Podcasts about physically handicapped

The Fiction Old and New book group is thrilled to welcome guest host Sally Rosenthal on Friday, January 3, 2025 at 8:00 p.m. to discuss “Crow Lake” by Mary Lawson, DB 59867 (BARD annotation below). We hope that you can join us to discuss this compelling story. Here is the NLS annotation: Crow Lake DB 59867 Lawson, Mary. Reading time 7 hours, 39 minutes. Read by Martha Harmon Pardee. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Family; Psychological Fiction Description: After their parents die, teens Matt and Luke Morrison give up their own university plans to raise two young sisters, Kate and Bo, in the northern Ontario badlands. Twenty years later, Kate, now a professor, returns to resolve past differences at a family reunion. Some strong language. 2002. This book can be found on Bookshare at this link: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/2325140?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPWNyb3clMkJsYWtl Our facilitator for this group is Michelle Bernstein (hamletsweetlady@gmail.com).

We had Peggy Chong as a guest in episode five of Unstoppable Mindset back in October of 2021. Peggy spends a great deal of her time researching blind people, she calls them her blind ancestors, to learn and write about their histories. For example, did you know that five blind people in the 1930s served as congressmen or U.S. senators? True. Did you know that the typewriter was invented for a blind countess? Did you know that it was a blind person who invented automobile cruise control?   Peggy will talk about all these stories and others. Recently she spent two weeks at the library of Congress researching one project that she will discuss. Spoiler alert: we don't get to hear the end of the story as Peggy has more research to do and more documents to uncover. However, the story she tells us this time is intriguing and spellbinding. So join me on a journey to learn more about the history of blind people and learn why you should even thank blind people for some of the inventions you take for granted today.       About the Guest:   Peggy Chong's first book in print, Don Mahoney: Blind Television Star is on the shelves at many book sellers.  She writes and lectures as The Blind History Lady.  Her infatuation with stories she heard of those she now calls her “Blind Ancestors” surprised and inspired her to learn more, for herself at first and then bring their light to the world.  Peggy researches their stories and brings to life the REAL struggles of what it was and is still, to be a blind person in the United States.   Her works have been published in _The Iowa History Journal, Dialogue Magazine, The Farmington Daily Times, The Braille Monitor and Future Reflections. _ Each month she sends to her email followers another story of a blind ancestor to inspire blind and sighted alike.   Currently, Peggy Chong chairs the Preservation of Historical Documents for the National Federation of the Blind of Colorado, to save the single-source files, records, news clippings and correspondence of the blind of Colorado dating back to 1915.   She has been an active part of the blind community for more than forty years.  Determined to imbue the service delivery system for the blind with a more positive and forward-looking philosophy, Peggy joined with other blind people in Minneapolis, Minnesota to establish Blindness: Learning in New Dimensions (BLIND, Inc.), a training center for the blind designed to encourage its students to achieve self-sufficient and productive lives.  In 1985, Peggy Chong accepted the position of President of the Board of BLIND, Inc., a position she held for ten years.  During that time, she worked with many students of all ages and varying levels of vision, encouraging them to learn the alternative nonvisual techniques of blindness and fueling their imaginations to dream of a life where each of them could live and work in their communities on a basis of equality with their sighted peers.  She also helped many of them to make intelligent decisions about their vision--when it would be helpful and when it would hinder progress toward independence.   After moving to Baltimore Maryland in 1997, Peggy secured a position with BISM as an outreach/instructor.  In 1998, Peggy left BISM accepting a position with the Job Opportunities for the Blind program at the National Center for the Blind in Baltimore, Maryland.  For more than a year, she led a succession of intensive two-week training sessions designed to teach computer and other important job-readiness skills to blind individuals seeking employment.  She also worked individually with each job candidate to refine the job search according to the unique needs of each, and she worked with numerous employers to ensure that the characteristic of blindness was accurately perceived and the blind job applicant treated fairly.  When a job was offered to any of her students, she provided assistance before  and after securing the job to ensure that each of them had the tools needed to succeed in the new position.  Sometimes this involved connecting her student with other blind persons doing that same job somewhere in the United States.  At other times, she provided information and advice about new, non-traditional techniques that could be used to perform the job successfully.   Later, Peggy served for three years as the National Program Manager for NFB-NEWSLINE®, out of the Baltimore MD offices.  In this position, she formed valuable relationships with national and local newspapers, community-based service delivery organizations and rehabilitation programs, and literally thousands of blind men and women--many of them newly-blind--across the country.   After moving to Iowa in 2002, she became a private contractor providing consulting services and employment training to governmental agencies and nonprofit organizations.  Her work involved the dissemination of job-search, résumé creation and distribution services designed to help individuals--with or without disabilities--to secure competitive employment.  She also taught independent travel to the Blind.  She also served as the NFB-NEWSLINE Coordinator for the state of Iowa for several years.   For more than forty years, Peggy has been active in a variety of community organizations: the National Federation of the Blind, the American Cancer society, the Hawthorn Area Community Council, the Cooperating Fund Drive, Iowa and Albuquerque Genealogical Societies, Friends of the Iowa Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, The Friends of the Colorado Talking Book Library, State Rehabilitation Council for the Commission for the Blind of New Mexico, board member-ADA Advisory Committee for the City of Albuquerque Iowa Shares and Oasis of Albuquerque.    Ways to connect with Peggy:   Website: theblindhistorylady.com   Email: theblindhistorylady@gmail.com       About the Host:   Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/   https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening!   Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast   If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset .   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review   Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.       Transcription Notes:   Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson ** 00:16 Hi. I'm Michael Hinkson, Chief vision Officer for accessibe and the author of the number one New York Times best selling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast. As we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion, unacceptance and our resistance to change, we will discover the idea that no matter the situation or the people we encounter, our own fears and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The Unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessibe. That's a C, C, E, S, S, I, capital, B, E, visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities and to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025 glad you dropped by, we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us. Well, hello and welcome to another episode of unstoppable mindset where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. We get to do a lot of all of that today. So it's kind of fun. In October of 2021 I had the honor and pleasure to interview well, let me rephrase that, talk with Peggy Chong, known as the blind history lady. Maybe it was a little bit more of an interview then, but we have really reshaped unstoppable mindset to be a conversation and not an interview. So it does get to be something where we get to talk with each other and ask each other questions and whatever else makes sense to do. Well, Peggy wrote a story about blind lady, and the story was published recently, and she did what she always does, she sends it to anyone on her mailing list. And I'm fortunate enough to be on it and read it, and I suddenly realized it has been two and a half years since we had Peggy on, and that has to change. So Peggy, welcome on to unstoppable mindset. Welcome   Michael Hingson ** 01:20 Well, hello and welcome to another episode of unstoppable mindset where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. We get to do a lot of all of that today. So it's kind of fun. In October of 2021 I had the honor and pleasure to interview well, let me rephrase that, talk with Peggy Chong, known as the blind history lady. Maybe it was a little bit more of an interview then, but we have really reshaped unstoppable mindset to be a conversation and not an interview. So it does get to be something where we get to talk with each other and ask each other questions and whatever else makes sense to do. Well, Peggy wrote a story about blind lady, and the story was published recently, and she did what she always does, she sends it to anyone on her mailing list. And I'm fortunate enough to be on it and read it, and I suddenly realized it has been two and a half years since we had Peggy on, and that has to change. So Peggy, welcome on to unstoppable mindset. Welcome   Peggy Chong ** 02:22 to me. Yes, that's I was really surprised it had been two and a half years. So thanks for having me back.   Michael Hingson ** 02:29 Well anytime. So Peggy is known as the blind history lady because she specifically researches information about blind people, and she really researches their lives and then tells people about them, and we'll dig into a lot of that, but why don't we start? Maybe it'll be a little bit of redoing of what we did. Tell us about the early Peggy growing up.   Peggy Chong ** 02:52 Well, I grew up in a family where my mother was blind, and I have three blind siblings out of a family of five kids. So there's four of us, and my mother had gone to the North Dakota School for the Blind, so she was not eager to send her children to the School for the Blind at all. She wanted us to go to public school. So we well. She did not like the idea of being so far away from her family. She felt that it really there were some family dynamics that go in to that as well. But basically, she went up there in the end of August, early September, many times came home for Christmas, but not always, and then she went home the end of May. So she was really only with her family, mostly in the summers.   Michael Hingson ** 03:53 I remember when I was growing up and we moved to California from Chicago, and my parents had really heated arguments with the school district in Palmdale because they said I shouldn't go to school there. I should go to the school for the blind, which at that point was in well, and still is in Northern California. It hadn't relocated to Fremont, I don't think, yet, but they wanted me to go there, and my parents said, No, he's going to grow up and go to regular public schools. And it was a huge battle. Well, my parents won, but I suspect it was for probably a lot of the same reasons why your mom didn't want you guys to go.   Peggy Chong ** 04:35 Well, my mom came from a town of 400 people, so the public school there. First of all, if she had gone to public school, most kids didn't get past the eighth grade, you know, they went to work on the farms, and I think she would have not been able to get a lot of material in any kind of a format at a. All her ophthalmologist when she was six years old, wrote in her record that she needed to go to the school for the blind and to learn to read and write in braille, which I thought was amazing, yeah, for a doctor to say that at that time,   Michael Hingson ** 05:17 yeah, the doctors told my parents to send me off to a home, because no blind child could ever grow up to amount to anything or be useful at all, and all I would do would be to destroy the family dynamic and but you know, the other side of it is, as we know, you and I, places like the School for the Blind in California really did teach a lot. They were at that time. I think Newell Perry was, was still, still there. You know, Tim Brook had been one of his students, and they did teach a lot of the right stuff, along with providing the right material. But still, was a question of whether that's where you really wanted to be sent to or have your child sent to.   Peggy Chong ** 06:01 You know, one of the interesting things that has changed a lot of my thinking, doing this whole history dive that I have been doing, when I graduated from public school, I didn't really feel like a part of my class, but I thought I had gotten a better education, and at that time, the schools for the blind were changing. More kids were getting into the public schools who were more academic, and the schools for the blind were receiving more of the students who were not academic. So the kids that were graduating from the school for the blind about the same time, I were not always, you know, job ready. They weren't going to do much afterwards. And so my impression at that time was that that's what happens when you go to the school for the blind, not understanding the dynamics that the whole education system was going through and so on. But I look back at some of these people that I've researched, and they talk about how in the farming communities, which many of them came from, because our communities were fairly small, they went to the School of the blind, and they they fit in. They had they had peers at their level. Everything was in enough format. They could read mostly, or it the accommodations were being made for them. They competed in sports. They got involved in some of the community activities in the towns where the schools for the blind were so that they were connected with the community, and they seem to have not all of them. Of course, you you don't always want to tire everybody with the same brush, so to speak, but you don't you see more of a population of kids who had more self confidence, who had more of an idea of what they were going to do as a blind person after leaving the school, as opposed to the public school kids who were exposed to a lot of things, but if they didn't get in with the group, if they didn't get a chance to really participate if they were just sitting on the sidelines. They left the public school system, and they didn't go to college, necessarily. They didn't go to work, they went back to the family home. So when I graduated from high school, I thought a public school education was the best thing for a blind child. I'm not at that time, but I'm not so sure that that's really the case. I think you have to look at the child, the family situation, the school situation. Is the public school gonna provide a good, positive, supportive, learning structure and of course, always happen.   Michael Hingson ** 09:05 Of course, yeah, it still doesn't always happen, although, of course, there is a lot more material and there are a lot of tools available now that even when you and I graduated, were not available and students should be able to get a better public education, but the other part about it is the whole social acceptance and like you, I think I was really mostly on the sidelines. I was active in the science club and a couple things, but really not involved in a lot of the social organization of the schools, and that went all the way through high school, but I did at least have access to Braille books and Braille material, and I had parents who were vehemently in favor of me working to be a. A good student in the school, and they gave me every opportunity that I could. And outside of school, I was in the boy scouts, and so I did have other activities, and again, that was encouraged, and I was very fortunate for the most part. We dealt with scout leaders who encouraged it as well, probably because they had conversations from my parents, or with my parents, who said, look and and gave them an education so but it worked out pretty well. My dad was involved in Scouting as well. But I hear what you're saying, and I think that the schools for the blind, as near as I can tell today, have receded even further and are not really as much focused on the academics of students who are blind, but now they're dealing with multi handicap situations and other things that make it even more of a challenge for them.   Peggy Chong ** 10:50 Yeah, but I do think that you're right. Parents make a big difference. Family Support makes a huge difference. Yes,   Michael Hingson ** 10:59 yeah. Yeah. And the parents really do make all the difference, if they're willing to, as I describe it, be risk takers in that they let us explore, they let us do things. I'm sure they monitor us, but they allowed us to explore. They allowed us to learn about the world, and they knew instinctively that's what they needed to do, just like they would do it with any other kid.   Peggy Chong ** 11:26 Yeah, my parents let us ride bicycles. Yep, which I know that my mother, she did not feel confident enough to ride a bicycle, but as kids, wanted to and and she was, she was gonna just let it happen. And we had a few bike accidents. But, yeah, so does my sighted sister,   Michael Hingson ** 11:49 yeah. I mean, everybody does. So there's nothing, nothing new there. And eventually we bought a tandem bike so my brother and I could deliver newspapers together, and then that worked out pretty well, but I had my own bike and rode it around the neighborhood, wrote it to school for the first three years, and then transferred to a school across town, because there was a resource teacher at who was based at that school, and the resource teacher was the teacher who would work with the blind kids, so I had a period with her every day. And I learned braille in kindergarten in Chicago, but after Chicago, I didn't have access to it for three years, so I had to relearn it, which I did. But you know, things happen. Yeah, they do. So what'd you do after high school?   Peggy Chong ** 12:45 Well, after high school, I met this guy and got married. I thought about going to college, but I was I wasn't quite ready for college. I didn't really think that I was academically ready, so I went to work, and worked as a librarian assistant for two years, and then when our daughter came along, then I quit, became a stay at home mom, and got active in the National Federation of the Blind. I got active in tiny tots, you know, because my daughter went to tiny tots and US mom sat around and exchanged coupons and everything like that. While they were in there.   Michael Hingson ** 13:27 Did you exchange your share of coupons? Oh, yeah,   Peggy Chong ** 13:31 I tried to call my dog food coupons for the things that I needed, like milk or diapers or whatever. And   Michael Hingson ** 13:39 we should say that this guy you got married to, I'm sorry you have to put up with him all these years, but, but his name is Curtis Chung and Curtis has also appeared on unstoppable mindset, but we probably have to get him back on too, because there's lots to discuss.   Peggy Chong ** 13:55 Yeah, we were just discussing actually riding bikes when he was a kid, because his father let him explore and get hurt. His mother was not inclined to do that, and so his dad took a lot of heat, because Curtis would ride around on his three wheeler and crash into the wall or roll out in the street or whatever, but   Michael Hingson ** 14:21 Curtis has to learn to listen.   Peggy Chong ** 14:24 I don't think that's gonna happen.   Michael Hingson ** 14:29 He's not nearby, is he? Oh,   Peggy Chong ** 14:35 catch it on the podcast. Oh, he   Michael Hingson ** 14:36 will. But, but still, but, but even so, he did get to explore, which is, you know, what's really important? And I think that the blind people who have the most confidence or who are the most outgoing are the ones who were really given those opportunities by their parents. I believe. So, yeah, sure. So you didn't go to college, you You did other things, which is cool, and exchanged coupons. I've never been much of a coupon collector, and even with online coupons, I don't do nearly as much of that as I probably should.   Peggy Chong ** 15:14 Well, I don't do that anymore either,   Michael Hingson ** 15:15 but Instacart is our friend. Yeah, that's true. I did   Peggy Chong ** 15:19 go back to college for a while, and it actually was a really big boost in my self esteem, because I went back to college thinking, I've got to start over. Got to start from scratch. And so I took the basic courses that you take when you're a freshman, and I aced them, and I was, I was quite surprised at myself, so it gave me, it gave me a lot more confidence in myself to go ahead and try new things. I got out more into the community, joined the neighborhood group. I wrote letters, wrote articles for newsletters, and really start to come into myself, probably when my daughter was about 10.   Michael Hingson ** 16:10 And she's surprised how much you've learned over the years, right?   Peggy Chong ** 16:13 Well, I was pretty dumb there between her 18th and 21st year, but I got pretty smart after that. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. And since she's 45 now, you know, I've been smart for a while. What a relief. No kidding, I feel very lucky when I look at the relationships that I read about in all these families that I research, and the dynamics of the families and how kids don't get along, and they never spoke to their parents after they were 22 or whatever. And I think, gee, you know, I got my fighting with my daughter all done by the time she was 21 now we're friends, so that's good,   Michael Hingson ** 16:52 yeah, which works out. So when did you start getting interested in this whole business of researching blind ancestors and learning about the history of blind people.   Peggy Chong ** 17:05 Well, that actually started in my 20s. The NFB of Minnesota owned a home for the blind, and we decided that it was it was past its time. We did not need segregated housing for blind people, so we were going to sell the property. That meant you had to clean out the building. And there was a lot of stuff in there, and they had kept the National Federation of the Blind of Minnesota, started as the Minnesota State organization of the blind, and in 1920 so they had some correspondence going back to 1919 and they kept everything. I mean, it was really cool. I was given the job of going through all of the boxes and file cabinets and getting rid of stuff, because we were going from this three story building to 1000 square feet office, and has to all fit, so everything had to go into one file cabinet, and I'm and they gave me the job because I had grown up in The blank community, and as a kid, I had known the people from North Dakota and Minnesota who were the blind newspaper dealers, the blind rug weavers, the blind door to door salesmen, the blind janitors. And they thought I would recognize people more than the rest of them would. So I'm going through stuff and pitching and pitching and pitching all this stuff into the trash. Every so often I stopped to read something, and one of the letters that I read was from the early 20s, from one of the board members to another one, describing their meeting with our blind state congressman, our blind US congressman, excuse me, and of course, they don't tell who it is. I didn't know there was a blind congressman, so I put that aside, and I started to pay more and more attention, so that blind Congressman became my first, what I call ancestor. I kept information that I had found here and there, kept those letters and put them in a box, and I went after who, what turned out to be Thomas David Shaw, who was the blind congressman who was working on a bill called the Robbins bill that would have been kind of a rehabilitation bill, putting some things together that would be similar to what our Randolph Shepherd vendor program is today. That bill didn't go anywhere. Um. But he then became a US senator, and he was one of two blind senators in the US Senate in the 1930s the other being Thomas prior gore. Thomas Shaw was killed by a hit and run driver just before Christmas of 1935 and he's a great ancestor to start with, because he had all this mystery around him, and you just had to know. So the driver of the car got out after he driven about a half a block and yelled back, well, he shouldn't have been in the street anyway. Now he was with his cited aid him one of his legislative aides, who was also hit and seriously hurt but but did survive that aid wrote a book about 20 some years later, as did the daughter of a newspaper man from Minneapolis who was killed in the very same way two weeks before Shaw was killed, and that newspaper reporter moved into this apartment a couple of weeks before he was hit by a car out of Thomas Shaw's house in Minneapolis because he was being harassed for the article He was working on about the mafia infiltrating the Democratic Party, and Shaw was helping him with this article. And so Shaw's family believed, as did the daughter who wrote the book about her dad, the reporter, as did the person who was with him that day, they all said that, you know, it was a he was deliberately hit, a man who hit him, he was deliberately hit because, if you talk to his grandson or his daughter in law, that they they believe it was a contract hit. But the man who hit him, who was unemployed. This was, you know, the middle of the Depression. He was unemployed, and all of a sudden, couple of years later, he has a brand new house that's paid for. He has no job. His children are in private school. They go on to college. He has no job. Where'd the money come from? Everybody wanted to know, and it was so he was somebody who I researched a lot, and that's before computers, and that was before you had an opportunity to go online, and before things were digitized. So you had to always go someplace and have somebody look it up for you. And a lot of times I would call and I would say, Well, can you read it to me over the phone? I didn't tell them I couldn't read it myself. I just asked them to read it. And I was surprised how many times people did read it, read articles to me, read them, the collection information to me, and so on. So he was my first ancestor. And because he was probably somebody I researched for good 30 years, I kind of got that in my blood, and then in about 2000 I decided I was going to do my family tree ancestry.com. Had just gotten started, and I thought, well, you know, why not? Keeps me busy for the winter. That is, it's it is worse addiction than chocolate or coke. I am here to tell you. I have been a subscriber of ancestor.com for a long time, and by and large, things are fairly accessible with that, unless you want to read the original document, because things were mostly handwritten, and these are scanned images, pictures of the originals and so on. But I'm surprised how many people are transcribing for their family trees, the information, the articles, the pieces from the books. So sometimes I get into things and it's already transcribed for me, I'm really kind of impressed   Michael Hingson ** 24:17 that works out very well.   Peggy Chong ** 24:18 I think so. So I was one who didn't like history in school because it didn't apply to me. And the few things that I had saved from Minnesota, you know, that applied to me because that was an organization I belonged to, and some of the people I had known. So I started with some of them because it applied to me. But once I really got into the family history, I just really got the bug. And when I would stall out on my family, I'd reach into now this collection that was more than a box or two of stuff that I have been collecting. And. Say, Well, I wonder what I can find about this person. Wonder what I can find about that person. And I took all these classes on how to research through the genealogical societies, several of them, and because it was when computers were not really used for genealogical research, they gave me a lot of information on the techniques that they use so they don't have to travel. And I used all of those techniques, and a lot of them are very great techniques that a blind person can use because for a $15 donation to this Genealogical Society, or this History Society, or this public library, there's some volunteer that's just willing to dig into something and find out what it is I want to know, and then they'll send me a nice email back, or a bunch of papers in the mail that I'll have to scan. But it's been really interesting to find out how easy it has been to dig into a lot of these old documents with the help of other people who have no idea that I'm blind at all,   Michael Hingson ** 26:13 which, which is, of course, part of the issue. They don't even know you're blind.   Peggy Chong ** 26:18 No, they have no clue. But they would do that for someone else. Yeah? So, yeah, I just take advantage of the opportunities that are already there and maximize them to my benefit.   Michael Hingson ** 26:31 So what are some of the early stories that you found that really fascinated you and that you found interesting that you've published?   Peggy Chong ** 26:41 Well, the one that just came out this month about Helen may Martin, the blind and deaf woman who was a concert pianist, is a fascinating story to me. And here's another example of this. Is a blind and deaf person who was born in 1895 the schools for the blind didn't take a blind and deaf student, and the schools for the deaf didn't take a deaf and blind student. In many parts of the country to get in as a deaf blind student, you either had to have a lot of money, or there just happened to have, happened to be somebody who was donating extra money at the time. You just happened to have a teacher that was skilled in working with one on one with a deafblind student. So Helen may didn't have that. She was born in Nebraska. The Nebraska school for the blind and deaf didn't want or the Kansas School for the blind and deaf didn't one of the Missouri School for the Blind in the School for the Deaf didn't want her, so her mother decided Helen is going to grow up and she is going to be the best of whatever she can be.   Michael Hingson ** 27:53 There's mom again. There's the family again. Well, mom   Peggy Chong ** 27:56 was a music teacher. Dad was a salesman who was on the road a lot, but he was also musically inclined, and they had a piano in the house. Mom taught music, and she kept Helen with her a lot. And Helen thought this was a game on the piano the keys and doing it, so she wanted to learn the game too. Mom, had her put her hand on the piano to feel the vibrations. Later on, it was the heel of her foot to feel the vibrations and how she would press the key harder and the vibrations of the piano were more full. When Helen started to really learn how to play the pieces, her mother would teach her with one hand, then the other, and they would put it together. And then her mother started to explain musical notes by using beans. A whole note was one bean. A half a note was two Beans. Quarter note was four beans. And explained how that worked to Helen. Then they would play these pieces, and the mother would say, Well, this is a song about the flowers, or this is a song about someone's life. And so Helen needed to know the story, and then the music had feeling her emotions. She understood the music better, and she learned to play with feeling as well. And when she was about 18, she wrote to the schools for the blind, asking again to have somebody come and teach her. Now, her mother was a smart woman. She knew there were magazines for the blind, and so she wrote and got everything she could find. Well, somewhere in New York point, somewhere in Braille,   Michael Hingson ** 29:56 Moon type and all of this. Hmm. And   Peggy Chong ** 30:01 so Helen learned several different ways to read. Her mother learned some of it and taught Helen. And then Helen, through reading these magazines, learned to read much better.   Michael Hingson ** 30:16 Let me stop you for a second, because I think it's important that listeners understand. You know, Braille was developed by Louis Braille in 1824, but it was quite a while before Braille itself was adopted. And one of the things that a lot of schools and people did early on, if you will, was assume that blind students could learn to feel raised regular characters, and then when they discovered that wasn't working as well as it could, other kind of languages were developed. Says Peggy said New York point and I said Moon type, which are two different languages, if you will, of raised characters that are somewhat different from Braille than it was a while before people realized finally that there were advantages to what Braille offered, because it was a very simple in a sense, dot configuration, but people could learn to read it and learn to read it well and read fast with it.   Peggy Chong ** 31:18 New York point was two dots high and four dots wide, right. And the New York point was started in New York, of course, with the schools there, Perkins, the Perkins School for the Blind, which began in the 1930 in the 1830s used the raise print system. They had their own printing press and everything. So they had all of the equipment to print their own books. Therefore they were invested in more ways than one into that raised system. The first school that actually taught Braille in this country was the Missouri School for the Blind in 1860 so Braille didn't quite catch on here. New York point had caught on, and what had spread across, especially New England and the East Coast, far more than Braille, the Braille did, which is why the Matilda Ziegler, what magazine was in Braille. Some of the religious magazines were Matilda Ziegler, I'm sorry, was in New York point at first, before it went into Braille. So   Michael Hingson ** 32:33 why do you think Braille finally caught on?   Peggy Chong ** 32:36 Well, it had a lot to do with money, but it also had to do with the fact that, you know, the schools for the blind, up until probably about the 1860s did more lecture and answer, question and answer, and that's how you learn they're just they didn't have either the money or the printing press or the access to actual tactile books for the kids. So the teachers themselves would lecture, and they would memorize and recite a lot more than than the sighted children did in the schools, although my dad tells stories about how they didn't have school a lot of school books, either in his school when he was growing up. I don't know, maybe that wasn't so different. But when Helen was reading things, she was getting some magazines from France, because Europe, England had publications in braille, and they would they could be received here in the United States. So her mother signed her up for those signed her up for newsletters coming out of California. California was quite a literate state in that the school for the blind, the school in Berkeley, the Institute for the Blind, they all had printing presses so that they could manufacture their books and share them. So Ohio was another place that her mother got her books Helen's books from as well. So she got all this material encouraged Helen to read and read and read, and she also taught Helen to type at the age of six, because her mother knew how to type. So her mother taught her how to type again. It was kind of a game. The keyboard was a game, and she learned to type quite well, so she kept a diary in print, and she wrote articles her mother would read to her, and they developed, at first, their own sign language, and then her mother and her sister. Her learned sign language, and they would spell into Helen's hand. Now, her dad died when she was about 1220, her sister was about 12 at the time, and so the mother had to go back to work. She became a seamstress. She had her own shop. She sewed dresses for people in town, and Helen learned how to do that. Helen had learned how to cook. She was constantly by her mother's side, so when her mother went to work, she was in charge of the house. Her mother got her classes at conservatories of music. Her mother went with her and translated into Helen's hand what was being said for the class. She never graduated from a conservatory, but because of her exposure, people were like this. She's deaf and she's blind and she's playing the piano. This is so amazing. She plays it with feeling. And so she would get a little concert here, and a little concert there. And pretty soon it expanded, and her mother thought, well, let's see where it goes, you know? So she started promoting her daughter, getting her all these concerts. There were all these professionals musicians, educators, even from the schools for the blind, who would come and watch Helen perform, because they just couldn't believe a deafblind person could do this. And when Helen would travel, she had the same experience. Her mother would send ahead all this information about Helen may Martin, the deafblind piano pianist who is going to perform, and there would be the announcement in the paper. But many times, the reporters didn't believe that Helen was deafblind, so they didn't put the article in. They would wait till after the performance, and then there would be the article about Ellen Mae Martin, and I went to see her, and she really is deaf and she really is blind, and she plays beautifully. Ripley's, believe it or not, had a program on the radio. He also had a Ripley's, believe it or not, theater in New York, and he sent someone out to check out Helen and see if she really was a deafblind pianist. And discovered that she was, and he brought her on her show. She was well received in New York, and got a multi week contract to perform at his, believe it or not, theater in New York. So she was in New York for quite a while, several months, performing for many concerts and many theaters in New York. Helen died in 1947 so she was like about 5252 years old, so she wasn't really that old. And her sister died in 1939 who was much younger than she was. So Mrs. Martin ended up out living all of her children, neither of Helen or her sister ever married or had children. So her mother ended up, not in poverty, but she certainly was not a wealthy woman when she passed away. But before she passed away, she supposedly gave all of Helen's diaries to some historical society, of which no one can find, which I'm hoping they're in a back box behind the furnace somewhere, and someday they'll be unearthed, because that would be fascinating, the little bits of her journal that were recorded in newspapers. She wrote very well. She had a very strong vocabulary. Some people equate deaf people with having a smaller vocabulary. That was certainly not the case with Helen, and Helen has been somebody that has really touched a lot of people. When you think about what you can and cannot do, nobody told Helen she couldn't. Nobody said, you know, as a deaf person, probably the piano is not something you should try to take up. But encouraged her because she had an interest, and worked with Helen's interests, and worked with what Helen knew, and her mother did that and encouraged her, made sure she was literate because she was a lot older when she went to school, really, when she went to school, she. Took about five years to complete the academic courses at the School for the Blind, and she did get a certificate of graduation she was older than the rest of the students. Her mother had blind pianists come and work with Helen while Helen was growing up, so she had music teachers, and she found some deaf students, graduates from the schools for the deaf, from other states, sometimes Kansas, who would come and work with the family. That's how they learn sign languages. So Helen's mother was extremely important with making Helen who she was I wonder   Michael Hingson ** 40:40 if she ever met Helen Keller. Yes, she did.   Peggy Chong ** 40:44 They both met when they were adults. Helen may Martin had written to Helen Keller, and Helen Keller had heard about the blind woman who was the pianist, the blind and deaf woman. So when Helen Keller went on one of her tours. She went to Nebraska, and Helen and her mother went and stayed with a relative and got an audience with Helen Keller. The Of course, Helen Keller was always followed by reporters, and so they reported on the meeting of the two Helens, and they called Helen may Martin, the second Helen Keller, well, Helen Keller was not happy with that. She said, Are you kidding? She is not the second Helen Keller, she has far exceeded everything I could have ever done.   Michael Hingson ** 41:38 I can see her say that, yes, it   Peggy Chong ** 41:40 was just, it was really wonderful. She scolded the reporter, and that reporter didn't report on the scolding, but another reporter reported on Helen Keller scolding the reporter for saying that she was the second. Helen Keller, and don't you call her at the second? Helen Keller, yeah,   Michael Hingson ** 41:59 you know, it's interesting that you, you clearly worked at this pretty hard and found a lot of information about her, even so. And you're you're right. It would be nice to find her journals and the other things, and I bet you will at some point, they're somewhere.   Peggy Chong ** 42:15 I think so I think they're somewhere.   Michael Hingson ** 42:20 Now I have to go back to a story that you talked about a little bit on our first unstoppable mindset episode, because you said something here that brought it up, and that is that Helen may Martin learn to type, tell us about the history of the typewriter. Will you? Oh, I love to I know it's a great story.   Peggy Chong ** 42:42 When I go to talk to the students who are at agencies for the blind learning to be blind people when they're in their adjustment to blindness, training, a lot of them, oh, talk about how difficult the computer is because it's so difficult you can't see the keys. And I love to tell the story of the invention of the typewriter, because it was an invention for blind people. And we have forgotten that as a society, the typewriter was the invention of a man who was overly friendly with this Countess, married to this count. The Count wasn't attentive enough for the Countess, so she had to find other interests, friends, but they would write back and forth. Now the problem was the ladies in waiting who wrote the letters to her friend, her special friend, showed them to the count, and that just, you know, wasn't a good thing. So, and they also didn't get delivered either, because if the count didn't like it, he had the letters tried, so he invented this device where she could type out the letters and then send them to him without having a ladies maid between them. And it caught on the schools for the blind in New York, especially the schools for the blind taught typing at the school and their students by the late 1880s and early 1890s were going to state fairs and the World's Fair demonstrating the typewriter for the Remington company as something that really would help the gentlemen who were secretaries in the office. Lady secretaries were not quite yet the thing and   Michael Hingson ** 44:42 would have helped Bob Cratchit Anyway, go ahead,   Peggy Chong ** 44:46 you never know. Do you humbug? I love that story. Yeah, but yes. So their students graduated, were really good typists and. They saw to him that they got put into insurance companies, law firms, and highlighted their students as typists. And the typewriter was also catching on really well in the business community, because now you didn't have to decipher some of that handwriting. And believe me, that handwriting that still exists from back then is very difficult, always doing to figure out just   Michael Hingson ** 45:27 handwriting of old days or days of your that is hard to understand. So I'm told,   Peggy Chong ** 45:33 No, it's today's but yes, well, and they're actually teaching handwriting again in school. A little side note is that I have a lot of volunteers that have been transcribing documents for me from about 1915 to about 1980 from the collection of old files at the Colorado Center for the Blind that we unearthed and we found we could not use high school students and some younger college students because they couldn't read handwriting. We had to, we had to go into the retirement communities to find our volunteers who were very good, by the way. But anyway, so the typewriter has was really the communication material, tool that was used by so many blind people for a long time, and I think we got away from that now, where we have to have special keyboards for the blind. Some places are really insistent on that. Some blind people are insistent on that when you were meant not to look at the keys. That's why the two little bumps on the F and the H are there is so that you could orient yourself and continue typing looking at the paper. The sighted ladies would look at the paper and type their material and not have to look at their keys. So something that we have forgotten, and you know, like the scanner, is, you know, a product that was originally designed for blind people. We forgotten that, I think, in our society as well. But I like the inventions that blind people have contributed, such as cruise control. That was an invention by a blind man to make the cars in his lot stand out from the other car dealers in his small town. There was a man in Minnesota who had lost his hand as well as his eyesight and part of his hearing. He went to the summer programs for adult blind people at the School for the Blind in the 19 late 20s, early 30s. There were no programs for adult blind in the in the state, really at that point, unless you wanted to make brooms. They suggested that he become a piano tuner. And he said, Well, you know, I really wasn't very musical when I had my sight and my hearing, I don't really see how I can be a piano tuner if I can't hear it and I only have one hand. So what he got out of those summer programs, though, was he met other blind people who gave him job leads, and they told him to go to this broom factory in Minneapolis, because it was owned by a blind guy. And he employed some blind guys and sighted guys as well. So he went up there, and this is during the Depression, and the guy said, you know, I really love to help you. I don't need anybody in the factory. I have all the blind salesmen. Most of his salesmen were blind. I have all the salesmen that I can use for this area, but you know, if you want to branch out and head out to like, say, North Dakota or South Dakota, I'd be glad to hire you. And probably thought he'd never heard from the guy again, but the guy came back and says, Well, I found another guy. He doesn't have a job, he doesn't have a home, but he's got a pickup. So the two of them bought as many brooms as they could put into the pickup, and they headed out. Sold all the brooms. They came back. The two men, in a couple of years, earned enough money where they both bought property, and this guy, he bought the property, and what we would call today flipped. It bought a duplex and got renters in. It continued to sell brooms until he really became pretty handy at flipping houses, buying and selling property. So he got kind of tired, though, because, you know, he's now, like, close to 50 years old. Wild, and he has to change the storm windows on the house in Minnesota. Have to put on the screens in the summer and the storms in the winter. And he's climbing up the ladder. He's only got one hand trying to change the windows on the second story. And thought, There has got to be a better way to do this. I really don't want to keep climbing up this ladder. So I talked to this other guy, a blind guy, who was a furniture builder, had his own furniture shop. And he told the guy, this is my idea. I want to design a window where it comes in on a hinge, and then I can just reach in, pull in the storm, clean it, put it back, and they invented this window. He built a few of them on his own, demonstrated that it worked, put it in his house. This window company came along, bought the patent and the blank, I never worked again. He didn't have to work again. The neat thing though, was when he went blind, his wife had passed away a couple of years before, and he became very depressed, lost his job, lost his house that he had paid for his relatives, and the county came and took his three children away. When he sold his patent, he got two of his children back. His oldest child was now in the service and serving in World War Two. But he got his children back. He provided a home for his mother. He actually remarried again, you know, a man who just came back from nothing, and then out of his own need, created this window that many houses in the Midwest, the older houses built in the late 40s and 50s, have those windows that you pull in on a hinge and open up, clean them and close them   Michael Hingson ** 52:03 back out. Now, of course, we have dual pane windows and other things like that. But, yeah, yeah, so, so who invented the scanner?   Peggy Chong ** 52:12 Well, that was Ray Kurzweil. I   Michael Hingson ** 52:14 just wanted to see if you'd say that it's interesting. Kurzweil   Peggy Chong ** 52:19 is an interesting guy, you know, he is still alive and still very concerned about blind people, and active in the blind community, providing funds for scholarships and so on. We correspond, yeah, and he had this wonderful idea in the 70s to provide a scanner that would read to the blind, and it was as huge. I mean, it was bigger than my washing machine.   Michael Hingson ** 52:48 Yeah, the whole thing weighed 400 pounds, not too gosh, yeah,   Peggy Chong ** 52:51 the library, the public library in Minneapolis, bought one. Unfortunately, not a lot of people used it because they locked it up because they were afraid it was going to get broken.   Michael Hingson ** 53:03 That makes sense somehow. Yeah, right. It's, it's interesting, though, also to try to describe how the scanner worked, because you, you can't really say it took a picture like you would do today with a phone. No, because the way it worked was there was a piece of technology called a charge couple device. Won't go into the theory of that, but basically, the scanner would move up and down the page, like an inch at a time, scanning across, then dropping down, scanning back, dropping down, and so on, building up an image that took almost a minute to do. And then the computer would take probably anywhere from depending on the complexity, 20 seconds, to 30 or 45 seconds, to process it. And then it would read out loud.   Peggy Chong ** 53:52 But it worked, and you had access to that book right, and   Michael Hingson ** 53:58 you had access to that book right away, and it worked. And of course, it did get better over time. And then Ray was also very much involved in unlimited vocabulary, voice input and other things. So you mentioned two blind senators. Were there any other blind national politicians.   Peggy Chong ** 54:22 There were five blind congressmen all together. There was Thomas Shaw and there was Matthew Dunn. He served from 1935 to 1940 he was the last of any of our national representatives as blind people. And Matthew Dunn came from Pennsylvania. He was an interesting person because he did really he was interested in politics, but it was not what he wanted as a career, but he did it because he was a part of the. The Pennsylvania Association for the Blind, which was one of the original affiliates of the National Federation of the Blind. They were very concerned that the welfare system in the country was going federal, which was a good thing and a bad thing, a good thing if it was done right, a bad thing if it was not. And they knew from just Pennsylvania alone, how a charity system, a welfare system, a poor house system, they had all these different types of programs to serve blind people, as far as financial was concerned, and they had many situations in their state where if you lived on one side of the street as a blind person, you could get maybe $8 a month if you lived on the Other side, maybe only two, because you crossed a county line or you crossed out of the sea. And so they wanted to have some input on a federal level to all this, these pieces of legislation, Social Security, the rehabilitation legislation that was being bandied about, they wanted to have some input into it, to make sure that it wasn't a charity, that it wasn't for the poor, that it was something that would make you have A step up, that you could get out of poverty, that you wouldn't be stuck there, that you would have an opportunity to get a job, that you would have an opportunity to go to school and still get some financial support, that you could own your own home and maybe still get some financial support, because if you were a blind person in Pennsylvania, in some parts of the state, and you went blind at, say, 40 years old, your house was paid for. You had to sell that house or that asset in order to get financial support. And they wanted people to have a right to protect what they have so they can get a step up and get back to work. And Matthew Dunn was sent there by the blind people, and he campaigned on those issues, about wanting to go to Washington to make sure that the new laws regarding social security rehabilitation would provide people an opportunity to progress, rather than stay at home, remain in poor farms, remain in nursing homes. So he was, it was an interesting sort   Michael Hingson ** 58:01 and it's a battle that still goes on today. For   Peggy Chong ** 58:06 you know, as much as we look at history, you know, if you don't know your history, you're bound to repeat it. And you just look at things, and they just cycle through and cycle through. I remember in the 1920 minutes of the NFB of Minnesota. Back then, it was called the Minnesota State organization the blind. There were three resolutions that were just about the same as three of the resolutions at the 1995 convention. We haven't gone very far have we   Michael Hingson ** 58:40 not in some ways, you know, we have been doing this mostly an hour. But I can't end this without saying two things. One, we'll have to do another one, but, but the other one is, tell me a little bit about your recent trip to Washington. That had to be fascinating. It was   Peggy Chong ** 58:59 fascinating. I went to Washington knowing very little. What I thought I knew turned out not to be what I should have known. I came across a newspaper article about, oh, four years five years ago, five years ago, I guess, now, about a blind guy, a broom maker, who had gotten an award from the Harmon Foundation, and I couldn't understand why he got the award, because it didn't really say why he got the award. He just got an award. Well, I didn't find out much about the broom maker, so I decided to look in the Harmon Foundation, and what I had learned online was that the Harmon Foundation had given a lot of support, financial awards, loans to the black community who were into art. And I couldn't figure out how this broom maker, this white guy, Bloom. Broom maker fit in, and there was nothing online about it, until I got into the Library of Congress and found the Harmon foundation collection. And I looked at that and went, Oh my gosh, there must be a lot of data there, because the Harmon foundation collection goes from 1913 to 1965 there's 122 boxes. 14 of them are for this one program. Now there's about, oh, maybe 20, 3040, programs that the Harmon Foundation also has in this collection, none of them have that many boxes connected with it. So I thought I had hit a gold mine, and then way I did just not what I anticipated. The first two days, I spent 11 days in the Library of Congress. The first two days, I took the boxes chronologically and could not figure out what the heck was going on, because it none of it made sense. None of it fit into the stuff I knew about the program and the strangest stuff were coming up. People were writing on behalf of a school for the blind, or a public school area wanting a playground for the School for the Blind, and I'm thinking now in an awards a literary award program, why would you write and ask that? And then there were all these letters from blind people wanting to go to college and asking for a loan. And again, I thought, what? That just doesn't fit. So it took me till the third day before I got an understanding of exactly what was going on the Harmon foundation. William Harmon was the chair. He decided in 1927 he wanted a new program that would provide awards to blind people, much like their literary program that was providing scholarships for college students. They had a essay contest for farmers down in the south, and they would award them money to beautify their their property. They also had this program once I saw their newsletters where they had provided within like a five year period, over 50 playgrounds to schools or Communities for Children. And so it's starting to dawn on me that there's this group of people who've done their research on the Harmon Foundation, and there's a group of people that haven't done their research. And then there's what's going on with the award the Harmon foundation knew they had to reach out to the blind community. Part of their structure, when they were doing new awards, and they did many, was to reach out, put an advisory committee together with sewn from the Harmon foundation and those in that community in which they were trying to enhance so they wanted to reach out to the blind community. They found the Matilda Ziegler magazine, and they had the editor as one of their advisory committees, and they reached out to the American Foundation for the Blind, and ended up with a few of their representatives on that advisory committee, their normal process, the Harmon Foundation's normal process was then to take this advisory committee and then reach down into the community and have all these nominators who would take the applications for the awards and seek out applicants. Get the applications filled out, get the supporting documents filled out. For example, in their their farm and land beautification, one photographs needed to be taken sometimes, or they needed to get the names of some of the plants they were using. Sometimes, fruits and vegetables were sent to the Harmon foundation to show, hey, look how good my garden went, that kind of thing. So the nominators were to make sure that all of that was completed before the application was then sent in. That didn't work the application process. The Harmon Foundation put the application together, much like their other programs, and sent it to the advisory committee, and there were about 12 different versions of it after I went to the advisory committee in the Harmon. Original version that they had asked for award. They were going to give out 100 awards in total, and there were about eight categories, and they were going to have an award for the person who submits this great work of literary work, they were going to have an award for people who wrote essays about how they have made a difference in their life, how they made a difference in other people's lives, as blind people, and especially in that one, there's a little sub noted, and it says, when it's talking about what you might include in the essay, which is usually only about a paragraph it mentioned, and talk about how, as you progressed, your posture got better, your became more involved in the community. Well, the advisory committee ended up pulling all of that out. So the final application had a page of, is this person neat? Is this person polite? What is the posture of this person? All these personal things that when the blind people who were reading the Matilda Ziegler magazine, because Matilda Ziegler put all this information about the awards, they did a lot of promotion about the awards. They sent in essays from their previous editions of their Matilda magazine to the Harmon foundation to say these are the kind of essays that blind people can write, and they can tell you about how they have made a difference in their lives. They've made a success of this career. They have been instrumental in building their community school or their community church. But the Matilda Ziegler magazine people got the application and filled out what they thought was important, the the references and so on. And they get to all this stuff about their personal behavior, and one lady writes in and says, you know, I'm submitting my essay, but I'm not going to fill out these pieces because I don't think it has any bearing on whether or not my essay should be, should be judged on that. So I'm, I'm getting the drift here that the people that were sending in essays were not completing their application. The deadline the applications were sent out on April 15 of 1928 the deadline was August 15 of 1928 AFB provided a list of all of the organizations, the mailing list of all the names, organizations, schools, workshops for the blind, and the Harmon foundation sent out letters asking all of their these agency people to be the nominators. The AFB did not do that. They didn't write separate cover, hey, we're participating in this Harmon Foundation award, and we want you to support this award, be a nominator, and we want you to help fill out these applications and send them back so these principals at the schools for the blind or in the public schools who oversaw the program for public schools or the director of a workshop,   Peggy Chong ** 1:08:51 they they would either totally ignore it, or they would write back, well, sure, I'll be a nominator. I don't know what it involves, but you can use my name. So come August 15, the Harmon foundation doesn't have enough accepted applications to fill the awards, so they they're contacting AFB and Matilda Ziegler, what do we do? They extend the award for children and for been blind for two years. How has how have you progressed in two years to November 1, they still don't get enough because what happened is, especially with a lot of these schools, they saw it as a charity award, not a literary award. And so they would send the application in, partially filled out, and say, this student deserves this award because they came to the school and they only had one set of clothing, and we have been needing to support the student, or you need to gi

The NLS annotation follows: Stillhouse Lake DB88737 Caine, Rachel Reading time: 14 hours, 5 minutes. Carol Jacobanis A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Four years ago, Gina Royal discovered that her husband, Mel, was a serial killer. Since then Gina and their two children have been on the run, both from Mel’s fans and from those who believe she was complicit. Now copycat killings occur at her front door. Violence and strong language. 2017. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/2080253?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPXN0aWxsaG91c2UlMkJsYWtl Alan Lemly will facilitate the 9/25/24 meeting and Shelly Kane will be facilitating the other meetings until our regular facilitator Liz Lindsey returns. Shelly can be contacted by email at shellykane323@gmail.com.

The NLS annotation follows: A noise downstairs: a novel DB92788 Barclay, Linwood Reading time: 9 hours, 11 minutes. George Newbern A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Mystery and Detective Stories Psychological Fiction When professor Paul Davis surprises a murderer disposing of two bodies, he nearly dies and is left with physical and mental issues. His wife brings home a vintage typewriter to encourage him to write. But Paul swears the typewriter is possessed and tied to the murders. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/3882839?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPWElMkJub2lzZSUyQmRvd25zdGFpcnM Shelly Kane will be facilitating the Mystery Book Discussion Group until our regular facilitator Liz Lindsey returns. Shelly can be contacted by email at shellykane323@gmail.com.

Join us on July 2, 2024, first Tuesday, to review another blockbuster and best seller by Robert Woodward , Fear: Trump in the White House DB91876 Duration: 12 hours 20 minutes. NLS Annotation Fear: Trump in the White House DB91876 Woodward, Bob Reading time: 12 hours, 22 minutes. Robert Petkoff A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Biography Government and Politics Bestsellers U.S. History Pulitzer prize-winning investigative journalist details the decision-making process for both foreign and domestic policy within the Trump administration. Draws on interviews with firsthand sources, meeting notes, diaries, files, and documents. Strong language. Commercial audiobook. Bestseller. 2018. Bookshare This book can be found at Bookshare at the following link: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/2686300?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPUZlYXIlMjUzQSUyQlRydW1w

The NLS annotation follows: Me before you DB76161 Moyes, Jojo Reading time: 12 hours, 58 minutes. Jill Fox A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Disability Bestsellers Romance Working-class English girl Louisa “Lou” Clark is hired as an aide to wealthy Will Traynor, a former mogul who has been paralyzed since a road accident. Lou tries to keep the embittered Will engaged with the world, while Will encourages Lou to expand her horizons. Some strong language. Bestseller. 2012. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/5146164?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPU1lJTJCQmVmb3JlJTJCWW91

Please join us on Tuesday, March 5, 2024 at 8:00 PM Eastern to discuss America’s first daughter DB88020 by Stephanie Dray. NLS Annotation America’s first daughter DB88020 Dray, Stephanie Reading time: 21 hours, 53 minutes. Pilar Witherspoon A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Historical Fiction Patsy Jefferson, eldest daughter of Thomas, grows up during the tumult of the American Revolution. When her mother dies, she joins her father in France and is torn between love and filial duty when courted by an abolitionist. This conflict of desires follows her through life. Some violence. 2016. Bookshare This book can be found at Bookshare at the following link: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/1887909?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPWFtZXJpY2ElMjUyNiUyNTIzMzklMjUzQnMlMkJmaXJzdCUyQmRhdWdodGVy

Mike Coughlin was born in 1947 and had what most people would say is a somewhat normal childhood. I would agree, but it is relevant to say that Mike was diagnosed in the second grade with youth related Macular Degeneration. While he did not lose all his eyesight, he lost enough that reading, especially out loud in school, was not doable for him. In fact, his eye specialists did not even tell him that he was what we classify today as legally blind. Michael did not learn the true extent of his eye condition until he was in his twenties. He was not given access to what we call today assistive technology. Even so, he survived and flourished. He is an Eagle Scout and has achieved the highest rank in the Boy Scouts Order of the Arrow society. Mike secured a college degree from the University of Notre Dame and a Master's degree in Ocean Engineering from the University of Miami. Later he earned a second Master's degree in systems management (MSSM) from the University of Southern California's continuing education program. He worked for General Dynamics for seven years. Then he went with his boss to work for 20 years at Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc in acoustics. He then worked, again as an underwater acoustical engineer, for 20 years at Boeing. Michael is clearly unstoppable. He will discuss the various technologies he began to use although somewhat later in life. He also will discuss just how he accomplished so much and, as you will see, it is all about attitude. About the Guest: Until early in my second-grade year at St. John the Baptist Catholic grammar school in Fort Wayne, Indiana, no-one knew my eyes were changing. It was the eye screening they provided that singled me out as having a problem. My wonderful parents, Joseph and Dorothy Coughlin, transplants to Fort Wayne from New York City, started trying to find out what was wrong. Eventually they learned it was Macular Degermation, something rarely found in young people. My earliest years were spent on a farm outside of Fort Wayne as my parents had moved from New York to Fort Wayne due to a transfer by the General Electric Company, where my father was an engineer. The transfer included a move to a rural rental farmhouse on a 40-acre farm and the birth of myself in 1947 and my brother two years later. My mother, with a master's degree in education from Columbia University, was raising my brother and I and teaching English at the local rural high school. During those four years my father took up hunting and growing a large garden, a big step for a kid from New York, and I learned about rural life with the ability to play on farm equipment and see many types of farm animals. Early on I wanted to be a farmer. Once I reached school age, we moved into Fort Wayne for the schools. Fort Wayne is a middle sized Mid-west city of about 250,000 people. It was like so many Mid-western cities of that day. We lived outside the center of the city and my schools, both grammar and high school, were made up of middle-class children. As my sight degraded, I was taken to several ophthalmologists and to the University of Indiana Medical Center, but learned little helpful information other than the details of my situation. My teachers accommodated me by letting me sit in front of class and because my outload reading skills where poor did not call on me to read aloud. Interestingly, I seemed to be able to hold things close to my eyes and comprehend the text I saw silently. Because I passed all written tests and my classes with satisfactory grades, they gave me. OK grades and passed me. My shining moments during my grade school years came in my achievement as a Boy Scout. I attained the rank of Eagle Scout with a Bronze Palm and was selected for all three steps in the Order of the Arrow. I also was the senior patrol leader for our troop. My years at Bishop Luers High School, a co-institutional Catholic school, were another matter. I succeeded from the start, earning high honors grades and selection as president of both the Junior and Senior National Honor Societies. I was a member of the yearbook staff and was given a leading part in the senior play. Although I am sure a number of the girls in my class had the higher grades, due to the non-mixing of most classes, class rankings were separated. So, I was 3rd in my class. of about 150 boys. I was also awarded the Indiana State Catholic Youth Leadership Award by the Knights of Columbus. I still had not been given information on my actual visual status nor information about assistive aides for the blind. Everything I did was by holding written materials close to my face, listening very attentively and not driving. I took the SAT and other tests such as an engineering aptitude test, I wanted to be like my father, an electrical engineer. I scored adequately on the SAT and highly on the aptitude test. I applied to four mid-western colleges and was accepted in all and chose to attend the University of Notre Dame in south Bend, Indiana, which I thought would be fairly near home. The summer after high school, I was an exchange student to France, where I lived with a French family for seven weeks and my counterpart lived with our family for seven. It was a great experience, but while in France, I learned my father had taken a job in Philadelphia. On my return, together with my family and my French counterpart, Francise, we moved to Strafford, PA, outside of Philadelphia. The move took me to a new part of the country and my summers in Philly were full of excitement with the exploration of a big city and learning about the Jersey Shore. During those summers, I worked for General Electric as an engineering aide. College went very well too. Nort Dame was a good experience. It was competitive but their Electrical Engineering Department was staffed with excellent professors who helped me through every step, but not as a person with a visual disability because I rarely mentioned it to anyone. Honestly, I am not sure why, but I tried to be as normal seeming as possible. I learned to take notes from verbal descriptions of what was being written on the blackboard and if a professor did not verbalize the writing, I asked him to do so, and he did. If I missed something, I left a blank in my notebook and obtained the missing information from a friend. I completed all my course work and had a 3.5 grade average at graduation and was selected to the Eta-Kappa-Nu honorary Electrical Engineering Fraternity. ND won the football national championship my sophomore year and that was a real highlight. During my senior year, it became obvious that due to a crash in the space program, jobs would be hard to find. I decided to go to graduate school and took the GRE and GMAT, again with no assistive help. One path I investigated was to get an MBA, and I had also heard from a friend, about Ocean Engineering. My advisor suggested I stay in engineer, because he felt my talents were best suited for it. Although I applied to several MBA programs, I also applied to the University of Miami in Ocean Engineering (OE). In addition to the advice I received to stay in engineering, it is possible the choice of Miami was because my brother was a sophomore there. I was accepted and given money at Miami, and the next year started my graduate studies in OE. Two years flew by during which I was married to my first wife Judi and I left Miami with an MS in OE. One course of suey in OE is underwater sound. It is focused on SONAR and is quite mathematical, just what an electrical engineer likes. During the summer of those two years, I was married to my first wife, Judi. The job market was still tight, but I interviewed and was hired into the Sound and Vibration group at the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics (GDEB) due to my studies in underwater sound. Once in Connecticut, I found a very good ophthalmologist, Dr. Kaplan, and for the very first time, was told I was legally blind and what that meant. We had some long discussions after which he voiced some displeasure on how little information I had been given on my situation. He said he had to register me with the state and set me up with a low vision specialist. Those steps led me to getting a Closed-Circuit TV (CCTV) magnifier and access to the Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (LBPH) and their Talking Book program. Both the CCTV and Talking Books opened my world to general reading and technical literature which I generally avoided due to the increasing strain of both the MD and the onset of myopia or age reeled eye changes. During seven years at GDEB I moved from engineer to supervisor and had the opportunity to earn a second master's degree in systems management (MSSM) from the University of Southern California's continuing education program offered at many military installations. For me it was at the submarine base in Groton CT. My wife and I bought a house and had our daughter, Laura. In 1978, my boss at EB opened an opportunity for me by interacting with associates at Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc. (bbn), at the time, the foremost acoustics firm in the world. He opened a local, New London, CT, office of the firm and hired three of us to staff it. We continued working for the Navy, but as consultants. I stayed with bbn for twenty years and participated in many projects around the world. For the last ten years I was manager of a group of about 40 engineers and scientists, many ay of whom had Ph.D. or master's degrees. bbn provided me with several CCTVs and a Xerox/Kurz well scanner-reader. bbn was an early adopter of Ap-le Macintosh computers. One of my associates immediately found that all Mac's had magnification and text to speech features. This opened the computing world to me. (I had been able to deal with punch cards, but the computer screen with small letter left me out.) During these years, I was able to travel to Hawaii, Japan, and many cities in the US. My LBPH recorded books were constant companions. During this time, my daughter Laura was married and gave us a grandchild, Chloe. Throughout my working life, I have had the opportunity to give something back to several communities. I was on the advisory board for the Connecticut Stat Library for the Blind, on the Board of directors for CHRIS Radio, and on the Board of Directors for the Waterford Education Foundation I was president of a a Macular Support Group in Waterford, CT and am now on the Board of Directors for the Southeastern Connecticut Center of the Blind, where I conduct a support group for those with Macular on how to use digital technology. Shifts in the Department of Defense (DOD) business world produced some big layoffs at bbn. Thus, in 2000, I was searching for a job and with the help of a friend, connected with a group at the Boeing Company that worked in the undersea world, as opposed to most of the company which did airborne things. They were looking for someone who lived on the east coast who had a background like their work. The group was in Anaheim, CA, and then in Huntington Beach, CA. I fit the profile and after an interview was offered a. job as an off-site Technical Representative. Since I had no other solid offers, I accepted feeling the job would last at least a few years. The relationship lasted over 20 and provided a very rewarding end to my career. Boeing, like bbn was totally accommodating to my assistive needs. Although they computer usage was based on Windows PC's s, they provided me with special software which was now available on those platforms and with CCTV equipment as I needed. Someone was always available to assist in getting special software up and running. By the time I started with Boeing, LBPH cassette readers were small and made traveling with them quite easy. I also had a laptop with screen magnifier'/reader software and internet connectivity anywhere I needed ii. While at Boeing, family matters took some good and bad turns. My daughter and her husband had my second grandchild, Evan. The bad part is my long-time wife and partner, Judi, died of cancer. After the grieving time, where things seemed s unsteady. it all turned around, when I met and married my current wife, Karen. I am again on firm footing and life has not been better. As I grew nearer retirement and brought up the subject with my supervisor, she had other ideas. She wanted me to keep working, however, I was able to reduce my work week to four and then three days. Finally, when I found a good replacement, she agreed to let me go. I had to stay in a two day a week consulting role for a year or so. I worked for Triad Systems Inc., a firm that provided part time support to aerospace firms on the west coast. On the home front , life proceeded without mishap. I am now fully retired and working as a volunteer for the southeastern Connecticut Center of the Blind. God things have again arrived as Karen's daughter, Kate, and her husband brought us another grandchild, Esme. Although most of the events above were very good, I am now happy in retirement and ready to do what I can to support others and to enjoy my family. Ways to connect with Mike: mjcoughl@aol.com About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog. Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards. https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/ accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/ Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below! Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe in your favorite podcast app. Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. Transcription Notes **Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i  capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us. **Michael Hingson ** 01:21 Well, hello, once again. I'm Mike Hingson. Your host Welcome to unstoppable mindset. And today we get to interview Michael Coughlin. Who's Michael Coghlan? Well, that's what we're going to find out in the course of the day. But I'm going to start a little bit different Lee than I have in the past. Let me tell you how I met Michael. He wrote me an email a few months ago, and talked about the fact that he read my book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man's guide dog in the triumphant trust. And we had discussions about that Michael happens to be a person who was blind. And he talked about his engineering background and other such things. And me being a person with a physics background and also in sales, but also doing a lot of engineering and tech stuff. It just seemed like the thing to do was to have Michael come on to the podcast. So we can find out all the scandalous and non scandalous things that we want to know about him. And just give us a chance to dialogue. And I thought it'd be kind of fun if all of you get to hear it. And that's how we, we discovered each other, we finally were able to get a time where we could get together and chat. So here we are. And Michael, welcome to unstoppable mindset. **Michael Coughlin ** 02:34 Thank you. I'm glad to be here. **Michael Hingson ** 02:37 Well, we'll really appreciate you being here. Why don't we start by you may be talking about the the younger early, Michael and tell us a little bit about you. And we'll go from there. Sure. **Michael Coughlin ** 02:48 And as you said, I had emailed you because of reading the book, which was powerful. There were in addition to my low vision blindness, were a few other parallels that caught my eye and maybe we'll cover those as we go through this feel free start. I was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, another midwesterner and I was born on a farm, as was my brother. My mother and father were New Yorkers at birth, and in their early years, they moved to Indiana, because my father was an engineer working for General Electric, and he was transferred to Fort Wayne. When they arrived in Fort Wayne, they decided to look at the Midwest, there's different sets of eyes and they rented a farmhouse on a 40 acre farm. And my father even became a hunter and raised a large garden and it was something pretty adventurous for a New York kid. But they were loving it. And I grew up for the first five years of my life on that farm, exposed a farm animals farm equipment. And I think at that time, I had been wanting to be a farmer. But quickly, they moved me into the city because of the school system. My mother had been a was a school teacher by trade and that taught in a rural schools and they felt the city schools would just be stronger. So at five years old, we moved in to Fort Wayne, and I started school at St. John the Baptist Catholic school and began my early years. In second grade. When they were doing I skipped screening for students. They immediately picked up on the fact that I couldn't see very well. And it was a bit of a shock to everybody I was getting by okay, but my parents were told that I had high problems and they immediately contacted a friend who was not the mala just to look at me, sent me to quote the best ophthalmologist in the city and I started going to him, he examined me and examined me and sent me to the University of Indiana Medical Center. And they all pretty quickly decided that I had macular degeneration. As a juvenile, um, it's very unusual in those days to come up with juvenile macular degeneration. **Michael Hingson ** 05:21 So What year was this? This would **Michael Coughlin ** 05:24 have been about 1953 or 54. Yeah. So, I mean, I was in second grade. And I was obviously starting to have visual difficulties. One of the things I didn't do very well was read aloud, because I was having trouble seeing the print even though I held it close I, I just never could read things out loud. But the school accommodated that well enough. They sat me in front of the class, when the work was going around, and each kid was asked to read a paragraph, they just skipped me. However, I was able to hold things close, read silently, figure out what was on the page, do my homework, pass my tests, and get reasonably good grades, I was probably an average to a little better than average student. So as I progressed, through grammar school, I was just given a little leeway on reading out loud, and everything else seemed to work fine. So they said average student, but if I had something to brag about in those years, it was my Boy Scout work. We had a wonderful Troop at my school. And in the years that I was a boy scout, I earned the rank of Eagle Scout with a bronze POM. I was awarded all three steps in the Order of the Arrow. And by eighth grade, was the senior patrol leader for our troop. Though I had managed through scouting, to excel in something, and then I moved on to high school. At this point, of course, I'd gone through all through grammar school, I'd been seeing ophthalmologists, I knew I had macular degeneration. But I had not been given one piece of information regarding assistive technology, such as talking books, large print, learning Braille, or anything else. I can only attribute that to the fact that I kind of saw things. I didn't run into anything, because I did have a low vision, but I could see. And so they just treated me like everybody else. And just acted like everybody else as best I could. When I got in high school. And I went yeah, go ahead. No, go ahead. Alright, went to Bishop lures High School, called institutional Catholic High School where the boys were sort of separated from the girls in most classes, because that's what was done in those days. I really got it, my grades markedly improved. I made high honors or honors at every grade point, every grade session all the way through high school. I was elected president of the Junior National Honor Society and the senior national honor society. I was in senior play with the lead one of the lead roles. I was on a yearbook staff. I just participated in everything I could, and the only thing I could not do was drive. And I had a lot of friends. And back then, at 16, not only could you drive, you could drive with a friend. So I was always able to get rides, and I just went right through high school. Still not using anything in the way of assistive technology, assistive technology. But I prospered. And at the end of my senior year, I was awarded the Catholic, the Catholic Leadership Award for the state of Indiana by the Knights of Columbus. And I decided that it was time to think about college. So there I was, and I was starting to fill that application. And so I took the graduate or the SATs test, it took another test in engineering aptitude. I scored reasonably well on the LSAT, again, with no help, no large print, no extra time holding it close. But I got through it did pretty well on that engineering aptitude test applied to four colleges in the Midwest and were accepted to all of them. I think a lot because my high school teachers liked me and gave me good recommendations. Anyway I have the four selected the University of Notre Dame, which was a good school, good Catholic school, had electrical engineering, which was where I had applied to get in and was ready to head off to college. My senior year at the end of my senior year, in high school, my parents, I was an exchange student in France, where I went there for seven weeks and lived to the French family. The correspondent, French student, Francis came back in the US for seven weeks. And right in the middle of that, my father took a job in Philadelphia, and we moved to Philadelphia. So I was transplanted into the east coast into a big city, and had a whole nother set of experiences that were great. I enjoyed it, I explored that city for the four years I was in college, even though I went back to Notre Dame, went to the Jersey Shore and saw what that was about. And went off to college, where they put me on an airplane in Philadelphia, I flew out and began my career at Notre Dame in electrical engineering, again, doing everything everybody else did, I didn't go out of my way to tell people that I couldn't see very well, I just played the role of a student. And for four years, managed to get by with pretty good grades, I had a 3.5 GPA at the end of my four years. And I had a degree in electrical engineering, and was ready to move on again to the next stage in life when the space program collapsed, and engineering jobs virtually disappeared. And so I said, Well, maybe grad school would be something one might think about for a little while longer. And I started looking into MBA programs, which I don't know we're getting popular. But my one of my engineering advisors suggests that I might want to stay in engineering because he thought I was a good engineer. I had done well in all my classes, all my labs, working with computers. So I thought about it. And somebody mentioned that there was a kind of a new field opening up called Ocean Engineering. And at the University of Miami had a program. While at the time my brother is a sophomore at Miami. And it seemed like wow, wouldn't it be kind of interesting to put out there and maybe room with my brother and, and whatever. And so I applied in ocean engineering, as well as a few MBA programs. I was accepted to Miami, they gave me money to go to school, paid my tuition gave me a stipend. And so I went, I went off to the University of Miami for a to attain that graduate degree, which I did in two years. In the middle of those two years, married my first wife, Judy, we moved she moved down to Florida. And there we were, for a couple years earning a graduate degree in ocean engineering. One of the curricula within ocean engineering is underwater acoustics. And that was very interesting to me because it was pretty mathematical. And guy double E's love math. And so I spent my courses in acoustics. And when some job interviews on campus came around, one of the companies looking for people with odd degrees were was electric boat Division of General Dynamics, because noise and submarines go together, or at least the lack of noise. They want you to be quiet. Yeah. So they gave me a job offer. And I took it, and we moved to Connecticut. And the came up here and one of the things I did during that first year, besides getting started with my job was to find an ophthalmologist because since I didn't see very well and I didn't want it to get too much worse. It was probably a good idea. And I found a fella Dr. Kaplan in Mystic and got an appointment and walked in and for the first time in my life had been I was told I was legally blind. I had no idea what that meant. And I was surprised because up until that point, I was getting by. I was enjoying what I was doing. I wasn't failing in anything, and like seem good. But anyway, he gave me a good overview on it. He said yeah, he was pretty disappointed. At the fact that I had been involved in everything to that point and never been told I was legally blind, nor had been told that there was any assistive technologies available to make it easier for me. So wait, you're mistaken. That would have been 1971. **Michael Coughlin ** 15:19 Okay. He did a few things, he registered me with the state of Connecticut. They actually have people in the state that come out and try to help you with things. He, they then sign me up for the Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. They stay State Library. And, lo and behold, they provided me with a talking book reader and talking books. For the first time ever, I was able to listen to books. All the ones I wanted, anything I wanted, was there available to me. And it was eye opening at that point. i From that time on, even though the device they had for as a player was pretty bulky. I carried that around everywhere. I went and was always listening to books, in addition, **Michael Hingson ** 16:11 is that records or cassettes? That **Michael Coughlin ** 16:15 at that point, they were both that's and I got records. Okay. They gave me a record player. Mostly those were the periodicals on what were then throwaway discs and, and the cassette, but I had to carry a second briefcase anywhere I went to bring that recorder because it was pretty big beast. Yes, **Michael Hingson ** 16:36 I remember those ranking was a General Electric manufacturing machine might **Michael Coughlin ** 16:42 have been but it was a great believe me went from nothing to that it **Michael Hingson ** 16:46 was large, but still Yeah. **Michael Coughlin ** 16:50 In addition, through Kaplan, I met another low vision specialist. And what he showed me was a closed circuit TV magnifier. And at that time, that beast was bigger than the tape recorder, believe me, oh, yes, full size, black and white television with a separate camera. But all of a sudden, I could see things I couldn't see because there were magnified. And so instantly, on arrival in Connecticut or close to it. I had two pieces of technology that just opened up the world. And it allowed me through that CCTV to get a second master's degree in systems management from University of Southern California. They ran that program on military bases. And they gave it I went to the submarine base in Groton and took that for two years and earned a master's second master's, I had access to closed circuit television for that I had my library books on or talking books on tape, and I was pretty happy in my career at General Dynamics was going well. I went, I went from an engineer, through senior to specialist and was an engineering supervisor in about seven years. And anyway, so we were good, but my boss at the time was struggling a bit with his advancement in life. And we had been doing a lot of work underwater acoustics on submarines with with a consulting firm that worked for the Navy called Bolt Beranek and Newman while the BBN was a diverse company, because not only were they the leading acoustics company in the world, but they also had some people that were working on something through DARPA called the ARPANET. So here we go, he gets an offer to start a local, then in New London, which is across the river from Groton, a local office of BBN recruits myself and a couple of other engineers and I am now a consultant working for the Navy Department. At that point in time, BBN was extremely interested in helping me out. So they provided me with a closed circuit was actually a portable closed circuit TV magnifier as well as the desktop version. And a few years later, I Xerox kurz wild text to speech reader. So now I had a little more technology that I could use to get printed books into text format, or speech format. And soon thereafter, one of my good friends who I still play golf with Doug Hannah, came across the fact that a Macintosh computer could magnify the screen and had text to speech. And that was from the all Most of the beginning of the Mac, those features were built into their operating system. Did **Michael Hingson ** 20:06 you ever get to spend much time up at BBN in Cambridge? **Michael Coughlin ** 20:10 Oh, yes. Lots of time at BBN in Cambridge. **Michael Hingson ** 20:14 Did you ever get to meet a guy up there named Dick Durbin sign? **Michael Coughlin ** 20:19 No, but I'll bet he was in a speech synthesis group. **Michael Hingson ** 20:24 I don't know that. He was there. He, he and I went to UC Irvine together. And I actually saw him. I actually saw him at BBN later, and we worked on some projects together, but I suppose there's a large place. So it **Michael Coughlin ** 20:41 was it was large and, and for the most part, my work was done with the acoustic side of things. Although as the internet grew, the computer side of BBN, when I started was about 5050 grew huge and dominated the company and, and all. I mean, they were very early adopters in, in speech recognition, right? They had a voice recognition or a voice sort of dialer feature in their phones from years before they were they were very much into that sort of thing. I **Michael Hingson ** 21:20 remember once when I visited BBN, he Dick told me about a transducer they had that actually would simulate the sound of a jet engine. I believe that yes, he said it was like the size of an ashtray that like the typical floor ashtray in a hotel but he said you didn't want to be anywhere near it when they fired it up because it really was just like a jet engine and it had all the the audio capabilities and all the features. So it really sounded like a jet engine. So you didn't want to be anywhere near Munich fire to an **Michael Coughlin ** 21:57 an aircraft acoustics was a huge part of the work that was done there. And air airport acoustics and they were just in a lot of acoustics but our little group was in submarine acoustics and, and kept us busy. Working at BBN was great in that they were a Mac House, everybody used maps. They put a Macintosh on my desk. It had the ability to magnify what I wanted to see and do text to speech. Even though it's a bit cumbersome, in that you had to copy things paste and whatever. But But I got good at that. I was able to use that computer to do word I could do Excel spreadsheets. I could do graph view graphs. I could do program planning, you name it. All of a sudden the world of the PC was opened to me, thanks to the Mac. And my career at BBN span 20 years. It was it was a great place. They were very early adopters in a lot of technology exposed to a lot of it early emails. They were one of the first companies to to use email. In fact, the fella that put the at sign in email name worked at BBN Ray Tomlinson, so that that was the place but after 20 years, because they were a true consulting firm and fairly expensive rates. And the government was competing on a cost basis. And so eventually I was in a situation where I was looking for a job. And friend of mine at BBN suggested a fella he knew at Boeing might want to buy mica job. And that led to a situation where they their group who was doing work and underwater vehicles, were located on the west coast, wanted somebody on the East Coast who did similar work. And so I was hired as a tech rep, where I would represent the group on the west coast, but I would interact with their Prime customers on the East Coast, one of whom was General Dynamics electric boat, and so my location in Groton was, was great. So what I thought would be about a four three or four year experiment with Boeing ended up as a 20 plus year career with Boeing. And I, they too, were a great employer. They provided me with up to date, closed circuit TVs, they made sure that I my laptop had the best software it turned out by that time. In the PC world. There were software there were things like Jaws and zoom texts. And so I they had Zoom Text on my machine. I was stopped into the internet anywhere I went. And I had closed circuit TVs, both at their facility in California and at my house. And by that time, you could put the library of the blind cassettes into Walkman size machines. So it was easy to carry that along on my travels. And for what was what 20 plus years I had a great career with them as as a tech rep. I was no longer now you had mentioned sales. My father and brother are sales people he was a sales engineer, my brother was a salesman and so is light all his career. My case not so much being in Myers Brigg ISTJ, which stands for introvert a bit. Sales was always a pressure job to me. And as a manager, by that time at BBN have have managed managed the Department of 40 engineers and scientists, the whole job was get more work sales. That was a pressure position for me, when I switched to BBN and I was nothing but a an engineer in the field with no sales pressure and work at all times. I loved it just lower pay less pressure, but I prospered. i I'm sure I was a huge help to them. Because every year my contract or the thought of me coming on for another year came up. Different supervisors wanted me and I just stayed in I was there for over 20 years. And it was it was kind of career where I was traveling a lot. And I enjoyed traveling. And I could get by in airports with little monoculars and asking questions and remembering the Airport layout. So I didn't get lost. And I just got by. Great. And as that careers continued through 20 plus years, and I was getting older, the subject of retirement began to crop in. I talked to my supervisor, you know, I'm at an age where retirement is something I might want to think about. Nope, nope. Well, I went from five day weeks to 40 weeks to three day weeks always saying I want to get out now. And finally they said, Well, if you can find a replacement, then we'll talk about it. So I was fortunate and able to find somebody I thought was good at it as today. And so then they put me on as a consultant for another year and a half on Tuesday weeks. And finally I was able to retire. What year was that? He retired? Yes. And that's where I am today. **Michael Hingson ** 27:42 But what year did you retire? **Michael Coughlin ** 27:45 Okay. During my time at Boeing, which I thought the career itself was fantastic. There were some times good and bad. I, my, my daughter and her husband gave us two grandchildren, Chloe and Evan. However, after many, many years, my first wife Judy succumbed to cancer. And that was tough. And when you are seeing some of that now, I'm sure, but in any case, after that, there's some low points and whatever I met Karen, my current wife, we, we went out for a few years and eventually we're married and, and everything has just turned back around the way it was. I'm happy. I'm retired. Her daughter has given us a grandchild ESMI who's now two and a half, almost three. And we are enjoying life. **Michael Hingson ** 28:42 So how long have you guys been married? **Michael Coughlin ** 28:45 This will be it was just 10 years we were we were married in 2012. Newlyweds? **Michael Hingson ** 28:50 Almost. Yeah. Well, I'm curious. What. So you, you clearly had a rich life you'd have the life that you enjoyed. But what do you think about the fact that early on? They did not that that no one the ophthalmologists and others didn't give you any access to assistive technology didn't give you more access to understanding about blindness and so on. And I don't ask that to say what a horrible thing but rather just what do you think about it? Now looking back on hindsight is always a wonderful thing. Looking back, **Michael Coughlin ** 29:34 I almost angry. At the time, I thought everything was fine. But when you look back, I believe. Number one, I think a lot of eye doctors are great if they can help you but if they can't help you, they tend to push you off to the side. And I think that was a little of it. And it maybe was just the fact that in the URL The days even though I had macular and I couldn't see printed and everything I saw well enough to get by. And I'm just thinking they figured, well, he's doing okay, whatever they should have done way more. And maybe even my parents should have done more. But But I don't I even looking back feel that in some sense the fact that I had to hold things up here to read was almost embarrassing to them, they they didn't grasp the concept of a young person not saying well, it just didn't grasp it. And unfortunately, since we were in the middle of Indiana, and there really weren't Apparently, people with very much knowledge of the subject. It just happened. And I just hope today, that way more attention is paid to people, the few juveniles that are limited sight, because I'm sure I could have had a fuller experience in life, if I at least had been exposed to talking books at a younger age. **Michael Hingson ** 31:14 Here are a lot of us who believe that it is so unfortunate that more of us also did not get the opportunity to learn braille, because right is outcomes, the basic means of reading and writing. **Michael Coughlin ** 31:30 I understand I agree completely. And so here I am having to sit here with my closed circuit TV, off to the right with about 40 power magnification in order to be able to see my notes, hey, I have a fellow in our, at the center of the blind Kevin, who is a braille reader and, and he's totally blind, but he has the Braille and he can sit at a meeting and read what he needs by reading it in Braille, when I'm at those meetings, I can't read anything. You can't, I cannot see any print, I just always have to rely on what I hear or ask questions. **Michael Hingson ** 32:13 So you're seeing reality, the advantage that we had was being blind people than if we do read braille, and so on, for not the advantages that we can look at meetings from a different perspective, which I love to talk about which, namely, is, if people are doing meetings truly the right way, they would provide everyone the information in advance of the meeting, so that people could read this stuff with the idea, then you can prepare and then you go to the meeting, and you can discuss it rather than spending half the meeting reading the information. Yep, well, they **Michael Coughlin ** 32:50 do that fortunately, times. Case of the center, I gather all of the information they're going to pass out as Word documents earlier, and I do go through them. **Michael Hingson ** 33:02 But what I'm saying is they should really do that for everyone, rather than passing out information at the meeting. People should get it in advance so that nobody has to read it at the meeting, rather use the meeting to be more efficient. So that's a lesson we could teach them which, which a lot of people really haven't caught on to yet understood. It does make life a little bit of a challenge. But I'm glad that that your your work at the Center will tell me a little bit about your work at the center and how you got involved in what the center is all about. **Michael Coughlin ** 33:34 Right? Well, it's my second time involved being involved with the center of the Blind in New London. First, the first interaction came about in in probably the late mid mid to late 90s, when we had a macular degeneration support group in Waterford, that that was started by a fellow's a friend Duncan Smith since passed. And, and I ended up as president of the group. And it was it was a pretty active group for about 10 years. And we brought people in that had macular and tried to provide him with information. And as part of that the center of the blind was one of the participants and their lead person helped us get speakers and so there's sort of a three to four person group as the lead and and that center lead person was one of those. I can tell you what her name was, but I forgotten it is too many years ago. So when I retired and I'm trying to think of giving back and doing things that what what can I do also I should have mentioned that not only they work with a senator I also at one point in time was a reader On the advisory group for the State Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, where I'd attend meetings and from a reader point of view, try to help them with their services. And I was on the board of directors for Chris radio, which is a radio service that reads newspapers and periodicals to people. So I've done a few of those kinds of things as well. But now I'm retired, I say, I want to be able to give back to some degree and, and so I thought of the Senator and gave them a call. They looked up their webpage, and there's a phone number I gave a call, talk to the Executive Director, Wendy Lusk. And she said, we'd love to have you come down and talk so. So I did, Karen and I went down. And we sat and talked to Wendy and, and Tammy, the assistant and said, well, might I be able to do. And after a little discussion, the concept of a support group for macular degeneration came up. And they didn't have such a thing. And they thought that would be a worthwhile project that they should put into their calendar. And that's what we've done. So I, every first Wednesday of the month, get together with others who are interested in. And the primary focus is learning how to use cell phones, because the new cell phones or smartphones and iPhones and also that others are pretty hard for people who are beginning to lose their sight. And they don't have an understanding of some of the assistive aids that are in the phone. So that's what we do. We spend a couple hours just answering questions and presenting information that I pick up over the web on things their smartphone can do for them. And as as that went and started gaining traction, Wendy asked me if I wanted to be on the board. And I said I'd be glad to do that and was elected to the board a couple of months back. So I'm on the board of directors as well as running that support group. **Michael Hingson ** 37:17 Do you think that let's deal with the pathological world? Do you think that attitudes have changed very much in terms of how I doctors handled blindness and blind people today over, say 40 years ago? **Michael Coughlin ** 37:35 Well, a little better. I mean, I have a fella now Dr. Parker I've been seeing for when, when Kaplan sold his practice, Dr. Parker took it over, I go to see him. He, he tries to keep me appraised of any new emerging things in the way of AI specialists, and what they may be doing for people with low vision. But, but they're more on the scientific side, and he really doesn't have any, any of the low vision aids, you have to go to a separate guy for that. And I've gone through those things so many times. That? I don't know, right? I would say better, but not great. Yeah, **Michael Hingson ** 38:29 what, what I have found and having significant conversations with people is that still all too often, if you go to an ophthalmologist, and it's discovered that for whatever reason, you're losing eyesight, and they can't do anything about it. They consider it a failure. And they just walk out sorry, there's nothing we can do and that we haven't seen enough of an awareness raising in the eye care world, where people recognize that just because you can't see it's not the end of the world and you can still be just as productive as you otherwise might have been accepted when you use different techniques. And, and a lot of state rehabilitation agencies are somewhat in the same sort of boat, they don't really ultimately do the things that they could do to better prepare people for having a positive attitude about blindness when they're losing their son. **Michael Coughlin ** 39:31 Yeah, I think that's true, although Connecticut, their agency is called WSB. The Bureau for the education of the blind and and they're pretty good. I just actually had a SB fella come to my house to give me a how do you use a cane training? I've never used a cane. And it's part part of our macular sport group. Discussion. One of the fellas in They're mentioned the, what he called his ID cane. And that was a term I'd never heard him. And what do you mean by that? And he said, Well, he said, because he has macular like me, said, I still see well enough to get around. But I'm tired of explaining to people they don't see very well. And so I got an I A cane, white cane, which you're legally able to use. And he said, the one I have is a little shorter, because I don't really need it as two more people with less vision. And it helps people understand that I don't see very well **Michael Hingson ** 40:37 in the answers. And the answer is even with an ID cane, that works until it doesn't. I know, I know, a guy who lived in I think it was Mount Laurel, New Jersey, and will take the train to Philadelphia every day, when he was losing his eyesight and the New Jersey Commission gave him a cane. But they also continued to emphasize eyesight a lot. And they didn't really convey to him the true importance of learning to use a cane as he's losing his eyesight. So one day, he was walking along the side of the New Jersey Transit train to go into the car to find a seat and involved process to Philadelphia. And key he turned in where the where he saw the openings for the car, and promptly fell between two cars. And then the train started to move and they got stopped and got him out. If he had been using his cane that would never have happened. And he became an avid cane user after that. Right. **Michael Coughlin ** 41:48 Great. And I completely understand that. And and I'm using it more and more. No doubt. **Michael Hingson ** 41:56 Yeah, there's and the problem is that people just all too often think it's a horrible thing and makes you look weird. Well, you know, there are a lot of things that all sorts of people use that make them look different than other people, that doesn't mean that they're less people. **Michael Coughlin ** 42:12 I actually had an experience a while back, which made the use of the cane even more, it highlighted it a little more is a number we were going back and forth to the Caribbean for a few years at on vacation at the Sandals Resort, and we got to the airport in Antigua getting ready to fly home. And since I don't see very well, I always will go up to the attendant at the ticket counter and say, you know, I'm visually disabled, can't see I really need early boarding we could cause legs, feet and other things trip me and I I'd like to get into a seat before the crowd arrives. And the first thing she did is looked at me and said, You're not blind, you know. And, and I was stunned. But but said yes, I am I cannot see. And they let me show. All right. All right. So after that in airports, I started at least wearing dark glasses. That helped a little bit with a cane. It's even at least then you have a claim to your claim, having to pull out the piece of paper from the state that says I'm legally blind. I have one of those, but that's kind of going a little too far. So I do find it a little bit more helpful. **Michael Hingson ** 43:39 Well, of course, what you discovered, the more you use a cane is the better traveler you are. And that helps you get around. Yes. Now as you know, I happen to use a guide dog. In fact, I didn't use either a cane or a guide. Well Mark cane or guide until I was 14 when I got the guideline. I never learned to use a cane until I was 18. But I discovered that I could teach anyone to use a cane in five minutes, but teaching people to have the competence to use a cane takes months because one is just a technique which you can learn easily the other is developing an attitude and developing the true awareness of that you know where you are and what's around you and how to recover from getting lost and and other such things like that along the way. That's a whole different animal entirely. Absolutely. But nevertheless, it's it's doable. So I still mostly use guide dog but there are some times that I'll leave the puppy dog at home or if I'm just stepping out a little bit leave the dog tied down and I'll use a cane but that doesn't happen very often. And certainly when I travel Alamo who is not a current guide dog comes with ready to go so We just returned from a weekend Israel doing work and all that, and he needed fine. And even on the long airplane flight to and from Israel, He did really well. Excellent. You know, it's, it is a matter of learning to use the skills that that we have. That **Michael Coughlin ** 45:19 is That is true. And in my case technology has been my savior. Sure, closer to TVs, the books on tape, and the fact that computers now have text to speech and magnification. Without it without those. I would not have had an engineering career I don't believe. So **Michael Hingson ** 45:44 what do you use to read books today? **Michael Coughlin ** 45:48 I do. I use my iPad. I have the bard application, which is the current app that's put out by the library. handicapper, I think they changed their name recently, but it's the same thing. And so I download books through them, and use the iPad, to read the books to me, I don't have to use a recorder anymore. It's and I can do the same thing on my iPhone. So. **Michael Hingson ** 46:23 So now of course, you have the ability to navigate through those books a whole lot more than you used to. **Michael Coughlin ** 46:28 Yes, because the again, I'm an apple person, but on my iPad, I can magnify the screen very easily. So downloading books is a little cumbersome, but not bad. And then I can pick whatever book I want to listen to and with Bluetooth headphones, or what I air pods or whatever they call them and listen to those without bothering anybody else. **Michael Hingson ** 46:53 Yeah. And again, the other neat thing is that you can skip around in a book, which is something that you couldn't do before, right now with the advantage of the DAISY format and so on you can which is a format, which is kind of an ePub environment. But you can literally skip around the book by chapter or any number of levels. Yep. **Michael Coughlin ** 47:15 And, and not only do I use that app, but I also have downloaded books on audible. Occasionally, if I can't find where I wanted, or, or iBooks it's now called something else. But and so some of the books he can't get it the library right away, you can you can go on and pay for him. And but mostly, it's through the the Library for the Blind. Certainly, that's where I found the underdog. So **Michael Hingson ** 47:45 what do you think overall has been the biggest obstacle you've had to overcome? **Michael Coughlin ** 47:49 If you go back and look, to me, the biggest obstacle was the invent the advent of the PC, and getting to use a PC. When, when I was moving along in my career, and early on, I did a lot of software engineering. But I was back in the earliest days, it was key punches. And all of that I got by then as they started using terminals, but simple terminals, I could have the software printed out, I could use the CCTV to see it, I could make changes to the software and have others enter it. It was everything was slow back then. But when the PC came along, it became an individual tool that everybody used, you had to be able to use it and and as I said it was Doug, Hannah and my good golfing buddy now who, who figured out how to use that with text to speech and magnification. And that just opened up the whole world of the personal computer, which which is today I mean MATLAB and other pieces of software you have to use. It made it available to me, had I not been able to make that jump into the PC world, I think I would have really been hampered on my ability to continue as an engineer or an engineering manager. **Michael Hingson ** 49:20 So you're not too bothered by the fact that there was a time that Bill Gates said that 640 K is all you'd ever need. And we have Emory. **Michael Coughlin ** 49:29 Well, you know, I remember using before Yeah. And I remember when the very first Mac's came out, they only had two floppy drives and no hard drives. So I had **Michael Hingson ** 49:45 a my first computer that I really use it all was Xerox sigma seven. We also had an OS born from my wife even before that, but it had the Xerox had two eight inch floppies no hard drive 64k and What was it? Yeah, you know, but amazing. I **Michael Coughlin ** 50:03 mean, the technology has just moved so fast. And, and the fast moving technology is great. And it's frustrating. Because a lot of the people that develop it's because now they can write software that does everything. The concept and of course you work for a company that that's very attuned to that fact, is that much of the stuff they throw out there now is very hard to use. If you're visually disabled, **Michael Hingson ** 50:34 you'd have visual issues there. The awareness has not grown like it needs to to make sure that all that stuff is inclusive. Absolutely. **Michael Coughlin ** 50:42 And it as fast as the technology is moving it. The accessibility features of software, to me are falling further and further behind. Even though there's more and more people that seemed to work in the field of accessibility. I think they're still not moving fast enough. And it is frustrating I had, I mentioned that one of the other obstacles that are countered, over the years when I was working at Boeing. Computer Training was becoming easy. And everybody had to take seven or eight computers, courses through the year and be qualified in things like obstacle don't leave obstacles and jet engines in called FOD and foreign object detection and on and on. And, and those courses were originally written by the various divisions and by people who got told make a course. And so they might dig up a course making pieces of software, whatever. And when they would finish it and put it out to everybody. Many of them wouldn't work with screen readers. And not only Weren't they work with screen readers, and they didn't redo the text, they'd have little tests you had to pass. And those certainly didn't work for the screen reader. And they were very, very frustrating. And I ran across to fellow at Boeing corporate, who became a friend and his father who had macular and he was really sensitive to that fact. And between the two of us we, we fought tooth and nail to get a standard a corporate standard on for courses put in place that included the fact that you had to be able to access the course with a screen reader took about five years for for that standard to finally be propagated throughout Boeing. And even when they did, I ran across the fire protection course where it wasn't in place. And I couldn't do that test and this. So you have to fight for that stuff. There's no doubt about it. **Michael Hingson ** 52:55 There are times that you do things to draw the line and say, look, you've got to make this inclusive. **Michael Coughlin ** 53:01 Great. Absolutely. It's getting better. I mean, I mean, at least if you stand up and squawk about it, there are people who will listen more than they used to. **Michael Hingson ** 53:13 Yeah, well and I think we're slowly raising awareness and it's a it's a challenge. consumer organizations are helping and we're we're we're now getting people to recognize it more much less that it really is part of the law the Americans with Disabilities Act really is more comprehensive than people want it sometimes to get credit for. And sometimes we have sites where it is still happening. **Michael Coughlin ** 53:40 Oh yeah. And and sometimes it just happens when you don't think about it we had when I was at the Boeing facility in California and they had been California it's always beautiful as you know. And and so stairways for buildings are often outside and inside stairways and we had a nice building and an out big, big wide outside stairway and they came in and put in new a new surface on the top step of the third floor landing so you wouldn't slip and a just as they did it, they covered up that yellow stripe that marked the top step and that next day I almost stepped right off into an clobbered down a flight of stairs, got my supervisor and said hey, help me an appointment and we she took me right over to the safety people within this was in Huntington Beach and today a day later they had a yellow stripe on the top **Michael Hingson ** 54:40 of that step car alternative that is which you didn't really have access to at the time was 30 Days came back. Which is another story of course I agree. But at **Michael Coughlin ** 54:51 that time, I was not. Right. Right. Look for yellow stripes, because I could see that much But anyhow. **Michael Hingson ** 55:02 So what what do you do for extra curricular activities in such out of work like sports and so on? Yeah, **Michael Coughlin ** 55:09 I, I love sports. When I was younger, I could play other few others like I never could be a baseball player with a little ball moving real fast, or a tennis player. But But I did like to play football because I was big enough to be a blocker and part of that team. And I played basketball, because basketball is pretty big. I played that least through college but but I was very fortunate in that my father, as an engineer had a medium kind of income and belonged to we belong to a country club in Fort Wayne. And the golf pro, there was a big advocate of teaching young kids how to play golf. So I started learning golf when I was about eight years old, and have always played golf. It got harder when I couldn't see the golf ball very well. I became eventually became a member of the US blind Golfers Association. I still am a member, they have a well, it was at the time a DVD. Now I think it's an online thing. It's a course for coaches of blind golfers. And they adopted the term coach, but I don't know helper to whatever the sighted person is about the blind golfer. And I show my friends that and, and pretty quickly, they figured out well, let's see, we've got to help him line the ball up in the middle of his clubface and point out where the hole is. And, and then there's these new range finders, the one I have talked. And so I push a button, it says your 180 yards. And so between a friend Nirn learning how to be a coach, and that I'm still an avid golfer, I play that a couple times a week. And if I have a good round, and I play from the senior tees, because I'm definitely senior, I still can once in a while break at which is a very, I think a very good score. And then I love to swim. And we had a swim team at that club and I from about age eight to 15 or something I was into competitive swimming. And now we have a pool and I swim every day in the summer. So **Michael Hingson ** 57:23 So is is Karen a golfer? **Michael Coughlin ** 57:27 No. It was the last week. We thought about that once but it didn't go over too. **Michael Hingson ** 57:33 Well. You try Yeah. Now you have, **Michael Coughlin ** 57:36 of course also love sports on television where I have a big TV and sit close my my passion of course is Notre Dame football. And for the people that see a video, the back screen of my my video is a picture I took of the Notre Dame Stadium football field when I was back at my 50th college reunion. **Michael Hingson ** 58:01 So Oh, go ahead. **Michael Coughlin ** 58:04 Well, I was gonna say they improve the stadium immensely since I was there. And there's a big area up at the top where you they have banquets and and you entertain and and so our class that was where we had our 50th anniversary dinner. And so he couldn't be looking over the stadium and I took a picture and put it in my Zoom background. So so they **Michael Hingson ** 58:28 still talk to you. They still talk to you even though you've got some advanced degree work from USC, and Miami and Miami, USC even more than Miami. But yeah, **Michael Coughlin ** 58:40 well there was a time Miami and Notre Dame went like that. Now it's not but USC Of course. And I tell people that but I I have never had bad vibes over the fact I have advanced degrees from **Michael Hingson ** 58:55 C See, I love to tell the story that when my wife and I got married, the church didn't fill up until 12 minutes after the wedding was supposed to start, I suppose started for and and for 12 crowds came in and Only later did we learned that everyone was still sitting out in your pliers waiting for the end of the USC Notre Dame game. Of course. Again, I want to point out that my wife, of course, is an SE grad she did her master's work there. And of course I have to point out that we won, which proves that God was really on our side that day. Just say sometimes, **Michael Coughlin ** 59:30 you know the story of one of the Notre Dame Miami games where they had the great dinner or breakfast before the game and and when they the University of Miami Chaplain got up and said that well, you all know that God is not doesn't take sides in football. And so we'll both pray and see who the better team wins and Lou Holtz, then the coach Scott up and said, Yeah, you're completely right. God is not involved. But his mother is. **Michael Hingson ** 1:00:08 Good answer. Yeah, only Luke could do that. That's the neat thing about good college football rivalries. Absolutely. Always find that. That's **Michael Coughlin ** 1:00:19 kind of my sports, fat, passion for, for television, and then golf and swimming or my dad, **Michael Hingson ** 1:00:26 I grew up listening to the Dodgers. And of course, we're spoiled. We have been Skelly who I still know them. Yes, yes. The best announcer that ever is when was and probably will be in. So I learned baseball from him. There's a lot of fun listening to him. And **Michael Coughlin ** 1:00:43 posters where Claire and I are now. I've been converted. She's from Boston. So we're Red Sox fans. So this weekend, they're playing each other. Well, **Michael Hingson ** 1:00:53 and then in days gone by in basketball. We had Chick Hearn, and of course, Boston had Johnny most. **Michael Coughlin ** 1:00:59 Oh, yes. Oh, yes. **Michael Hingson ** 1:01:03 Johnny is, Johnny was certainly a character. Well, I want to thank you for taking the time to do this today. It was was fun to do. I'm glad that we got a chance to really chat and do

The NLS annotation follows: If the creek don’t rise DB91901 Weiss, Leah Reading time: 9 hours, 32 minutes. Kate Forbes A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Historical Fiction Young Sadie Blue Tupkin was warned about marrying her husband Roy, but she’s illiterate and expecting a baby. The community provides her support, though her grandmother Gladys thinks Sadie Blue should handle the problem the way she did. Then a stranger arrives offering even more hope. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2017. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/5221043?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPWlmJTJCdGhlJTJCY3JlZWslMkJkb24lMjUyNiUyNTIzMzklMjUzQnQlMkJyaXNl

Our next month's book to discuss is the best seller “American Prometheus: the triumph and tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer” DB61087 by Kai Bird and Martin Sherwin, 699 pages. Because of its length, we will cover the growing up and transformation of the brilliant Oppenheimer and ultimate triumph in Chapters 1 through 23In our January 2nd meeting and the remainder of the book covering the outcome of his loss of security in our February 6th meeting. American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer. the first full-scale biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer, "father of the atomic bomb," the brilliant, charismatic physicist who led the effort to capture the awesome fire of the sun for his country in time of war. Here's the NLS annotation: American Prometheus: the triumph and tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer DB61087 Bird, Kai; Sherwin, Martin J Reading time: 27 hours, 34 minutes. Steven Carpenter A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Science and Technology Biography Biography of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967)--"the father of the atomic bomb." Chronicles his New York City upbringing, marriage to Kitty Puening, work on the Manhattan Project, and life after the 1954 Atomic Energy Commission hearings which denied Oppenheimer his security clearance for questioning the ethics of nuclear weapons. Pulitzer Prize winner 2006. 2005. Here's the Bookshare link for this title: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/5599711?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPUthaSUyQkJpcmQlMkI

NLS Description: Six cats a slayin': a Cat in the stacks mystery DB94075 James, Miranda Reading time: 8 hours, 42 minutes. Erin Bennett A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Mystery and Detective Stories With cat Diesel's help, Charlie welcomes five tiny felines left on his doorstop. Meanwhile, his nosy neighbor Gerry Albritton, a real estate agent, decides to throw a lavish holiday party--where she winds up dead. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018. This book is available on Bookshare at the following link: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/2269467?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVNpeCUyQmNhdHMlMkI

The NLS annotation follows: They're watching DB71566 Hurwitz, Gregg Andrew Reading time: 14 hours, 6 minutes. Scott Brick A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Screenwriter Patrick Davis gets fired from his first film, is sued by an actor, and has problems in his marriage. But when he begins receiving threats and accepts an offer to fix things, he lands in a murder conspiracy. Strong language and some violence. Commercial audiobook. 2010. This title is not available on Bookshare.

The NLS annotation follows: Be frank with me DB84263 Johnson, Julia Claiborne Reading time: 9 hours, 45 minutes. Celeste Lawson A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Human Relations Alice Whitley works for a publisher who sends her to California to help reclusive author Mimi Banning deliver her long-awaited second novel. While Mimi locks herself in her office supposedly writing every day, Alice takes care of Frank, Mimi's ferociously intelligent but eccentric young son. 2016 You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/3705109?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPWJlJTJCZnJhbmslMkJ3aXRoJTJCbWU

NLS annotation: Mr. Mercedes: a novel DB79570 King, Stephen Reading time: 17 hours, 46 minutes. Erik Sandvold A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Bestsellers Job-fair applicants are mowed down by a man in a stolen Mercedes--and eight die. The killer later sends a letter to ex-cop Bill Hodges, who--with the help of two others--is determined to find him before he strikes again. Violence, strong language, and some explicit descriptions of sex. Bestseller. 2014. Here is the Bookshare link to this book: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/5459117?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPU1yLiUyQk1lcmNlZGVz

Travis Michael is all of what the title says. As he says he “played jump rope his entire life over the Mason-Dixon line spending time between the mountains of Johnstown Pennsylvania, and the city bay life of Baltimore”. As I spoke with Travis during our initial call as well as during our episode he is an incredibly curious person who also wants to do good in the world.   He will tell us a great deal about his new app called “Bridgd” which you can learn about at www.bridgd.com.   In addition to app development, he and his company help other companies and nonprofits improve their efficiency by streamlining and enhancing what they do and how they do it.   Now, Travis is completing work on his book, “Honor Thy Father” which he expects to have published in the August 2023 timeframe.   I think you will enjoy Travis and his wisdom. I know I did.     About the Guest:   Founder of Trav Media Group, Travis Michael played jump rope his entire life over the Mason-Dixon line spending time between the mountains of Johnstown Pennsylvania and the city bay life of Baltimore Maryland before traveling the United States helping companies as their one-stop Chief Marketing Officer. In his spare time, he's spending time with his family and friends while donating time to his church and community.     Ways to connect with Travis:   Website - https://trav.media Email - travis@trav.media Bridg'd App - https://bridgdcom.com Instagram & TikTok - @travismichael.official @trav.media      About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe in your favorite podcast app.   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.     Transcription Notes   Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i  capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson ** 01:20 Greetings, everyone, I am Michael Hingson. And you are listening to unstoppable mindset where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Today we get to talk with Travis Michael. That's his pen name and what He wants us to use, which is great. And it's his pen name because Travis is about to come out with a new book. And we will definitely talk about that in the course of the next hour or so. But Travis, welcome to unstoppable mindset. We're really glad you're here.   Travis Michael ** 01:50 Michael, it's a pleasure being here. We have had so many amazing conversations that I'm excited to see where this one goes.   Michael Hingson ** 01:59 Well, let's start. Let's start with something that I love to do, which is learn a little bit about you as a younger Travis, where you started from what you did, and and kind of how you got where you are. I know you talked about jumping rope over the Mason Dixon Line going from Pennsylvania to Baltimore. See, I know how to say that. Right? Yeah. And I lived there for six months. So And anyway, so tell us a little bit about Travis.   Travis Michael ** 02:32 Yeah. So you know, I, I love to like preface this with like book recommendations. There's a really good book. It's called outliers. And it's basically about people that have had access to unique things in their lives, right, you know, what really defined your childhood and what drove you. And I was fortunate to be able to go to what's called a magnet school. So magnet schools, they had a four big professional focuses. And that was environmental science, Applied Engineering, visual, graphic art, and mass communication. And so by sixth grade, you're taking a two period class with that specialty and you transition every quarter, by seventh grade, you narrowed it down to two. And by eighth grade, you're taking that specialty class the entire year through. And so, you know, people, you know, kids that go through those types of experiences and have access to more tools, as laid out in outliers. I Bill Gates, people realize that he worked at a college that had a supercomputer. So he he actually worked in the lab of the supercomputer to have access and access to it. And then he was able to understand the different problems because he was there, troubleshooting. He was there helpdesk, essentially. And, you know, he took that knowledge and that knowledge base and was able to expand upon it. So you know, I love talking to people and finding out like, what really drives them and being able to expand upon that as well. So yeah, that was kind of me growing up, right, you know, the I try to like take in as much as I could. From a media standpoint, my focus was visual graphic art that has really driven me and my helping take people's visions and use my skills to drive their visions as well.   Michael Hingson ** 04:45 But you talk about really wanting to help people interact with people and help them I'm not trying to put words in your mouth as such but become better than they are what what caused you to have that kind of a wide scope and wide view of what you wanted to do, because that's far beyond graphics?   Travis Michael ** 05:03 Well, you know, right as a kid, you know, you're like, I want to, I want to change, I want to, I want to make a change, there's something that's not right. There's something that's off. And I just, I needed to I wanted to, there's a lot of blocks in communication, right there in and how people communicate and the ability to communicate. You know, and I, in middle school, I was, I think it was in the early 90s, when American Sign Language came into play. And whenever I moved up to Pennsylvania, in eighth grade, I had access to a, there was a young young girl in my grade, that she, she was deaf, and they offer sign language classes, and I took some sign language classes. I know very little, I think I know, the ABCs up to like, G. And that's where it stops. But I also knew that like, obviously, there was there's a huge disconnect there. Right, Mike? You know, there's, there's having the ability that there's, there's some sort of even social block right, in being able to communicate,   Michael Hingson ** 06:23 and that's something that has fascinated you, and that you've wanted to kind of address and you do that primarily through dealing with graphic arts, or do you go beyond that?   Travis Michael ** 06:34 Well, I like to go beyond that, right. And I just just got back from Chicago, and I ended up there is a stop at the Wonder Museum, and I would highly recommend if you have the opportunity to go to Chicago, definitely check it out. But it offered experiences and, you know, anytime any type of social engagement is an experience, and I want to be able to help those that have communication blocks, be able to communicate, in general, you know, being able to not be a fly on the wall, not just, you know, a person in the back, doing their best to read lips. And so, whenever I was in Chicago, there, I'm, I think I'm very approachable, Mike. And next thing I know, I'm being a tourist, I'm taking videos and pictures. And this gentleman approaches me. And he starts is puts up one thing, he starts signing, and you could hear just in his voice is I'm deaf. Just like that's like all he was able to get out of his voice at a very low get Gatsby. And then I, I he was trying to show no sign to me. I said hold on one second. It just so happens that I'm developing an app for deaf people. And I pulled the app out. And it started transcribing my voice as I was talking. And I was able to communicate. And we had a wonderful conversation about it, even whenever we were kind of walking and talking. That I was I had my chin down. I was kind of, you know, looking down and talking. And he's like, he's like, Hey, I'm up here. I can't read your lips. If your chin is down.   Michael Hingson ** 08:54 And I was gonna ask how did he understand you? It wasn't mainly lip reading, or I definitely want to learn more about the app. But did he read your lips? Is that how you he understood you?   Travis Michael ** 09:04 Yes, that's how he understood me, you know, as his education revolved around, being able to read my lips, you know, being able to read lips, period, not just my lips, anyone's lips. And you know, they can hear low tones. Yeah. And it's, it's very interesting. I had a we really didn't miss a beat in our conversations as I was able to use the app. And if there was something that he was trying to communicate communicate with me that wasn't getting through. He could just use my phone and type in whatever you type it in, and then hit play and it played out the speaker.   Michael Hingson ** 09:53 I when I was in elementary school, and I don't remember what grade I was in In but it probably was third grade. Or earlier, I'm going to say the third grade. We were at a Halloween party at the school. And I ended up sitting across a table from a gentleman who was one of the janitors at the school. And we talked for a while. And occasionally I looked away. And he didn't necessarily respond. But then he volunteered that he had been deaf since Pearl Harbor. And that he communicated, he did not, his voice was as natural as someone who was a full hearing person. But he understood people by reading lips. And it's the first time I ever had exposure to that. And he was very kind and very generous with his time telling me about it, because I became, of course, very curious being blind. And we had a wonderful conversation than in several since when when I was still at that school, but it is it is fascinating. And he was as good as a body could be at reading lips, he certainly understood me.   Travis Michael ** 11:14 So he was able to speak back to   Michael Hingson ** 11:18 Yes, he absolutely could speak back to me. And I had no clue that he was death, because he served in the military. So this was like, What 1958 or so. And he had been in the military and served at Pearl Harbor, and which is when he became deaf, so he continued to be able to speak very well.   Travis Michael ** 11:40 Ah, gotcha. That makes a lot of sense. And I   Michael Hingson ** 11:43 had no idea that he was deaf or, or anything other than just a person who could talk to me and I could talk to him. And then he told me about being deaf. And that was, I'm sure, in a sense, brave of him. But for me, it was fascinating. And I haven't thought about him very much since then. But this brought it up. And just as fascinating that you're having success, how's the app doing?   Travis Michael ** 12:11 Oh, it's wonderful, we're getting ready to launch the new the new user interface, it's a lot brighter cleaner. And you know, from there, because that's going to be the base base design that we have, we're going to be pushing out a lot more demos and videos, because now this is okay, we've proved out the model, it works. We've got approval from Apple and Google for the model. And now we're getting ready to do a full launch with some really neat upgrades, including voice segmentation. So if you're interested, you can find that app over to read br idgd.com. So that's bridged with no E. It's no e.com. And you can download and be a test user right now, we're, we're really excited to roll out the next version with some really cool updates, and ultimately expand out into other markets, including translations. And so stay tuned for some really awesome upgrades that are going to be incremental in connecting people not only of speaking and non speaking and hearing and non hearing, but languages all across the globe, as we build this thing out. So head over to bridged.com with no E, and sign up as a test user, and where we're really super stoked about getting this thing out here, Mike,   Michael Hingson ** 14:02 when will the next upgrades and so on come out?   Travis Michael ** 14:06 Yeah. So we're ready, getting ready for phase one be new upgrades will be coming early fall. So I think August, we're going to be really pushing it out. But we were probably going to have some short term upgrades, including the new UI, maybe not with the full scope. But we're, we're really close to full implementation. I think we're, you know, just to keep this moving. I think there's just gonna be I think it's gonna be like dollar 99 a month, very minimal, just to be a being able to support the technology. So it's not a whole lot, but it's something that we can put into a humanitarian effort to be able to connect with Many people have many different languages Have you   Michael Hingson ** 15:05 have you tested it with VoiceOver and so on to see that it's accessible from that standpoint.   Travis Michael ** 15:13 Really, we're just focusing on the, in real life, engage engagements, you can customize what's really beautiful about this, this app is the ability to then speak back, there's a lot of platforms where you can just, it just transcribes. But then the user has the ability to, to then type in a quick reply, or selective select from a series of quick replies that are already loaded, kind of like your emojis that you pull up another, it's like another keyboard, and you can have, you can actually program your quick reply keyboard, based on, you know, maybe you have, you're going to the doctor's office, and you have some, quote, some questions that need to be answered. And rather than picking them on the fly, you can add them into the keyboard under your favorites, you tap it, if you add it to the keyboard, and then it plays through the phone speaker. And you can go down and you've talked to actually talk to your doctor about these things. And being able to maybe have questions for you, just in general, just being able to converse, you know, pick the conversation type, it's going to help them be able to communicate better.   Michael Hingson ** 16:45 Well, the question I was asking what I was getting at is that with like iPhones and with the Google Android phones, there are what are called screen readers, there are software packages that will that will verbalize whatever comes across the screen. And in this case, you're going deeper than that, because you're also dealing with providing input by other means. And my question really was, have you explored making sure that the app is accessible using screen readers, for people who may not be able to necessarily see everything that comes across the screen, but needs to hear it. And that's a little bit different set of gestures, it is all part of what Apple provides. And, and the Google Android phones do, although I think Apple still does a little bit better job of it. But what what VoiceOver is, is a software package that will verbalize whatever comes across the screen. It also means that if I needed to, I could type messages. If somebody isn't a lip reader, for example, I'm assuming that this is part of what the app would allow one to do would be for me to be able to type and then it would appear on the screen. And voiceover would allow me as a blind person to be able to do that. So my question really was, are you looking at accessibility for the product across the board?   Travis Michael ** 18:20 Oh, absolutely. I think that it's going to be critical for for those types of conversations. And you know, and being able to last time we talked being able to add that. Well, I've also had some very interesting conversations with with Google. And I look forward to having more about exactly that. Being able to provide accessibility in improve their accessibility, that   Michael Hingson ** 18:54 I will have to download the app and and experiment and can give you some feedback regarding that. Because a lot of app developers don't really understand what they can really do to make visual and non visual, well, visual apps more usable by people who may not see what's on the screen. And so Apple provides a lot of information about that, but there are no requirements for any of that. So a lot of people don't necessarily see it, or they may make their app work. And then the next time a new update comes out, something gets broken because it doesn't become part of their process to keep that going. But I'll be glad to download it and take a look at it and see what it looks like. It sounds like it would be a lot of fun to do.   Travis Michael ** 19:46 Yeah, yeah, that's, you know, and we're gonna be, you know, constantly working on improvements. This is a definitely a new space that we're looking to help people explore And upon, and being able to have the ability to remove social norms, where, where social norms aren't necessarily good, where Deaf people are not communicating, they're typically standing in the back and being a wallflower. And because you don't know, or most people in that contact group, don't have don't have don't have the ability to communicate, whether it be ASL, or what have you, soy, or even, you know, having someone there that that knows ASL that can translate. And then it's, there's still that barrier, there's still that extra person. Whereas, you know, now you can kind of have that freedom to go to the store, go walk down the street taught, you know, talk to someone randomly. And it really helps clear that that pathway, right, right.   Michael Hingson ** 21:10 What What got you started doing this app?   Travis Michael ** 21:14 Well, so the president of the company is deaf. So this is I'm doing this, I'm creating this app for my client. And his dad, and I had been working together. Now his dad's the CFO of the company. And his dad, Todd Trichur, pulled me aside after one of our meetings that we had been working together on his HFC, one quick question. Can you build apps? I see. Well, yeah, absolutely. You know, I just developed an app for client out of Los Angeles, like an Uber like app that people can just book trips to and from the airports just right from their website. I said, Yeah, sure. Got it. Got a team, you know, we're really starting to roll on some big projects. He says, Well, my son was born deaf. And I've always had in my head that when the technology was there, we would build this app together. And being able to help deaf people communicate in real time, using this technology. And he's, you know, done a lot of market research. And I think it's time to just start pulling the trigger on this and move forward. So we go through many conversations. I built I personally built the user interface user experience that I've laid out for my developers, wonderful team that put this put what we have to get put the kind of the, the engine behind the machine. Well, I kind of just had the, the brick and mortar, right. So it's, it's been a wonderful experience. And we're picking up steam, and some other really, really cool projects that we're looking to take some of these industries by storm, with our creativity, and how we have how we start building markets in a positive way.   Michael Hingson ** 23:38 What's the name of your company?   Travis Michael ** 23:39 So my company is travel Media Group. You can find me online at if you just type in travel dot media. There's no.com It's just https colon forward slash forward slash Trev. Tr AV dot media, I think if you look down here, yeah, right there. Under my Zoom picture here, you can see my my website. I work with companies doing you know, it's great, because I have the ability to flex. And you know, I can be doing these wonderful mobile apps. And then I can also kind of switch into for marketing training, and working with different teams. On You know, I'm able to kind of be more budget friendly for nonprofits, where I can instead of doing it, I can train people, and then they can kind of work the plan. So, but I'm also doing, I still enjoy doing logos. I still want to, you know, doing custom websites, I build a custom website for a client out of Georgia, that does. Jet parks for private jets, build a custom, ecommerce quoting system for their website. And there, it's been just steamrolling, or our SEO has been wonderful. The ability to add parts to their, to their quoting system is, is pretty seamless. And then they can just quote out the prod the product and get people into their, their funnel a lot quicker. So it's, you know, a lot of this is is just problem, problem versus solution, finding the solution to, you know, unique problems and identify the market. You know, again, I do my own market research and with search engine marketing, and I try to understand the entire funnel. And, you know, a comp a company may have different a few different demographics that they're partnering to. Right. You know, I could be working with marketers, you know, and I can also be working with CEOs, you know, so many different parts and understanding supply chain as well. That's a big help.   Michael Hingson ** 26:20 Yeah, yeah. There's, there's a lot to that, isn't there?   Travis Michael ** 26:23 Yeah.   Michael Hingson ** 26:24 How long have you been doing this? How long has the company been around?   Travis Michael ** 26:28 Yeah, so I started traveling media in 2017. I was just out as bootstraps in a computer, right? And just just talking, I saw one of my first clients that they dealt and drones, they they actually built drones. That got me into some really cool spaces. Gave a handful of clients in the aviation sector, one of one of them, does the, the drone light shows. So you know, if you're in the aviation world, the trade show booths, done, you know, even like, instructional instructional design. So on the back of all those drones that for those light shows, I there's a sticker that they put on him. And that sticker just happens to be my designed, very kind of Honeycomb like, so it's really cool.   Michael Hingson ** 27:29 What did you do before you started travel media?   Travis Michael ** 27:33 So same kind of space? Like I, right out of college, I was doing animation boards and malls, and then they go, can you do business cards? Can you do logo design? And can you do brochures? Next, you know, I'm doing billboards, I'm animation for commercials. I was then, you know, really getting into animation with After Effects. And you have some 3d stuff. And then I might, I would give designs to web developers, and they were just butchering my designs. And I was like, stop it, stop, quit, quit screwing up my design, they already approved this, this design, and you're not giving them anything remotely close. So I went in started teaching myself CSS and HTML, and it kind of I, I can understand JavaScript and PHP, but I can't really write it. But But now with with Chet GPT. You know, I'm, I'm also building unique plugins for that. That helped me with my technology. So we, for instance, we have the we have the the website for the for the bridge app. And then we have the app, right? And so there are two different, different things, but how do you get them to communicate with one another. So anytime someone registers on the app, a signal is then sent back to the website that actually has a database that can house that information. So that's so we're reusing that they're developing a REST API that gives them the ability to communicate with each other. So that's been, you know, just the evolution of technology and   Michael Hingson ** 29:40 explain that just a little bit more for me. I'm not quite sure I follow what yeah, what that's doing.   Travis Michael ** 29:45 Absolutely. So it, basically it's handling the user registration. So if you when you register on the mobile app, right, so Michael Pinkston, at my I go hangsen.com. And it goes to all that information is then. So your your profile is then created on our website, in our in our database, right? That database doesn't necessarily have to be on the website, it can be on an entirely different shooter. But for the kind of being able to control the two, we're able to create that that communication gap worried. So the app can then talk to the website. Does that make sense?   Michael Hingson ** 30:44 Yeah, I think I, I follow it. So and so by the app talking to the website, it and obviously keeps the profile up to date. What does it do for the user, in terms of communicating with others and so on?   Travis Michael ** 31:00 Well, all it does is, you know, if you lost your password, maybe you switch apps. Okay. So that's all it really handles. Right? Got it.   Michael Hingson ** 31:11 Okay. What do you think about this whole discussion of AI Artificial Intelligence, which well, not widgets, but artificial intelligence products, like, chat, GPT, and so on, you know, they've become so sensational, sensationalized? What do you what do you think about all of the furor around all of that?   Travis Michael ** 31:33 Well, it was coming. It's I mean, we it's been, you know, we've been working with autocomplete now for how long? Right? So like, that was just a form of AI. Yeah. And now we know, it's expanding into more of a user interface where the end user can dictate what the outcome should be. And so you really have to be able to figure out, it's your best use cases, for what you need. Right. I, people are afraid of the maliciousness behind it. I'm sure that there's some sort of kill switch. There, there would have to be.   Michael Hingson ** 32:33 The other aspect of it is that we keep hearing about all this potentially bad stuff with it. But look, we haven't eliminated the dark web. And we have the internet and the internet is is a way to get a lot of information to people and has been since the early 1990s. So it's always going to be dependent on what we use it for and how we use it for and hopefully, we have enough fried people who will use it. And that will hopefully set some of the tone about don't do bad things with it, because that's not appropriate. But the other part of it is, if you said, a kill switch, or we will have to probably put some governors on it because too many people are going to misuse it. When they don't need to they're gonna go down a rabbit hole, they don't need to go down.   Travis Michael ** 33:28 But Potentially, yes, potentially, potentially, I, you know, I'm not the I'm not the all things on this. But, you know, my, my theory is, you know, use your powers for good. Yeah. And, you know, we're getting ready to our next version. With with working closely with Google, hopefully, we're gonna get an early release of their new language model, that also includes the includes AI. So being able to better provide a better trans transcription experience, your voice to text is actually going to be more accurate. And also working on being able to segment people's voices, and ultimately using that as a security model. So as we identify, this is Michael Hinkson speaking, and in the back end, it creates a digital thumbprint that every time you're you're now you're now speaking, that it actually authenticates that it's you. Right. And it will also provide security from Ai duplication. You know, that's a one of the big focuses that we Been looking at these different different programs duplicate, you know, Morgan Freeman, like, obviously it's not Morgan Freeman speaking, it was the AI speaking like Morgan Freeman. And that's what we want to, you know, basically safeguard. We want to safeguard your voice, there's been too many incidents that I've come across where voice has been captured, manipulated and used for malicious.   Michael Hingson ** 35:43 Although I've said to, to a few people, jokingly, I know I'll really have arrived when I can hear John Wayne read The Hobbit. You even imagine that? Yeah, but you know, and, and the reality is, it's ultimately going to come down to how we use it and how we treat it. And it's going to be up to us. And that all comes down to moral compasses, and so on. Here's a question regarding your app, have you thought of, or is the capability coming are there where a person who's deaf or hard of hearing can sign the phone can pick it up and translate that into text or to voice that is spoken out by the phone,   Travis Michael ** 36:34 there is technology, I have even seen gloves that have been developed. And, you know, a lot of that is, you know, they're already using some of that movement stuff with, with robots, you know, as they've been, you know, focusing on you know, wrote a hand robotic hand going in acting like a human hand, you know, maybe even like, creating bionic hands for people that maybe we've lost a hand and the transfer of energy and those types of things. So, that's a little bit further outside of our scope. For this, we really wanted to start small.   Michael Hingson ** 37:18 Sure, no, I appreciate that. But the reason I asked the question probably is reasonably obvious. If I'm communicating with a person who is deaf and who doesn't speak, I can't see their signing. And so the question is, how will I communicate with him now, there are some technologies, for example, there is a device that a person can type on, and it will produce Braille at the other end, and obviously, you can type on a computer. And with voice technology, it can be heard, but it just seemed like it would be intriguing and interesting to think about the concept of the app, being able to take advantage of the camera on a smartphone, to see the person signing and verbalize that, but I don't know, all the ins and outs of the pluses and minuses of how hard that would be. My first job out of college was actually working with Ray Kurzweil, the developer of Omni font OCR. And that's when I also first got introduced to artificial intelligence because his first machines would reprint and the more they read, the higher the competence they gained of being able to read material, especially when characters were somewhat degraded, and it actually learned. But it just seemed like an illogical interesting idea might be for this. If signing is uniform enough, where a software package could be taught to interpret signing, if that could be the case, it would be trivial to then output it to voice because the phones already have the ability to talk anyway.   Travis Michael ** 39:02 Is there anything that like, would you know, I'm thinking I'm thinking of like hardware is there is like a, like a Bluetooth. Maybe, like a Bluetooth device where maybe as it would be typing, or as it would play out of the phone speaker. It could also be like felt, you know?   Michael Hingson ** 39:29 Oh, yeah, I mean, there are ways that there are refreshable braille displays that I can connect to my iPhone so that I can turn the speech off completely and use just the Braille display, to read whatever's coming across the phone, but I'm thinking of the other end of it is the person inputting information. And so I was thinking that if a person who was deaf signed how II See, would it be for that signing to be interpreted? Because if you said, you know, A through G, well, if somebody signs an A, can the phone be taught to recognize that a? If it can, then it doesn't matter what the output is, it could be outputted directly to the phone speaker or it could go to a Braille display or whatever. It's the recognition of the sign. That's the issue. Yeah.   Travis Michael ** 40:28 I think that might be something we tackle. As we start looking down the line. Whatever we get, we won't really want to get into AR augmented reality, like the Google Glasses and those types of things. Yeah. Because then as the person is speaking, you can then do like real life closed captioning. You could also do what you're talking about. So if I'm, I can actually, you know, sign. And then the AR, could then close caption the sign language, essentially? Well,   Michael Hingson ** 41:07 yeah. Well, yeah, I could close caption it. But the idea is that if it recognize the signing, then the output part today is very straightforward. Yes, it could close caption it and put it on a screen. Or since it's recognized it, it could just as easily go through the voiceover screen reader on the phone to verbalize it. Yeah, none of that's the problem. The issue is recognizing what is being signed from the signer. And so as you said, og augmented reality, if that's the way to do it. But anyway, it's an intriguing idea. And it would open up some interesting vehicles for communication, which, which would be kind of cool. So in addition to developing apps you work with, with other companies, and I know you're kind of almost a global chief marketing officer in a lot of ways, aren't you?   Travis Michael ** 42:05 Yeah, absolutely. You know, the companies bring me in to kind of turn their brand around, and not just turn their brand around, but, you know, help them embrace technology for for operational purposes, you know, that there's like, for instance, this new website has kind of acted as they're another sales tool, they website doesn't take a day off, it's there, you know, so being a collection hub for the for that business, and, you know, finding unique problems, and you're getting them getting their teams to kind of cheerlead the path forward. So working, I'll typically come in, I'll work very closely with the president CEO, to understand where they're where their mindset and leadership is, and help them prepare for the next steps, what their teams can be expecting time that their teams need to be allocating to these different projects, right? It's not just me, I don't just come in and wave a wand, and tada, here it is, their teams, your things will change dynamics will shift, you know, how do a step that you once did, or maybe three steps that you once did, are now done in one step? Because something system was optimized. So that's where I come in, but I also have to make sure that, you know, you know, maybe they what was done, what was once done was was wasn't done in vain. Like it was there. It was it some things are grandfathered in, that maybe aren't necessary, and a new system can be put in place. So,   Michael Hingson ** 44:14 companies are are always looking for or should be looking for ways to improve their processes. And I've talked to a couple of people on unstoppable mindset who were very much involved in trying to help companies really reorganize their basically their way of doing business, their, their way of getting things done inside the company, and so on. And so I appreciate exactly what you're saying, which is it's all about trying to become more efficient, and trying to have the best processes possible.   Travis Michael ** 44:49 Yeah, and I've there's a really good John Maxwell book. He's John Maxwell. If you read anything of his you'll be better for reading it. He's just one of those guys that has a very, very deep message. And I just read his book as good Leaders Ask Great Questions. And you really have to start asking great questions, if you're in this in a position of leadership. And, you know, I ask questions to prepare my, the companies that I work with, I don't ask questions to be nosy, or judgmental, I ask questions because I need to understand what their starting points are, what have they done? Where are they at? And how can they move forward? And that's a lot. And then I provide training around different aspects around that model. And they've, they've been proven to be very helpful and healthy and business's understanding their why why are they doing this? Who are they talking to? And what is the message behind what they're doing? And I'll take all of that, run it through my marketing machines, my branding, machines, design, technology, audits, all of that. Understand your industry, and, you know, what your, what your end goal is. And some of the companies, you know, I work with companies that are our profit, nonprofit, and defense, and they they all have many different hats in many different industries. And one industry does this, this, but not this, and then another company will go, Oh, I do not this, this and this, but we work together, and it's their partnerships. And there's something to be said about partnerships. That can really be beneficial, especially when you find people that are moving in the same direction as you.   Michael Hingson ** 47:11 Well, and, you know, one of the most important things that we can do as human creatures is to ask questions, it's it is curiosity, it is trying to learn, and when you're asking questions of company leaders, to help focus them in is clearly also helping you.   Travis Michael ** 47:33 Yeah. You know, and one of the great questions is, what books are you reading? Yeah. What books are you reading? Because I need to know that, that they have, if there's a point that I'm trying to get across, it's going to be better if I can, if I have a client read a book, or read a chapter, and then he can go, Okay, I see what you're saying. Now, here's how they overcame that. And, for me, it's a wonderful thing. It's a, you know, diagnose prescribe model, that hell helps me from the, you know, just giving book recommendations as and that has even even reading for me has been a huge shift. That was never me. That was never me. I was Bye, bye. Your kids are my little cousin graduated the other day. And my grandma was like, Oh, my goodness, she's on the Dean's list or the you know, the high dean's list and you know, forgetting being on the Dean's list for so long. I was like, that's wonderful. And I just kind of snickered I got you know, that was never May.   Michael Hingson ** 48:57 I love to read a lot of fiction, which I do for relaxing. But I also do like to read nonfiction. One of my favorite books, and I quoted often in one way or another in speeches is The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni, which is really, I think, the best short book that I found that describes what a good team should be and how to get there and I also love some of the Malcolm Gladwell books. I really enjoyed reading David and Goliath. Again, he puts a lot of things in perspective.   Travis Michael ** 49:35 Yeah. It's seeing the Go Giver. The Go Giver is wonderful. Yeah. Being able to get yourself into a, a mindset. And this person is struggling in sales. And he's like, there's this guy in the back that I swear I maybe see once every week and he's never We're here and all whenever he's here, he's just kind of feet up and kick back and everybody seems to love him. And if he's like, how does this guy do it? He's kind of getting the same sales. He's like, sales professional, he's, but he's, it's such like, what's the difference between sales and business development? Right. And so that was that's when things really changed and he was able to get understand mentorship. So if you're trying to understand mentorship, and that's a really good one as well. Let's see, Jocko willing and feel like Jocko is if I like I, my I I'm not I'm not really much of a reader, I audio books. I'm writing and I'm reading all day long. So by the end of the day, my eyes read Yeah,   Michael Hingson ** 50:55 I love audiobooks. And they're becoming more prevalent. audio book sales continue to be on the rise, which is great. Even as print, sales have gone down some. And I think ebook sales are going up, but audio books are great. And even for people who are blind and so on the Library of Congress has a number of programs. And they're they're coming out with new programs to make access more easy and usable on things like smart speakers like the Echo, and so on, which is great. So I can turn a book on an echo now and listen to it while I'm either cooking or maybe not even doing anything else. But I can do it from any echo device in the house. Once the the app while the skill was activated, then every echo knows about it. So I can stop reading in one room and come back tomorrow and be in another room and tell it to pick up right where we left off. And it does, which is great. makes reading a lot more convenient.   Travis Michael ** 52:03 So for those who aren't familiar with how the echo work is it just you have like a main hub. And then like speakers in like multiple rooms,   Michael Hingson ** 52:11 no. Um, so the Echo is what they call a smart speaker. So there are echoes or echo dots. And Echo shows a lot of different ones, some have screens on them, and so on. But you connect it to your network. And then it communicates with, I assume the Amazon server that coordinates whatever goes on with echoes. And so you can have four or five echoes around the house. And I can go to one and I can say what's the temperature outside and it will tell me and so on. But there is the skill that actually the Library of Congress, the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped is, is creating, it's called My Talking books. And it's a skill that runs on the echo. So I can tell an a device to open the app, my talking books, and then I can say, let's say I'm starting from scratch, I could say open or find the Go get the Go Giver. And assuming it's in the collection, which is not a given at all. But assuming it's in the collection, it will find it from my voice input. And then it can start reading it. So I can read for an hour and then quit and come back. And if I have several echo devices around the house, I can go to any one of them because they all communicate with the same Amazon server somewhere in the world. And I can pick up right where I left off. But I find the Echo to be a really handy device for a lot of different things, whether it's even just doing whether I use it to control my home security system. Even turning the lights on and off and making sure they're off because I don't see them. And when my wife was alive, she was used a wheelchair. So it was also a lot easier if she were on the bed to just tell the system to turn on light. So it's really handy.   Travis Michael ** 54:15 So do you typically walk around the house with the lights off? Or?   Michael Hingson ** 54:20 Yeah, mostly I do I don't need to have them on. So my wife has passed so I you know we have solar so it doesn't really matter a lot but   Travis Michael ** 54:28 but that helps you with your electricity bill. Hmm, yeah, it   Michael Hingson ** 54:31 does a lot anyway, but I but I don't turn the lights on at night. So far it hasn't bothered the dog or the cat a whole lot. So it's just the three of us. There we go. But if they're sighted people in the house, I do like to help my light dependent friends by turning the lights on for they   Travis Michael ** 54:51 defended friends. I love it. You know?   Michael Hingson ** 54:55 Well, light dependency is a disability. It's just that technology is covered it up by Thomas Edison. and inventing the electric light bulb, but it doesn't mean that it isn't there. Well, above it, tell us about your book that you're writing. Yeah. So   Travis Michael ** 55:10 writing a book that it's really kind of about my my background, and, you know, really challenging family dynamics and being able to help break generational curses, and the through some of the events that I've experienced, that have kind of shaped me into who I am as a person, and you know, how I've developed some understandings about myself and kind of some really funny, really crazy, very serious events, you know, and I really wanted to share this because it the show was that a lot of the struggles that I went through, I went through myself, because if they've they've challenged a lot of my trust issues. And so if I understood that I went through it myself, and I'm sure that many others out there are going through challenging family dynamics as well. And I want to be able to help them, give them my share my perspective, and maybe maybe it helps them to, you know, kind of get over the some of some of their hurdles that they're having. And, you know, I'll kind of leave leave it with this. It's, it's forgiveness isn't always about, you know, forgiving. Let, it's not, it's not for the other person. Yeah. Forgiveness is for you. Yes. And you have, it's also about building a forgiving heart. Because we're human. And if all we can just be better humans, and develop forgiving hearts, I feel like this, this world would be in such a better place, and being able to move forward, and even build, build boundaries, you know, sometimes you just because you forgive, doesn't mean, you know, it's I, sometimes it's, it's good to kind of create that, that space to allow yourself to grow. But, you know, but having those spaces and you're still holding on to that, that old junk. It's,   Michael Hingson ** 57:27 it haven't really forgiven yet. Haven't really forgiven yet. And I, one of the things I talk about a lot are dogs, needless to say, and I talk about the difference between dogs and people in the dogs do love unconditionally, I believe that I watched a 60 minutes show the other day that talked about the difference between dogs and wolves. And there are actually physiological genetic differences, that they've been able to pinpoint, basically, what they call the friendly gene and a dog, and then we'll stone house. But I think dogs love unconditionally, but they don't trust unconditionally, what they are, however, unless they are, had they've truly been overly traumatized by something. Dogs are open to trust. And that's the difference between them and us. We're always into what if what if this person really is not interested in gaining my trust? Or what if they're going to abuse, the trust and all that, and we, we have become so mistrustful that we tend not to recognize any more the value and being open to the idea of trust. Now, if somebody doesn't earn our trust, okay, then we recognize that and we move on. But if somebody can, and we're open to that, what a wonderful thing.   Travis Michael ** 58:48 Yeah, it's being able to, you know, create that kind of space for yourself. It's, you have to be able to, you know, trust yourself a that, that you've gotten this far. And, and being able to continue to push forward. And, and build, build things, create things, you know, in love you loving what you're doing. And if you're not loving what you're doing, then you need to take the time outside of what you're doing, and figure out what it is and push towards what you want to do.   Michael Hingson ** 59:26 Yeah. And recognize that there are probably lots of people out there who would be really happy to support you. You'd be shocked. Yeah, absolutely would be shocked at the number of people who, if they really understood we'd be willing to support you. Well, so what's the name of the new book and when can we see it?   59:47 So the new book is called Honor thy father's and it really pushes towards the you know, the father dynamics and push towards you know, mentorship and Understanding how important it is to seek mentorship and being a good mentee. And, you know, I first discovered mentorship in Toastmasters, and Toastmasters is a an international public speaking organization. Wherever you're at in the world, I'm sure there's one nearby you, if you're trying to get better at public speaking, and really shed, that skin that has kind of kept you in this box. You know, Toastmasters is a wonderful organization, to be able to stretch your speaking skills in front of a supportive group of people who are trying to achieve similar results. So within that group, I, you know, that's something that I had to really sink in it within that group. They gave me a mentor. And I didn't know what a mentor was. And, you know, at some points, I was probably not a really good mentee, if I'm being honest, because I was kind of in my own head doing my own thing. And I've graduated from that. And we're wonderful friends and hate you. So he, he's my public speaking mentor, well, he's not he's he's in he's, we've also done develop great relationships and in sales and talking to people in systems and in growth, and he has a wonderful mindset. And but then, then there's other things and I've learned about mentorship, and so many other places that have provided me wealth and growth. So the the book is, we're we're looking to come out with it in the fall. But we are going to launch the marketing for it on Father's Day, ironically, so you can catch Honor thy father's. And I'll be promoting that. You can follow travel media, online and travel media group on Facebook, travis media, or I think it's Travis dot media, on Instagram, on tick tock, travis media as well. So you   Michael Hingson ** 1:02:13 have a picture of the book cover.   Travis Michael ** 1:02:17 design that right now. So as soon as we we get that out, I'll be sending it over to Mike,   Michael Hingson ** 1:02:23 please, because we will put that in the show notes, by all means.   Travis Michael ** 1:02:27 Absolutely. Absolutely. I'm sure. But I think by the time that we published this, I'll have the show. I'll have the graphic ready for you.   Michael Hingson ** 1:02:35 Perfect. And any other pictures and other things that you want us to have? Well, I want to thank you, Travis once again for being with us today. This has been enjoyable and fun. We spend a lot of time talking about the app and I'm gonna have to go play with it and, and maybe give you some feedback, or at least learn a little bit myself, which will be kind of cool. Absolutely. Absolutely.   Travis Michael ** 1:02:58 Looking forward to hearing and hearing your feedback, Mike.   Michael Hingson ** 1:03:01 But I really enjoyed today and I hope you did as well. And I hope all of you listening did we appreciate you doing so? So, enjoy it and get a hold of Travis let him know but I would appreciate hearing from you as well. We would love a five star rating from you wherever you're listening to unstoppable mindset. Five Star Ratings are greatly appreciated. You can also email me at Michaelhi M I C H A E L H I at accessibe A C C E S S I B E.com. Love to hear any thoughts you have, as well as suggestions for others that you think we ought to have an unstoppable mindset. We're always looking to make new friends. You can also go to our podcast page www dot Michael hinkson.com/podcast Michael Hanson is m i c h a e l h i n g s o n.com/podcast. We'd love for you to go there. And you can leave comments there as well. But either way, please keep us posted. Let us know and trap us likewise, if you know anyone who want to come on love to to get your thoughts and you know we'll have to do this again. Especially once the book is out and you start getting comments and all that we'd love to catch up with you again on this.   Travis Michael ** 1:04:13 Absolutely. Thank you for your time, Michael, I greatly appreciate it.   **Michael Hingson ** 1:04:21 You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com. accessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for listening. Please come back and visit us again next week.

We will be discussing Maisie Dobbs: a novel DB67808 by Jacqueline Winspear when the Mystery Book Discussion Group next meets on 7/23/23 at 5pm Eastern. This is the first book in a series of which BARD currently has 16 titles in audio format. BARD also has these 16 titles in Braille format. Liz Lindsey is the group facilitator and will be leading the discussion. NLS annotation: Maisie Dobbs: a novel DB67808 Winspear, Jacqueline Reading time: 9 hours, 28 minutes. Jill Fox A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Historical mystery fiction Historical romance fiction War Stories Thirteen-year-old Maisie is lucky to be a maid in the home of a wealthy London suffragette who sees to her education. Maisie becomes a private investigator in 1929 after serving as a nurse during the Great War. Her first case involves a shelter for wounded veterans. 2003.

The first and only successful slave revolution in the Americas began in 1791 when thousands of brutally exploited slaves rose up against their masters on one of the most profitable colonies in the Atlantic world. Their success was devastating not only to their former masters but to colonial powers including the United States. We'll discuss this in the next meeting of A Journey through History on 6/6/23 with the book Avengers of the New World: the story of the Haitian Revolution DB60295. The NLS annotation follows: Avengers of the New World: the story of the Haitian Revolution DB60295 Dubois, Laurent Reading time: 14 hours, 45 minutes. Anne Flosnik A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. World History and Affairs Professor analyzes the 1791-1803 revolution in the French Caribbean country of Haiti. Traces the history of Hispaniola and describes how slaves from Africa under Toussaint Louverture defeated France, Britain, and Spain and achieved emancipation at great economic and human cost. Violence. 2004.

Jody Hudson was born in Michigan but has moved a number of times since graduating high school. She spent 15 years in the retail industry. She then spent five years being a stay-at-home mom before finding new employment in the nonprofit sector. Her story sounds somewhat typical, right? Not really. Jody has a much different story to tell which you will get to hear on this episode of Unstoppable Mindset. Jody is the penultimate unstoppable person. Jody's second child, Alex, was born in 1995. Alex was a very active child and worked hard at everything she did. While in the fifth grade, Alex began exhibiting physical symptoms which eventually lead to her no longer being able to be an athlete and active person. In high school, she began losing weight. No doctor could diagnose what was happening. It wasn't until college that happenstance lead Jody and Alex to a doctor who correctly diagnosed Alex's condition as Lyme's Disease. Listen as Jody tells hers and Alex's story. She will tell you about the book she wrote as well as about the Alex Hudson Lyme Foundation. This episode is very powerful, and Jody leaves us with strong advice we all can take to heart when we are presented with life challenges. About the Guest: Jody Hudson, Grants and Philanthropy Director for California CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates), is a fundraising professional with over 15 years of nonprofit leadership experience. She is the CEO and founder of the Alex Hudson Lyme Foundation, an organization that seeks to increase research efforts and patient support for Lyme disease and MCAS. Before joining California CASA in 2021, she served as Vice President of Development and Communications for Girls Scouts of Central California South and, before that, led the Catholic Charities Diocese of Fresno as Director of Operations. In 2018, Jody was honored with the Marjaree Mason Center Top Ten Professional Women Award. Hudson is also an author and speaker. Her book, My Promise to Alex: Through Pain Comes Purpose, is a memoir about her daughter's journey with Lyme disease and her passing at the age of twenty-two on March 24, 2018. For more information on Alex's foundation, please visit www.alexhudsonlymefoundation.org About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog. Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards. https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/ accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/ Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below! Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe in your favorite podcast app. Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. Transcription Notes You have been listening to the unstoppable mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes please visit w w w dot Michael hinkson.com/podcast. Michael Hinkson is spelled mi ch AE l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site. Please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of anyone or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hangsen.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free ebook entitled blinded by fear. The Unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessibility and is sponsored by accessibility. Please visit w w w dot excessive b.com excessively is spelled ACC e ss IBE. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for listening. Please come back and visit us again ne Michael Hingson  00:00 Access cast and accessibly initiative presents unstoppable mindset, the podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet Hi, I'm Michael Hinkson, Chief mission officer for accessibility and the author of the number one New York Times best selling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion, and acceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The Unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessibility, that's a cc e ss I, capital B II. Visit www.to. Access a b.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson  01:20 Well, Hi, and welcome to unstoppable mindset. Today we get to interview Jody Hudson and Jody has got a very good and strong and compelling story to tell. She is a person who has worked in the world for a while. She is the Director of of grants right for California casa.   Jody Hudson  01:43 That's correct. The advanced philanthropy director,   Michael Hingson  01:46 advanced philanthropy director Wow. And, and, and again, but there's a lot more to Jodi than that. So we're gonna get to it. So Jodi, welcome to unstoppable mindset. Now, where are you? Exactly.   Jody Hudson  01:58 So I'm in Fresno, California. And we have just been getting hit with these recent rains. It's really sad to see what's going on out there. But in fact, before I jumped on, we just had another big downpour. So we're, we're right now good, but you never know when a next one is going to hit us.   Michael Hingson  02:18 Yeah, we don't get that level of rain in Victorville. I don't think it's rained here today. We had a little bit of rain Tuesday, but we just don't get that kind of rain here. And as I mentioned earlier, I heard on the news that there are a few places in the Sierras that have had something over 670 inches of snow, and they've gotten more snow this week. So how will this affect the drought it will, at least in the short term, but whether this is really going to have enough of an effect on the aquifers to really give us long term aid remains to be seen. But the way it's going, I think we're going to see more years of a lot of rain and other things happening. So we'll we'll kind of see how it goes.   Jody Hudson  03:05 I yeah, I agree. It was crazy. Last week, the 99 was shut down because of flooding. So you just never know what's going to happen. Right?   Michael Hingson  03:15 Go figure I know. Well, so let's start a little bit by you maybe telling us some of your background. As a younger God, what you did when going to school and all that give us all the highlights from an earlier time.   Jody Hudson  03:33 Oh my goodness. Okay, we could be here a long time because I'm not a young man. You know, I'm in my early 60s here now. But now I'm teasing.   Michael Hingson  03:41 So just talk about the early parts.   Jody Hudson  03:44 So I'm a Michigander born and raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan, went to school at Central Michigan University where I graduated with a degree in retail. I've always loved fashion clothing. And so that's what I did for quite some time. Worked at Marshall Field's Lord and Taylor made my way west to Los Angeles. My claim to fame was that I was the manager of the Chanel boutique on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. I felt like I had arrived, so to speak. Then got married and made my way to Fresno where I currently reside. Two children, Garrett and Alice, my son's 29 My daughter's 22 And I stayed at home for about five years just to be a stay at home mom. And then when I decided to get back into the work environment, I got into the nonprofit world which I absolutely love. I have a servant's heart and it really spoke to that worked at Catholic Charities for about 1314 years. I worked at Girl Scouts for a little bit until I couldn't eat any more cookies. It was not good for my waistline and at all. And then I've been with California, Casa for two years, and we oversee all of the 44 Casa programs throughout the state of California. I am a product of foster care, I was born to a single mother who put me up for adoption. So I was in the foster care system for the first six months of my life until I was adopted. So I've kind of come full circle in that whole realm. But so that's what I'm currently doing. And then we'll get more into my true purpose and mission, which is the Alex Hudson line foundation.   Michael Hingson  05:46 So Marshall Fields, so did you get good deals on Franco mints?   Jody Hudson  05:50 Oh, my gosh. I know, Chris, and at Christmas time, because I worked out in Chicago at State Street at their flagship store. And during Christmas time, they'd have like the big pyramids of frango mints and I just devoured those. Like there was no tomorrow I have a weakness for sweets. I could not have sweets in my home, because they will be gone. I don't have willpower. I don't know what the word means.   Michael Hingson  06:17 No. Have you ever had mint? Meltaways? Yes. Which do you like better? Franco mints? Yeah. I like them both. But I do have to admit that there is something about Franco mints.   Jody Hudson  06:29 Oh my gosh, that just brought me back. I love that brought me back in time for sure. Yeah, and I miss them. I do too. I do too. I love those Frank moments. So good. It's kind of like melt in your mouth.   Michael Hingson  06:42 Yeah, really tasty stuff.   Jody Hudson  06:44 I think that's probably why girls with the Girl Scout cookies, then men's is my favorite. Because I was born and raised with the kids go mess with men. Go into the cooking mode. Then minutes. So what's your favorite Girl Scout cookie?   Michael Hingson  07:00 And Miss? Then Miss? Yeah. Although I've also enjoyed venture foals, which is one of the newer Well,   Jody Hudson  07:06 that's yeah, that's one of the the newer ones.   Michael Hingson  07:09 A new one rasberry one that I haven't tried yet. Yeah, you   Jody Hudson  07:12 know what I'm not a big fan of of the data, kind of like to keep my my the fruit and the chocolate all separate love them both, but really like the the combination together, but anything with chocolate, mint, peanut butter, I'm down for all of that stuff.   Michael Hingson  07:31 So I bought a case of Thin Mints. Well, actually, last year, I guess, I bought a case of Thin Mints. But somebody misunderstood and they made the order for two cases. Oh, and so I accepted that and I took them all. But even with the one case, what I did with two would have been the same with one which is they all mostly get put away mostly in the freezer. And for me, especially out of sight out of mind. And so most of them are still there. And they will be eaten over time. Which makes it a little bit frustrating for the Girl Scouts every year because I don't buy a case every year. It'll take me three years sometimes to eat those two cases, as I said, out of sight out of mind. But I do know where they are now having thought about them. This may cause a open so   Jody Hudson  08:26 I think I know where you're going after this little conversation here.   Michael Hingson  08:31 Yeah, I promise I won't get up and go do that while we're talking. Okay, but still. So So you got into this whole idea of the nonprofit Well, I actually another memory going back to Chicago and Marshall Fields. Do you remember Robert Hall? I do. Where the values go up, up, up and the prices go down? Down? Down?   Jody Hudson  08:52 Yep, yep.   Michael Hingson  08:55 Ah, those were the days having been born in Chicago and live there for five years and been back occasionally. But still. Great stories, great stories.   Jody Hudson  09:05 Yeah, I just don't like Chicago when it's December, January. It's like 80 degrees below with the windchill factor and you're trying to make your way from where you live in Lincoln Park down to State Street a little bit.   Michael Hingson  09:18 A little bit tough. And even with the L it could be tough. Oh yeah.   Jody Hudson  09:23 Oh, yeah. But boy, I had good good times there. I just graduated from college. So I was making a little bit of money hanging out and living with my sorority sisters. So it was just like an extension of of college. But when you have a little bit of money, it's a little bit more fun. Yeah.   Michael Hingson  09:41 Well, you were you bring back memories for me also, a few years ago, I was in Chicago for a speech or I was there for a convention I don't recall which now, but they were doing the event where you Um, to raise money for something, they did the Polar Plunge so everybody would go and jump in Lake Michigan. And I think Rahm Emanuel was the mayor. And Jimmy Fallon was there and they decided they were going to go do the plunge. And I was watching it with my cousins on TV. And they went in the water. It was zero or colder. Oh, we were very happy to be in a heated house. And the reporter said, these guys are doing it all wrong, because they went in in their suits, you know. And as soon as you get out of the water, you can go into a tent that was warm, where you could dry off. But just before they got out, a woman got out who was just wearing a bathing suit. And the reporter said, How much smarter she is because it'll dry right off and she won't be cold very long. And they were right, you know, but Well, that's the difference between intelligent people and politicians sometimes, I guess. I don't know.   Jody Hudson  11:01 My gosh, when my dad had a summer camp in Grand Haven, Michigan, and that brings me back to those memories that summertime with like the Polar Bear Plunge, we had that with the kiddos getting up early in the morning, like at six o'clock and going down. And if you if you did it every day, then you got like a special award. But yeah, I never did it. I watched my campers go in. But I'm like, Yeah, that's too cool for me.   Michael Hingson  11:29 Yeah. But you know, it's part of our country. And it's always fun to go to, to different places. And of course, go into Chicago go always for me at least. There I'm sure better places. But I like to go to UNO's and get a nice good deep dish pizza to   Jody Hudson  11:46 deep dish pizza. And it's a fun place to be in Chicago on St. Patty's day too. So Oh, yeah. That's always a blast. Dine the river green and drinking green beer and all that good stuff. Yeah, Chicago. Chicago is a fun fun city.   Michael Hingson  12:02 Yeah. Memories will tell us about California casa a little bit. So you've been doing that for now? What two or three years? Yeah,   Jody Hudson  12:10 for two years. And as the grants and philanthropy director, I helped to raise money not only for California, casa, but for our network. So California, CASA is the the parent, the umbrella so to speak, over the 44 Casa programs throughout the state of California. And we our initiatives, our mission, our you know, philanthropy, everything is in support of foster children. And there's 80,000 foster kids in the state of California. And what a casa does is they are that one person that link to help these kiddos to navigate through the court systems to be that voice for them, to help them where maybe they don't have a mom, dad and adult anybody to help guide them through life. And it can be transformational for these children to have a casa appointed, watching over them, it really makes a big difference.   Michael Hingson  13:24 Do foster parents help with any of that? Or is this really kind of pre them or our in spite of them? Sometimes,   Jody Hudson  13:31 you know what I mean, it's kind of done in conjunction with them as well as a CASA is a volunteer, they go through a training which I went through a training as well, just to kind of better understand what a CASA volunteer does, it's about a 3040 hour training commitment. Once you go through, you actually get sworn in as a casa and the in the court system. And then you are assigned a child and you could be assigned a child for maybe a year, two years, some people have had classes for, you know, even greater longer periods of time. It just depends upon, you know, the the cases. But it really is such a great meaningful program. And we definitely, you know, right now, we have probably 12,000 classes, but as I said earlier, there's 80,000 foster kids, you know, in the state of California, so there's definitely a gap. And that's what we try and do is you know, raise money raise funds to recruit classes, to train them to help the local network, you know, really pouring into the hearts of these foster kids.   Michael Hingson  14:51 So are their centers that these people are based out of or how does it work?   Jody Hudson  14:55 The classes themselves? They Yeah, so There's, you know, like I said, 44 class of programs throughout the state of California. So there's like a casa in Kern County, there's a casa and Fresno County. It's all, you know, based upon that the counties, each county is really supposed to have a CASA program. And, you know, there's what 51 counties, I think, in the state of California, so, yeah, 58 So we're, we're missing obviously, a couple of Casa programs, but each CASA program is you know, their own 501 C three, they, you know, raise their own funds money, they have their own board, executive directors, own staff, and we come alongside them to support them, and to give them you know, additional training, additional resources, and help where we can, we were lucky enough California casa, to be working with a lobbyist team who petitioned and we did receive a state appropriation in Governor Newsom budget for $60 million. And that is, you know, going to be funneled out to our Casa programs. However, as we know, the state of California is a little messed up right now with with budgets, and we only received the first wave of that $60 million, we received $20 million, and we were able to pump out that money to our network. But the other two bases are in jeopardy right now. And we are petitioning and trying to get that money back. So we will see   Michael Hingson  16:39 is that because of the legislature in some way or what? Yeah,   Jody Hudson  16:45 we are very grateful for what we did receive, and that was a blessing, we didn't even think that we were going to get that. And it really is to help our, our programs with infrastructure, it's to help them with, you know, recruiting, it's to help them just really build upon their their programs. So yeah, we're hopeful though, the, you know, legislators and other government officials and senators and people in the Capitol, they were not happy that our funding was was cut, because they really have become aware of our programs and the impact on the foster children. So we do have some really good people in our corner. So we'll, we'll see what happens.   Michael Hingson  17:30 He cut it. Who cut the funding, if the governor had it in his budget, and so on what happened,   Jody Hudson  17:37 it was in the legislative portion of the budget. So I don't know all the details. Yeah, in our inner workings of how all that happens. And, you know, with politics, things can be moved around, things can be cut, because maybe they're negotiating and looking for something else. Who knows what goes into all of those discussions. But like I said, we've got a lot of good champions and people in our corner, and it wasn't just cost of that was cut, there was a lot that was cut. So yeah, we're just hoping that we're gonna get that back.   Michael Hingson  18:14 I remember. Now, a number of years ago, the national level, there was a major discussion about the government. And what it had been doing through what was called the Talking Book program, which later became the National Library Service of the Blind and Physically Handicapped. And they, the Congress decided that they wanted to cut a bunch of the funding. They said, we can get things from other ways. And one of the magazines that was produced under the program was playboy. And the Congress people's fee with a conservative said, Well, that's ridiculous to publish Playboy, that blind people can take advantage of all the pictures and stuff. And the answer to that was, that's correct. But go read Playboy read the articles, because there were there were many, well written articles. And mostly, they are really good articles in Playboy. The original story, the short story, the fly came out of Playboy among other things, and eventually it got dealt with, but people do get some very strange ideas about things from time to time, don't they?   Jody Hudson  19:26 They sure do. And, you know, I've never seen a playboy, but I did hear that. There are some really great, great articles in there. So but yeah, so you know, well, we'll just have to kind of wait it out. I mean, we're so full speed ahead. And we are, you know, implementing what we can with the the funding that was awarded to us in our in our programs and and we're grateful for that.   Michael Hingson  19:49 We are a 501 C three, right. So you do you obviously do a lot of soliciting outside of what the government provides.   Jody Hudson  19:55 Oh, absolutely. I mean, we have, you know, government money. We've got you no private funding. So, yes, we have different pockets that we definitely, you know, reach out to. But, you know, from the pandemic, it's it's tough. Yeah, for for fundraising for nonprofits, I mean, everyone, you know, that was was losing out because they weren't able to have fundraising events and other things. And people were really tightening up their belt. So, yeah, well, we'll have to see how how things work out. But the nonprofit world is definitely definitely hurting.   Michael Hingson  20:37 Yeah, and it's gonna be a process. Well, for you, though, what made you go into the whole idea of doing nonprofit stuff? So it's different than what you've done in the past?   Jody Hudson  20:49 Oh, absolutely. Retail and nonprofit, very, very different. But   Michael Hingson  20:54 although you, you can tribute it to the nonprofit of Marshall Field's with Franco mints, but that's okay.   Jody Hudson  21:00 That's right. So, so I had my son in 93, I had my daughter and 95. And then I stayed home for for five years. And then when I was deciding to you know, get back into the workforce, one of my girlfriends, became a development director over at Catholic Charities, and she called me up. And she said that she was going to be starting this position at Catholic Charities, and she was going to be forming a women's Guild and that she wanted me to be on it, there was gonna be about 12 of us that were going to, you know, be the the pioneers of this Guild, and a common, you know, take a tour of the facility and see what I think, see what I thought so sad to say, I mean, I'm Catholic, but I had never heard of Catholic Charities before. So got my car went and down and opened up the doors, took a tour, I saw the clientele, I saw the people there that were, you know, waiting for services. And I just had this aha moment where this was where I was supposed to be, I was supposed to be giving back. I was supposed to be helping those, you know, less fortunate. And I told my girlfriend Kelly at that time, I said, Yes, I go, I want to be part of this guild. But even more importantly, I want to see if there's employment here, I would love to work at Catholic Charities. And as luck would have it, there was a position open. And it was for in the food pantry overseeing the food pantry. And check this out, overseeing the thrift store. Well, I think with my degree in retail, and working on Chanel boutique, I qualified to oversee the Catholic Charities thrift store. So the joke was always, you know, hidden, here's Jody from Rodeo Drive to Fulton Street, where Catholic Charities was and yeah, the price tags are just, you know, a couple of zeros off, but hey, she's, she can handle those. So, I fell in love with it. And it was so good as my kids were getting older, you know, to bring them to these, like food drive events, and, you know, the the farmers market that we would have, and they would see what the face of poverty looked like. And they fell in love with it. And you know, they were always there supporting my fundraising efforts. And and, you know, just supporting, giving back. So it was it was wonderful. It was really good. It must   Michael Hingson  23:45 get pretty emotional. Because you see so many people who are facing challenges and so on. How are you able to just move forward and not take it so emotionally personal, if you will?   Jody Hudson  23:59 You know, that's an excellent question. And it was very hard for me in the beginning, I wanted to take home these children that I saw, I wanted to fix everything I wanted to be the Savior. I wanted to be the knight in shining armor and I realized that I couldn't do it right. I mean, there I was limited in what I could do, but I could go out and raise money so that the pantry would be full of food so these families could eat so these families could you know go into the thrift store and purchase clothing or be given clothing, clothing and hygiene every so often so I can I can do you know what I can do in my in my wheelhouse. But you're right, it was tough. The first six months, I took it home with me there was no separation of my work and my life. But it just became more of a driving force for me in my job, more motivation to really get out there. and get the community involved with our mission and what we were doing. And even though the names of Catholic Charities, we never asked what people's religion was, hey, if you have a need, then we're going to be there. And we're going to meet that need.   Michael Hingson  25:18 Yeah. And it's, it is a an issue and a challenge for, for I know a number of people to get beyond the being so emotionally involved that you can't separate it, while at the same time developing a greater empathy. And I in fact, I think it's, it makes sense to develop the empathy and the understanding. But you can't take it personally because you didn't cause it all. And all you can do is try to work to fix it.   Jody Hudson  25:45 Right? And, you know, I said about my children going down there and being exposed to that, to this day, my my son, he'll tell me, Mom, he goes, it's a blessing and a curse, this empathy that has been passed on to me because he wants to be now that fixer, and he wants to, you know, when people come to him and share their problems, I mean, he wants to, you know, help them and he's going through that process right now realizing that he can't fix everyone's problems, right? He can, he can only do so much. But yeah, it's definitely tough. What does he do? So he used to work at Merrill Lynch. He graduated from ASU in 2008. Teen got a job right out of college, I mean, super smart, young man. And he worked at Merrill Lynch for over a year. And that just wasn't him. Like I said, he has that empathy, that very sensitive heart. And we also had a, you know, family crisis during that time. And I'll get into that later. But he just really, and then we had, you know, the pandemic hits. So he left Arizona, came home to Fresno to try and figure out what it was that he wanted to do. And now he's been with his current job for over a year. And really, really excelling in it and doing well. And I think he has found his niche. And he works for this organization called behavioral stars. And they are assigned troubled children from the school system. And he meets with these kids one on one, he has about 12 kids right now in his caseload, and he really tries to work with them on behavior modification, trying to work with them on just, you know, being a positive influence in their lives, because so many of these kids come from such troubled homes that they don't have that. And so Garrett is kind of trying to fill that void. And he's done very, very well, just this morning, he sent me over a text and he had to present to his team on some like motivational, inspirational messages. And it was like a 2030 minute presentation. And I love the two YouTube clips that he shared, and one of them spoke about how, you know, you can't let your past you know, dictate what you're doing today. It's like the overcoming and, you know, we're all going to have challenges, but how it's how you rise above from it. And I love it, because as he is administering to these kids, and helping them with their life challenges is also healing for him.   Michael Hingson  28:44 And it's clear, you've passed on a wonderful legacy that that he is taking advantage of, and he'll he'll expand out and I suspect,   Jody Hudson  28:58 Oh, absolutely. And, you know, I wrote a book, and I keep telling my son, I go get, your story is going to be even far greater than mine. And I can't wait to read your book one of these days, because it's going to be so inspirational with everything that you have gone through. I mean, I'm just really, really proud of him for climbing Klein, and just, you know, making it happen.   Michael Hingson  29:25 Well, we've talked about Garrett, and we should get to Alex, I know you want to talk about all of that. So you said that Alex was born in 1995. Correct. And, and a lot of things have happened. So tell us a little bit about Alex, if you will.   Jody Hudson  29:42 Sure. So Alex was supposed to be a Christmas baby. Her original due date was December 25. But she came a little bit early and she was just a sweet, sweet baby. She and her first five years I mean just a very sweet, shy, innocent little girl. And then she discovered sports and the tomboy in her really came out along with the the big brother that was right by her side helping her. So she was very active. She played soccer, she played softball, she ran track, she did cheerleading, volleyball, you name it, and she was very, she was a very good scholar to her brother definitely had more of the smarts. But he didn't apply himself out, worked much, much harder for her grades, and did very well with that. And then in the fifth grade, she started developing joint pain, inflammation, and we thought it was all related to her sports. And that's what the doctors thought as well that she was just an overworked you know, athlete. And so she would suck it up. She would like tape up her legs, ankles, do the ibuprofen. Well, that went on for several years, and nothing really changed. In fact, it just kept getting worse. To the point where her freshman year in high school, she was playing basketball running on the court, and her knees ballooned up to be like the size of grapefruit. And she dropped to the ground. And she was carried off by her teammates and coach. And they ran some X rays. And they discovered that she needed to have knee surgery that she had some issues with with her knees. So she had one knee surgery done on her right knee and they said if that took and did well, and it was successful, then they would do the left knee. Well, it didn't help but it didn't change anything. So basically from her freshman year in high school on Chica never run again. She it was the beginning of the the end for her because she couldn't play sports any longer. Everything that she had identified with was gone. And in high school, that's especially hard when you lose your your peer group. And so she really went through a dark period for a while only had maybe a friend or two, started losing weight started developing digestive issues. Then we, you know, started thinking, well, maybe he's got anorexia or an eating disorder. I mean, we just really went through hell and back. And she graduated from high school went to a junior college because we were still trying to figure out what was going on with her health. And she did well at junior college and applied to several colleges and ended up getting a full ride at UCLA. But she wasn't able to carry that out because she was losing weight. And she was down to about 87 pounds. And we were going from doctor to doctor probably 40 Plus doctors, and Alex on her own just by going on the internet, found this doctor down in LA who specialized in digestive issues. And she said mom goes I think I found a doctor that might be able to help me. And at that point, I'm like, Sure. What's what's another doctor? I mean, we we've been, you know, striking out with all of our local doctors and everybody at this point, just that she and I both were crazy, right? Because they would run tests and they couldn't find anything wrong with her. So we got in the car went down to LA. And within a half hour of talking with this doctor, he asked me Mrs. Hudson, has anybody test tested Alex for Lyme disease. And I innocently said, What is Lyme disease. And then he told me what it was and this was in 2017. And I'd really had never heard about it. And here I am from Michigan, you know, thinking that maybe I would have heard about it growing up. But we consented to her getting tested for Lyme disease and a couple of weeks later, sure enough, came back with a diagnosis that she she had Lyme disease. So now test, what's the test the test. If you go to a regular doctor, most of them are still testing with an outdated western blot test, which will give you false reads on it. This doctor was smart enough to have outs tested through iGenex and iGenex is out San Jose area. And they are very detailed. I mean, it's everyone sends people to iGenex just to because they know that testing that's part of the problem with Lyme disease. testing can be so. So what's the word I'm looking for? Not not reliable, inaccurate, inaccurate? Yeah. So tested her with the iGenex. And that's what it came back with. So in that moment, you know, I had to first of all, as a parent, figure out what this diagnosis was. And then second of all, how do I treat it, because I'm disease, you just can't go to any doctors, so many of them don't know about Lyme disease and how to treat it. And therein lies the problem trying to find proper doctors that know about this disease. And also, you know, the the treatment, because it's not like cancer, where there's a tried and true path. With Lyme disease. It's almost like, here's your buffet, you can do antibiotics, you can do this, you can do that. Or maybe you can do a combination. And it's a trial and error. But Alex didn't have have time to go through a trial and error. You know, she was at 80 pounds and 2017, down to a handful of foods that she could eat without reacting. And I had to get her better quick, like,   Michael Hingson  36:17 do you before going on? Do you have any sense of how she got Lyme disease?   Jody Hudson  36:25 No. And that's the thing. 35% of people that get Lyme disease will have what's called the classic bullseye rash, where it's a circular little red ring on your body of the point of impact where people are a bit, the majority of people don't know they have Lyme disease, until maybe they've been sick for a while. And by then it's hard to treat, because it's you know, once it gets into your bloodstream, and in your system, it can wreak havoc on every part of your organ. I mean, people have died from Lyme disease, because of, of, you know, getting into their heart, people have died from it from, you know, getting into their brain. It's, it's really quite horrific. And I mean, that can be adopted at this point from everything that I had to get schooled on real quick like in 2017. Till she passed away in 2018. But yeah, the majority of people when when you first have Lyme symptoms, it's like a summer flu. So you, you know, might have just being you know, feeling lethargic, joint pain, inflammation. And it's not until other symptoms appear when it can really become quite critical, like an Alex's case where it affected her whole digestive system.   Michael Hingson  37:53 You How did you how did you end up handling it? What did you do, because you certainly had to do something in a hurry.   Jody Hudson  38:01 So what I did was, you know, social media can work for you or against you. And in this situation, it definitely worked for me two things happen once I got Alex's diagnosis. Interestingly enough, she was diagnosed in May, which may is Lyme Disease Awareness Month, and our local TV station, KC 24 had just done a episode a segment on Lyme disease. And I knew these people very well through all of my fundraising efforts at Catholic Charities. So I called them up and said, Hey, you guys just did a episode. You guys just did an episode on on Lyme disease. My daughter has just been diagnosed with Lyme disease. I need to know these three women that you spoke with because I need to find out how to treat my daughter. So that was number one. Number two, was I took to Facebook with Alex's consent. And I basically made a play saying, you know, my daughter has just been diagnosed with Lyme disease. I'm still trying to figure out what Lyme disease is. If anybody has any resources, know of any doctors locally, can put me in touch with people, please, you know, DM me, and you'd be surprised at how many people that I didn't realize had Lyme disease in the central valley that reached out to me. And Jessica Devine was one of them that lived right in Clovis, a couple of you know, Fresno, who had been diagnosed with Lyme disease had been battling it for a couple years. And she gave us the name of her doctor in Pismo Beach, and that's where we started. So it definitely helped by, you know, getting the message out there. And when you're a parent, parent and your child is struggling and you need answers, you do what it takes. aches. Right?   Michael Hingson  40:00 Right. So you reached out to that doctor.   Jody Hudson  40:04 So we reached out to that doctor. And then at the same time, we googled best Lyme facilities, best line treatment, because, you know, I'm a mama bear. I single mom at that time, Alex's dad wasn't in the picture at all, financially, emotionally, any of that. And I was working parents. And I thought, Okay, I need to tackle this, right. I'm going to roll up my sleeves, we've got a diagnosis, we're gonna get the doctor treatment, she's going to be better in a couple of months time, I was so naive. I had no idea what I was facing. And so we had this appointment with, you know, this doctor in Pismo in June. So Alex had been diagnosed in May that this appointment for June. But then I started researching best Lyme clinics. Sofia Health Institute was one, there was a couple others and I basically got on the phone. And I begged and pleaded to get into these facilities. And insurance doesn't cover a lot of this. In fact, it didn't cover most of it. In a year's time, I spent over $100,000 Trying to get Alex better, I sold cars. I had people give me money. I mean, it was crazy what I did. But again, any of us would do that in our situation with a sick child. So we went to the doctor in Pismo, we also went to Sofia Health Institute. And with every doctor that we saw, it was a whole new protocol. Everybody, you know, had their own opinions. And it was just, it was just really tough. Like I said, you know, with cancer, it's tried and true. These are the treatments that you go through. But with Lyme disease, because there's so many different co infections. You have to figure out who you know what symptoms are the most troublesome, you start there, and it's like, okay, eliminate that. So that symptom, and then let's move on to the next. And that's what we were trying to do with Alice. But at the same time, she kept losing weight, and she couldn't be strong and healthy enough with her treatments. Because she was so malnourished, so it was just, it was a mess.   Michael Hingson  42:35 And no matter what happened, nobody was able to come up with any solution that seemed to help.   Jody Hudson  42:41 We had a team of about 12 doctors we had, because as I said, once Lyme disease is in your blood system, which for Alex, it had been since. You know, if you go back when her symptoms first started, which we thought was just that overworked athletic body. It was in fifth grade. Now here she is in college, right? So I mean, it'd been 10 years that this had been living in her her system. So she had cardiologists she had a gastro doctor. She had, you know, a doctor, the doctor in Pismo that was kind of like the the lead on this. But we had so many other people that we had to bring onto the team. And then not to mention, just she was in and out of hospitals, just trying to get IVs and other stuff in her system to keep her healthy.   Michael Hingson  43:42 When did you get to the point where you realize that you weren't going to be able to fix her and how did you reconcile that?   Jody Hudson  43:52 So May of 2017 She got the diagnosis by December after going through a whirlwind of in and out of hospitals, different doctors. I knew in December that I was losing her she was we just we couldn't get a leg up. And from June until December, we literally had gone cross country Now mind you, I was still trying to hold down a job at this time, right? So I was just going back and forth and people were giving me their their sick time and vacation time. And I was just trying to uncover anything that I could to get her her better. But we realized that not only did she have Lyme disease, she had something else called mast cell activation syndrome, which she basically was allergic to almost every type of food she was down to like four or five safe foods. She could eat. And I detail all this in my book because I mean, it could take hours and days to go into all of this because it's just such a crazy, crazy disease. But   Michael Hingson  45:12 was that caused by the limes? Disease?   Jody Hudson  45:15 Correct? Yeah. When your immune system is compromised, it creates havoc in your in your system. And so everything gets Miss wired. And her histamine levels, everything we're, we're off. So you know, her treatments, she would try and have different types of treatments. And her supplements things that normally she could take before now, it was as if it was an enemy entering, you know, a danger zone here, she would try and swallow these supplements and take her, you know, treatment. And her histamine levels would just start attacking, thinking that was, you know, something bad that was coming into her system. Just horrific the pain that she was going through, but it was December. And I remember, you asked me, How did I reconcile with this, I remember getting in my car, and just driving. And I pulled over and I found it on the dashboard. And I had the serious conversation with God. And I was in tears. And I basically said, listen, here's the deal. Like I'm telling God what to do, right? I said, here's the deal. I go, you either take her right now, because I can't deal with this anymore, or you heal her. But this purgatory is not working for me, I cannot do this any longer. And that says, you know, and so that's what he did a couple of months later.   Michael Hingson  46:47 So you had so hard and I have some associations with Lyme disease in a different way. First of all, when I was living in New Jersey and the selling some products, I knew a couple guys who had accompany the turns out they they did have Lyme disease, it was apparently somewhat controlled, but they did have it. And I only know that because they told me but my fourth guide dog was bit by a tick relatively soon after we moved to New Jersey and we knew she was bitten we, we got the tick and we got it out of her and and the vet said there's nothing you know, we can do to analyze it or anything. And you know, as long as she's okay, she's okay. Well. One of the things I've learned about guide dogs is that they are and a lot of dogs, especially when there's a lot of love, and they want to please, they're incredibly stoic. We never detected any illness in her until May 1 of 1999 When I called her to dinner, and she didn't come and we found her on her bed, almost unresponsive. And through getting her to an emergency vet and then going elsewhere and so on. And finally meeting a woman who we regard as a very dear friend, although I haven't talked with her for a while Tracy Gillespie, who is in the University of Penn system. And working for emergency vet in Toms River, New Jersey, as I recall. She said Lynnae has glomerular nephritis. And it is morphed from Lyme disease. So she wouldn't keep the good stuff in her system, the kidneys would pass it out along with the bad stuff because the Lumeria went bad. So she had to retire. And we were able to keep her for three more years. But still, we we knew that there was was something there but it was just one of those things. So I appreciate all you are saying that's my closest brush, fortunately, or whatever with Lyme disease, but it's it is a very insidious thing.   Jody Hudson  49:04 It really is and you know, that's can be carriers of Lyme disease and, you know, with with the ticks and that's why I always when I'm you know talking make make sure that I recognize that it's not just humans. I'm glad that you shared that story. I mean, it is, you know, as we do tick checks from head to toe on our body, we need to do that as our animals come in from the outside because they are just as susceptible to it as as we are.   Michael Hingson  49:38 Well I'm being a guide dog. We kept a close eye on her so we found it right. Still it occurred. Well so. So Alex past, God listened to you and and did take her then what did you do?   Jody Hudson  49:57 So, what I did was yes, she she passed on March 24. In fact, tomorrow's her five year anniversary, I cannot believe. Yeah, I can't believe it's been five years and some aspects of it, I feel like it was just five, five minutes, five days and other times. So I feel like maybe it's been longer. But she and I were very close, we were just with everything that I'd gone through being divorced. And being a single mom, I mean, the mother daughter bond is very strong. To begin with, and ours was especially strong just with our our life experiences and challenges. And when Alex was, I mean, she was bedridden for for several months before she passed away. And she was always so positive. And she kept, you know, thinking that she was going to be this Lyme warrior, she was going to, you know, get to UCLA, finish that degree and start her own nine nonprofit. And when we knew that, God, you know, had other plans for her, I made a pact with her and said that I was going to basically carry her torch for her. And so after she passed, money started just flooding in. There was a GoFundMe account that someone had set up for me and I started receiving quite a bit of money. And I knew that was going to be my my seed money to start the outsets in line Foundation. And here again, I was working for a nonprofit, I was still working at Catholic Charities. And I thought, Okay, I'm gonna, you know, petition, I'll get someone to help me to, you know, see what that looks like. And, you know, people have told me, it's going to take about a year to get a nonprofit up and running. So that okay, good, that will give me time to adjust and make the transition. Well, I received status that I had been awarded 501, C, three for the outsets, in line foundation in 30 days. And in my classic CPA, comment, my CPA when I got the letter, I said, Okay, roll in, tell me that this is like a joke. Like, this isn't true, right? Like, I really didn't get this approved so quickly. And he said, God, sometimes the good Lord does things that there are no explanations for Congratulations. You have a 501 C three. Yeah. And so yeah, we were up and running in June, we started our first fundraiser, we were able to work with global Lyme Alliance and do a research grant with them, we were able to award some financial grants to lyme patients. So we, you know, we're doing everything according to Alex's wishes, and five years later, we're still doing that. So it definitely, like I said, before this mother daughter bond, I know I'm not doing it alone, I know that she, you know, is helping me every step of the way. And you wrote a book. And I wrote a book. And that was something that I did not expect at all, like I am a business woman, I write reports. I don't journal I don't write for fun. But this was something that was just laid on my heart. And I was a member of the Fresno State book club. And there was a gallon there who had just written a book, and I started talking to her. And I said, you know, I feel like I need to get this stuff out of my head and onto print. Because just as I'm chatting with you, there's so much that people didn't realize of the journey that Alex and I went on, especially that last year, even my closest group of friends, you know, when they read my book, they're like, God, God, we just didn't realize everything that you had gone through, we thought we did. And I said, No, I, I feel bad. I wasn't able to catch everybody up on this, I said that I was running so fast to get my daughter better, that I didn't have time to bring my team along with me. So this book was written for so many different reasons. Just to let people know how amazing my daughter was and what she went through, also to, you know, give people hope, inspiration. And also just to, you know, give validity to this horrible disease that so many people's still in the medical community don't recognize, or, you know, give it such a stigma. So the book came out. Last February, I self published it and Uh, you know, it's, it's done pretty well, I mean, I've received over 100 plus five star reviews on Amazon, which, to me, if I just, you know, was able to impact one or two people at that, wow, that would be great, you know, people would really understand what I'm trying to convey. But you know, just the, the impact, and what I'm getting back from it that people, you know, write to me or call me. It's just so overwhelming, you know, and for them to appreciate my daughter and love my daughter, with what she went through, it's pretty, pretty touching.   Michael Hingson  55:42 What a blessing. Well, tell me, what would you like people to take away from listening to you today.   Jody Hudson  55:51 So what I want people to take away from listening to meet today is, no matter what challenges you have going on in life, it's how you show up that people are going to remember. And for me, in that moment, when Alex passed away, it could have been so easy just to throw the covers over my head, and give up and be, you know, this grief girl, but I didn't want to be defined by that I wanted to, you know, have people look at me, and be that example, for others be that example for my son, be that example for my friends, that no matter what I had gone through, that I can still show up every day, and that there's still like to be lived. And to do that, also, you know, in honor of my daughter, right, with everything that she went through, how could I just lay it in bet. And I mean, she's suffered far greater than, than I did, and, and I just, I couldn't do that. So I needed to make some, you know, purpose out of what she went through. And that's what I'm I'm trying to do and I'm trying to accomplish?   Michael Hingson  57:05 Well, how can people reach out to you and communicate, correspond or learn more? And   Jody Hudson  57:11 yeah, so we have a website alexhudsonlymefoundation, website, www dot alexhudsonlymefoundation.org, there's ways that you can get a hold of me on the website, you can also go into Amazon, and look for my book, my promise to Alex written by me, Jody Hudson, I would love it if you know, people would, you know, by the, by the book, and, you know, support me through that, because all the proceeds from that book, go right back into the foundation. And, you know, if people are out there, struggling right now with, you know, medical mysteries, you know, check out Lyme disease, check out and see maybe if that's something that you might have in the doctors just haven't been able to diagnose. You know, be your own advocate, never, never give up. And that's one of the things that Alex and I never did, no matter how many times that door was slammed in our faces from the medical community. We still kept opening it up and trying to get to answers.   Michael Hingson  58:22 Never giving up is extremely important. We do it all too quickly. And we, we don't realize that we can do a lot more than we think we can.   Jody Hudson  58:33 Amen. Amen. You don't know you know how strong you need to be until you are in those moments where strength is all you got?   58:42 Well, I want to thank you, Jody, for being with us today. And for telling your story and having the courage to do it and to continue doing, what you're doing and anything that we can do to help through this podcast and so on, please let me know. And we met through accessibility, which I'm really happy about. And I appreciate your desire to help in dealing with inclusion and website accessibility but more important, anything that we can do to continue to promote what you're doing. We're in so I want to thank you for that. And I want to thank you for listening to us. We really appreciate it reach out to Alex through Jodi reach out to Jodi especially and Alex will know and we want to hear from you please email me at Michaelhi at accessibe.com. Accessibe is A C C E S S I B E.com. Or go to www dot Michael hingson h i n g s o n.com/podcast. Please give us a five star rating wherever you're listening and like especially if you're on iTunes, please give us a five star rating. Those tend to show up a lot and we appreciate it. But Jody most of all, once more. I want to thank you for being here and for not only inspiring us but I hope educating a lot of people about Lyme disease and just being stronger and more unstoppable than we think.   Jody Hudson  1:00:00 Thank you so much for having me and listening to my story and Alex's story It really means a lot to me   Michael Hingson  1:00:11

Please join us on Sunday 4-23-23 @ 5:00 PM, EDT to discuss the first book in this three book collection , Vanishing Girls by Lisa Ragan BARD Description Detective Josie Quinn.. Books 1-3 DB92685 Regan, Lisa, (Lisa L.); Regan, Lisa Reading time: 27 hours, 9 minutes. Emily Ellet A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Mystery and Detective Stories After an abusive upbringing and a failed marriage to her childhood friend, Josie Quinn works as a detective in the small town of Denton. Includes Vanishing Girls, The Girl with No Name, and Her Mother's Grave, in which Detective Quinn uncovers startling information about her past. Violence, strong language, and some descriptions of sex. 2018.

The Fiction Old and New book group discussed the classic novel, "Invisible Man" by Ralph Ellison. Two versions of this novel are available on BARD and both are posted below. Here are the two book annotations: 1. Invisible man DB 56346 Ellison, Ralph. Reading time 20 hours, 57 minutes. Read by Peter Jay Fernandez. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Classics Description: Classic novel of a young black man's search for identity. Follows the unnamed protagonist from his youth in a Southern town through the depression years in Harlem, where he examines and rejects the values thrust on him by both whites and blacks. Some strong language. National Book Award 1953. 1947. 2. Invisible man DB 09600 Ellison, Ralph. Reading time 17 hours, 43 minutes. Read by Stanley Eisenberg. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: General Description: Classic novel of man's search for identity. Follows a young black man from his youth in a Southern town through the depression years in Harlem, where he examines and rejects the values thrust on him by both whites and blacks.. Our facilitator for this group is Michelle Bernstein (hamletsweetlady@gmail.com).

The NLS annotation follows: The Christmas train DB55045 Baldacci, David Reading time: 7 hours, 37 minutes. L. J. Ganser A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Humor Romance Bestsellers Holidays Journalist Tom Langdon takes a cross-country train from the East Coast to Los Angeles to spend Christmas with his girlfriend. On the trip he meets a host of zany characters, including one who happens to be his former lover. Sparks fly until Tom's girlfriend shows up in Chicago. Bestseller. 2002. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/4086297?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVRoZSUyQkNocmlzdG1hcyUyQlRyYWlu

How to walk away DB 91087 Center, Katherine. Reading time 10 hours, 38 minutes. Read by Therese Plummer. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Human Relations; Family Description: Margaret Jacobsen is in a plane crash with her boyfriend which leaves her paralyzed. In the aftermath, she reevaluates her relationships, reconnecting with the sister she hasn't seen in years and bonding with Ian, the tough physical therapist who won't let her give in to self-pity. Strong language. Commercial audiobook. 2018.

How to walk away DB 91087 Center, Katherine. Reading time 10 hours, 38 minutes. Read by Therese Plummer. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Human Relations; Family Description: Margaret Jacobsen is in a plane crash with her boyfriend which leaves her paralyzed. In the aftermath, she reevaluates her relationships, reconnecting with the sister she hasn't seen in years and bonding with Ian, the tough physical therapist who won't let her give in to self-pity. Strong language. Commercial audiobook. 2018.

NLS annotation, as well as he ZOOM information. The cooking school murders DB21819 Rich, Virginia Reading time: 7 hours, 53 minutes. Patricia Beaudry National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Mystery and Detective Stories Takes place in the small farming town of Harrington, Iowa. After the first session of a gourmet cooking class, one of the thirteen class members is found with her throat slashed; another is a suicide and the apparent murderer; a third member drowns. All remaining members are suspect.

NLS annotation, as well as he ZOOM information. The cooking school murders DB21819 Rich, Virginia Reading time: 7 hours, 53 minutes. Patricia Beaudry National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Mystery and Detective Stories Takes place in the small farming town of Harrington, Iowa. After the first session of a gourmet cooking class, one of the thirteen class members is found with her throat slashed; another is a suicide and the apparent murderer; a third member drowns. All remaining members are suspect.

Episode Summary I have had the honor to interview many guests since beginning Unstoppable Mindset. No guest has demonstrated a greater ability to be unstoppable than this episode's guest, Ian Walker. Ian learned at a fairly early age that he happened to have ADHD. He also demonstrated a great aptitude and love of music. His love of music won as he will tell you in in our interview. Ian also has worked at other jobs in his life. He will tell you about them as well. Ian's insights about music and ADHD especially will show you and anyone you bring to our podcast that we can use our inner strength to overcome any challenges we think we have before us. As you will hear, Ian is also a successful author and is even creating a play. Join Ian and me and be moved.  Thanks for listening and I hope you will let me know your thoughts about our episode and the Unstoppable Mindset podcast by emailing me at michaelhi@accessibe.com.   About the Guest:  In Stirring My Soul to Sing, Overcoming ADHD Through Song,_first- time Canadian author W. Ian Walker, ADHD survivor, musician, author and speaker tells his story of lifelong struggles with ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) and how he found relief by leaning into the music and his Christian faith during his successful 30-year career in music and the arts. Walker's book continues to grow in distribution and is listed on _43 international bookseller websites and stores. _ In his gritty and moving autobiography published in 2018, Walker offers "hope" for families and individuals facing an ADHD diagnosis. Walker is a classically trained musician, singer (baritone) and arts manager. He shares stories about how music (with an emphasis on vocal and choral music) brought him joy, success, and fulfilment in a life that was marked by a constant battle with ADHD. Walker credits his musical experiences and profoundly personal faith with mitigating and overcoming the potentially devastating impact of the disorder. He explains how, for 35 years, he used vocal and choral music to help him stay  focused, achieve goals, and meet deadlines, in conjunction with his ADHD.  Mr. Walker will be speaking at all online conferences for 2022 on “Overcoming ADHD with the Arts and Music Therapy”  A Long Road from the past until now... Although Ian was told he was “hyperactive” and had a learning disability in the early 1970s; he was not formally diagnosed with the disorder until 1996. In the intervening years, Walker experienced verbal abuse, school bullying, poor academic performance, employment instability, financial hardships, and failed relationships.  Despite these challenges, Walker persevered and now holds a _BA in Theater and Film, from McMaster University and a Post-graduate Certificate in Fundraising and Volunteer Management, from Humber College, Toronto and is a successful Arts Consultant.  W. Ian Walker is an in demand speaker and has recently spoke at ADDA/CHADD International OnLine Conference in 2020 & 2021. He also involved in many local community projects and is in preparation to lauch his first vocal performance and tour of a “Cabaret Evening with Ian” in 2022.  Walker is touring, speaking, and singing in support of the book. He has also produced eight videos.  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpXUoGfVMOrt6BtsrZiPtbg?reload=9  For Contact: wiw@emliancommunications.org/shop or to purchase the book. Please call: 1-289- 700-7005  About the Host:  Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/  https://twitter.com/mhingson  https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson  https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links  https://accessibe.com/  https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe  https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening!  Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast  If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe in your favorite podcast app.   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review  Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.     Transcription Notes Michael Hingson  00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i  capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us. Michael Hingson  01:19 Welcome to another episode of unstoppable mindset. Thanks for being here. I hope that you enjoy what we have to talk about today. We have a guest who I've been looking forward to for quite a while and circumstances keep causing us to have to delay getting together but we finally made it didn't we Ian?  Ian Walker  01:42 Yes, exactly. Nice to be here, Michael.  Michael Hingson  01:45 Thanks. And it's good to have you here. Ian Walker has a very interesting background. And I'm going to say up front, one of the interesting things about en and one that I'm really anxious to learn more about is that he himself has what people would classify as a disability. And that's fascinating to me, needless to say, so why don't we start there? You You say that at some point in your life, you since you were different? Can you tell us about that?  Ian Walker  02:15 Yeah, so um, I was raised in a very musical family. And music and the arts were really important. And especially for me, when we found out that I was diagnosed later on in my life with ADHD, but being a kid from the 1970s, they used to, you know, call me hyperactive. And so ADHD wasn't, you know, wasn't diagnosed wasn't used then. But I basically had all of the elements of, you know, dealing with ADHD. And so that's Attention Deficit hyper disorder, we're for people that don't, don't understand the disorder. And so, you know, I dealt with a lot of stuff. My mother, my grandmother, and my mother were very musical, and they acted as my, my mentors. And so, you know, once we sort of found out that I wasn't in your MOS, I wasn't your average, you know, person here that was going through the regular school system. My, my grandmother suggested to my parents that I'd always love to sing and that I should take singing lessons. And that opened up a huge, you know, door for me a level of confidence, and self esteem. And, and then, you know, I had to deal with all the bullying that went on, because I was a young young man who wanted to sing. Michael Hingson  04:09 When did this occur? When did all this occur?  Ian Walker  04:12 So, I was born in 1960. Okay, and by around 1970 1971, I, you know, I'd already been a boy soprano.My grandmother really trained me very well. And as a result, people come up to me all the time and say, Oh, II and when you sing, you have great diction. Yay, Grandma, you know, Ian Walker  04:39 oh, well, about your D's and T's and that you want to be heard at the back of the hall or the back of the church, you know? And that was the days before amplification right where amplitude vacation is used so much now. So, so I got all of the the great beginning sings and grandma would work with me on the piece and the finesse and the phrasing, and the and, you know, the diction, and mom would help me with, with rhythm. You know, sometimes my rhythm wasn't always right on track. And then she'd also helped me with, you know, the finesse more maybe about dynamics and, you know, interpretation of the songs. And so, you know, this being the early 70s, there wasn't a lot of great selection out there to, for a young staff to learn to sing. And so I'd be and because I was raised in the church, you know, I sang a lot of early boy soprano stuffs, a lot of Easter pieces of hallelujahs. And, you know, a lot of those kinds of wonderful thing is a great training, a great training, you know, I really, really wished we had recorded my voice as a young soprano, I don't have a boy soprano. I don't have any, you know, except vague little memories every once in a while, sort of, you know, pops in my head. But so then, around 1971 72, I was in grade four, grade five. And they determined that I needed to go and deal with my ADHD issues. So it being the 70s, they took kids out of the regular school system, this is here in Canada, they took kids out of the regular schools and put them into a special school for disability issues. Well, I was always really good on all of my, you know, English, geography, history, all of the main core, you know, subjects, but my weakness was math. And so as now probably what they would do is just, you know, have a special tutor for me, but anyways, I had to be taken out of the school system. Put two years behind, you know, and, and, thank goodness, in my second year, we had an amazing teacher, who was a background of the military was a left handed Colonel here in Canada. And he, when you were in his class, you were like, in the army was it and so we classmates almost saluted when we came into. And, but he was very, very good with me. And he recognized and said, This boy's intelligence, he's got, you know, English and history and, and geography and, you know, an interest in science, what's he doing here? So, he made a special, you know, presentation to me to the, you know, to the board or whatever, and said, Ian needs to be put back into the regular classroom curriculum. And so, I did grade six, and then to grade eight, back in the road rotary system, but I was two years behind, you know, my peers so so, you know, still continuing on with my music. You know, it was in a lot of different shows. At that time. They had a kid's version or student version for the pirate No. Gilbert and Sullivan's not pirates, but the other one. pinafore pinafore, HMS Pinafore, and I got to play the captain and you know, Michael Hingson  09:13 you are not the model of modern major model of the modern Ian Walker  09:17 meeting general No, no. That's a wonderful twisting song. Oh, my goodness, it's, you know, takes a long time to learn all the lyrics in that song. Yeah, Michael Hingson  09:32 but you know, yeah, go ahead. Ian Walker  09:35 So there's a little bit about, you know, dealing with the disability stuff. Michael Hingson  09:39 So do you regard yourself as a person with a disability today? Yeah, why? Why? What do you think about that?  Ian Walker  09:51 Well, because of Okay, so, it took me 27 years to get my BA And a lot of the hindrances, that when, you know, I gone through high school, and did, you know did some other sort of other some other courses along the way to, you know, check out, see what I really wanted to do, but I really wanted to have a degree in music. And when I got into the program at the University of Western Ontario, very good school, for singers, and choral people. I just couldn't handle the program, I could handle all the artistic, all the creative stuff, but I couldn't handle the academics. And that's where we really found out that I had a disability with my writing, that there was some some problems that I'd leave out words that, you know, my sentence structure was in great. I couldn't do syntax from one paragraph to the other paragraph. And there was just some other, you know, other stuff along the way that I really, it was really determined to me that I did have a disability, as you know, as an ADHD student, Michael Hingson  11:18 how did you deal with that, then, in terms of addressing the issue of word gaps and so on?  Ian Walker  11:25 Well, before you know, voice activated software, right, I would have to read my papers over, like, you know, and that was part of the chore as getting the work done way before the the deadline was, you know, was required. But then when voice activated software came in, I use Dragon Naturally Speaking in the early years. And so then, eventually, it could read it to me. And then I went, Oh, my goodness, you know, I've left out a verb here, I've left out an adjective there, or, you know, the sentence didn't make sense. Or, and then, you know, as I learned more about syntax from the next paragraph to the next paragraph. Yeah, it was difficult. And I still got some of my papers. From those some of the early beginnings before I was officially diagnosed with ADHD. And I go, Oh, my goodness, like look at the mistakes, you know, as well as spelling mistakes and things that now you know, software can grammerly Naturally Speaking, no grammar, grammar, Grammarly. I like Grammarly. It really, it really punches up my my work. I haven't checked Michael Hingson  12:53 lately but for me, Grammarly has been somewhat inaccessible, which is a little bit of a problem. But it doesn't at least I haven't found that it works with screen readers well, but I again, I haven't looked at it now. And in a couple of years, so maybe there have been some improvements. But I do agree with you and appreciate the concept that software helps us a lot. If we're open to using I remember Dragon Dictate back in the very early days. Ian Walker  13:26 And yeah, and there. Michael Hingson  13:29 Well, and it wasn't overly accessible and Dragon wasn't overly accessible. There is a product now I use a screen reader called JAWS that verbalizes whatever text comes across the screen, and a gentleman over in England has created a product called JC which is sort of a bridge between dragon and jaws, and actually makes the combination a lot more accessible. So it's very easy now to use Dragon Naturally Speaking and use it effectively. And voice input software like Dragon has made such a difference. I think to so many people. It's so much easier to compose now as you point out. Ian Walker  14:15 Mm hmm. And, and I love it. Like you know, I'm generally a Microsoft guy. So you know, I yeah, I tried Mac and it just it's just too complicated for my brain. Michael Hingson  14:30 Mac is great for graphics. Yeah, and a lot of and a lot of people use it but I too tend toward windows. Ian Walker  14:38 Yeah, yeah. And so you know, now that when I'm writing and stuff, I just love it that AI can either use dictate or you know, or just click on the Grammarly and clean up some stuff that need may need it Michael Hingson  14:55 has Grammarly ever said You dumb bunny. Aren't you ever gonna figure that out, oh, no, just checking, just checking. Ian Walker  15:06 They may say, Huh, you might have another, you have two or three other options. Michael Hingson  15:13 That's my wife would say that though. But that's, that's what wives do. Well, you know, you, you talk about your grandfather being a preacher or pastor, how did? How did his influence affect you? Ian Walker  15:31 Okay, so this is great grandfather. So I had two great grandfather's on my dad's side, who were Baptist preachers. So faith has always been very important in our family. And, you know, and then along with, with the music and stuff, my grandmother that the one that was my, my vocal coach, everything, she was a music director for 25 years, and her Baptist Church and director, choirs, as well as all, you know, musical events. So, so between both my mom and dad had both strong faith and, and I was raised in the Baptist Convention of Ontario, and Quebec, or Baptist of Canada. So our faith has always been very, very important. And that's a really good point. Because in my later years, as I, you know, was learning more about the disorder and a whole deal, when I would be really frustrated, I could just, you know, I could just turn to my faith, I could turn to God, and just, you know, say, God, I need strength here. And I need help, I need support. And, you know, and, and then the thing was, I had lots of people in the family praying for me as well, genuinely, all of them on both sides of my mum and dad side are a lot of, you know, secure Christian, so they had been Christians for a long time. And they they, so I would really say on both my mom and dad side generally is we're a family of faith. And that made a huge, huge difference in actually tell you another story. When I was going through some really bad bullying, in so this is public school, just before third grade, seventh grade, sixth grade seventh, my mom formed a prayer group for children that were having disabilities, mostly boys. Were there were some girls in in the group. And that prayer group continued, I think they got together like, once or twice a month, that prayer group continued for a good 10 years. And I know that I'm walking out of the blessings of that prayer group, because of the faithfulness of my mom and her, her friends that prayed me for strength to get through the issues that I needed to get through. And Michael Hingson  18:17 they pass that on to you. Mm hmm. Which is pretty cool. I think that faith is a very important thing. And I think that it is very relevant for us to have faith, however we express it, that inner strength is is very important to all of us. And, and I'm sure that you, especially when you're talking about bullying, and so on, clearly you, you've had a lot of tests of that. And, you know, at the same time, you know, as well as I that a lot of the bullying comes simply from ignorance and people just don't understand. And you you can choose either to hold a grudge and create a lot of animosity, or you can move beyond that. Ian Walker  19:11 That's right. Well, I think what happened was, you know, when I got to a point, kind of just sort of before my 30s and I just didn't like all of the excess baggage that you know, the that I was still having, I was having, you know, bad dreams of these experiences and stuff. And just just right around there, I was starting to have some, some marital ish issues with my first wife. And so I got into some really good Christian counseling. And, you know, we had to go deep, deep deep down the well, you know, To deal with this stuff, but once we got it out, and as they will talk about it. And the other thing was to learning how to forgive those who had really, you know, hurt me, like, as in the Bible, you know, Jesus says, you know, forgive those who may not know what they've done, right? And, and so once I was able to do that, oh my goodness, a huge burden was lifted from my heart and my whole presence. And I just, you know, I was able to carry on, and I think a lot of the blessings that I've had over the last, say 10 or 15 years is because I've gotten rid of that, those burdens of, you know, of not of those burdens of unforgiveness still holding on to those those issues. So I'm, I'm grateful that, you know, I learned that experience relatively young in my life. Michael Hingson  21:05 You have written a book I have, that I'd love to hear more about. Ian Walker  21:12 Okay, so I'm holding it up here. So it's called stirring my soul to sing, overcoming ADHD through song. And it's available on Amazon. It's available on Barnes and Barnes and Noble, and you can find it on a lot of other you know, platforms. Michael Hingson  21:34 Is there an audio version of the book? Ian Walker  21:36 Not yet. This is that I'm just starting to think about that, too. So when we were getting it, you know, published and my resources didn't include in the budget to do an audiobook, but I'm, I'm thinking about doing one very soon. So, yeah, Michael Hingson  21:55 it won't earn you money, but you might explore in Canada. I'm not sure what the process is. But you might reach out to the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, there is a program. In most countries, it used to be called Talking Books. It sort of still is, I guess, to some of us who remember those terminologies. But yeah, we're blind people are in books created for blind people are exempt from standard copyright laws. And so in the in the United States, contacting the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, print impaired or print disabled, however you want to call it, readers, they record books. Now, it's only available to blind and other print challenged people. But it is also a place where you might look at going. But did you did you publish the book yourself? Or was it? Ian Walker  22:55 I went through through a Christian Faith Based publisher in Canada called Word allied press. Okay, so yeah. And I would Michael Hingson  23:07 think that they should be able to help you get the book out on programs like Audible. Ian Walker  23:14 Yeah, well, that's, that's kind of in the works. So we're just just setting up the time, then, you know, the studio time to be able to do it. And I'm hoping I'm hoping to have it done. You know, probably by the fall, so yeah. Michael Hingson  23:31 Well, when we did thunder dog back in 2010, and 2011. It was published by Thomas Nelson sets, the largest Christian publisher, now part of Harper Collins. Yeah, I didn't read it. They actually had someone else read it. But they did make that part of the process. And I kind of encouraged and someone insisted that it needed to also be an audio book. As it turns out, the Library of Congress has also produced it along with our second book running with Roselle so that they're directly available to blind people. Of course, you know, it's always nice when people buy it through audible, as opposed to the Library of Congress because these poor starving authors, dogs, and our dogs make a little bit of money. So you know, Alamo my guide dog always says, whenever we travel, please tell people to buy books because we're running low on kibbles. You know? Ian Walker  24:25 That's great. Michael Hingson  24:28 But, but tell me more about, you know, the book. Okay. Ian Walker  24:30 And so, um, so for the longest time, you know, I was really thinking about should I write a book and just, just sort of sitting down and thinking about the process and, you know, like, this is, this is my first effort. I've had other you know, other pieces published in different sort of music publications and things like that, but So, um, but I just went, Oh, can I do this? So I sat down, and I just sort of came up with potential chapter, you know, like, chapter titles. And then and, you know, wanted to start at the beginning and, and sort of worked my way through. And that's how I started to do it. And so it took about five years to write. Some things were very easy that just flowed really well. Some of the other real difficult issues took a long time, one particular chapter, in dealing with the relationship with my ex wife, I wrote at least 50 times, and, and then I sent it to my publisher, and, you know, I got it back with lots of red ink and crossbow this and, and, and said, No, in, we've taken your chapter, we've added it now. And if you want to publish with us, it has to be this way. And, and I went, you know, and when I read it, and I'm like, Oh, my goodness, like, why did this take me so long to you know, but it's the process of getting it out. Right, the good as well as the bad. And, and so I was really, really happy, you know, when I read their sort of version of that particular chapter. And, and then, you know, different things just started to come along way. So the first part is about the difficulties of dealing with ADHD from a from a child to, you know, to early 20s. But the other part is about the success of my career is working in arts management, in choral and, well, choral arts management, and I've done some orchestral, but most of my career, so I've worked with some major choral organizations in Canada. And, you know, I've worked with some incredible artists. And so I'm not sure if you're familiar with marine forester, she's an amazing classical vocal artists, she was, you know, big in the 40s. To, to the early 2000s. And she had an opportunity to sort of work with her, and she sort of took me under her wing. I'm an alumnus of the Tanglewood Institute program for actually called Boston University Tanglewood Institute. And so when I was down at Tanglewood, in 1981, I got to spend 20 minutes with Leonard Bernstein, and had an amazing conversation with him about one of his choral pieces. And, you know, the other one who comes to mind is like, an over 10 year relationship with Sir David Wilcox that's he's the conductor for or was the conductor for King's College, Cambridge. You know, what Christmas times Christmas from Kings is usually broadcast and Oh, my goodness, that, you know, well, so David was just one of the most amazing and generous people I've ever met my life. And so we, you know, became friends. And then we emailed for over 10 years, you know, right up to Lee. He was in his early 80s, then right up to his early 90s. And he lived to be 95. And, you know, so I wanted to talk about the other side of my career, which was still having a disability, but basically getting to do what I wanted to do, which was to work in music. And, you know, I talked about some of the teachers that I, I worked with, and, you know, choral experiences. And Ian Walker  29:23 so I it's, it's genuinely an arts book, for that arts person in your family who you don't know what to deal with. Michael Hingson  29:34 Yeah. So when you went, by the way when you were done and tinker with Did you ever get to sing with the Boston Symphony? Ian Walker  29:40 No, because our program was a young artists vocal program. But, but we had all kinds of speakers coming in throughout the summer. We were there for eight weeks. And it was an incredible program. and no says You didn't come and speak to us. But we could go at any time, you know, with the student card and go and listen to rehearsals all the time. And our, our, our choral director just recently passed away Leonard Atherton, who used to be a part of University of Muncie, Indiana. But he was a Canadian first. And he did some work up here, like just not very far from where I live in Hamilton, Ontario. And so I was just amazed, choral people that he knew, and that I knew, and then, you know, we come down to dangle wood, and, you know, it becomes International. So, so it's wonderful. And our group are has stayed together this summer, this coming summer, we'll celebrate 41 years, that and we've got composers, we've got conductors, we've got singers that had had incredible careers. And so we're just, you know, through the wonder of the internet, that we're able to still, you know, stay connected. We've got about three reunions throughout the years to that's pretty Tanglefoot. Michael Hingson  31:22 How long did it take you to act? How long did it take you to write the book? Ian Walker  31:27 Well, it was about five years. And then I was looking for the right publisher, and I was going to publish with one in the States. But there was some problems with, you know, the price of the book then and having to add the tariff coming back on and, you know, for a paperback it was going to be like between 35 or $40 for, you know, who would pay that. So. So, I'm connected with a very wonderful group here called the word guild, for Christian writers, and Christian folk who write for, you know, for Christian media. And so some of my friends said, Ian, why don't you check out word alive press. And it's been a very good, you know, association being connected with them. So they, they really helped me get the book out there. And now it's gone into 43 International bookstores on website, I am just, it's gone all over the world. The last it was in China, and it was being looked at in Russia, I was just totally blown away. So Michael Hingson  32:45 exciting. It is. Ian Walker  32:47 And, you know, I'm working on a second book right now. So but it's not gonna have you know, I've already told my story, you know, now, it's time to finesse and, and have some fun. Michael Hingson  33:03 Yeah, we're, we're sort of in the same boat, Thunder dog having been publishing it, and it tells my story. And we have talked in previous episodes of unstoppable mindset about working on another book, and I interviewed Carrie Wildkin, who I'm working with who's collaborating with me on writing it. We also had Susie Florian, who's the lady who wrote and helped me write. She's a professional writer, and she helped me write thunder dog. She is also very involved with Christian writers on the west coast. So we should probably introduce the two of them. That would be wonderful. All right, yeah, I'll do that this afternoon. But we, but we are now getting ready to write another book. And this one's going to be more about fear, and learning to better address and control fear and make it more of a positive thing then, when something happens and you just become so blinded by fear that you can't move forward or do any do anything. So our tentative title is the guide dogs Guide to Being brave me having worked with a guide dogs, and you're just about to have a contract signed on that, which is really exciting. So we'll be awesome. We'll be telling people about that as it moves forward. But I I'm with you the stories out there. So now it's time to be able to branch out and do other things. Yeah, but Ian Walker  34:33 that's really interesting that you you're, you know, looking at writing a book about fear because I've really felt in the last little while that a lot of ADHD issues, open the door to fear. And I was thinking about writing a book on fear, but but I just I've seen it, you know, time and time again, and I A lot of like, part of, you know, part of my journey has really also been to just break down the doors and say, I'm not going to be held by fear anymore. And, you know, I mean, it took me 27 years to get that degree and I was bound and determined that I was going to get it. I, you know, I didn't think it was going to take that long. But there, you know, and there were elements of fear that I had to break through and just say, No, I'm not going to I'm not going to let that, you know, just one little element stopped me from achieving my goal. Michael Hingson  35:37 Hence, the concept of unstoppable. Exactly, yeah. Let me ask this. I'm just curious, have you have animals been a part of your life and help you and moving forward in any way? Ian Walker  35:52 Yes, we growing up, we had an amazing Labrador, and her name was shadow, black lab. And when I would have bad days, she would always come near me, and sit with me. And just she sensed that you know, that I'd had a bad day or had been bullied or whatever. And we had a tent trailer. So sometimes, if it was a really bad day, I'd go out underneath one of the beds and sit with her just, you know, for half an hour or 45 minutes. And she just helped me to really calm down. And then, Elaine, and I, my second wife, we have a Shih Tzu have a niece and her name is Faith. And oh, my goodness, she is such a good dog. And I recently had some health issues. And she came and sat with me almost every day, you know, while I was recovering. And, yeah, so Oh, yes. I love animals Michael Hingson  37:05 very well, we, Ian Walker  37:08 I'm not a cat person. They're the only thing I like we Michael Hingson  37:15 we are now going to draft you to be interviewed for the book. Great. So I think there's, there's a story there. And I think it will be fun to make it part of the book because we will be talking to other people. And Ian Walker  37:33 I would love to write a story for that. That'd be wonderful. Michael Hingson  37:36 Well, we'll get we'll get you interviewed, and we'll be working on that. Definitely. Okay. But, but you know, it's it is interesting animals have such a positive effect on all of us. If, if we allow that. And I understand you're not a cat person. We do have a cat. Yeah. Okay. And she is the most verbal creature. I think I have you ever known. She talks to us all the time. We rescued her. And it took her a couple of months to decide that maybe we were reasonable creatures to have in her house. You know how cats are. So, so we we do have a great relationship with her. And she's good. She's on reason. Ian Walker  38:21 I don't like taxes. I'm allergic to them. Michael Hingson  38:24 So yeah, I understand that. Ian Walker  38:27 You know, a couple of my friends have some tolerable cats that Michael Hingson  38:34 we had. When we lived in many years ago in Mission Viejo, California. We had neighbors, whose kitchen faced our kitchen, and they discovered that from time to time, I would drag out my ice cream freezer and make homemade ice cream. We actually had okay, why we actually had wireless intercoms between the two kitchens. And whenever they looked through their window and saw the freezer going, they would announce that they'd be over with bowls and spoons about 630 or seven o'clock. And sure enough, Alan Linda would show up with bowls and spoons. We also had to we also had two cats. They were sisters. Yeah. Al was not a cat person. These two cats every time he came over, would jump up on the couch where he was sitting and they would wrap themselves around his head and purr and purr and you knew that he was a little bit uncomfortable. But what's funny is what's what's really funny is eventually there was a cat in the neighborhood that would occasionally go to their house and he fed the cat and suddenly the cat adopted him. And he became a cat person, which was really hilarious. Ian Walker  39:49 That's funny. Michael Hingson  39:51 But But animals are a part of our lives in so many ways. So you took five years to write the book was published in 2018. And it's doing Yes. Hmm. Let me ask this. So you come from a musical family, obviously. Yes. Your, your parents and so on. Do you have any, any musical relatives that maybe some of us would have heard of? Ian Walker  40:19 Yes, I do. So on my grandmother's side, my great uncles and everything, generally, we're all very artistic, loved music or arts or, or. And so my third cousins are Jonathan and Jordan night from the New Kids on the Block. So, and we got to see them in concert, because I'm about 10 years older than they are. So Michael Hingson  40:54 that's why there's a new kids. Ian Walker  40:56 That's right. So we got to see them in concert in, I think it was around 2014 or 15. And I understand they're coming to Toronto again in the near near future, I think. I think this coming June or something anyways. Yeah. So. So they're, you know, that that's pretty amazing that but vocal and choral music have been a part of my mom's side of the family. I have other cousins, second cousins or third cousins that have also been in some international choirs and, you know, sang in church choirs as well as you know, community when cousin, she's sung in the Toronto Mendelssohn choir for a number of years. So which is 160 voice choir? Michael Hingson  41:49 You were part of that for a while, weren't you? Ian Walker  41:51 I was I was in the Toronto Mendelssohn youth choir. And that was wonderful. And as a result, Robert Cooper, who has been my good friend and mentor, he was the artistic director of that, that program, and oh, my goodness, we, we had wonderful, wonderful years wonderful training. And I have still about, you know, good 10 or 15. Friends from from those years that we've still stayed in touch, and that's also at least at the 40 year mark, too. So. Michael Hingson  42:29 Well, I have to ask, do your third cousins acknowledge you as members of as a member of the family? Ian Walker  42:36 Oh, yeah, they know, checking? Yeah, they know who I am, what you see their grandmother was my favorite great aunt. Okay. And so, she is mentioned in the book quite a lot. And, and she was an amazing painter. I have like five or six of her paintings in my house. And, and so the eldest, Jonathan knew her fairly well as the Jonathan Jordan was a couple years behind. And so, you know, he didn't get to spend as much quality time as, as Jonathan did, to, you know, connect with her. They were living in Boston, so yeah, so, but she was wonderful. Oh, my goodness, I love spending time with my aunt all of Michael Hingson  43:35 Well, obviously, ADHD was something that you you dealt with very well, but even so, and music helped that, but help you deal with that. But was was your ADHD ever a problem when you were dealing with music singing or studying music? Ian Walker  43:54 And that's really interesting, because some other people have asked me that, no, you know, and the, like, the only thing that I have a problem with right now, maybe it's partly age, but is memory. And so when I'm memorizing words in with music, there's no problem. When I have to memorize like, you know, written script part. It is, it's a real difficult time unless I sort of have worked out some, you know, some steps along the way, like, Okay, I'm telling this part of the story, and this is what it means in depth. So that, you know, and it's kind of like I have to sort of like do a, a plot analysis. But when I'm learning music, with lyrics and music together, there's no problem. And I would love to, to see an MRI of my brain to trying to do one or the other, just to you know, to understand what what's going on. out there, why what, you know, problems. Michael Hingson  45:06 But it's interesting that you can use that as a breakthrough to really, in a lot of ways get beyond the absolutely HD. Ian Walker  45:15 Yeah, yeah. And also, they say after 50 That your ADHD, you know, lessons, and mine certainly did. But the other thing that I wanted to stress too is I've chosen since I was 12 or 13 years old to be non medicated. So I have used music as my therapy. So I have a catchphrase music versus medicine. And that has worked so well for me. Michael Hingson  45:53 So you sing that great thing. Yes. Do you Do you play any musical instruments? Yes. Besides kazoo Ian Walker  46:03 No, I don't play kazoo, but I cannot play because you know, but I play flute accordion and piano and as well as voice Michael Hingson  46:11 Yeah. Well, then you can work on because you could work on kazoo. Ian Walker  46:16 I could work on kazoo. Yeah. Michael Hingson  46:19 That that should go well with football I would think. Ian Walker  46:22 Yeah, the right part. I'm going to be a new what's his name? Bobby. You know that. Don't worry. Get Don't worry. Be happy. Yeah, some? Yeah. That well, he is an incredible musician, incredible singer. And so he can think like he can hum and sing Mozart parts and and then I love it when people come and we'll sing harmony with them or whatever. Oh, it's really mix Aaron Bobby McFerrin. I know, even Ferran Michael Hingson  46:57 right. Yeah. We we are great fans here. My wife and I have acapella music. We listen a lot to groups like Straight No Chaser. Are you familiar with them? No, don't know them. They're a group of 10 students who went to to college in Indiana, formed a group saying some then didn't do anything. And then later got all got back together. Now they have a number of of albums. And it's all acapella. Which is really wonderful. And the harmony is great. And they, they, they sing one of my favorite Christmas songs who spiked the eggnog, you have to hunt it down and listen, oh, that's it. It's really cool. It's really clever. And, but but, you know, music is so much a part of all of our lives. And I'm glad that for you, it really is able to, to mean so much and do so much. So from a professional standpoint. You graduated from college? And then what did you do? Ian Walker  48:10 Well, then I worked a lot in different arts organizations. So in now, like, you know, because it took such a long time to get the degree and, you know, get myself established and because I'm an arts consultant, so I deal in public relations, marketing and fundraising. And I've had a various number of clients, you know, throughout the years. Now, with COVID, some things are starting to, you know, pick up again, but it's me time, I've wanted to really do a cabaret evening. So I've just started working with this amazing music director, her name's Don Martens. She's here, right here in the Hamilton area. She's so talented, and I just love working with her. So our plan is, for September, we're going to do a backyard concert to you know, try it out, we're going to do six to eight or eight, eight to 12 songs or so. And then we'll we'll try it out her husband does all the sound and the lighting. And then we'll see how it goes. And if it's ready to be, you know, shipped, then we can start promoting it when I also do other book signing events. Michael Hingson  49:34 How many people will be involved in that? In terms of singing? Yeah, Ian Walker  49:37 yeah. Well, I've tried to do something different with my book signing events. I've tried to always sing. So you know, do three or four pieces. And, and that's all gone overwhelmed with people that you know, don't know me. But the other exciting news is I'm working on an album. So so this is the first time You can find me on the internet. And, you know, I've just done a whole Christmas community thing with the Dundas Baptist Church, which was our home church, we, my family was there for over 50 years. But Don put together this wonderful sort of community program during COVID. And so I've got a good, good piece on there. So and now we're going to be we're going to be putting together six songs to to, you know, to start an album, so I'm really excited about that. That's been, I've wanted to do an album for a long time. And so we're gonna have the gospel, inspiration, style and one Christmas song. Michael Hingson  50:52 Where can people find out? Where can people find your singing today? Well, Ian Walker  50:55 as soon as I yeah, you can go to my website. And if you can sign up, I do a newsletter vote every, you know, either once a year or six every six months? And do you want me just to tell you the new website, Michael Hingson  51:14 or Sure, we'll, we'll do it later as well. But sure, go ahead. Ian Walker  51:18 So it's Emily in E M, Lian, communications plural.org. And if you go to that website, and there's a, you know, become a friend, join my website, just give us your name and your email address, we'd love to have you, you know, come on board, and then you'll be able to see my, my events. So but the other odd other real exciting big news is, I've written a play about the book. And I taken seven characters, and created a 60 minute play about dealing with ADHD, and using music therapy. So and it's going to be called stirring my soul to sing. And we're going to be premiering it in July here within the Greater Toronto Area. We're just waiting for confirmation. But I think it's going to be done as Baptist church because they have a wonderful sanctuary area, that will just work perfectly. We're going to kind of do it, what I refer to as opera and concert style. So music stands with scripts, and it's gonna kind of like an old time radio show, we're going to begin to try that, that format out. And so I'm really, really excited about that and information, how to get tickets, as all my will be on my website very soon. Michael Hingson  53:02 Cool. Well, that's pretty obviously pretty exciting all the way around in terms of the things that you've accomplished. I'm interested to know a little bit more about what it means to be an art consultant. Ian Walker  53:14 Oh, well, you know, I've worked in, in that position. And as for 30 years, so you know, working with different arts organizations, you learn a multiple level of skills. And so excuse me, when I started off, I was working in marketing, and I loved marketing. And then, you know, you as part of, because I was in an apprenticeship program, so we had had to move around, you know, and learn so many skills. So then I was taught, I think I was like, a month or so in the box office. So I learned box office skills. And then, you know, some of the events that I was working on in marketing promoted me to learn more about PR. And then also that summer I learned fundraising as I was on the phone selling tickets for, you know, for the orchestra. So all of those Ian Walker  54:17 skills became a what's what I call now an art consultant. So I have, I've raised $2.5 million for Arts and Social Sciences. Ian Walker  54:30 And before I'm done when I'm ready to retire I'm aiming for my goal is going to be 5 million. So, so I got another 2.5 to go. You can do it. I think I can do it. Yeah, cuz I'm not ready to retire yet. And I'm just in my early 60s. So Michael Hingson  54:47 there Yeah, there you go. Yeah. So in addition to being an arts consultant, what are you doing to help prepare the next generation whether it's a In art, or I'm more curious to hear what you would say about helping people in the future dealing with ADHD. Ian Walker  55:08 Absolutely. And my whole thoughts is, you know, I want to be able to give back. So I'm, I'm, as we're just starting to, you know, put things together for the production, I'm going to have two or three students, that will be learning stage managing, or, you know, and I'm hoping that these are kids that have some disability issues, you know, if it's a DD ADHD or a DD to be able to see how to use your energies, you know, is really important, and to have the right people there to help steward you, you know, in that, in that process is really important. So, so we're going to do that. I've been speaking to Chamber of Commerce, you know, in the within the community, as a, as a public speaker, and talking about ADHD, and disability in in the classroom, and how important it is that the shaming stops blaming, and the shaming stops, you know, and that disability is part of our lives, as artists as, as whatever that, you know, we continue to grow, and to have tolerance for people that have a difference, you know, then then, then the normal person. And so those are really important things. And, and I had built that into my company that we will have students or we will have assistants that have ADHD, or whatever. And that, you know, we will be working with with adults of disability, in our projects that we're doing into the future, Michael Hingson  57:09 will is clearly a person who has a lot of knowledge about ADHD, especially from the first person's point of view. Have you found? Have you found challenges using websites and the internet? Being a person experiencing ADHD? Ian Walker  57:28 Um, sometimes, like, I'm just because we're, you know, coming out of COVID now, and just bombardment of emails, like, you know, I mean, I get over, sometimes, like, over 150 emails, now I gotta start going through, get rid of the sales stuff. Michael Hingson  57:48 But that takes care of 149 of them. But go ahead. Ian Walker  57:51 See, there you go. Right. And, and so the thing is, I just, I get exasperated, I get tired. From Michael Hingson  58:01 websites. Have you had challenges on going to visit web pages? Ian Walker  58:06 Not so much? No. Because I've just discovered now, and I love this, especially on, you know, on the Kindle books, whatever, that those kinds of books and web pages can read back to you. You don't have to read everything. And I love this. And so. So now with the upgrade and you know, software through Microsoft web pages, if I'm tired or at it, you know, they can can voice activate and read to me, which is wonderful. Michael Hingson  58:44 One of the reasons that I asked the question is that is you may know, if you've looked at me a lot, I work for a company called accessiBe, which is a company that manufactures products that make webpages and websites accessible and accessiBe. It deals with a variety of disabilities and actually allows you to activate profiles to address specific issues like in terms of ADHD, a lot of noise on websites and other things like that. And AccessiBe has a profile specifically intended to deal with websites that can be a challenge for some people with ADHD to make them much more usable. So if you get a chance, you might check it out. It's, Ian Walker  59:33 I wouldn't use it. Yeah. Michael Hingson  59:37 Yeah, I will A C C E S S B E, I will I'll send you some information. Because it might very well be that there is a great partnership that can evolve from that around the wonderful accessiBe likes to work with people who have disabilities and who know more than than we do. So yeah, it's it's good to establish that but the way it works is that there are a number profiles that accessiBe be deals with and ADHD and, and other cognitive disabilities are profiles that can be activated. So it certainly makes sense for us to get you and some of the folks that accessiBe together. Ian Walker  1:00:16 Awesome. Michael Hingson  1:00:18 Well, we have been doing this a long time. And we could go on and on and on. But we both probably have lots to do. But I'd like to do this again. But I really, thank you for your time being here today to talk about a lot of this. And I'd like you to go through again, if people want to get a hold of you not sending you sales emails. Okay, how can they reach out to you? Ian Walker  1:00:45 Okay, so my website is www.E M L I A N communications. So C O M M U N I C A T I O N S .org Emliancommunications.org. Now, there's an easier way to remember if you just Google Walker, or Stirring Walker ADHD, it will also bring up all the information that you need to know about me and the book. Michael Hingson  1:01:30 And if people want to email you, Ian Walker  1:01:33 you can email me at info@Emliancommunications.org. Michael Hingson  1:01:41 Well, thank you very much for being here. I know it's taken us a while to get together. But I am so glad that we finally were able to do it and have a chance to really chat. I've got to ask, do you do a podcast? Ian Walker  1:01:56 I do. And I just started it. It's called the arts report music for the ADHD brain. And it's on Spotify. It's on a couple others, you can find it on my website. We're going to be adding some more to it. It's just been, you know, time to I've got some programs in the can that just have to be edit it. And well, thank God I have somebody who's amazing that does that. I don't have to do that. That's not my that's not my, my specialty. Michael Hingson  1:02:33 You do? No, that's Ian Walker  1:02:34 not what I do. Well, I like being able to have a producer say hey, what do you think about this? And Michael Hingson  1:02:41 do you deal with some of the PATA Palooza folks? Ian Walker  1:02:44 Just starting to get into that. So in been very grateful of the new connections that we're we've made there. So of course, you're one of those. So that's, that's wonderful. Michael Hingson  1:02:59 Well, again, what's the name of the podcast? Ian Walker  1:03:02 So it's called the arts report music for the ADHD brain. Michael Hingson  1:03:09 Well, if you ever need a guest to come on and talk about something esoteric or another, let me know we'd love to do Ian Walker  1:03:16 that because we want to talk about disability as well. So you know and overcoming disability so love to have you on Michael when we can can schedule that. Michael Hingson  1:03:27 Let's do it. All right, in locker thanks again for being here. And I want to thank you for listening to us today. I hope you've enjoyed your time within reach out to him. I am sure that he won't treat your email as a sales email. He's he's responded to mine pretty well. So I guess he he liked me can distinguish between what's real and what's not. But I want to thank you all for listening to unstoppable mindset. We sure appreciate a five star rating wherever you are listening to this podcast. And if you'd like to reach out and talk to me possibly be a guest on the podcast or just share your thoughts. You can go to www.Michaelhingson.com/podcast that's www.M I C H A E L H I N G S O N.com/podcast or email me at Michaelh M I C H A E L H I at accessiBe.com accessiBe is spelled A C C E S S I B E. And again, we mentioned the concept of accessiBe dealing with a variety of disabilities. If you want to learn more about accessiBe , please visit www.accessibe.com. But again, thanks for listening and Ian, thanks very much for being here today. Ian Walker  1:04:53 Thank you so much, Michael. It's been great hanging out with you today. Michael Hingson  1:04:57 It's been my honor as well. Thank you Michael Hingson  1:05:03 You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com. accessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for listening. Please come back and visit us again next week.

The NLS annotation follows: The wife between us: a novel DB86959 Hendricks, Greer; Pekkanen, Sarah; Whelan, Julia Reading time: 11 hours, 15 minutes. Julia Whelan A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Psychological Fiction A tangled love triangle isn't what it seems. An exploration of the complexities of marriage and the dangerous truths often ignored in the name of love. Some violence, some strong language, and some descriptions of sex. Commercial audiobook. 2018. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/1903247?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPXRoZSB3aWZlIGJldHdlZW4gdXM

The NLS annotation follows: The wife between us: a novel DB86959 Hendricks, Greer; Pekkanen, Sarah; Whelan, Julia Reading time: 11 hours, 15 minutes. Julia Whelan A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Psychological Fiction A tangled love triangle isn't what it seems. An exploration of the complexities of marriage and the dangerous truths often ignored in the name of love. Some violence, some strong language, and some descriptions of sex. Commercial audiobook. 2018. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/1903247?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPXRoZSB3aWZlIGJldHdlZW4gdXM

2217 Encore of 1715 Audio Book Narrator (Apr. 27, 2022) Show Notes You've probably heard her voice on a Talking Book from the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. Martha Harmon Pardee has narrated over 3,000 books for the NLS. Hosts Nancy and Peter Torpey talk with her about the process of … Continue reading 2217 Encore of 1715 Audio Book Narrator (Apr. 27, 2022) →

The NLS annotation follows: Ordinary grace: a novel DB78187 Krueger, William Kent Reading time: 11 hours, 44 minutes. Graham Halstead A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Mystery and Detective Stories Minnesota, 1961. Thirteen-year-old Frank Drum's summer is steeped in death: a neighborhood boy hit by a train, a hobo found dead--and then a member of Frank's family is murdered. Frank is determined to seek vengeance and can't understand why his younger brother isn't. Some violence and some strong language. 2013. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/4358626?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPW9yZGluYXJ5IGdyYWNl

The NLS annotation follows: Ordinary grace: a novel DB78187 Krueger, William Kent Reading time: 11 hours, 44 minutes. Graham Halstead A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Mystery and Detective Stories Minnesota, 1961. Thirteen-year-old Frank Drum's summer is steeped in death: a neighborhood boy hit by a train, a hobo found dead--and then a member of Frank's family is murdered. Frank is determined to seek vengeance and can't understand why his younger brother isn't. Some violence and some strong language. 2013. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/4358626?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPW9yZGluYXJ5IGdyYWNl

Please join us to discuss this classic novel by a significant 20th century American writer. Here is the NLS annotation: The optimist's daughter / DB 31668 Welty, Eudora. Reading time 4 hours, 26 minutes. Read by Laura Giannarelli. National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Family Description: Laurel Hand, a middle-aged widow since World War II, returns home to a small Mississippi town after the death of her beloved father, a judge. There she confronts her past to gain a better understanding of herself and her parents. Pulitzer Prize, 1973. Your facilitator for this group is Michelle Bernstein (hamletsweetlady@gmail.com).

Please join us to discuss this classic novel by a significant 20th century American writer. Here is the NLS annotation: The optimist's daughter / DB 31668 Welty, Eudora. Reading time 4 hours, 26 minutes. Read by Laura Giannarelli. National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Family Description: Laurel Hand, a middle-aged widow since World War II, returns home to a small Mississippi town after the death of her beloved father, a judge. There she confronts her past to gain a better understanding of herself and her parents. Pulitzer Prize, 1973. Your facilitator for this group is Michelle Bernstein (hamletsweetlady@gmail.com).

Worlds of Books to discuss Sworn to Silence DB 70357 by Linda Castillo. The NLS annotation follows: Sworn to silence DB70357 Castillo, Linda Reading time: 12 hours, 4 minutes. Madelyn Buzzard A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Mystery and Detective Stories At eighteen Kate Burkholder left her Amish community in Painters Mill, Ohio. Now chief of police, Kate is shocked by the reappearance of the serial killer who terrorized their town when she was a girl--because she thought she had killed him. Violence, strong language, and explicit descriptions of sex. 2009.. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/1251243?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVN3b3JuIHRvIHNpbGVuY2U

Worlds of Books to discuss Sworn to Silence DB 70357 by Linda Castillo. The NLS annotation follows: Sworn to silence DB70357 Castillo, Linda Reading time: 12 hours, 4 minutes. Madelyn Buzzard A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Suspense Fiction Mystery and Detective Stories At eighteen Kate Burkholder left her Amish community in Painters Mill, Ohio. Now chief of police, Kate is shocked by the reappearance of the serial killer who terrorized their town when she was a girl--because she thought she had killed him. Violence, strong language, and explicit descriptions of sex. 2009.. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/1251243?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVN3b3JuIHRvIHNpbGVuY2U

On this episode of Tar Heel Talk, the writing contest, introducing Foreign Language Quarterly, some staff interviews and histories mysteries . All this and more in this issue and episode of Tar Heel Talk, the patron newsletter of the North Carolina Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped.

Earlier this week, we lost Ann Parsons who was facilitator of the Mystery Book Discussion Group since its inception. Ann passed away on the evening of 10/4/21 and will be sorely missed. We will remember her at the beginning of our 10/24/21 meeting. Topic: Mystery Book Discussion Group Time: Meets the fourth Sunday of each month at 5pm Eastern. The Mystery Book Discussion Group will meet at 5pm Eastern on 10/24/21 to discuss Rebecca DB48914 by Daphne Du Maurier. BARD has two versions of this book, DB11106 narrated by Dale Carter and DB48914 narrated by Barbara Caruso. The annotation below and the info included in the subject references the title narrated by Barbara Caruso. The NLS annotation follows: Rebecca DB48914 Du Maurier, Daphne Reading time: 16 hours, 34 minutes. Barbara Caruso A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Gothic Fiction Rebecca, the glamorous mistress of a great English estate, died eight months before Maxim de Winter brought a young and frightened second wife to live there. Mystery, intrigue, and violence eventually reveal the circumstances surrounding Rebecca's death. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/4080554?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVJlYmVjY2E

Earlier this week, we lost Ann Parsons who was facilitator of the Mystery Book Discussion Group since its inception. Ann passed away on the evening of 10/4/21 and will be sorely missed. We will remember her at the beginning of our 10/24/21 meeting. Topic: Mystery Book Discussion Group Time: Meets the fourth Sunday of each month at 5pm Eastern. The Mystery Book Discussion Group will meet at 5pm Eastern on 10/24/21 to discuss Rebecca DB48914 by Daphne Du Maurier. BARD has two versions of this book, DB11106 narrated by Dale Carter and DB48914 narrated by Barbara Caruso. The annotation below and the info included in the subject references the title narrated by Barbara Caruso. The NLS annotation follows: Rebecca DB48914 Du Maurier, Daphne Reading time: 16 hours, 34 minutes. Barbara Caruso A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Gothic Fiction Rebecca, the glamorous mistress of a great English estate, died eight months before Maxim de Winter brought a young and frightened second wife to live there. Mystery, intrigue, and violence eventually reveal the circumstances surrounding Rebecca's death. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/4080554?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVJlYmVjY2E

Worlds of Books will skip July due to conventions and meet at 9pm Eastern on 8/17/21 to discuss Two girls down: a novel DB90238 by Louisa Luna. If you like strong female characters as I do, you might also read the second book in this series titled The Janes DB98666. Alice Vega is not a character you will easily forget. The NLS annotation follows: Two girls down: a novel DB90238 Luna, Louisa. Reading time: 12 hours, 5 minutes. Read by Tavia Gilbert. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Mystery and Detective Stories When two young sisters disappear from a strip mall parking lot in a small Pennsylvania town, their devastated mother hires an enigmatic bounty hunter, Alice Vega, to help find them. Shut out immediately by the already stretched-thin local police department, Vega enlists the help of disgraced former cop Max Caplan. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/3796483?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVR3byBnaXJscyBkb3du

Episode Notes The day has finally arrived! The Blind Guys get to meet the new Director of Human Resources, Hector; and there are some new promotions and developments coming down the road. Will Stuart be happy? Let's wait and see... The lads chat about the weather as usual, and Óran tells us that his guide dog Larry has been unwell lately. Jan is about to head off on his holidays, but before he goes a WhatsApp for desktop demo is in order. We have an interview with Dr Judy Dixon, who is Head of Consumer Relations at the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped in Washington DC. Judy has written a new book on audio description, which, as you all know, is our constant obsession. The Microsoft Soundscape app is now available in Ireland. Stuart chats about it, and tells us how he managed to get lost while using it. We've asked him to do a demo for the next podcast, and hope he finds his way back home in time! Clodagh is here with your emails about airport travel and politically correct language. Please keep the emails and voice messages coming - send them to blindguyschat@gmail.com. Clodagh will be so happy! All this and more in this episode. We hope you enjoy it.

We will now be discussing "Joy in the Morning" by Betty Smith. "Joy in the Morning" is the story of Annie and Carl in their first year of marriage in a 1928 Midwestern town. It is a delightful story of the ups and downs of newly married life. Here is the NLS annotation: Joy in the morning DB 38778 Smith, Betty. Reading time 10 hours, 49 minutes. Read by Barbara Rappaport. National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Romance Description: In 1927 eighteen-year-old Annie McGairy arrives in a midwestern university town to marry her boyfriend, Carl Brown, who is studying law. Back in Brooklyn, both sets of parents react badly to the news and cut off all support. Despite the struggle to make ends meet, the couple's good spirits keep them going. As Carl finishes his law degree, Annie, who never went to high school, pursues her dream of becoming a writer. Some strong language. Your facilitator for this group is Michelle Bernstein (hamletsweetlady@gmail.com).

Fiction Old and New will be discussing the book, "The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek" by Kim Michele Richardson, DB 95243, on Friday, March 5, 2021 at 8:00 p.m. eastern time. This is a compelling historic fiction account of the pack mule librarians of the 1930's. This memorable story weaves in themes of family, love, discrimination and friendship. Here is the NLS annotation: The book woman of Troublesome Creek DB 95243 Richardson, Kim Michele. Reading time 9 hours, 28 minutes. Read by Katie Schorr. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Subjects: Historical Fiction Description: Kentucky, 1936. Nineteen-year-old Cussy Mary Carter has been working as part of the Pack Horse Library Project, but her father hopes she'll marry--despite the family trait of blue skin. In addition to her father's hopes, Cussy must also face the prejudice of the community she serves. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2019. Your facilitator for this group is Michelle Bernstein (hamletsweetlady@gmail.com).

Angela Fisher Hall, Regional Librarian and Program Director, and Tim Emmons, Read Adviser, Alabama Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. Alabama Care is partially supported by ACDD.org. The views expressed are not necessarily the views of this organization.

On February 2 we go North across the Canadian Border in the year 1917. NLS ANNOTATION: The great Halifax explosion: a World War I story of treachery, tragedy, and extraordinary heroism DB94498 Bacon, John U. Reading time: 10 hours, 40 minutes. Read by Johnny Heller. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. World History and Affairs An account of the world's largest man-made explosion prior to the creation of the atomic bomb, which took place in 1917 when a freighter carrying thousands of tons of explosives caught fire. Examines the recklessness that led to the tragedy, the ensuing rescue efforts, and the extent of the damage. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2017. Don Queen

Worlds of Books to discuss South of Broad DB69381 by Pat Conroy. The NLS annotation follows: South of Broad: a novel DB69381 Conroy, Pat. Reading time: 20 hours, 42 minutes. Read by David Hartley-Margolin. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. Human Relations Bestsellers Charleston, South Carolina; 1960s. Lonely, troubled Leo and several other high school students form an unlikely but close-knit friendship. They endure crises and successes until their loyalty is put to a final test two decades later, in San Francisco. Strong language and some descriptions of sex. Bestseller. 2009. You can find this book on Bookshare at the following website: https://www.bookshare.org/browse/book/2478260?returnPath=L3NlYXJjaD9tb2R1bGVOYW1lPXB1YmxpYyZrZXl3b3JkPVNvdXRoIG9mIEJyb2Fk

Last Tuesday, on December 1, David Faucheux prepared the recorded portion of the program and facilitated the discussion on the book Neffertiti. It was agreed that any story about the lives of persons who lived over three thousand years ago had to be fictional, although it read like a novel it was informative. On January 5, 2021 at 8:00pm The group will review a book written by the Pulitzer prize winning granddaughter of participants of the Great Migration of six and a half million Afro-Americans to the North. NLS ANNOTATION: The warmth of other suns: the epic story of America's great migration DB71929 Wilkerson, Isabel. Reading time: 19 hours, 57 minutes. Read by Erin Jones. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress. U.S. History Bestsellers Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist chronicles the migration of African Americans from the South during 1915-1970. Recounts experiences of sharecropper's wife Ida Mae Gladney in 1937, citrus picker George Starling in 1945, and physician Pershing Foster in 1953. Asserts that institutionalized racism spurred millions to uproot themselves. Some violence. Bestseller. 2010. Journey THROUGH HISTORY meets monthly on the first Tuesday at 8:00 PM ET.

On today's show I get a little random but towards the end I also talk about my thoughts on being totally blind visually impaired or physically handicapped --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

The featured speakers for this telephone discussion are Katherine Freund, the President and Founder of the Independent Transportation Network (ITN America), a national nonprofit providing transportation to seniors and to adults with visual impairments, and Karen A. Keninger, director of the National Library Service (NLS) for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, where her top initiatives are to increase braille literacy and leveraging technology to improve service to NLS's 500,000-plus patrons.

The featured speakers for this telephone discussion are Katherine Freund, the President and Founder of the Independent Transportation Network (ITN America), a national nonprofit providing transportation to seniors and to adults with visual impairments, and Karen A. Keninger, director of the National Library Service (NLS) for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, where her top initiatives are to increase braille literacy and leveraging technology to improve service to NLS's 500,000-plus patrons.