrait. The legend of Helen Spence refuses to be forgotten--despite her unmarked grave. Denise Parkinson is a freelance writer living in Hot Springs, Arkansas. A graduate of Hendrix College, Parkinson's writing appears in a range of publications, including the Arkansas Democrat, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Arkansas Times, Little Rock Free Press, Memphis Flyer and Cooper-Young Lamplighter. Since 2008, she has been the lead writer for Hot Springs Life and Home magazine. Dale Woodiel was born and raised on the banks of the White River in Crockett's Bluff, Arkansas. He teaches humanities at the University of Hartford. Daughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta
Episode 19 features Cason Short, an Arkansas Delta based farmer, conservationist, and hunting club manager. https://byersfarm.com/ Black Duck Revival https://www.blackduckrevival.com/ Title Track Music https://m.soundcloud.com/user-304540684
Helen Ruth Spence, aka “The Swamp Angel,” grew up in a tight-knit rural Arkansas community during the Great Depression. Unfortunately for Helen, the world she knew shattered when she became the only surviving eyewitness to her father's murder. Helen's life then became a collection of choices based on her desire for justice and need for safety. A truly unlikely outlaw, Helen Ruth Spence forces us all to ask the question, “What would you do?”Tea of the Day: Palais de Thé - Big BenSources:Title: Daughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta by Denise White ParkinsonAudiobook narrated by: S.J. Tuckerhttps://onlyinark.com/arkansas-women-bloggers/helen-spence
In 2021, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reporter Stephen Simpson won a grant from the University of Southern California’s Center for Health Journalism to work on a series about health disparities in the Arkansas Delta. In his six-part series, called the Great Delta Divide, Simpson explores a number of issues in a region that was once an economic powerhouse in the American South. Such issues include mental health, population declines, access to healthcare and the impact of the pandemic. On this episode of Capitol & Scott, Simpson discusses his reporting and what the future looks like for those who continue to call the Arkansas Delta their home. Background reading: Simpson's series on the health and economic disparities Delta: arkansasonline.com/delta-divide/ Let us know what topics would you like to hear about in future episodes: arkansasonline.com/capitol-and-scott/
The Arkansas Delta is a network of gravel and farm roads weaving through some of the most fertile farmland in the world and Crowley's Ridge ascends on the Delta's western edge. Both together create a relatively untapped biking experience waiting to be inhaled. Martin Smith, owner/principal of Ecological Design Group along with Joe Jacobs, owner/editor of owner/editor of Arkansas Outside and Revenue Director at Arkansas State Parks, share plans for the area and talk about their recent bike ride from Jonesboro to Clarksdale, MS.
Michelle chats about the incredibly important topic of heart health in Rural America with Dr. Jessica Barnes, co-founder and CEO of 20Lighter, LLC, an award-winning cardiometabolic health program targeting inflammation and visceral fat, the holy grail of cardiovascular and metabolic disease; and Irion “Chip” Pursell, M.P.H., R.N., B.S.N., the director of cardiology research at UAMS in Little Rock, Arkansas, and the Principal Investigator of the UAMS Lincoln Project. Pursell describes how the workings of this unique initiative, which is based on a strategy for community engagement and an ultimate goal of improving cardiovascular health in highly underserved areas of the Arkansas Delta. Local engagement is crucial to increase wellness measures and target obesity in a region where economic and health disparities have life-altering consequences for residents, explains Pursell. Dr. Barnes discusses the role 20Lighter plays in the UAMS Lincoln Project, including focusing on proactive engagement of at-risk patients. Her program addresses a medical condition associated with a variety of ailments, including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, and COVID-19. The UAMS Lincoln Project is in progress, with results expected later this year. Want to learn more about 20Lighter and the UAMS Lincoln Project? Visit 20Lighter.com/ArkansasDelta and UAMS Lincoln Project.
Geleve Grice was born on January 16, 1922, in Tamo, a small farming town located fifteen miles from Pine Bluff. At thirteen, Grice moved with his parents, Toy and Lillie, to Little Rock, where he graduated from Dunbar High School in 1942. An accomplished sportsman, Grice made the all-state football team his senior year of high school and later played for a service team during his four-year stint in the Navy. Grice entered the U.S. Navy immediately after graduation in the heat of World War II, eventually serving in the Pacific, where he guarded Japanese prisoners. Grice began his photography career as a high school senior. L. C. and Daisy Bates, publishers of the Arkansas State Press newspaper, encouraged his journalistic interests by creating a column that featured his images and writings about fellow Dunbar classmates. While in the Navy, Grice was stationed at Great Lakes Naval Air Station in Illinois and went to Chicago on leave, where he took photos of the city's nightlife, capturing unique images of famous black Americans like Joe Louis, Louis Armstrong, and famed guitarist T-Bone Walker. After completing his military service on April 23, 1946, Grice enrolled at Arkansas Agricultural, Mechanical, and Normal College (AM&N College), later to be known as UAPB, the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff where he majored in psychology. He also played football for the Golden Lions, served as yearbook photographer, and was eventually hired in 1947 as the campus photographer. In September 1949, Grice married his college sweetheart, Jean Bell of North Little Rock, a singer who became the first black graduate student in the music department of the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. They had one son, Michael. When he graduated in 1950, Grice had already opened the professional photography studio to earn his living for the next forty years. He frequently worked outside the studio for the Arkansas State Press and various local television stations. Grice's photos also appeared in such national publications as Ebony, Jet, and Life magazines. One of the highlights of Grice's career came while still a college student in 1948, when he was asked to document the integration of the University of Arkansas Law School in Fayetteville. As a result, Silas Hunt, accompanied by attorneys Wiley Branton and Harold Flowers, became the first black student to enroll at an all-white Southern university since Reconstruction. In 1958, Grice photographed Martin Luther King Jr.'s commencement address at AM&N College. Because Grice was often called upon to chronicle significant happenings in the black community, his collection includes images of other notable black Americans, such as Mary McLeod Bethune, Ray Charles, Thurgood Marshall, and Muhammad Ali. In 1998, the UAPB art department sponsored an exhibit of his work, Those Who Dare to Dream: The Works of Arkansas Photographer Geleve Grice. The Old State House Museum in Little Rock followed in 2003 with a more extensive exhibition of his work, A Photographer of Note: Arkansas Artist Geleve Grice. In 2003, the University of Arkansas Press published a book of the same title by Robert Cochran, featuring many of Grice's most captivating photos. Grice died on August 17, 2004.https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/geleve-grice-1161/https://digitalcollections.uark.edu/digital/collection/Civilrights/id/157https://news.uark.edu/articles/9559/diane-blair-and-geleve-grice-papers-donated-to-mullinshttps://arkansasresearch.uark.edu/a-photographer-of-note-arkansas-artist-geleve-grice/https://fulbright.uark.edu/departments/english/directory/index/uid/rcochran/name/Robert-Cochran/https://youtu.be/bUqlnPFeFew
Episode 79 features painter Ronald Jackson. Growing up in the rural South of the Arkansas Delta, Jackson was the youngest of eleven kids born to a farmer and a community organizer. His Mother and Father left a legacy of challenging and reshaping the norms of the racial status quo in their surrounding home communities. Jackson came from a lineage of black landowners farming in the South. In the mid-sixties, his parents led communities in the organization of multiple boycotts against the establishment of local racial injustices. Despite suffering continual threats, harassments, and organized retaliations, efforts eventually led to a successful lawsuit against their local school district and a subsequent US Court of Appeal's decision, ruling in the favor of forcing the area school districts into full desegregation. Jackson studied Architecture at Saddleback College in Mission Viejo CA before joining the US Army. He served 21 plus years in the Army and retired in 2014. Midway his military career, He began a pursuit of becoming a professional artist. With no access to art school, Jackson engaged himself on a journey of self-disciplines and personal discovery to realize this goal as an artist. The military afforded him the experience of living in places such as South Korea, Belgium, Italy, Germany, Iraq, and Kuwait; He believes that his childhood upbringing and the adult experiences of being immersed into other societies has given him an appreciation and broad perspective on life amidst the complex challenges that we all face. Photo credit: Ian Maddox Artist website https://www.ronaldjacksonartworks.com/ Artnet https://news.artnet.com/art-world/renaissance-noir-at-uta-1885608 The Hollywood reporter https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lifestyle/lifestyle-news/la-art-galleries-sell-works-benefit-black-lives-matter-movement-1298602/ Galerie Magazine https://www.galeriemagazine.com/arkansas-crystal-bridges-momentary/ Bmore Art https://bmoreart.com/2018/07/black-portraiture-fabric-face-and-form.html KC STUDIO https://kcstudio.org/pulse-nerman-museum-of-contemporary-art/?fbclid=IwAR0A6meEwJJB0e5XQRuHzgeBuCiKV7DbDAgS7-ldV_V7u6OY6gw31gW65ek&fbclid=IwAR0A6meEwJJB0e5XQRuHzgeBuCiKV7DbDAgS7-ldV_V7u6OY6gw31gW65ek Hercules and Old Doll https://farmersanddistillers.com/about/artwork/ronald-jackson/ The Spirit of James Hemings https://www.wearefoundingfarmers.com/artist/ronald-jackson/
“I never found a place I belong, so I'm making one.” Jonathan Wilkins is the founder of Black Duck Revival, a hunting and fishing guide service and simple lodge – built by his own two hands from an old church building in Brinkley, Arkansas. Jonathan is also a father and husband, a next-level forager and cook, a writer and working man. As he wrote in an essay for Outdoor Life last winter, “I am a Black man. Actually, I am biracial, but I live in a place where that nuance of truth is, most often, not afforded me.” Jonathan's story, and the story of Black Duck Revival, is an American journey, a reclaiming of heritage, a celebration of family, hunting and fishing in the beautiful and haunted lands of the mighty Arkansas Delta.
Ep 250 | Aired 06/23/2021 You'll recognize the name of my guest today on Up In Your Business with Kerry McCoy because he is a long-time activist, businessman, and political figure in Arkansas; Mr. Sheffield Nelson. Born in the Arkansas Delta, Mr. Nelson studied and worked hard to overcome his geographic and socioeconomic station in life and became the president of ARKLA Gas by the age of 32. After a decade as CEO, Nelson resigned from his position at ARKLA and began to dabble in politics. In 1990, he switched from the Democratic Party to the struggling Republican Party to oppose Bill Clinton for the governorship. Unsuccessful at this first attempt, he ran again in 1994 against incumbent Jim Guy Tucker, who became Governor when Bill Clinton resigned for the Presidency of the United States. Though Nelson never held an elected office, he continued to work in Arkansas politics through appointments. He also proposed an increase to the natural gas severance tax to fund highway improvements and opposed the Game and Fish Commission's attempts to exempt itself from the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act in regard to fiscal matters.
This week the late great Levon Helm of The Band would have turned 81. He was born May 26th, 1940 in Elaine Arkansas. He sadly passed away in April of 2012. This is an interview I did for my last podcast DISCovery. It's with author Sandra B. Tooze, who released a book last summer on Levon. The book is called "Levon: From Down in the Delta to the Birth of The Band and Beyond". He sang the anthems of a generation: "The Weight," "Up on Cripple Creek," and "Life Is a Carnival." Levon Helm's story––told here through sweeping research and interviews with close friends and fellow musicians––is the rollicking story of American popular music itself.In the Arkansas Delta, a young Levon witnessed "blues, country, and gospel hit in a head-on collision," as he put it. The result was rock 'n' roll. As a teenager, he joined the raucous Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks, then helped merge a hard-driving electric sound with Bob Dylan's folk roots, and revolutionized American rock with the Band. Helm not only provided perfect "in the pocket" rhythm and unforgettable vocals, he was the Band's soul.Levon traces a rebellious life on the road, from being booed with Bob Dylan to the creative cauldron of Big Pink, the Woodstock Festival, world tours, The Last Waltz, and beyond with the man Dylan called "one of the last true great spirits of my or any other generation."Author Sandra B. Tooze digs deep into what Helm saw as a devastating betrayal by his closest friend, Band guitarist Robbie Robertson––and Levon's career collapse, his near bankruptcy, and the loss of his voice due to throat cancer in 1997. Yet Helm found success in an acting career that included roles in Coal Miner's Daughter and The Right Stuff. Regaining his singing voice, he made his last decade a triumph, opening his barn to the Midnight Rambles and earning three Grammys. Cancer finally claimed his life in 2012.Purchase a copy through Amazon: (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07YF2WGG8/ref)Songs Discussed In This Episode: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6IojtEsB0kLcSZ17whfSNp?si=dec6b0fa23254775The Booked On Rock Website: https://www.bookedonrock.comFollow The Booked On Rock with Eric Senich:FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/bookedonrockpodcastTWITTER: https://twitter.com/bookedonrockContact The Booked On Rock Podcast:thebookedonrockpodcast@gmail.comThe Booked On Rock Theme Song: “Whoosh” by Crowander [ https://freemusicarchive.org/music/crowander]
In the rural Arkansas Delta, Helen Ruth Spence grew up living in a houseboat on the White River during the Great Depression. Helen’s father was murdered right before her eyes, and her mother taken and beaten. Helen Ruth Spence then decided to take matters into her own hands.It’s a lengthy, wild story, so there’s not a whole lot of discussion after the fact. We do get clarification on the difference between Awana and Kiwanis, and then discuss the fifth episode of WandaVision.Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pttdpod/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/paintthetowndead/Twitter: https://twitter.com/PTTDpodDaughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta by Denise Parkinson https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00XR9NYRC/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
From the publisher: Levon is a dazzling, epic biography of Levon Helm––the beloved, legendary drummer and singer of The Band. He sang the anthems of a generation: "The Weight," "Up on Cripple Creek," and "Life Is a Carnival." Levon Helm's story––told here through sweeping research and interviews with close friends and fellow musicians––is the rollicking story of American popular music itself. In the Arkansas Delta, a young Levon witnessed "blues, country, and gospel hit in a head-on collision," as he put it. The result was rock 'n' roll. As a teenager, he joined the raucous Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks, then helped merge a hard-driving electric sound with Bob Dylan's folk roots, and revolutionized American rock with the Band. Helm not only provided perfect "in the pocket" rhythm and unforgettable vocals, he was The Band's soul. Levon traces a rebellious life on the road, from being booed with Bob Dylan to the creative cauldron of Big Pink, the Woodstock Festival, world tours, The Last Waltz, and beyond with the man Dylan called "one of the last true great spirits of my or any other generation." Author Sandra B. Tooze digs deep into what Helm saw as a devastating betrayal by his closest friend, Band guitarist Robbie Robertson––and Levon's career collapse, his near bankruptcy, and the loss of his voice due to throat cancer in 1997. Yet Helm found success in an acting career that included roles in Coal Miner's Daughter and The Right Stuff. Regaining his singing voice, he made his last decade a triumph, opening his barn to the Midnight Rambles and earning three Grammys. Cancer finally claimed his life in 2012. Levon is a penetrating, skillfully told tale of a music legend from Southern cotton fields to global limelight Martin's interview with Sandra B. Tooze was originally recorded on September 30, 2020.
In the black community, we really just don't talk about death and hardly ever prepare for the transition of assets from one generation to the next. These conversations are often not had until after our loved ones have passed on and we start trying to unravel the financial life of the deceased either in a funeral home or via probate court. While we all know the stress that losing a loved one puts on a family, just imagine the drama that transpires after Big Mama is gone and her home and assets need to be equitably distributed throughout her 12+ descendants. While this sounds like the start of a black BET Network movie, this is the reality that many of us face. The Association of Black Estate Planning Professionals notes that "Black Americans today own little ⎯ if any ⎯ of America’s land, produce little if any of the country’s resources, and possess negligible amounts of this nation’s immense wealth. Yet Black Americans still project an aspiration based on blind faith in the American Dream". Much of our community's current lack of wealth is due in large part to how we plan for death versus funerals. So the Amerikan Therapy team sits down with some savvy legal and insurance experts to help us better understand how to ensure the effective passing on of generational wealth via legal, tax, and insurance structures. Ashley Stepps, Esq:Ashley was born and raised in the Arkansas Delta in Pine Bluff. She is a graduate of Delaware State University and received her law degree from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock – William H. Bowen School of Law.Formerly with The Raymon B. Harvey Law Firm, Ashley’s career has been spent serving elderly and special needs clients, their families, and loved ones as they encounter the legal issues that accompany aging and disability. She works to assist her clients in making sense of the intricate legal areas of elder law including probate, estate planning, and long-term care/Medicaid planning. She aids her clients with accomplishing their specific goals by developing plans that are unique to them.As well as being a frequent National Business Institute speaker, she has written, planned, and presented programs on various elder law subjects for several professional,s and her writings on pet trusts have been published by Outskirts Press. Ashley is also a Veterans Administration (“VA”) Accredited Attorney.She is a past Chair of the Elder Law Section of the Arkansas Bar Association, a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated, Phi Alpha Delta Legal Fraternity International, and the American Bar Association. Ashley has been selected as a Rising Star in Elder Law by Super Lawyers since 2018 and has been named one of the Top Attorneys in Arkansas in the area of Elder Law by Arkansas Life Magazine on multiple occasions.Location: Conway, ArkansasPhone: 501-428-9139Fax: 877-415-3706https://rsalawgroup.com/emailVanessa Lindley: Vanessa A. Lindley, the CEO of Lindley Consulting Group LLC is a transformative thought leader, trainer, coach, and author. She has 25-plus years’ in the finance industry and is an alumnus of the Goldman Sachs 10K Small Business program. Her company is a certified Minority Women Business Enterprise (MWBE). Her mission is to transform the lives of individuals, organizations, and communities. As an author, Vanessa has written publications and curricula such as, “Achieve Financial Victory, 7 Ways to Win With Your Money,” “Realizing the American Dream,” “Life Balance for the Women on the Rise, “Financial Coaching: Helping Clients Reach Their Goals” and “Delivering Effective Financial Education for Today’s Consumer.” She is also the financial contributor for Women of More Magazine Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/AMERIKANTHERAPY)
Things are heavy out there and Eric needed to talk to someone connected to a higher consciousness musically, spiritually, and civically. Noted activist, theologian, author, documentary filmmaker, and musician, Reverend Osagyefo Sekou was born in St. Louis, Missouri and raised in the rural Arkansas Delta. Rev. Sekou's music is an unique combination of Arkansas Delta Blues, Memphis Soul 1970s funk, and Gospel. His most recent record, When We Fight We Win - Live in Memphis was released in March 2019. He is featured in Orlando de Guzman’s 2015 documentary film Ferguson: A Report from Occupied Territory and also spent 6 weeks on the ground in Charlottesville, VA training clergy in response to the Unite the Right rally. Night Owls and the Reverend go deep on the Gospel of Mark, the healing aspects of music, Jesus Christ as a revolutionary figure, social media, writing songs on stage, the 2020 presidential candidates, and his history and perspective in activism. Follow Nite Owls on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.Follow Rev. Sekou on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. See Rev. Sekou's NPR Tiny Desk!
Homeownership, savings and holding down a job are three keys to financial well-being and moving out of generational poverty, so that’s what Southern Bancorp focuses on in its home Mississippi and Arkansas Delta region, one of the nation’s poorest. On the ABA Banking Journal Podcast, Southern CEO Darrin Williams talks about the bank’s high-touch focus on pairing in-depth financial counseling with a Bank On-certified checkless checking account to help reach the unbanked in the Delta. Williams explains $1.6 billion Southern Bancorp’s work as a group of three distinct community development financial institutions. He also discusses its partnerships, which include equity investments from Bank of America, Simmons Bank, BancorpSouth Bank and Regions Bank, among others, and program-related investments from philanthropic organizations and individuals in the mid-South. And as a CEO who entered banking laterally from a career as a lawyer and state legislator, Williams discusses the role of hiring from outside the industry in diversifying the ranks of banking. Additional resources: Bonus clip in which Williams discusses Southern Bancorp’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and participation in the Paycheck Protection Program. More information about ABA’s call for all banks to offer Bank On-certified accounts.
This week on Rural Health Leadership Radio we are talking building a network of rural hospitals and the power of collaboration along with the challenges of rural hospital CEO turnover. We are having that conversation with Mellie Bridewell, CEO of the Arkansas Rural Health Partnership. “Oftentimes people don’t recognize how hard a rural hospital CEO job is because you kind of have to be a jack of all trades. You don’t have all the levels of leadership so sometimes, you’re it!” ~Mellie Bridewell Ms. Mellie Bridewell currently works for the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) as a Regional Director of the Office of Strategic Management and serves as the Arkansas Rural Health Partnership’s Chief Executive Officer. Mellie has eighteen years of experience in community and organizational networking, grant writing, and program development and implementation. Mellie created the Arkansas Rural Health Partnership organization in 2008, which began with five critical access hospitals and has grown to fourteen-member hospitals across the south Arkansas region. Mellie has obtained over $15.2 million dollars in grant funds for Arkansas Rural Health Partnership to implement healthcare provide training opportunities, healthcare workforce initiatives, chronic disease programs, behavioral and mental health services, and access to care throughout the Arkansas Delta. Mellie currently serves on the National Rural Health Association Congress and graduated last year from the NRHA Rural Fellows program. She also serves on the board of the National Cooperative of Health Networks Association. In 2016, Mellie was acknowledged as a Federal Office of Rural Health’s Rural Health Champion, and this year was awarded the Healthcare Heroes Innovation Award by Arkansas Business magazine. Under Mellie’s leadership, ARHP has been recognized nationally as a Rural Health Community Champion for Collaborative Partnerships by the Federal Office of Rural Health and as Outstanding Network of the Year by the National Cooperative of Health Networks Association.
Dr. D. Antonio Cantù and his wife Sandy have three children, Derek, Dylan, and Deanna. Dr. D. Antonio Cantù is Associate Dean and Director of the Department of Education, Counseling, and Leadership at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois. Dr. Cantù received his Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from Southern Illinois University, Ed.S. in Community College Education, M.A. in History, and B.S. in Social Science Education from Arkansas State University. He has also attended educational leadership institutes at the College of William & Mary and Yale University. Prior to his appointment as Chair of the Department of Teacher Education at Bradley University, he served as Professor and Dean of Education at Indiana University Kokomo, Professor of History and Director of Social Studies Education, as well as editor of the International Journal of Social Education, at Ball State University, and Social Studies Department Chair and Teacher at Ste. Genevieve (MO) High School. Prior to beginning his teaching career, Professor Cantù also served as a Military Intelligence Officer in the U.S. Army. With nearly 30 years of experience in professional education, from high school through the graduate level, Professor Cantù’s articles have appeared in such publications as the Organization of American Historians’ Magazine of History, American Historical Association Perspectives, National Council for History Education History Matters, and the Journal of the Association for History and Computing. He is also the author of a number of books and curriculum monographs: Presidential Elections: 1789-1996, Early Education in Arkansas Delta, An Investigation of the Relationship Between Social Studies Teachers’ Beliefs and Practices, The Vietnam War: A National Dilemma, and Take Five Minutes: Reflective and Critical Thinking American History Class Openers. In addition, Dr. Cantù’s most recent book publications include the following: The Art and Science of Elementary Social Studies Education, 2nd Edition (2015), ILTS: Test for Academic Proficiency (2013), History/Social Studies Education in the Digital and Standards-Based Classroom (2012), Technology Applications for the Digital Classroom (2011), The Art and Science of Elementary Social Studies Education (2010), History Education 101: The Past, Present, and Future of Teacher Preparation (2008), and Teaching History in the Digital Classroom (2003). He has also served as a curriculum writer for various national organizations including The History Channel, The Wall Street Journal Classroom Edition and PBS Frontline, and as editor of The International Journal of Social Education. Dr. Cantù has also served in a variety of leadership positions in professional organizations, including service as President of the American Association for History and Computing, President of the Indiana Council for the Social Studies and Missouri Council for the Social Studies, and Chair of three National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) Committees. In addition, he currently serves on a number of national governing boards and editorial boards; including as a member of the Governing Board of the National Social Science Association (NSSA), and House of Delegates for the National Council for the Social Studies. At the state level, Professor Cantu currently serves as a member of the Illinois State Educator Preparation and Licensure Board for the Illinois State Board of Education; Past-President of the Illinois Association for Teacher Education in Private Colleges (IATEPC); Communications Director for the Illinois Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (IACTE); and Executive Director of the Illinois Council for the Social Studies (ICSS). Ted Talk: Memento Mori: the personification of Deathhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvnnqRy6ctI&feature=emb_logoSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/Death-By-Design. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Author Sandra B. Tooze is the guest on this episode of DISCovery. She has a brand new book out now on Levon Helm called "Levon: From Down in the Delta to the Birth of The Band and Beyond". The book covers Levon’s life starting with his younger days in the Arkansas Delta where he discovered the blues, country and gospel music, his teenage years as a musician and member of Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks, playing with Bob Dylan, his rise to fame with The Band along with his successful acting career. The book also gets into Levon’s days following The Band's breakup, including his struggles with his finances and health along with what Levon saw as a devastating betrayal by his closest friend, Band guitarist Robbie Robertson. To order a copy of “Levon: From Down in the Delta to the Birth of The Band and Beyond” go to the Diversion Books website page here: https://www.diversionbooks.com/books/levon-helm/Find DISCovery on Facebook at www.facebook.com/TheDISCoverypodcasthomeThe DISCovery theme song "Woo Hoo" by Reebosound (https://reebosound.bandcamp.com)Please give the show a five-star rating and review wherever you listen to DISCovery!
For most of his life Isadore Banks found ways to survive—and thrive—in the violently anti-black South. He became one of the largest land-owners on the Arkansas Delta, ran several businesses, and was a leader in his community. Then, something changed. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
For most of his life Isadore Banks found ways to survive—and thrive—in the violently anti-black South. He became one of the largest land-owners on the Arkansas Delta, ran several businesses, and was a leader in his community. Then, something changed. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Unfinished: Deep South tells the story of a wealthy African American farmer named Isadore Banks who was lynched in 1954. He owned more than 1,000 acres of land along the Arkansas Delta until it all disappeared with his death. In a quest to find his killers and unpack how his murder shattered a community, we’ll get to the heart of America’s unfinished business by asking ‘Who Lynched Isadore Banks?’ Premiering June 29th. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Unfinished: Deep South tells the story of a wealthy African American farmer named Isadore Banks who was lynched in 1954. He owned more than 1,000 acres of land along the Arkansas Delta until it all disappeared with his death. In a quest to find his killers and unpack how his murder shattered a community, we’ll get to the heart of America’s unfinished business by asking ‘Who Lynched Isadore Banks?’ Premiering June 29th. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Michelle chats with Mara Tieken, associate professor of education at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, whose research focuses on racial and educational equity in rural schools and communities. Her landmark book, Why Rural Schools Matters, examines how rural schools define and sustain their surrounding communities. Tieken, a former host of Rural Matters, is working on two studies, one supported by the Spencer Foundation, which explores the college experiences of rural, first-generation students, and the other, supported by the Reed Foundation, studies the effects of school closures on rural, black communities in the Arkansas Delta. Tieken discuss key aspects of her research on college access for rural students, noting that as student spent more time on campuses, they became more aware of wealthier students, and how that led to them feeling more isolated and believing that their college was elitist and out of touch with their home communities; and they began to doubt that our education system was a meritocracy. There are several inequities in this area, Tieken notes, including less familiarity with four-year colleges, financial barriers, and access to social mobility. Since schools are closed during the pandemic, Tieken notes, face-to-face contact with high school counselors on college access and campus visitations are often not an option for students. Tieken hopes the COVD-19 pandemic will provide the impetus to narrow these inequities, but she and Michelle agree that this requires a real commitment from stakeholders. This episode is sponsored by NREA, www.NREA.org
As the daughter of an Arkansas farmer, Talya Tate Boerner grew up playing in the cotton fields of Mississippi County while perfecting the art of making mudpies. After high school, she attended college at Baylor University, graduating with an economics degree primarily because her Daddy said, “If I’m paying for college, you’ll get a business degree.” So that’s what she did. For nearly thirty years, Talya lived in Dallas, built a successful banking career, married, raised two incredible children and enjoyed life—all the while planning to someday return to Arkansas. In 2011, after an “aha” moment, (the topic of her forthcoming memoir, Gene, Everywhere) she left banking to pursue her dream of writing. Now she lives in Fayetteville with her husband, John, and two miniature schnauzers, Lucy and Annabelle. Her family still farms in the Arkansas Delta. Talya’s debut novel, The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee, was released in January 2016. Although the story is fiction, the characters and setting will be familiar and relatable, especially to those with southern roots, less than perfect families, and questions about life in general. The Second Edition of The Accidental Salvation of Gracie Lee is now available – complete with illustrations!) Talya is a contributor to Arkansas Farm Bureau’s Front Porch Magazine where she writes a regular column, Delta Child. Her short stories, essays, and micro-fiction have been published in Arkansas Review, Ponder Review, and other print and on-line journals. She shares stories of farm, food, garden, and life on her personal blog, Grace Grits and Gardening. Follow her on Goodreads too!
Jonathan Wilkins of Black Duck Revival headed up into the Ozarks for his first raccoon hunt with Clay. In this podcast, Clay gives Jonathan a "sportsman pop quiz" after their hunt, and they talk about cooking raccoon. Jonathan talks about his first perceptions of hound hunting and his recent "revival" outing they had where he brought in some people from different parts of the country for their first waterfowl hunt in the Arkansas Delta. Check out the Bear Hunting Magazine "Quarantine Sale" at www.bear-hunting.com Bear Hunting Magazine is Powered by Simplecast
Jonathan Wilkins of Black Duck Revival headed up into the Ozarks for his first raccoon hunt with Clay. In this podcast, Clay gives Jonathan a "sportsman pop quiz" after their hunt, and they talk about cooking raccoon. Jonathan talks about his first perceptions of hound hunting and his recent "revival" outing they had where he brought in some people from different parts of the country for their first waterfowl hunt in the Arkansas Delta. Check out the Bear Hunting Magazine "Quarantine Sale" at www.bear-hunting.com Bear Hunting Magazine is Powered by Simplecast
Today David & Linda had a conversation with Landscape Architect Martin Smith about the Streetscape Improvement project in Downtown Wynne. Martin is a native of Arkansas and currently resides in the small community of Birdeye raising his family in a home built by his Great Great Grandfather in 1901. His passion and commitment to his local community runs deep in the Arkansas Delta much like his family history. Martin has led design teams throughout the state with a focus on innovative award winning low impact development for urban and rural environments. Martin uses stormwater to initiate his designs while placing an emphasis on the integration of public spaces with the founding principles of ecology. Martin and his wife Kara are active throughout the Delta promoting the importance of Healthy Living lifestyles while also promoting locally grown regional sustainability.
https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Black-Against-Memphis-Killers-ebook/dp/B06XVT2976/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=blood+on+black&qid=1559059428&s=gateway&sr=8-1 https://www.amazon.com/Where-Monsters-Go-Against-Memphis-ebook/dp/B06XVNXCJV/ref=sr_1_1?crid=XNLYB8QUIQ7F&keywords=where+the+monsters+go&qid=1559059470&s=gateway&sprefix=where+the+monsters+go%2Caps%2C167&sr=8-1 https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-West-Memphis-Killers-ebook/dp/B07C7C4DCH/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=gary+meece&qid=1559059536&s=gateway&sr=8-3 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0753HJZ1P/?ie=UTF8&keywords=gary%20meece&qid=1559059573&ref_=sr_1_6&s=gateway&sr=8-6 https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Black-Against-Memphis-Killers-ebook/dp/B06XVT2976/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=gary+meece&qid=1559059573&s=gateway&sr=8-2 Prologue There is the myth of the West Memphis 3 -- innocent teenagers railroaded by malicious police and prosecutors into murder convictions because of the way they dressed and the music they listened to, there being no evidence against them except the prejudices of Southern white Christians. And then there is the reality --- three criminally inclined young thugs involved in occultism who gleefully tortured three 8-year-old boys and then brought the justice system down upon them based on multiple factors, including a series of confessions, failed lie detector tests, failed alibis, eyewitness sightings and a history of violence. The second volume in this series, following "Blood on Black," continues to examine the evidence against Jessie Misskelley Jr., Jason Baldwin and Damien Echols in the murders of Christopher Byers, Michael Moore and Stevie Branch on May 5, 1993. Misskelley, Baldwin and Echols met up that afternoon just outside Lakeshore Estates Trailer Park, according to the multiple confessions of Misskelley. Echols and Baldwin were drinking beer. Misskelley had a bottle of whiskey jammed down into his pants. Misskelley had been told the plan was to go to West Memphis and beat up some boys. They walked about two miles into woods known as Robin Hood or Robin Hood Hills, just behind the Blue Beacon truck wash located on one of the network of service roads in West Memphis, Ark., where east-west Interstate 40 and north-south Interstate 55 briefly merged. Echols knew the woods well, having lived in the nearby Mayfair Apartments, frequently walking through the area as a shortcut between his home in West Memphis and his friends in the trailer parks and having been spotted in the woods recently by an acquaintance. Michael, Stevie and Christopher Byers, all second graders at Weaver Elementary School, lived south of the woods and, like other children in the area, visited the woods frequently to play. That afternoon they were spotted heading toward Robin Hood around 6, close to the time their killers entered from the north. When Echols heard the children approaching, he began making sounds to lure them in, while Misskelley and Baldwin hid. Then, according to the confessions of Misskelley, and indicated by the blood patterns at the scene and other evidence, the teens jumped the 8-year-olds, beat them viciously, stripped them of their clothes, mutilated Stevie's face, castrated Christopher, sexually molested them, hogtied them and dumped them in a muddy ditch, where Michael and Stevie drowned. Christopher already had bled out from his wounds. Misskelley quickly left the scene, which was scrupulously cleaned up. Echols was spotted walking along the service road near the crime scene later that evening in muddy clothes. After frantic parents sparked an extensive search for the missing children, their bodies were discovered the next afternoon by law enforcement officers. Tales of strange rituals held in the woods by mysterious strangers spread quickly among the crowd gathered near the crime scene. As detectives and other officers gathered information and talked to witnesses or potential suspects, Echols quickly drew the scrutiny of officers. Besides the talk among the boys' neighbors, the ritualistic aspects of the murder -- including the way the boys were bound, and timing possibly influenced by setting, proximity to a pagan holiday and celestial events -- furthered suggested occultism as an impetus for the killings. Local officers were familiar with Echols as a dangerous, mentally ill teenager immersed in witchcraft. Among the many tips coming into police were reports that Echols had been seen near the crime scene that night and that he was heavily involved in a cult. A series of police interviews with an all-too-knowing Echols did nothing but deepen suspicions. Echols failed a lie detector test, thereafter refusing to talk. Police heard that Echols had been telling friends about his involvement in the murders. Vicki Hutcheson, an acquaintance of Misskelley who also was friends with the Byers family, decided to "play detective. As a result of her investigation, and statements from her son, Aaron, who had been a playmate of the dead boys, the West Memphis police brought in Misskelley for routine question about his acquaintance with Echols. After he, too, failed a lie detector test, he gave the first of a number of confessions about his involvement, along with Echols and Baldwin, in the murders. Arrests quickly followed. Baldwin never offered an alibi at trial; after a series of conflicting statements about his activities that day, Echols admitted in testimony that his description of his alibi changed to meet circumstances; Misskelley tried out several alibis, in between his confessions, none of which were sufficient to convince jurors that he had nothing to do with the murders. The real-life horror story continues to play out in the second volume of this series, with Echols' background and mental illness extensively documented in the first book, "Blood on Black," along with incriminating details on the other two killers. Baldwin and Echols have been given an opportunity to respond to questions regarding the case but gave no comment, blocking contact via social media. Contact via social media with the reclusive Jessie Misskelley was blocked. Questions posed via social media to Matt Baldwin, Stacy Sanders-Specht, Pamela Metcalf (Pam Echols/Hutchison), Angela Gail Grinnell, Constance Echols Mount (Michelle Echols), Garrett Schwarting, Kenneth “Lilbit” Watkins, Stephanie Dollar, Holly George Thorpe, Jennifer Bearden and John E. Douglas were not answered. The former Deanna Holcomb, who still lives in Arkansas under another name, gave no answer to a Facebook query on an account that otherwise appears active. Heather Dawn (Cliett) Hollis threatened legal action to prevent her name from being used (an empty threat on a number of legal grounds) and otherwise refused to explain the many discrepancies in her stories. Domini Ferris (Domini Teer) graciously and freely gave a phone interview. Susie Brewer responded with a forthright, honest update on her troubled relationship with Misskelley. Much of the following was drawn from the official record in the words of actual witnesses, friends and neighbors of the killers and their victims. Some misspellings, etc., in the transcripts have been corrected to facilitate comprehension; obvious transcription errors or lack of punctuation have been addressed, if not completely resolved. Excerpts from transcripts have been minimally edited for readability, sense and flow of narrative. Some information, such as the multiple confessions, has been repeated to set forth as complete a record as feasible. Quotes represent evidence as recorded, as well as common usage in the Arkansas Delta. Deputy Prosecuting Attorney John Fogleman once said that it would take a book of 1,000 pages to tell the story of the case. These two volumes by no means exhaust the topic. If the case was not so controversial, the story could be told in a standard true-crime format of some 300 pages or so. Given the one-sided narrative that has dominated this case, these two volumes have the stated purpose of showing the case against the West Memphis 3 killers. No attempt was made to offer the many counter-arguments made by defense attorneys and others benefiting materially from the case or explore the views of the many virtue-signaling "supporters" of the West Memphis 3 killers, since the overwhelming bias of Hollywood, the media and academe has been generously aired for many years. Other than those already noted, any errors are the author's.
Hello hello! Hey there Wigglians! We have a great show for you. This time S.J Tucker joins us for an interview about something entirely new. Mojo and Sooj have a great discussion about her new project. S. J. has produced and narrated an audiobook of Denise Parkinson’s Daughter of the White River, Depression Era Treachery and Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta! As a true crime fan I can tell you I am looking forward to listening to this story. We couldn't have Sooj on the episode without playing her music. This time for ALL the spots. From the Tricky Pixie album Mythcreants we hear Taglio (Mojeo if you like). My favourite has always been Tam Lin from the same release. In addition, from Wonders we have for you Song of the Witches, Sailing Song, and of course Wonders. Sparrow is starting a 30 days of Gratitude practice within the next week. The program at Positively Present Blog looks like an excellent resource that we can all develop attitudes of gratitude together. You can join us now or later and we will meet at the Facebook group to discuss our insights. You may have to join the page and we will welcome you with open arms. Today, I am thankful that my migraine was short lived yesterday. That makes today a day of productivity.
Imagine you would like to address food and food insecurity in particular and could start with a blank slate, what kind of programs and practices would make sense given the incredible array of possibilities? Our guest today, Curt Ellis and Karrie Denniston have addressed this issue in their own work. Welcome to The Leading Voices in Food. I'm Kelly Brownell, director of the world Food Policy Center at Duke University and professor of public policy at Duke. I'll begin by introducing Curt Ellis, who was co-founder and CEO of FoodCorps, a national organization affiliated with AmeriCorps. He has received numerous awards for his work and is in my mind one of the most creative people anywhere working on food issues. Curt, it's really nice to have you here. Thanks so much for having me, Kelly. The work of FoodCorps is something that I know personally because my daughter worked in Arkansas as part of the AmeriCorps and FoodCorps program, and I saw the transformative experience it had on her, but also the impact that the FoodCorps volunteers can have on the community. And I assume some of our listeners will know a lot about the organization and others less so. So could you please tell us what FoodCorps is all about? Of course, our work at FoodCorps is an effort attempting to address the challenges of healthy food education and healthy food access for kids at real scale. And we currently support the daily work of 250 AmeriCorps food educators who are working in high poverty schools across 18 states to build school gardens, to introduce kids to new foods on the lunch line and to work with their school communities to build a school-wide culture of health. In addition to that direct impact work that's focused on healthy food education, FoodCorps is doing a new body of systemic work called reWorking Lunch, which seeks to improve the quality of school food at scale and unlock some of the ways in which the way school systems approach healthy food education and access have been stuck in old patterns for far too long. And in addition to those two efforts, we advocate for policies that are rooted in the evidence and that you can see in real life form when you come out to FoodCorps schools around the country, policies that have a potential to drive greater progress faster, in improving what kids eat in school, and what they learn about food there. Our next guest, Karrie Denniston serves as Senior Director of sustainability with the Walmart Foundation, and in this role manages the strategy and grant making for the foundation's efforts to help create environmentally and socially sustainable supply chains globally. Prior to joining Walmart, Karrie served as a vice president of national programs at Feeding America and also worked as a policy analyst with USDA. Karrie, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much for having me. It's great to be here. Why did the Walmart Foundation make food insecurity an important priority? Thanks, Kelly. That's a great question. At Walmart and the Walmart Foundation, first think about where we can make the biggest difference. And if you go back in history, Walmart was founded on the idea of helping to democratize access to things that people need in their everyday lives. That was the whole idea of Sam Walton opening a store in rural areas so that people could have affordable access and have that same access that living in a city would afford. So today as the nation's largest grocer, we're continuing that legacy and providing access to safe and affordable food is one important way that we do that. So that's an important backdrop. But also, we fundamentally believe in the importance of addressing hunger, food insecurity, and nutrition and its importance to society. This is a place where we have a lot of assets that we can contribute, even just going beyond philanthropy. So if we think about the business side, what might that look like? Having low food prices. That looks like thinking about how do we reformulate product to make it healthier so that people can access that. It looks like us donating any excess food that's coming through that may not be sellable but is still quality and could still be utilized. And it also means that engaging our suppliers and customers to helping them understand issues of food insecurity and how they can help. We utilize our philanthropy to try to help increase the capacity of the food banking system, the charitable system, access to federal benefit programs. How do we make that system help people get food when and where they need it? So we support initiatives to increase things like access to emergency food programs, or things like benefits, like the SNAP program, the WIC program, children's meal programs in schools, which Curt has a lot of experience with. And we also help to think about how can we advance nutrition literacy and skills. Curt, if you think back to when you founded FoodCorps back in 2010, there were lots of things one could have done. Why did you choose to focus on children and then schools in particular? One in six kids today is growing up in a food insecure household where they don't reliably have enough healthy food at home. And one in three kids across our country is already showing early signs of diet related disease and we know that these diseases discriminate and we know that one in two of our kids of color are expected to develop type 2 diabetes during their lifetimes. And for FoodCorps and the five folks who I co-founded this organization with back in 2010, it was clear to us that our nation's school system represents the best chance we have as a country to reach kids when they are setting their lifelong eating habits in place and school systems represent one of the most powerful leverage points for unlocking larger change in our food system as a whole. There are seven times as many school cafeterias in this country as there are McDonald's franchises. And if we could only turn those school cafeterias into places where every child is getting great high quality food every day and where the supply chain that serves those school meals protects the lands and waters that we depend on, that could be a powerful transformation. For a company as large as Walmart, is this caring for example about the welfare of the farmers and caring about sustainable practices and things like this just considered a good business? Is it part of the ethical nature of the company? Is it because customers care about it? Why be doing these things? Yes to all of that. I think the principle of shared value first is that if we don't actually do those things, very hard for us to run business in the longterm. If we aren't thinking about the sustainability of supply chains and the practices that are in place, and we aren't thinking about how we can have that, we are not going to have a supply in the future, right? So that's important. So it is good business and it is important to business. That is coupled with it is also a place where we can have a leadership position and help advance those issues forward. And customers do care and they should care. Well, given the enormous scope of the Walmart customer base and the stores all over the world, why did you decide to partner with FoodCorps? Well, one objective of our philanthropy is to help improve people's confidence in their ability to consistently consume healthier foods. So we decided to support FoodCorps for a couple of reasons. First was the approach. Nutrition education itself, it's an incredibly valuable tool and it has an importance in trying to help advance people's ability to understand what's healthy and how to make choices. But FoodCorps also developed their program with the belief that nutrition education had to be delivered in context. So if the food quality in the cafeteria and the overall school environment was sending a different signal to the kids after they just had this great nutrition education lesson, that was going to be really hard to maintain those healthier choices. We were also really impressed because FoodCorps thought about, and I'd be curious for Curt to comment on this, they thought about learning from day one. I really feel like FoodCorps wants to know if their efforts are making a difference. They're willing to be creative and they're willing to take some risks in figuring out some paths forward. For us, because we were also trying to figure out this balance, this important question of what can you do at scale in a really structured and thoughtful way, and what has to be built at the local community and really contextualize to a particular location, FoodCorps was really thinking about that and wrestling with those same questions. So we were really excited to be a part of that journey with them. So Curt, can you explain how the partnership with Walmart is working? What's actually occurring on the ground because of it? Yeah. Over the five years that FoodCorps has been able to partner with the Walmart Foundation, so far we have scaled up our quite significantly. So a big piece of what we've been able to do has just been to reach more kids and more schools with the kind of hands-on food education that we know make a really powerful difference in what children eat. This year, FoodCorps is reaching 170,000 students in 350 high poverty schools, thanks in really significant part to the partnership we have with Walmart. The relationship we have with the foundation has also enabled us to bring a strong equity lens to the AmeriCorps service members who we are recruiting and supporting in their work in the field. The Walmart Foundation has made it possible for us to increase what we pay our core members well above what AmeriCorps requires of us. That means we're able to attract core members who come from limited resource backgrounds themselves or members who themselves grew up struggling with hunger and food insecurity, grew up struggling with the realities of a food system that did not serve them healthy food every day. It makes a huge difference in how effective our core members are and how much authenticity we can show up with in the communities where we serve. And the Walmart Foundation has made it possible for FoodCorps to bring our work to places that don't have the kind of philanthropic supporter base that a New York city or a Bay area has. At least a third of our service members are in rural communities and small town settings that don't typically get reached by a national organization. But for FoodCorps, serving native and indigenous communities thoughtfully and well, serving communities like Flint, Michigan, serving communities like the Arkansas Delta and the Mississippi Delta and rural areas in North Carolina, these are huge priorities for us as an organization and they're the kind of priorities that are very hard to achieve without the kind of high trust partnership that we have with the Walmart Foundation. Curt, your mission is so noble and important and I also admire you and your colleagues being willing to have an objective evaluation done to learn and then to move on to other paths that may be more productive than what was going on in the past. Can you give an example of somewhere along the way where you learned something from evaluation that surprised you and changes the way you did things? Yeah, absolutely. So we did a big external evaluation project with Columbia University Teacher's College and the Tisch center on food education and policy there. And one of the findings of that evaluation work was that the real magic happens in food and nutrition education when that approach is hands on. There's a really powerful shift that happens in what kids learn about food and more importantly, what their behaviors are towards healthy food, fruit and vegetables in particular when they engage directly in a school garden and taste a beat pulled raw out of the ground with the dirt still on it, or when they cook in their classroom and learn the skills and build the agency to make a salad dressing themselves, and a cook our recipe for their family at home. We know that kind of thing works because supermarket in Oregon told us they ran out of rutabagas the week FoodCorps taught the rutabaga lesson. That kind of hands-on approach to learning about food is a dramatic shift from what I certainly got in my nutrition education as a kid, which was an authority figure pointing at a government poster on the wall. And I think that old model is one that we've kind of kept going in far too many schools. But because of this finding coming out of the research we did with Columbia University, which showed that when kids get more of that hands-on food education, they triple the fruits and vegetables in their school meals. FoodCorps has oriented much of our policy agenda that we're currently working on in the upcoming child nutrition reauthorization towards trying to stand up programming that would put food educators into school meal programs around the country, because we recognized if we can give more kids that kind of hands-on food education, we'll suddenly be able to take different advantage of the $18 billion our country already invests in putting food on lunch trays for our nation's kids and we can get that healthy food we're putting on lunch trays and the fruits and vegetables in particular eaten by more and more kids if they just get the right introduction to it. So Karrie, from your perspective, what do you see is the value of your work with FoodCorps and what sort of outcomes are you seeing? It's really, it's interesting, Curt listening to you talk about what you sort of see as some of the value and the outcomes. My list would be similar. I think of it in a couple of areas. One has been the learnings on the direct programmatic work. We are seeing that there are practices that are working and some that aren't, that we shouldn't be doing anymore. And in that kind of learning about what are the outcomes that are being driven and what are the different techniques and experiences that can be created more at scale to try and support that. And I think Curt, what as you were sort of talking about, then how do we take that to a more structural level, whether that's through policy or other kinds of mechanisms or embedding that kind of learning across multiple programs. These are really valuable insights that go beyond one organization and one donor, but really start to have implications across the entirety of the field. The other that Curt touched on that I do want to highlight that has really advanced our thinking is how intentional FoodCorps has been about things like hiring, and about diversity, equity and inclusion. Their approach of thinking about recruiting talent, training talent and having that be of the community is incredibly thoughtful and they've been very honest about what does that take. What does that take in terms of stipends? What does that take in terms of support for core members over time? But I think the organization has also not just stopped with frontline. They've also internalized training across their staff in the organization. I would say as a sector, and whether that's food, security support organizations, nutrition education organizations, or really as a nonprofit sector, struggling with issues about how we think about diversity, equity and inclusion in our own organizations and our programmatic work and in the services being provided is something that is very difficult and that the FoodCorps has really been leading the way in starting to put some ideas on the table, learning from those. So that's informed us. It's informed the field. That's really changed the way we thought about the work as well. What sort of training skills do you think are important for the next generation to help tap with food and nutrition and food insecurity issues? Kelly, I love this question because we speak a lot with organizations about how are they thinking about preparing for the future. So the first is that I think we recognize that the needs of families who are experiencing food insecure, they're not static. They're not static in any way. This is a really simple example, but think about when food banks used to hand out information about where pantries were and what their hours were, they handed out paper lists. Today, what's the first thing you would do? You'd go online and you'd do a search. Where is my local place to get help, right? That's an example of how the changing nature and expectation around how people would find information and resources. Now take that to a bigger scale. That means the choices, like do we build a physical location to provide services? Do we offer mobile services? Do we need to explore more on demand kinds of services? Same with nutrition education. Is that hands-on experience the thing that matters? How much can digital play a role? This all has implications for how our responses need to be built for these kinds of issues. So I think our future leaders are going to have to understand and think about how to apply a more human-centered design approach to figuring out how our organizations need to be structured in the future. We need to start with the individuals who are experiencing the situations and build from them as opposed to starting from the structures that we have in place. The second area that I think about is about how technology can be applied to the problems of response. How do we use data? How do we better understand who's in need? How do we better target responses? How do we support shared learning about outcomes? I think about future skills for this sector, applying things like machine learning. How is that going to help us be faster and more targeted in the approach? And then probably the third thing I would offer is not to underestimate personal competencies that we need in the leaders of the future. This is incredibly hard work. It's complex, it's important. It really, really matters. I really think about the kinds of creativity and the passion that's going to be needed from future leaders but also a strong ability to be self-reflected. And as we talk about self reflection, I think Curt talked about this willingness to pivot away from things that aren't working. If it's not working as well as it could, we have to be brave, and that bravery is really important. Thanks for that description. Curt, I was going to ask you the same question. But as Karrie was speaking just now, it made me think of another question that I'd like to ask you instead. Communities often are quite distressful about outside organizations and people coming in to help them, and for a good reason. There's been a long history of this happening without much benefit and the communities are worried about the motives of the people coming in. They just want to get their research done or they want to do their philanthropy and feel good about it. There are a lot of reasons communities have this distrust. How do you address this? Because you're in so many communities of need and I'm sure trust must be a big issue. Trust is the foundation on which all of this work rests and for anyone who's spent meaningful time in your own kid's school or another school setting, you know how relational those environments really are at the end of the day. And it makes me feel like Karrie was spot on in saying a big piece of what is needed in this next wave of work given the ecosystem we all find ourselves in is the ability to be nimble and adaptive and responsive to local context. And so for FoodCorps, that begins with a very strong priority on recruiting folks who work for us, whether it's in our AmeriCorps program as frontline food educators, or the folks who are in our field offices leading the kind of district and principal level relationships and working with other organizations and allies and policy makers around the state, begins with recruiting local talent who come in with expertise and relationships and informal knowledge as well as formal knowledge about the ecosystem in which they are operating. But at an organizational level, it requires us to be placed-based. And it's a tricky thing for a national nonprofit like FoodCorps to strike the right balance between enough consistency from place to place that we get all the benefits of replicability and scalability and measurability and we can tell a powerful story to policy makers, to our partners, and have what is most important, which is adaptive responses to local context, the fact that climate and culture and food culture play out so differently in the Navajo nation from how they play out in rural Maine, from how they play out in New York City. That adaptability is what gives you relevance and it's what actually makes your work make a difference. We work really hard to lean in on the place-based side of that and the culturally relevant side of that. I do think our nation school meal programs in large part are still trying to solve the problems of the last century. The modern school meal program has its origins at a time when we were trying to get the surplus commodities, we were growing on our nation's farms used up by our school system and try to make sure that folks going off to the battlefield in our country were not malnourished and we have a different food landscape today, one that needs to put public health at its center and needs to recognize the fact that in today's incredibly diverse America, food is one of the best tools we have to connect across lines of cultural difference and come together around a shared table to affirm our values. I do believe there's a way we can have school food be an engine, not just for kids being well nourished, but kids feeling really, truly cared for and valued and affirmed in who they are and where they come from. I also would say that there's been a sea change in what young adults are interested in around food. And now everywhere I go there's more and more young people raising their hands saying, "How do I get involved in FoodCorps? How do I donate a year or two of my life to this cause of building a more just and healthful and sustainable food system?" And that is totally thrilling to see. Karrie, do you share Curt's optimism? I do share that optimism. There is an incredible amount of passion. I'm seeing a lot of ignition around what it means to have positive food experiences and how people are relating to food and valuing food within their communities. Food is the most personal thing we do. It's a decision that we make multiple times a day. It's cultural, it's our families, it's we gather around food. We celebrate with food, and we celebrate our communities, our heritage, all around this core convening factor. I am seeing where the value of doing that and putting that in the center is starting to become more and more important, and that is really encouraging for the structures and the processes and the systems and addressing some of these issues. I think that gives me a lot of hope that we have this very personal base in which to build. Given that food insecurity is a major problem in the US and around the world, despite years of efforts to try to help address it, what do you think are the most important things that need to be done? I think first starting with most people just simply don't realize how pervasive food insecurity really is. I often will give people the fact that we look at data and food insecurity exists in every county in America. This is neighbors, friends, family, and that means that we have to think about solutions at a community level and at scale. And it's really complex. At the core, I think food security and food insecurity is about instability. So that might mean housing. That might mean employment. That might mean health. That might mean a very personal family situation. And it also isn't about a static aspect, right? A person isn't food insecure forever. They're insecure often for a moment in time or a few months or some years. For some people, it's more of pervasive over a lifetime. But people are cycling in and out of need. And I think those are all dynamics and aspects that are important to understand. And I think that leads us to two reasons that it continues to be such a pervasive issue. So first, there's still an incredible stigma associated with people who are struggling to have access to healthy food. And it's difficult to ask for help when needed because of that. And second, because it can be so cyclical, it also means that our systems have to make it seamless for people to be able to ask for help when they need it. So it's not easy to navigate a benefit application. It is not easy to figure out, "Where do I go? What's going to be the best place for me," especially when a family is struggling with other stressors in life. So setting aside more of the structural questions around things like housing and healthcare. I think there's some practical short term things that we can really do. We can prioritize helping to reduce stigma, to demystify what food security really is, and to assess where these systems that we have in place may be putting up barriers for people that don't need to be there, that they could be accessing food easier. You know, in our part, well, we think about our own work. We're still going to address these issues at scale. And for context over the last five years, we've helped to provide about 4 billion meals to people in need, right? So scale matters for sure. That is something that needs to happen. But As we think about those lessons and the learnings and some things we can immediately do, we're also thinking differently about how do we prioritize investing in programs in the geographies and for communities that are disproportionately impacted by these issues. You know, Curt shared some of the stats in the beginning for communities of color, for rural geographies. There are areas where we need to have a more targeted approach to develop better tools to address stigma and better tools to reduce some of those system barriers so that people can get access to their needs met in the communities where they're at. So thank you, Karrie. Curt, what are your thoughts on that? At FoodCorps, we're really focused on how do we leverage the scale and reach of our nation's school system to make sure that the 30 million kids a day who are spending half their waking hours and eating often half their daily calories in school learn what healthy food is in a reliably effective way and eat healthy food every day in the meals their schools provide. And our sense is that systemic change that we could catalyze across the school system will have huge longterm impacts on the trajectories of kids who have the chance to fulfill their potential and fulfill their dreams in school and in life and also have a huge impact on how our food system as a whole works there. But I would say if we want to change our school system to better address the needs of the kids who are walking through their school doors food insecure, the kids who on snow days don't get enough food to eat, we have to change some of the stuck mindsets and mental models that have kind of been holding our schools in the place where they've been around food for so long. And really I think we have a school system that very often sees food as a cost center to be minimized instead of an impact center waiting to be unlocked. And when we treat it as a cost center to be minimized, we minimize the amount of time kids have to learn about healthy food. We minimize the amount of time kids have to eat healthy food in their lunch rooms, and we minimize the investment we make in the quality of food we're serving to kids in school, and we minimize the attention we pay to the lunch ladies and gents and the district level school food leadership who are on the front lines of actually getting healthy food to our kids. The result of that is a food system that devalues food in school and leaves a whole lot of kids feeling unsatisfied and unfulfilled and being unnourished by that system and I believe there's another way to approach it, which is to treat it as an impact center and a value center and show what happens when we use the power of food to make sure every child gets the nourishment they need to thrive and every child gets that feeling that only food can give you of knowing you are valued and cared for by the adults around you. Thank you. Well Curt and Karrie, there couldn't be any two more capable, insightful, and passionate people working on this problem. And thank the heavens you're doing this work. And congratulations for what you've accomplished. I know it's only begun. And thank you for being leading voices in food and of course for joining us today. Thanks so much. Our guests today have been Curt Ellis co-founder and CEO of FoodCorps and Karrie Denniston, Senior Director of Sustainability with the Walmart Foundation. And thank you for listening. If you would like to subscribe to the Leading Voices and Food Podcast series, you may do so at Google Play, Stitcher, RadioPublic or Apple Podcasts, or by visiting our website at the Duke World Food Policy Center. This is Kelly Brownell.
We took time at the recent World Squirrel Cook-off to catch up with our new friend Jonathan Wilkins from Black Duck Revival. Jonathan is an interesting guy who was raised in an urban area and started hunting when he moved to the Arkansas Delta. We talk about a lot of things including his background, some of his pursuits, consuming knowledge about hunting, how race comes into play in hunting, marriage and family, and more! Bear Hunting Magazine is Powered by Simplecast
We took time at the recent World Squirrel Cook-off to catch up with our new friend Jonathan Wilkins from Black Duck Revival. Jonathan is an interesting guy who was raised in an urban area and started hunting when he moved to the Arkansas Delta. We talk about a lot of things including his background, some of his pursuits, consuming knowledge about hunting, how race comes into play in hunting, marriage and family, and more! Bear Hunting Magazine is Powered by Simplecast
We’re talking about occupational health issues within the agricultural community with Knesha Rose-Davison, the Health Communications Director at AgriSafe. “We known farming is a tough occupation but they have some of the hardest working, and most dedicated people…” ~Knesha Rose-Davison Knesha was born in Arkansas Delta, with many of her family members working in agriculture. She received her Bachelor of Science in Biological Sciences in 2002, and in 2016, obtained a certificate in Agricultural Medicine, focusing on rural occupational health and environmental health safety. At AgriSafe, they focus on protecting the people that feed the world, and through the Total Farmer Health Program, Knesha and her team is able to look at all of the potential factors that can affect a producer’s health and wellbeing. “Everything impacts a farmer or producer’s life and we have to take that into consideration…and try to provide information to help them alleviate some of those concerns…” ~Knesha Rose-Davison Knesha also serves as the 72nd president of the Louisiana Public Health Association and is a March of Dimes Gretchen C. Carlson Advocacy fellow. She has covered the spectrum on care, ranging from infants to the elderly, and eventually took her position with AgriSafe, bringing her back to her Delta roots. Knesha has over twelve years of public health experience, and is passionate about serving vulnerable populations and increasing health care access and equity. Below are the resources mentioned during our conversation: AgriSafe Mental Health Resource Total Farmer Health (web link) https://www.agrisafe.org/total-farmer-health National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-327-6243 http://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ Farm Aid Farmer Hotline: 1-800-FARM-AID (1-800-327-6243) https://www.farmaid.org/our-work/resources-for-farmers/ AgriSafe Think Tank
The True Tale of "Arkansas Gun Girl," Helen Spence On this episode of Arts & Letters, we continue our discussion with Denise Parkinson about the mysterious and infamous life of 1930s "outlaw" Helen Ruth Spence. Parkinson's book, Daughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery & Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta is a true-life tale about a depression-era tragedy. Through archival research, newly discovered prison records, community stories, and interviews with Spence's childhood friend, LC Brown, Parkinson provides an in-depth account of a complicated woman whose legend lives on today. Part I of this story told of the communities along the banks of the White River where Helen grew up, her early life and short marriage, the death of her father and step-mother at the hands of Jack Worls, Worls' trial, the infamous shooting at the Dewitt Courthouse, and a mysterious second murder. In Part II, Parkinson exposes the exploitation and abuse that could be found in the 1930s criminal
The True Tale of "Arkansas Gun Girl," Helen Spence On this episode of Arts & Letters, we’ll be talking with writer Denise White Parkinson. Her book is titled Daughter of the White River: Depression-Era Treachery & Vengeance in the Arkansas Delta and is published by The History Press. This true-life tale is about a depression-era tragedy and the stranger-than-fiction-life of Helen Spence: "so young and beautiful, even in death--Helen Spence-- a so-called outlaw . . . And why shouldn't she be an outlaw, being as she was of the river." For Helen Spence belonged to the River People. John Black carried Helen Ruth Spence's lifeless body to a patch of ground miles away from the funeral home in the Arkansas County seat of Dewitt, Arkansas. He did this with the help of others, who waited with him until dark to enter the funeral home in stealth and spirit away the body lying within. John Black planted a cedar tree on a summer night in 1934. ... He dug a hole in the rich Delta earth and
While Damien Echols has consistently downplayed his violent history in softball media interviews, the records, as usual, tell a very different tale than heard from Echols and his supporters. "DAMIEN ADMITS TO A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE." The central figure in the investigation, prosecution, incarceration and release of the West Memphis 3 was the flamboyant and problematic Damien Echols, whose boyhood ambition to become a world-class occultist put him out of step with his peers in the Arkansas Delta. Quickly pegged as a likely suspect in the murders from multiple sources, including his own all-too-knowing initial interviews with police, Echols seemed to have adopted his black-clad “figure of the night” persona as a defense against often-rough circumstances. Becoming a self-proclaimed witch and part-time vampire made sense to a mentally ill misfit who could turn his outsider status into a means of drawing attention to himself. Intrinsic to this dark image was the creation of the impression that he was capable of great and weird violence. For those who knew him, it was not surprising that he fulfilled his self-created legend as a dreaded monster. He worked hard at becoming the terror of the town. On the road to infamy, he built up a history of violence that gave credence to an ability to torture and kill. 'According to his discharge summary from Charter Hospital of Little Rock in June 1992: “Supposedly, Damien chased a younger child with an ax and attempted to set a house on fire. He denied this behavior. He reported that his girlfriend's family reported this so that they could get him in trouble. He was also accused of beating a peer up at school. Damien admits to a history of violence. He said prior to admission he did attempt to enucleate a peer's eye at school. He was suspended subsequently from school. He was suspended on seven different occasions during the school year. He related he was suspended on one occasion because he set a fire in his science classroom and also would walk off on campus on several occasions. He was disruptive to the school environment. He was also disrespectful to teachers. He has been accused of terroristic threatening.” Echols had gotten into trouble in one in- stance for spitting on a teacher. Much of this history of violence came from Echols himself. His teenage acquaintances told grisly stories about Echols' casual cruelty. Joe Houston Bartoush, Jason Baldwin's cousin, offered another insight into Echols' violent character; a portion of Baldwin's “alibi” centered on the fact that he had cut the lawn of his great-uncle Hubert Bartoush, Joe's father, on May 5. On June 14, 1993, Detective Bryn Ridge was interviewing Hubert when Joe Bartoush volunteered a statement. Joe, in his early teens, said he and Echols had been walking down the road west out of Lakeshore into a field when they came upon a sick dog. Echols grabbed a brick and began attacking the dog. Joe told Ridge: “On 10-27-92 I was at Lakeshore Trailer Park with Damien Echols when he killed a black Great Dane. The dog was already sick and he hit the dog in the back of the head. He pulled the intestines out of the dog and started stomping the dog until blood came out of his mouth. He was going to come back later with battery acid so that he could burn the hair and skin off of the dog's head. He had two cat skulls, a dog skull and a rat skull that I already knew about. He kept these skulls in his bedroom at Jack Echols house in Lakeshore. He was trying to make the eyeballs of the dog he killed pop out when he was stomping. Damien had a camouflage survival knife to cut the gut out of the dog with.” Joe was sure of the date of the dog killing because he had skipped school that day and had been caught. Joe said Echols had used the survival knife to carve his name into his arm on another occasion. A similar survival knife recovered behind the Baldwin home, known as the “lake knife,” was a highly publicized piece of prosecutorial evidence. His former girlfriend also described Echols having a similar knife, and Echols testified that he had owned “a bunch” of Rambo-style camouflage survival knives. Heather Cliett, Baldwin's girlfriend, told investigators of similar animal cruelty: “States that one time at 'The Case Against the West Memphis 3 Killers, Vol. I' the skating rink Damien told her that he stuck a stick in a dog's eye and jumped on it and then burned it.” Timothy Blaine Hodge, a 14-year-old ninth-grader at Marion who lived in Lakeshore, had known Baldwin for some time but only knew Echols since his return from Oregon. “I've heard Jason say that Damien was in the crazy house in Oregon. Damien and Jason were always together. They spent a lot of time in West Memphis at Wal-Mart. They stole a lot of stuff. I always seen just Jason and Damien and Domini together walking around Lakeshore. There was a big black Great Dane dog at Lakeshore that I was on the trail over the bridge to the right as you go over the bridge. It was dead. Its intestines was strung out of his butt. A boy named Adam told me he heard Damien did it.” Chris Littrell, a neighbor of the Echols family and a Wiccan, told the police that Echols liked to stick sharpened sticks through frogs to see how long it took them to die. He said Echols claimed that he had burned down his father's garage and then stood in the flames chanting. Echols told Murray Farris, another teen who was a Wiccan, that he once poured gasoline over his own foot and set it aflame. Reports of Echols planning to sacrifice his own child in a ritual were persistent. Littrell told police that Echols did not intend to kill the baby that Domini was expecting, as the child would entitle him to a larger government check. The story surfaced after Echols was arrested with Deanna Holcomb as they attempted to run away. Jerry Driver, the juvenile officer in charge of the Echols case, mentioned the baby sacrifice rumor on June 1, 1992, in a phone message to Charter Hospital, where Echols was taken for his first hospitalization for mental illness. The message read “Court-ordered to Mid South Hospital. Suicidal, self-mutilating -- made pact ... girlfriend & Devil to sacrifice 1st born.” A psychiatric evaluation at Charter dated June 2, 1992, stated: “There was a conversation that concerned staff at the detention center. Reportedly Damien and his girlfriend were going to have a baby and then sacrifice the child. Damien denies this type of behavior.” The discharge summary on June 25 repeated that information, as did the discharge summary on Sept. 28 after his second trip to Charter. The Sept. 28 discharge summary also noted that Echols had been on probation for threatening his girlfriend's parents and for a charge of second-degree sexual misconduct stemming from having sex with his underage girlfriend. Driver's dealings with Echols dated from that ar- rest on May 19, 1992, when Damien and Deanna were found partially clothed in an abandoned trailer at Lakeshore. In a series of contacts with law enforcement over the next year, Echols described a network of occultists active in Crittenden County. In turn, Echols consented to have his home searched and officials confiscated Echols' notebook, full of somber and morbid poetry, and artwork from his bedroom, full of demonic and occult images. Driver believed a drawing of four tombstones, with a baby's foot and a rattle, under a full moon, indicated Echols' plan to sacrifice his own child. Deanna told West Memphis police on May 11, 1993, well before the arrests: “I found out that he planned to kill our first born if it was a girl. Damien would not do it. He is a coward and would have tried to get me to do it. That's when I knew he was nuts and I had nothing else to do with him.” Stories about Echols drinking blood were similarly persistent and pervasive. The West Memphis Evening Times ran a story quoting an anonymous girl who said she had seen Echols drink the blood of Baldwin and Domini. The same story quoted a Lakeshore resident who said that dogs had come up missing in the trailer park. Schoolmates often asked Echols if he drank blood, and he didn't deny the practice. The Sept. 28 discharge summary from Charter noted that, “While at the Detention Center, he reportedly grabbed a peer and began ‘sucking blood from the peer's neck'. According to Damien, he relates that the peer was aware that he was going to do this. Staff reports that Damien was not remorseful for his behavior. Damien indicated that he sucked blood in order to get into a gang. He denies it was any type of ritual. … “Damien laughed when he was called a ‘blood sucking vampire'. He relates that he does not know why people think this.” After an office visit on Jan. 25, 1993, his therapist noted that Echols believed he obtained power by drink- ing the blood of others, that the practice made him feel godlike. At trial, John Fogleman asked Dr. James Moneypenny, a psychologist from Little Rock testifying for the defense, “In your business, is it not unusual to find people telling you about drinking blood, and that they do it to make them feel like a god?” “It's highly unusual,” said Dr. Moneypenny. “It's what?” “It's not usual at all,” said the psychologist. “It is very atypical. I think that represents some of the extremes of his thinking and beliefs and what it has come to for him.” Driver found that Echols was not the only blood- drinker in his circle of friends. Driver had transported Domini to Charter Hospital after she broke probation on a shoplifting charge. “She discussed with me the blood- drinking and said ‘Why should I not drink blood, because my mother drinks blood?' and I thought, now that's a strange thing to say.” Domini, consistently dismissive of the most damaging evidence, denied making this statement. While there is little else to suggest that Baldwin was an avid blood-drinker, testimony from a fellow detainee at Craighead County Juvenile Detention Facility centered on a gory confession made to Michael Carson. Carson, a 16-year-old admitted drug user, testified, “I said, just between me and you, did you do it. I won't say a word. He said yes and he went into detail about it. .... He told me how he dismembered the kids, or I don't know exactly how many kids. He just said he dismembered them. He sucked the blood from the penis and scrotum and put the balls in his mouth.” Carson stood by his testimony when reports sur- faced in 2000 that he had committed perjury. Carson said he didn't cut a deal in exchange for the testimony. He had passed the polygraph before testifying. Christy Jones, a friend of Misskelley's who had attended school with Damien, told police on Oct. 1, 1993, about Damien “I saw him cut his arm with something and he then sucked the blood out of the wound. I had heard that Damien was weird and part of a satanic cult.” The evidence of his cruelty to animals continues to dog Echols. When such talk surfaced on Twitter in 2013, Echols referred to the many stories as “animal lies” and suggested that, if the stories were true, they would have showed up in the court record. After all, Damien's dad, Joe Hutchison, had told the “Paradise Lost” documentary filmmakers: “This boy is not capable of the crime that he's been arrested for. I've seen him take a little kitten and love it just like you love a little baby.” Considering that Echols intended to sacrifice his own little baby, Hutchison's statement held a certain ironic truth. Documentary filmmakers have made no mention of Damien's history of torturing animals, drinking blood and planning human and animal sacrifices. https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Black-Against-Memphis-Killers/dp/0692802843/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_1?keywords=gary+meece&qid=1549834053&s=gateway&sr=8-1-fkmrnull https://www.amazon.com/Where-Monsters-Go-Against-Memphis-ebook/dp/B06XVNXCJV/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_3?keywords=gary+meece&qid=1549834053&s=gateway&sr=8-3-fkmrnull https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-West-Memphis-Killers-ebook/dp/B07C7C4DCH/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_4?keywords=gary+meece&qid=1549834053&s=gateway&sr=8-4-fkmrnull https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-West-Memphis-Killers/dp/B071K8VNBM/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_6?keywords=gary+meece&qid=1549834053&s=gateway&sr=8-6-fkmrnull https://www.facebook.com/WestMemphis3Killers/ https://eastofwestmemphis.wordpress.com http://callahan.mysite.com https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Black-Against-Memphis-Killers-ebook/dp/B06XVT2976/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_2?keywords=gary+meece&qid=1549834053&s=gateway&sr=8-2-fkmrnull
Episode 8 of "The Case Against" tackles another persistent falsity about the West Memphis 3 case: Belying the claim that Damien Echols and Jason Baldwin were barely acquainted with Jessie Misskelley are their own words and the words of their friends and acquaintances. They knew each other and frequented the same teenage hangouts. https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-West-Memphis-Killers/dp/B071K8VNBM/ref=sr_1_4?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1549233637&sr=1-4 https://www.amazon.com/Where-Monsters-Go-Against-Memphis-ebook/dp/B06XVNXCJV/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1549233533&sr=8-5&keywords=blood+on+black https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Black-Against-Memphis-Killers-ebook/dp/B06XVT2976/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1549233533&sr=8-1&keywords=blood+on+black https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-West-Memphis-Killers-ebook/dp/B07C7C4DCH/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1549233533&sr=8-2&keywords=blood+on+black https://www.facebook.com/WestMemphis3Killers/ "I THOUGHT WE WERE SORT OF FRIENDS" Damien Echols and Jason Baldwin were best friends, blood brothers, two boys from the trailer parks who had formed an inseparable bond. In May of 1993, Echols was a high school dropout who received Social Security Disability checks due to various mental illnesses. He stayed some of the time at his parents' home at Broadway Trailer Park in West Memphis and some of the time at his 16-year-old pregnant girlfriend's home in Lakeshore Estates, a trailer park between West Memphis and Marion, Ark. Jason's trailer was just down the street from where Domini Teer and her mother lived. Echols' parents had recently remarried after years of separation. His mother, who had lifelong troubles with mental illness, had divorced his stepfather the previous year over allegations of sexual abuse of Echols' younger sister, Michelle. The sprawling, trash-strewn trailer parks were near where Interstate 55 came from the north to join east-west Interstate 40 for a brief stretch through West Memphis. While Baldwin, a skinny 16-year-old, lived in Lakeshore and attended Marion High School, much of his social life revolved around the video galleries, bowling alley and skating rink across the interstate in West Memphis. Baldwin lived with two younger brothers and a mentally ill mother who had recently separated from his habitually drunken stepfather. His mother's new boyfriend, a chronic felon, had moved in a few weeks ago. Echols told of ficers handling a juvenile offense in May 1992 that he and Baldwin were heavily involved in “gray magic.” One of their mutual friends, Jessie Misskelley Jr., 17, a school dropout and another trailer park teenager, was regarded as a bully and a troublemaker. Misskelley had been in repeated trouble for attacking younger children. He eventually would admit that he had been involved in satanic rituals with Echols and Baldwin. One of the WM3 myths is that Misskelley was a distant acquaintance of the other two. Misskelley and Baldwin had been off and on as close friends for years, and Misskelley and Echols often spent time together. In a letter to girlfriend Heather Cliett written from the detention center, Baldwin, showing a sense of betrayal, wrote: “What gets me is why Jessie would make up such a lie as that, because I thought we were sort of friends except for the night at the skating rink when he tried to steal my necklace, and that made me pretty mad, but not as mad as all of this is making me.” Mara Leveritt's book “Dark Spell: Surviving the Sentence” tells of Baldwin's first encounter with Misskelley on his first day in sixth grade at Marion Elementary School. According to the book, Misskelley attacked Baldwin without provocation during recess, “hollering like he meant to kill him.” In eighth and ninth grades, the two boys lived on the same street in Lakeshore. They “got to be pretty good friends.” Around that time, Echols' grandmother moved to Lakeshore and Echols began hanging out, mowing lawns and using the money to fund his interest in skateboards. In “Life After Death,” Echols described first noticing Baldwin, “a skinny kid with a black eye and a long, blond mullet.” Echols was struck by the number of music cassettes Baldwin carried in his backpack — “Metallica, Anthrax, Iron Maiden, Slayer, and every other hair band a young hoodlum could desire.” After his Nanny suffered her second heart attack and had her leg amputated, the Echols family moved to Lakeshore. In “Life After Death,” Echols described Lakeshore as full of “run-down and beat-up” mobile homes, filled with jobless drunks and addicts who earned their money through petty crime or scrounging up recyclables. Echols more recently imagined that the dilapidated trailers somehow have improved with age along with the neighborhood: “I suppose it would now be considered lower middle class.” Not so. While some of the homes are kept up nicely, many of the yards are littered, youths roam the streets aimlessly and trailers often catch fire, sometimes from meth labs. Lakeshore residents routinely show up in Municipal Court hearings, often for petty crimes and drug offenses, for failing to appear at hearings, for not paying fines, for the sort of offenses committed by chronic small-timers everywhere. The “lake” at Lakeshore is the same scummy, trashy stinkhole that Echols remembered. Lakeshore is still populated by many carnies and other itinerant workers. It remains a hotbed of occultism, witchcraft and Satanism, with the West Memphis 3 having achieved the status of folk heroes. Similarly, Echols in “Life After Death” described Marion High School as a sort of “rural” “Beverly Hills 90210,” “a place where kids drove brand-new cars to school, wore Gucci clothing, and had enough jewelry to spark the envy of rap stars.” Actually, the students of Marion High were and are the typical mix of modestly attired kids from a modestly middle-class community. Marion is a small Arkansas town with a traditionally agriculture-based economy, with a number of residents who commute to jobs across the river in Memphis. As in many similar towns, a deeply entrenched elite holds sway over most municipal affairs. Their style is far from ostentatious. Marion is not an elite suburban community, though Marion residents do hold themselves aloof from the larger, predominately black and considerably rougher town of West Memphis to the immediate south. Median income in Marion today is roughly twice that of West Memphis. By comparison, median income in the elite Memphis suburb of Germantown is roughly twice that of Marion. Nonetheless, there was a class divide between the trailer park kids and the more affluent students. Local teen Jason Crosby described “high society people which would be the people who come to school in shirt and tie, don't want to get messed up, want to stay on the sidewalk all the time.” Among students with parents with steady jobs, a strong work ethic, no arrest record and solid social standing, kids from the trailer parks often didn't fit in. As outsiders together at Marion Junior High, Damien and Jason became fast friends, sharing interests in music, skateboarding and video games. In “Life After Death,” Damien described how he met Misskelley through Jason. Knocking on the door of the Baldwin trailer, Damien was told that Jason was over at Misskelley's trailer, four or five trailers away. Damien described Misskelley was a short, greasy, manic figure prone to funny and slightly odd antics. The Misskelleys were pumping up the tires on the old trailer and moving it to Highland Trailer Park, just across the way, that very day. Still, said Echols, “I never did see Jessie a great deal, but we became familiar enough to talk when we met. Jason and I would run into him at the bowling alley and spend an hour or two playing pool, or hang out for a little while at the Lakeshore store.” Echols former girlfriend Deanna Holcomb described a tighter relationship between Echols and Misskelley, naming Jason, Jessie and Joey Lancaster as particular friends of Echols. When Damien moved up to high school, he left Jason a grade behind. Damien made no attempt to fit in and soon adopted his trademark all-black wardrobe, complete with black trench coat, partially inspired by the Johnny Depp character in “Edward Scissorhands.” All three hung around typical hangouts in West Memphis such as the bowling alley, the skating rink and video game booths. A surveillance video from the skating rink posted on William Ramsey's Occult Investigations YouTube account recently showed Echols and Misskelley as two of the older boys hanging out at the skating rink soon after the killings. Jennifer Bearden was a 12-year-old Bartlett girl when she first encountered the three killers at the rink around February 1993. She struck up a romantic relationship with the 18-year-old Echols. Concerning Misskelley, “I knew him a little bit. … I saw him at the skating rink several times.” Asked about the relationship of Misskelley to the other two, she testified in an August 2009 hearing: “.… Whenever we were at the skating rink, uh, Jessie was, he, he was a little bit louder, he was a little bit more —- I don't know — he liked to cause a little bit more trouble. … We kind of like stayed to ourselves and there was an incident that he stole the 8-ball from the pool table at the skating rink. … And uh, he showed (it) to us and actually, Damien and Jason got blamed for it. And they got kicked out of the skating rink for it. … They were pretty upset with him.” Joseph Samuel Dwyer, a younger playmate of Baldwin living two doors down at Lakeshore in 1993, described in a hearing on Aug. 14, 2009, what he knew of the relationships among Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley. Dwyer said that he knew Misskelley quite well from the neighborhood, particularly since Misskelley's stepmother, Shelbia Misskelley, separated from “Big Jessie,” lived on the same street as Dwyer and Baldwin. Though Dwyer was in frequent contact with the Baldwin boys, he merely knew Echols but did not associate with him. Echols shared few interests with most boys and usually dressed in black. “I just never really hung out with him or even tried to get to know him,” testified Dwyer. He explained: “I really didn't have anything to do with him just because, uh, just the way he acted. … We'd get off the school bus and he'd be standing there, it's almost like craving attention in an all-black outfit so all of the kids on the bus would see him.” Dwyer pegged Echols as a poser who reveled in drawing negative attention to himself. “… He liked horror movies. He would talk about watching horror movies and stuff like that.” In an affidavit in 2006, Dwyer said of Echols: “I didn't like what I saw of him. He liked to call attention to himself. One day he painted a star over one of his eyes. Damien was a talker. He liked to say things to get peoples' attention.” Dwyer characterized Misskelley as a “trailer park redneck.” Dwyer recalled the relationship of Baldwin and Echols: “I did see Damien and Jason together after Jason started getting friendly with Damien, I was around him less than before because I didn't like Damien. I know that after Jason started hanging out with Damien, he got a trench coat just like Damien's. It was a long black trench coat. Damien had a certain way of talking and Jason picked up some of Damien's way of talking.” Another myth in the standard WM3 storyline is that the police pegged Damien as the killer partially because he wore a black trench coat . In 2009, Dwyer explained “the trench coat thing, at the time that was sort of a fashion fad. I have one, uh, everybody, if they didn't have one they wanted one. That was kind of a fashion thing. … It was the rock shirt, rock T-shirts and the trench coat.” So “everybody” had or wanted to have a black trench coat as part of a “fashion thing,” along with rock T-shirts. Baldwin and Echols tiresomely claim they were singled out, persecuted, arrested and convicted because they “didn't dress like everyone else.” But “everybody” wanted to dress the way they dressed. Dwyer added: “Everybody out there in the trailer park was terrified; everybody was profiled because of our rock T-shirts, the trench coat , the long hair. Everybody look at us like we were just part of this cult thing, and it was totally made up, if you ask me. Totally made up. And we all felt like we could just as easily have been, uh, picked as a suspect because we were in the the same trailer park, dressed the same. We were all scared about that. Channel 3 news, all the news station were riding through there every day trying to film us as we were walking down the street, you know.” Echols testified that after he began dressing in allblack, other students followed his example. Consider, too, the myth that the boys were singled out for their interest in heavy metal. In 2006, Dwyer said, “A lot of people in our age groups at the time were interested in rock and roll music, and in heavy metal music … I remember that after the three boys were found dead, and the news cameras came out to Lakeshore from time to time, anyone wearing a Metallica t-shirt, or some other heavy metal band t-shirt, was viewed as a devil worshipper, especially if the person had long hair.” Longhaired kids who were heavy metal fans were common, as were black T-shirts. At trial, defense attorneys elicited police testimony that Echols was wearing a Portland Trail Blazers black T-shirt on the night of his arrest, establishing to no clear end that black T-shirts were mainstream enough to be worn by NBA fans. Or by Reba McEntire fans, as demonstrated by a T-shirt from the Misskelley home. Juvenile Officer Jerry Driver testified about Misskelley's links to Baldwin and Echols in Misskelley's trial. Driver, who died in August 2016, had seen the three together for the first time around Nov. 15, 1992, at Lakeshore. Damien, Jason and Jessie walked by while he and a sheriff's deputy were dealing with a suspected drunken driver. “It was nighttime … They all had on long black coats, and Damien had a slouch hat and they all had staffs. … Long sticks that they were walking with.” Misskelley dismissed the story as ridiculous during one of his many confessions, saying he did not have a black coat. Driver's account has been widely ridiculed, though never refuted. Driver repeated the story at the Echols/Baldwin trial. “We saw three gentlemen walking by … Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley, and Jason Baldwin … with long coats” and “long sticks or staffs.” Driver had seen them together on a few other occasions, “maybe two or three times,” … “Twice, I think, at uh — at Walmart and once out in the trailer park.” Otherwise, he had seen Echols and Baldwin together dressed in black. Echols girlfriend Domini Teer, in a Sept. 10, 1993, statement, surprised Deputy Prosecuting Attorney John Fogleman by volunteering that “Jessie came around after them kids was killed.” Fogleman: “OK, what do you mean by that? That he came around after the kids were murdered? What do you mean?” Domini: “I mean, the boy shows up a week after them kids were killed …. Out of nowhere. I mean we hadn't seen Jessie for months. I mean he did that when Damien and me got back together, and Damien was living with his stepdad, Jack. All of a sudden, Jessie comes showing up, and the first time we've seen Jessie since the year before that. …” Fogleman: “And … then Jessie was around quite a bit then?” Domini: “Every once in a while, like once or twice, yeah, I saw him. … I mean, when all the cops were bringing everybody in and all and talking to everybody … It was like two days after the cops were coming around, um … Jessie came over to Jason's house one day while I was sitting there, and wanting Damien to take Blockbuster movies to Blockbuster … And they went, and I guess, took Blockbuster movies back and they wound up over at Jessie's house … because his mom had come over to get Damien … Damien's mom … cause he was supposed to be at Jason's house…. “And it made me mad, and I called over to Jessie's and said where's Damien. And he goes, Damien's on his way back. Matthew just come get him. I said I know, I sent Matthew over there to come get him, cause his parents are here. And then I hung up the phone.” Fogleman: “And about when did that happen after this Wednesday?” Domini: “Um … it was about like that next week.” That would have been when Damien's parents supposedly were temporarily separated, according to some contradictory accounts of Echols' mother, Pam, and after Damien had been interviewed by police several times and failed the polygraph. Jessie was trying to get Damien and selfappointed detective Vicki Hutcheson together about that time. “Dark Spell” described Baldwin's version of the visit. According to Baldwin, Misskelley showed up unexpectedly at the Baldwin trailer because a friend from Highland Trailer Park wanted to meet Echols. from Highland Trailer Park wanted to meet Echols. year-old Hutcheson. Domini told Fogleman she had seen Misskelley a total of three times. “The first time, we had come up the street, and he was messing around with Matt, and we thought somebody was getting beat up, because they were all screaming and hollering out there, and when we walked out there was Jessie.” “Messing around” with younger kids was routine for Jessie. “And the second time I seen him, they had come over there and me and Damien was together, and they had just come knocking on the door with him and B.J. … And that was the last time I'd ever seen him until that time that he …. came over to Jason's to go get Damien.” Charlotte Bly Bolois, who lived at Lakeshore the summer of 1992 and visited there often, told police that Echols and Misskelley were close friends at that time, constantly seen together along with her cousin, Buddy Lucas. She also described how Misskelley got into a fight in June 1992 with her husband, Dan Bolois: “My husband has two younger brothers, one is fixing to be 16 and other one is fixing to be 18, and he started a fight with my husband younger brothers and um, my husband went up there and ask him what was the deal and little Jessie Misskelley was going to pull a knife, but I got behind Jessie and took the knife from him.” The younger brothers were Johnny and Shane Perschke, and there have been various accounts of fights involving John Perschke. Bolois recalled a fight “right there at my trailer” with Misskelley. “Him and my husband got into a fight later on down Fool Lake.” That was the fight involving the knife. She requested that Misskelley give her the knife. “And he turned around and handed me the knife, I said if you're going to fight, fight fair. … He busted a hole in my husband's lip.” A recent account from a West Memphis resident who asked that her name be withheld painted a disturbing portrait of Damien, Jason and Jessie interacting with children from the neighborhood where their victims lived: “In 1993 I used to live in Mayfair Apartments. I lived in the townhouses that are located in the back of the complex. I lived there for around a year and a half. “One day I was coming home and parked in front of a park on the property close to my apartment. As I parked I noticed 3 teenage boys and 3 young boys. It caught me as strange cause one of the teenagers was dressed all in black with a long black coat the other 2 were standing a few steps back from the one in black. So I sat there in my car watching for a few minutes. The teen in black was coaching those 3 little boys (I guessed at the time were 8 or 9 years old) how to hold their bikes on their shoulders and climb a ladder of a slide and how to ride down. The other teen boys were just standing a little behind the one in black not doing much except watching and laughing from time to time. One was kinda stocky the other one skinny. It didn't seem to bother them that I was watching. They saw me. “Any way one of the little boys was about to start up the ladder so I got out of my car and told him to get down. That's when the teen in black made a couple steps toward me and said I needed to shut the f--k up and take my ass into my apartment. This was none of my business. At that point I said if it didn't stop I was going to call the police. Then I was called a f--king bitch. So I got my kids out of my car as he stood there and watched. He watched me all the way to my apartment. It was kinda frightening. I go to call the police but looked back out to see if he or they were headed toward my apartment but instead they just left. So I decided to not call the police and never thought anything else of it. … “About 3 weeks to a month later three 8 year old boys were murdered in the woods right out the back door of the apartment I used to live in. I remember thinking I was so glad we had moved. Well then I was watching the news showing that 3 teenagers had been arrested. When I saw the pictures of the boys I told my husband that the one called Damien Echols was the one that cussed me out and was the one trying to make the kids carry their bikes up the slide. I also recognized the other 2 boys. They are Jessie Misskelley and Jason Baldwin. “The three little boys I saw Echols, Misskelley and Baldwin with that day I can't swear was Michael, Stevie or Chris. I do remember 1 of the boys was blonde and 1 had a red bike. If I'm remembering correctly it was the blonde that had the red bike on his shoulder. I really wasn't watching the little boys. I was paying more attention to the 3 teen boys and what they were doing. “I never told anyone what I saw but family and friends. I never thought it was very important at the time since they had caught them. I was in my early 20's, working, taking care of 2 young kids and my grandparents. My husband was working and going to school at night. I had my hands full. Looking back I wish I had told what I saw.” "DAMIEN ADMITS TO A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE." The central figure in the investigation, prosecution, incarceration and release of the West Memphis 3 was the flamboyant and problematic Damien Echols, whose boyhood ambition to become a world-class occultist put him out of step with his peers in the Arkansas Delta. Meece, Gary. Blood on Black: The Case Against the West Memphis 3, Volume I (The Case Against the West Memphis 3 Killers Book 1) . UNKNOWN. Kindle Edition.
Michelle Kuo got a call one day, telling her that her favorite student had been arrested. After college, Michelle Kuo joined Teach for America and moved to the Arkansas Delta. She taught in a school that focused on teaching underserved youth who had been expelled from other schools. Her time there was transformative, both for Michelle and her students. But at the end of her term at Teach for America, she moved away to attend Harvard. Several years later, she got the call that Patrick, one of her most transformed students, had gotten in a fight outside his home and someone had been killed in the fray. Michelle set aside a new job to return to Arkansas and spend time with Patrick during visitation hours and continue teaching him as he awaited trial. She wrote Reading With Patrick about this experience. This book is moving, riveting, and essential all at once. It kept me up at night and I'm still thinking about it months after reading Michelle and Patrick's story. There is still so much work to be done in the American South to improve the lives of so many who live there. Writing about big issues takes courage and integrity, qualities Michelle exemplifies. But beyond these issues that need to be top of mind for everyone, there is the process of writing about issues, writing about real people, and writing about actual lives. We grapple with these topics in this conversation and, while I know there is so much more to say on these topics, anyone who is considering writing a book relating to social justice or about people in their lives will get a healthy primer on both topics in this episode. It's one I know I will return to again for inspiration and guidance from Michelle, who is a total rock star and a philosopher all wrapped up in one. You're going to love her. Happy listening! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
. Nikolai DiPippa, Clinton School Director of Public Programs, sat down Michelle Kuo, author of Reading With Patrick, who taught English at an alternative school in the Arkansas Delta for two years. Recently graduated from Harvard University, Kuo arrived in the rural town of Helena, Ark., as a Teach for America volunteer, bursting with optimism and drive. But she soon encountered the jarring realities of life in one of the poorest counties in America, still disabled by the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow. In this stirring memoir, Kuo, the child of Taiwanese immigrants, shares the story of her complicated but rewarding mentorship of one student, Patrick Browning, and his remarkable literary and personal awakening.
The mission of the Delta School in Wilson, Arkansas is to nourish every child’s strengths so each child is able to form healthy relationships, discover meaningful work, and make unique contributions to the world. The school’s state-of-the-art garden classroom allows all levels of learners to participate in the school garden initiative. It teaches students essential life skills and supports academic learning through hands-on classes in an organic garden. In this conversation, Kerry Sullivan, Director of the Lower School and Technology and Taylor Starkey, an instructor at the school who grew up in the Arkansas Delta, discuss how what the students learn in the garden classroom is integrated into other disciplines to teach them how to care for the environment, grow vegetables and plants and then use these skills to prepare them for life.
Michelle Kuo taught English at an alternative school in the Arkansas Delta for two years. After teaching, she attended Harvard Law School as a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow, and worked legal aid at a nonprofit for Spanish-speaking immigrants in the Fruitvale district of Oakland, California, on a Skadden Fellowship, with a focus on tenants' and workers' rights. She has volunteered as a teacher at the Prison University Project and clerked for a federal appeals court judge in the Ninth Circuit. Currently she teaches courses on race, law, and society at the American University in Paris.
Mourner’s Bench tells the story of brave, bold women who led the civil rights movement in the Arkansas Delta. Set in 1964, the story unfolds from the perspective of eight-year-old Sarah White, a serious child who feels ready to get baptized, but increasingly finds herself torn between the traditions of her community and her church and her mother’s progressive and feminist views. When the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee comes to town, the reverend considers them “the evil among us,” while Sarah’s mother and her friends seem determined to push the town toward integration. With vibrant characters and setting, Mourner’s Bench explores the conflict between progress and tradition as Sarah navigates her place in her family and community.
...in which Rex and Paul talk about the Arkansas Delta, including Paul's Italian Delta in-laws, the best places to get barbecue, the annual potluck dinner at the Eddie Mae Heron Center in Pocahontas, two great "eating routes" through the Delta, Piggott, Crawfordsville, Haynes, DeValls Bluff, Cypress Corners, Moark, Marianna, and the Mississippi River State Park.
For those of us who love rural Arkansas and are dedicated to its future, we have to start thinking about economic development in a different way. This week on Tune-In, I've started a conversation that I hope will grow and become better defined in the future. On this edition, Rex Nelson joins me and speaks from his depth of personal experience working to improve communities all across the Arkansas Delta. If you enjoyed our conversation and have an idea about how to make life better in rural Arkansas, I'd love to hear it. Please email me at this address: ideas@housemail.house.gov
Ozark Highlands Radio is a weekly radio program that features live music and interviews recorded at Ozark Folk Center State Park’s beautiful 1,000-seat auditorium in Mountain View, Ark. In addition to the music, our “Feature Host” segments take listeners through the Ozark hills with historians, authors and personalities who explore the people, stories, and history of the Ozark region. This week, Arkansas Delta Bluegrass pioneer Dave Brancecum performs live at the Ozark Folk Center State Park. Also, interviews with Dave, folklorist and author Charley Sandage offers an historical peregrination into Ozark culture, and Mark Jones presents an archival recording of Judi Klemenson. Dave Brancecum was born and raised in the cotton fields of the Arkansas Delta. A working man most of his life, Dave had always dreamed of moving to the Ozarks to enjoy a simple life, where he could play music and enjoy all the region has to offer. Good thing all that happened because Dave is now a regular performer at the Ozark Folk Center State Park. Equally adept on guitar and claw-hammer banjo, Dave possesses a natural feel in his playing and singing unique to the Ozark region. Dave says come visit the Ozark Folk Center rather than the website he’s yet to create. Author, folklorist, and songwriter Charley Sandage presents an historical portrait of the people, events, and indomitable spirit of Ozark culture that resulted in the creation of the Ozark Folk Center State Park and an enduring legacy of music and craft. This episode focuses on the founding of the Ozark Folk Center State Park. Mark Jones' “From the Vault” segment features a rare recording of noted Ozark mountain dulcimer mentor Judi Klemenson (Klinkhammer) performing the song “Where Would I Go But to the Lord,” from the Ozark Folk Center State Park archives.
A major figure in American blues and folk music, Big Bill Broonzy (1903-1958) left his Arkansas Delta home after World War I, headed north, and became the leading Chicago bluesman of the 1930s. His success came as he fused traditional rural blues with the electrified sound that was beginning to emerge in Chicago. This, however, was just one step in his remarkable journey: Big Bill was constantly reinventing himself, both in reality and in his retellings of it. Bob Riesman's groundbreaking biography tells the compelling life story of a lost figure from the annals of music history. For captions, transcript, and more information visit http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feature_wdesc.php?rec=5791.
Dr. Joyce Murray Alim was raised in the little southern town of West Memphis Arkansas. She attended Wonder High School and went on to study at Shelby State Community College and Christian Brothers University in Memphis. She worked as an analyst for International Business Machines. She moved to Champaign, IL where she received a BA in Psychology from the University of Illinois She continued her studies at the University of Phoenix where she earned a Master's degree in Global Management. She completed her doctoral Studies at Walden College majoring in International Business. She is the proud mother of one son, Glenn Murray. He is the owner of 220 Communications and 220 Publishing. She is an evangelist, musician, singer, motivational speaker, avid reader and one of the best cooks in the nation. She has decided to harness her imagination and write. She is the author of Smooth with a Twist, a book of short stories that challenge the imagination. She is putting the finishing touch on her second book Two Smooth with a Twist and a supernatural novel Murder in the Arkansas Delta.
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