Ryan Harris, Oxford American | Ep 107 | September 28, 2018
Ryan Harris, originally from St. Louis, Mo., graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, Marketing and Human Resources from Washington University. He took a job as a financial adviser at Equity Financial Services selling insurance. After two years, he realized music was his passion and went to work for New Music Circle and then Sheldon Arts Foundation, both in St. Louis. While there, he produced concerts with a number of local, national, and international artists and organizations.
In 2013, Harris joined the Oxford American Literary Project as Program Director. He has helped establish regular programs at South on Main (the restaurant and cultural venue owned and operated by Matthew and Amy Bell in Little Rock, Arkansas) and in the Oxford American’s annex space.
Along with free outreach programming to support local and regional musicians, writers, and visual artists, Harris has brought both renowned and emerging artists to Little Rock through the ticketed Oxford American Concert Series. The experiences created through this series have helped enhance the cultural offerings in the region and established South on Main as a desirable stop for touring artists.
Listen to the podcast to learn:
Financial advisor finds career in the arts after 2008 banking crises
Volunteerism can open the door to a career in your field
Up In Your Business is a Radio Show by FlagandBanner.com
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EPISODE 107
[INTRODUCTION]
[0:00:08.9] CC: Welcome to Up In your Business with Kerry McCoy, a production of FlagandBanner.com. Through storytelling and conversational interviews, this weekly radio show offers listeners first-hand insight into starting and running a business, the ups and downs of risk-taking and the commonalities of successful people. Connect with Kerry through her candid, often funny and informative weekly blog where you'll read and can comment on life as a wife, mother, daughter and entrepreneur.
Now, it's time for Kerry McCoy to get all Up In your Business.
[INTERVIEW]
[0:00:43.1] KM: Thank you, Chris. Like Chris said, I’m Kerry McCoy and it’s time for me to get up in your business. Before we start, I want to introduce the people at the table. We have who you just heard from Chris Cannon, my co-host, who will be managing the board and taking your calls. Say hello, Chris.
[0:00:57.5] CC: Hi.
[0:00:58.9] KM: Recording the show to make a podcast available next week is our technician Jason Malik from Arise Studios in Conway, Arkansas. If right now you're sitting at your computer, you might want to watch us live on flagangbanner.com’s Facebook page. Matthew, are we live?
[0:01:13.8] M: No.
[0:01:14.5] KM: Oh. No, you don’t want to watch us. How far away are we from being live on FlagandBanner.com’s Facebook page? I don't know, five minutes? Okay.
[0:01:24.6] CC: That’s okay.
[0:01:25.6] KM: It will be ready shortly. I have to take responsibility for that. I was very late getting here, so my technicians didn't have time to get together, so I can't be mad at them. As you noticed, I’m being really nice. Anyway, when it is live it's fun to watch what goes on behind the scenes because there's always something fun going on behind the scenes. If you know me, I'm a funny person, ain’t I Ryan?
[0:01:47.0] RH: You are hilarious. I would describe you as laughing all the time.
[0:01:50.3] KM: Oh, there you go. If for some reason you missed any part of today's show, or want to hear it again, there's a way and Chris is going to tell you how.
[0:02:00.5] CC: Listen to all UIYB past and present interviews by going to FlagandBanner.com and then click on radio show. Also, by joining our e-mail list or liking us on Facebook, you'll get a reminder notification the day of the show with a sneak peak of that day's guest. Back to you Kerry.
[0:02:19.4] KM: Up In your Business with Kerry McCoy began as a platform for me, a small business owner and a guest to pay forward our experiential knowledge in a conversational way. Originally, my team thought and I thought it would appeal to entrepreneurs and want to be entrepreneurs, but it seems to have had a wider audience appeal, because after all, who isn't inspired by everyday people's American-made stories? There are a lot of them out there.
To see people in their totality is humanizing. We all thirst to connect and make sense of an over complicated world. On this show, we have the luxury of time to go deeper than a soundbite, or a headline. It's no secret that successful people work hard, but another common trait found in many of my guests are the heart of a teacher, belief in a higher power and creativity, because business is creative and my gosh, my guest business today is so creative in so many ways on so many levels.
My guest today is Ryan Harris, executive director and programming director for Oxford American Literary Project. This nonprofit is the brainchild of Mr. Warwick Sabin, who by the way is currently running for mayor in the November election and has been on the show before, and who was once the publisher of Oxford American Magazine. Warwick, a New York transplant loves the southern culture as he told us on the show and decided he wanted to highlight the South in a more all-encompassing way than just with his magazine.
He applied and received a grant for his vision, partnered with Amy and Matt Bell to open South on Main restaurant and hired the successful, well-known Mr. Ryan Harris from St. Louis, Missouri to open and found his brainchild, the nonprofit Oxford American Literary Project. Because of Ryan Harris's reputation and good work as director of facilities and events at another nonprofit for the arts, the Sheldon Concert Hall and Art Galleries, Warwick sought him and hired him.
It was 2013 when Ryan moved to Little Rock, Arkansas and the rest is history. Through Oxford American Literary Project, Ryan has successfully built an organization that celebrates and supports southern artists of all genres. He has implemented the Oxford American Geoff Baskin Winters Fellowship Grant and offers UCA students internships at the OA Magazine. Co-worker and once publisher of Oxford American Magazine, Ray Wittenberg says about Ryan, Ryan has made a significant contribution to the cultural quality of life here in our community with his work as program director.
It is a pleasure to welcome to the table the hard-working and well-respected Mr. Ryan Harris and my friend. Thank you for coming on, Ryan.
[0:05:06.3] RH: Kerry, thank you so much. That's a heck of an introduction there.
[0:05:09.7] KM: I told you I could do your eulogy.
[0:05:11.5] RH: I guess you could. I told you, let's go ahead and contract that in right now. Of course, I don't know if you'll be here for my eulogy, but –
[0:05:21.1] KM: What was that – just because I’m older than you? What an age
[inaudible 0:05:26.2].
[0:05:29.2] RH: I just want to get this interview started off on the right foot, which is going to be back and forth banter –
[0:05:34.4] KM: Reckless.
[0:05:35.2] RH: Yeah, reckless. Thanks for having me.
[0:05:37.3] KM: You're welcome. You're from St. Louis, Missouri. Were you born there?
[0:05:41.0] RH: I was not actually. I was born in Nashua, New Hampshire of all places, but lived most of my life in St. Louis.
[0:05:47.6] KM: I don't know why I feel like this, and this may be so far off, but I feel your mother must have been a schoolteacher.
[0:05:53.0] RH: My mother was not a schoolteacher.
[0:05:54.8] KM: I don’t know why I think that value, but you look like a –
[0:05:56.5] RH: My mother-in-law was a schoolteacher though.
[0:05:58.2] KM: Your mother what? Your mother-in-law?
[0:06:00.3] RH: Yeah, my mother-in-law is a school teacher.
[0:06:01.5] KM: You seem like a protégé of a mother who is a schoolteacher and she got good work ethic.
[0:06:07.2] RH: Maybe it's that Catholic guilt or something. Growing up in St. Louis, you got a Catholic Church on every corner.
[0:06:16.0] KM: Is that right?
[0:06:16.8] RH: Oh, absolutely.
[0:06:17.6] KM: You went to school, Olin School of Business at Washington University.
[0:06:20.7] RH: I did.
[0:06:21.7] KM: I have to say the story about Ryan just a minute ago. I called him today, because the radio station, it's a transformer was I get struck by lightning and they're out there on the tower working on it, so we didn't – we weren't going to be able to go live today on the radio. I called Ryan and I said, “Do you want to go ahead? We'll be live on Facebook, we'll be able to make a podcast, we can play it on another day. Do you want to go ahead today?” He said, “Kerry.” When I called him, he answered the phone and said, “Kerry, I have to talked to your staff so many times this week. I feel like I'm on the payroll over there.” I said, “Ryan, I have studied so much about you, I feel like I could do your eulogy, so back at you.”
Anyway, you went to school at Olin School of Business at Washington University, you got a BS, BA, Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. You came out of school and were a financial adviser at Equity Financial Services selling insurance. That does not sound like you. Talk to me about that.
[0:07:12.9] RH: Well, it's interesting. First of all, I'm curious where you got all this information. I didn't know it was widely available out there.
[0:07:21.8] KM: There’s a lot about you online.
[0:07:23.0] RH: Interesting. Yeah, so I was a total sellout. I went to business school at Wash U and had degrees in marketing and HR and worked for money management firm actually right out of school. Had been doing an internship with these guys for a couple years and thought that I enjoyed the work and the lifestyle and all that stuff. Boy, I tell you, 2006 was a tough year for – the only person to be starting in the financial services industry. Yeah, I had some minor success, but ultimately with everything happening in 2007 and 8 with the market, just wasn't the right fit for me and couldn't stomach all the ups and downs. Parallel with that though at the time, I had started learning to produce –
[0:08:15.5] KM: Produce what? Music?
[0:08:16.9] RH: I'm sorry. Produce arts events. A mentor, now a mentor of mine, but a former professor of mine from Wash U named Richard Donnell, he said –
[0:08:28.0] KM: Is that new music circle?
[0:08:29.4] RH: Yeah. Rich has had a profound impact on my life, but parallel with my time starting in financial services I started working with Rich in this small grassroots arts organization called new music circle and really cut my teeth learning how to contract artists, produce shows, all the advance work and liaison that goes into making a live experience, whether that's a concert, or a poetry event, or video.
[0:08:57.0] KM: You liked it. You liked it. You're passionate about it.
[0:08:59.1] RH: Yeah. I loved it and had been doing that while I was trying to build the whole financial services thing and realized at the end of 2008, well this financial services thing is working, but I really love this arts management thing. Yeah.
[0:09:15.5] KM: That's hard work. You work all day at one job and you work all night at your other job, and you see which one plays out and it obviously was the music one. It must not have been making you very much money, because you went from there to let's see, the Sheldon Arts Foundation. How did you make the leap from new music circle to Sheldon Arts Foundation?
[0:09:35.2] RH: Yeah. That's a funny story too. New music circle was just a part-time side gig, doing it for the love of it, getting paid a little bit of money. Quit my job in finance late 2008 and was looking for jobs, looking for internships. I had run a grass cutting business for years, and so was cutting grass and things, just scraping by, trying to figure out how can I land in the arts, how can I find a job here in St. Louis doing something like this. I applied for an internship with the Shelden Arts Foundation for marketing and was lucky enough that they pulled my resume out of obscurity and –
[0:10:18.9] KM: Really?
[0:10:19.6] RH: Wow, this looks great. Unfortunately, we filled this marketing internship position now. Well, you know, it's too bad. We do have another position that's opened up and I said, “Well, what's that?” I said, “A receptionist.” Said, “Oh, and how much does that pay?” “Well, it's a volunteer position, but you'll get down here know get to meet all of us and it'll be a really good experience.” I swallowed my pride two years out of school and money management licenses and a business degree from Wash U and I went and started answering the phones for free at the Sheldon, and did that for about three months. Right when I was at my breaking point and decided I needed to do something with my life here, they said, “Hey, we just had a job open up and we really want you to apply for it.”
Yeah. They gave me a shot and I ended up getting hired onto their operations team. Started managing the building and running the bar actually and worked my way up in over four years basically. By the time I left the Sheldon was the Operations Director. Really learned how to again, produce arts events, but also private events and visual arts events at a high-level there. Sheldon is a nonprofit. They have oh, gosh, over 350 events a year –
[0:11:45.4] KM: There’s only 356 days in a year.
[0:11:48.2] RH: Well, we had – sometimes we had 400 events. Is a nonprofit. It's building built in 1912, not unlike –
[0:11:56.0] KM: The Dreamland Ballroom.
[0:11:57.1] RH: Very similar architecturally to the Dreamland Ballroom. Yeah, the Sheldon was this beautiful space built by the Ethical Society and did nationally touring concerts in jazz, folk, classical genres.
[0:12:14.3] KM: You like all music, don’t you?
[0:12:15.4] RH: I do.
[0:12:16.5] KM: You know who said to do exactly the career path that you just described was Warren Buffett, when he was talking to a group of people at Harvard and they were a bunch of business graduates and they were graduating. Someone said, “How do you get a job at the place that you want to work? We’re all about to graduate, how do we get the job at where we want to work?” He said, “The first way to get a job is don't go for money, but go for – research the company you want to work for, and then get a job there, even if it's sweeping floors and work your way up.”
[0:12:53.6] RH: Yeah. I mean, that's what I did.
[0:12:56.3] KM: Hard workers are recognized. If you're a hard worker and you're dependable, you'll be recognized and rewarded and moved up just exactly like what happened to you. Oxford America came to see you, or you came to see them?
[0:13:08.7] RH: Yeah. That's an interesting story also.
[0:13:13.2] KM: You want to save it for after the break? Let's save it for after the break.
[0:13:15.3] RH: Sure, we can save it after the break.
[0:13:16.7] KM: All right. When we come back, we'll continue our conversation with Mr. Ryan Harris, executive director and program director for Oxford American Literary Project in Little Rock, Arkansas. In this next segment, we'll dissect the sorted history of Oxford American Magazine four-time fall and rise from bankruptcy to solvency. We'll talk about how Ryan interviewed and got the position and moved to Little Rock, and we'll talk about his passion; music and the bands he's booked and heard in St. Louis and his current haunt at South on Main restaurant. Last, we'll learn about his nonprofits internship opportunities through UCA and his Jeff Baskin Writers Fellowship Grant.
[BREAK]
[0:13:54.0] KM: Want to create excitement for your business, or event? Do it with affordable advertisement from arkansasFlagandBanner.com. We have tear drop banners, retractable banners and table drapes, we have street pole banners, museum and exhibit banners, we have custom flags, event tents, tailgating poles, auto graphics and window scrim. Don't forget, welcome home and sale banners. Consult the experts at arkansasFlagandBanner.com. Go online for a free quote, or drop by our historic showroom at 800 West 9th Street in Little Rock.
[0:14:26.1] CC: You're listening to Up In Your Business with Kerry McCoy, a production of FlagandBanner.com. Over 40 years ago with only $400, Kerry McCoy founded Arkansas Flag and Banner. During the last four decades, the business has grown and changed, starting with door-to-door sales, then telemarketing, to mail order and catalog sales, and now a third of their sales come through the internet. This past year, Flag and Banner added another internet feature, live chatting.
Over time, Kerry’s business and leadership knowledge grew. As early as 2004, she began sharing this knowledge in her weekly blog. In 2009, she founded the nonprofit Friends of Dreamland Ballroom, and in 2014, Brave Magazine was launched, whose next publication is slated for October 2018 launched. Today, she has branched out into radio with this very production, podcast and live stream on Facebook.
Each week on this show, you'll hear candid conversations between her and her guests about real-world experiences on a variety of businesses and topics that we hope you'll find interesting and inspiring. If you'd like to ask Kerry a question, or share your story, send an e-mail to questions@upyourbusiness.org. That's questions@upyourbusiness.org, or send her a message on FlagandBanner.com’s Facebook page.
[INTERVIEW CONTINUED]
[0:15:49.4] KM: You’re listening to Up In your Business with me, Kerry McCoy. I'm speaking today with Mr. Ryan Harris, executive director and program director for the nonprofit Oxford American Literary Project in Little Rock, Arkansas; an outreach program that in conjunction with UCA South on Main restaurant and Oxford American Magazine, supports and celebrates regional, mostly southern musicians, writers and visual artists.
Before the break, we talked about how Ryan came from St. Louis, how he has a degree in business and he just happened to graduate from school right about the 2008 crisis, so that degree in business weren’t very good. He followed his passion and began working as a free receptionist at the Sheldon Arts Museum and later worked his way up the ladder to where you became the – let me see, what did you become?
[0:16:35.9] RH: Director of –
[0:16:37.3] KM: Events.
[0:16:37.8] RH: - operations or something.
[0:16:38.9] KM: Facilities and events.
[0:16:40.0] RH: Yeah, and event operations. That’s right. That’s right.
[0:16:40.5] KM: That’s right. Director of facility and events at the Sheldon Art Center. Then he did such a great job that when Oxford American Magazine publisher Warwick Sabin decided he want to branch out from his – from just talking about the south and supporting the south and celebrating the south and the southern culture, he decided he wanted to start this nonprofit. He went and hired Ryan who moved from St. Louis to Little Rock. How did that come to be?
[0:17:09.6] RH: Sure. Interestingly, I mean, the reason that I was ultimately in Little Rock was because of my wife.
[0:17:14.9] KM: Oh, she from Little Rock?
[0:17:16.2] RH: She is from Little Rock. Yeah, we had met in St. Louis shortly before she was taking a job back here. She lived in St. Louis for eight or nine years. She was hired in 2011 to come back to Little Rock. We dated a long distance for a while and ultimately, I decided that that was going to be with her, I needed to –
[0:17:35.9] KM: You got to follow her. She's a doctor.
[0:17:37.7] RH: That's right. Yeah.
[0:17:38.2] KM: She's a medical doctor. You got to follow that career.
[0:17:41.1] RH: That’s right. Yeah.
[0:17:41.7] KM: You worked too hard to get that degree, you got to follow it around. Now how many years you have to go to school, like 10?
[0:17:47.3] RH: Yeah, way too many. I don't know. I was done after four. At any rate, so yeah. I moved down here in February 2013 to follow her and was just lucky enough to say, be needing a job in Little Rock right around the time when the Oxford American had made this decision to –
[0:18:09.1] KM: Start a nonprofit.
[0:18:10.9] RH: Well, actually they started nonprofit earlier. The nonprofit was officially incorporated in 2004, but the venue part – the whole South on Main thing was something that happened in 2012 through an ArtPlace America Grant. Essentially, the 08 one, this Creative Placemaking grant through an organization called ArtPlace America to take the space that's now South on Main, do a big rehab of it and turn it into a place where people could come and have an Oxford American experience. II was hired to be the program director of South on Main to help the magazine realize its idea, its vision and its obligation to come through and create the space due to this grant that we got.
[0:19:01.0] KM: Obligation, that's right. Because in 2004, it was a nonprofit. Why would they have a nonprofit in 2004? Is it published by the nonprofit and written by the for-profit?
[0:19:13.3] RH: No. Interestingly, the magazine was founded 1992 as a for-profit in Oxford, Mississippi. Then it as you've noted or alluded to had a series of financial problems over the years, but eventually in 2000 or 2001 it was sold to a media group in Little Rock.
[0:19:33.8] KM: At home Arkansas.
[0:19:34.8] RH: Yeah, at home Arkansas. They ran it for a year too and it wasn't really working out, and so it went out of business again, and then was revitalized in 2004, and at that time affiliated with UCA and incorporated as nonprofit.
[0:19:49.3] KM: Oh, I get it. That's why they had to be a nonprofit. For UCA to get involved, they had to have – part of it as a nonprofit.
[0:19:54.3] RH: Exactly. That's when we really beefed up the educational side of things.
[0:19:59.9] KM: That’s very creative. That's very creative. All right, let's just tell our listeners the story, the history, because I love how Oxford American Magazine started. In 1989, a man named Marc Smirnoff, like vodka and Smirnoff vodka. I think it's gluten free too, just FYI. I know. I don't know why it doesn't advertise that.
[0:20:23.2] RH: You know what? Maybe you should start Flag and Banner vodka.
[0:20:27.5] KM: I k now. I mean, Tito's is really charging the money for gluten-free vodka and Smirnoff is naturally gluten-free and is cheap and they don't even tell anybody.
[0:20:36.0] RH: I would assume at all is this distilled from potatoes, isn’t it?
[0:20:38.1] KM: No. It’s all from wheat, even the real expensive stuff has been on wheat. All that expensive vod just made from wheat.
[0:20:43.8] RH: Shows what I know.
[0:20:45.0] KM: Well, that's because you're not gluten-free. Anyway, so in 1989 in Oxford, Mississippi, Marc Smirnoff like the vodka, was on a road trip, he's from California, a suburb outside of San Francisco suburb and his BMW broke down in Oxford, Mississippi on this cross-country excursion that probably in 1987 couldn't get parts. I don't know why, but he ended up staying there and working at a bookstore, an independent little bookstore called Square Books. Oddly enough, John Grisham, the guy who's written bestsellers year-after-year lived in Oxford, Mississippi and this little bookstore had a lot of really important writers coming through there, and this guy Marc Smirnoff got the idea to start a magazine about this town.
[0:21:31.7] RH: Yeah. The story goes and obviously I wasn't there, but the way it's been told to me is essentially what you said. There's this great community of writers in Oxford at the time, who were having to send their work elsewhere to potentially get published mostly to New York, which remains obviously the literary capital of the country today. They got together and on a shoestring and said, “Gosh, why don't we start this – start our own magazine?” They did.
[0:22:01.2] KM: Yeah, because there was the Atlantic Monthly, which talked about Atlanta, and then there was the New Yorker, which talked about New York. There was nothing that was really about the south. He wanted to make a little bit broader and more southern.
[0:22:13.3] RH: Yeah. I mean, I think a general interest magazine, but focused on the south and I think his original artist statement, or vision statement doesn't necessarily say it had to be, or the idea wasn't necessary that it was focused on the south as much as it just so happens that this is happening in the south.
Over the years, that vision has evolved and we've really obviously come to be known for is this organization that has empowered hundreds of artists and helped launch and sustain the careers of many now significant southern writers, artists, visual artists and musicians.
[0:22:55.9] KM: What a great legacy.
[0:22:57.1] RH: Yeah. It's really special to be a part of that. I mean, I fully acknowledge I've been with the organization five years now and there's this huge legacy and brand that was built during this 20 years prior to my involvement. I'm just really grateful to be a part of that, and again, I think that what we do is really important. It's very much –
[0:23:20.0] KM: Nobody's doing it.
[0:23:20.8] RH: - I feel lucky. There are other people doing it, but I feel very lucky to be in a position where essentially my job is to help empower these creative voices, these people who are shaping the cultural legacy of the region for the years to come.
[0:23:33.3] KM: I think Southern Living magazine is more of a woman's magazine. This is more of a writer’s magazine.
[0:23:38.3] RH: Yeah, it's more of a writer’s magazine. An artistic magazine. I would say unlike maybe a commercial publication, we have always been focused on the content first, because we're not trying to run a for-profit business that essentially exists to sell advertising to niche marketers.
[0:24:01.1] KM: Well, maybe you should. It’s going belly-up four times. You should very change your hat down.
[0:24:05.8] RH: Yeah, maybe that is part of the problem.
[0:24:06.2] KM: I don’t know why everything for-profit is a negative word, because –
[0:24:09.6] RH: It’s not a negative word, but what I’m saying is the fact that we're nonprofit allows us I think the flexibility to focus on content first, rather than gosh, we need to – cater to a certain profile, because we know that we're going to be able to sell those ads to X, Y and Z. Maybe unlike some of those other titles that you talked about, we have been maybe a little bit more authentic and genuine to what some of the complex social, economic, racial challenges have been that had faced the south and have confronted those head-on, rather than presenting this idealized romanticized version of the south with gingham tablecloths and iced tea sitting on the front porch.
[0:24:51.7] KM: Well, there’s nothing wrong with that. All right, so listen. The debut was 1992. He got all these writers to for-free these paid professional pro writers to write for free articles. He put in his magazine and he launched it in 1992. He did it with his credit card. He launched it with money off his credit card, which is a lot of small businesses do, and he also did it with a bunch of his friends, which I think is the great friends and family and credit card I think it's a great way to start a small business. I think that is – I mean, I'd rather do that than a bank. You often hear that. If you go to the SBA, they'll say go to your friends and family and credit cards first.
[0:25:32.3] RH: Interesting.
[0:25:33.1] KM: I know. He also had the cover of the magazine was done by a local artist, I think for free, but it was only published for two years because in 1994 it didn't have enough funding and probably no one wanted to keep writing for free.
[0:25:50.6] RH: Probably not.
[0:25:52.3] KM: Artists have a problem about selling ads. I mean, about sales let's just say that, about sales. They want to create, instead of doing that the sales part.
[0:26:02.4] RH: Different way of thinking.
[0:26:03.6] KM: It's a different way of thinking. It stopped in 1994. Count. That's the first time it goes – it came up and went down. Okay, the second time was a year later and John Grisham who we talked about a few minutes ago in Oxford couldn't stand it. He decided to put his own money and resurrected it.
[0:26:20.5] RH: Yeah. Again, that's my understanding. I wasn't there but yeah, John became the first publisher I guess at that point. There's actually a great letter from him that he had a letter from the publisher that's appeared in one of those early issues and just saying something to the effect of – Marc Smirnoff asked me to be the publisher of the Oxford American and I agreed and then I said, “Well, what does a publisher actually do? What am I supposed to do?” It was this –
[0:26:56.6] KM: You're the man with the money.
[0:26:57.7] RH: Yeah, quirky kind self-aware joke about well, I got myself into this. Not really sure what it is, but yeah. My understanding is that he – Grisham provide a lot of financial backing for a number of years and there was some strategy around serializing some of his books and releasing them piecemeal in the Oxford American. At that time, I think some of the strategy or some of the –
[0:27:30.3] KM: Yeah, the painted house, which is actually about Arkansas.
[0:27:33.6] RH: The advice was well gosh, we need to really up the circulation on this thing. Let's get it on every grocery store, newsstand in the country, and so they were printing tons and tons of copies.
[0:27:45.8] KM: That will make you go bankrupt fast. Smirnoff is still the editor and Grisham's now on a money man.
[0:27:52.2] RH: That's my understanding.
[0:27:53.6] KM: They're doing a book. They're going to, like you said, do snippets out of his, or short stories about teasers out of the book he's writing. The one he did was the painted house, which I thought was about Arkansas, which I read, which was good and I don’t even read and I read it. It was good. Okay, but after in – he pulled the plug on that in 2000. He did it five years, he said. This is a whole where all my money goes, like the song.
That's okay, that's one, that's two. That’s two resurrections and two downs. Now third, and two years later, it comes to Little Rock. Like you said, it was in conjunction with at home Arkansas, and they tried to do it, but again, insufficient advertising revenue. They sell for a living. They have a staff that sells. Why is it hard to sell ads in Oxford America?
[0:28:49.6] RH: That's a great question.
[0:28:50.4] KM: American.
[0:28:51.4] RH: I wish I knew the answer to it. I mean, I think because part of it is because it's very niche, it's relatively small circulation, right?
[0:29:02.0] KM: How many? What is the circulation?
[0:29:03.5] RH: Currently, it's about 20,000 copies for the non-music issues and 50,000 for the music issue.
[0:29:12.1] KM: People pay for those, right? It's not a free publication.
[0:29:15.2] RH: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Newsstand price is $10.95.
[0:29:20.1] KM: It's an expensive magazine, but it's almost books. How many articles are in?
[0:29:24.0] RH: Yeah. I mean, the way we look at it is good riding and good art or worth paying for.
[0:29:29.6] KM: I agree.
[0:29:30.5] RH: We are compared to and are in the same league as other magazines, like the New Yorker and like the Atlantic.
[0:29:38.8] KM: How much does it cost?
[0:29:40.2] RH: I can tell you what the exact newsstand price is now.
[0:29:41.2] KM: You don’t know what your competition is paying. Well, you’re not –
[0:29:43.4] RH: It’s over $10 an issue. Going back to your question, why is it difficult to sell ads for the Oxford American? I wish I knew the answer to that. Other than the circulation is relatively low and what we do again is very – it's very niche, it's done on a high-quality level, it's very much about the quality of the writing in the art and it's not marketing-driven first. It’s editorially driven first.
[0:30:15.2] KM: Which is why it was good. Again, third time down, third resurrection, third they decide at home group of magazines decides to stop in 2003, and in 2004 it is turned into a nonprofit, which I think is perfect. UCA comes in and gives it the revitalization it needs. Moves it to Conway campus.
[0:30:36.4] RH: Yeah. They were I guess in the old main building for a while up there, and then a few years after that they moved to a house off-campus for a while, but we've essentially had an ongoing affiliation with UCA since 2004.
[0:30:54.2] KM: Now they're doing great. You're doing great. It's 2004. This is the one – this is why this could be a Netflix series. I swear it could, because in 2008 are y'all sitting down, the secretary, the business secretary is caught embezzling money.
[0:31:11.7] RH: Yeah.
[0:31:12.0] KM: Can you believe that? They're solvent, they're doing good, she's not paying the corporate taxes and she embezzles money for about a year. She pleads guilty, goes to jail, supposed to give the money back, but it's going to be just like OJ, you're never going to see a dime, because she's going to be a cash-only, pay me cash-only everything. Am I wrong? Hhas she paid any money, or do you know?
[0:31:36.2] RH: I can’t comment on that.
[0:31:37.7] KM: Oh yeah, you can. Okay, so UCA saves the day again. They restructure. They take the current publisher and replace him with Warwick Sabin. He was already on the table at the University of Arkansas as a spokesperson, and he's doing such a good job as a spokesperson they say, “Come in and save Oxford Magazine.” Warwick is like, “Okay.”
[0:32:10.0] RH: Yeah. Again, I don't know all the details of it, but my understanding is for several years he worked for free as the publisher. He was –
[0:32:18.7] KM: You’re kidding.
[0:32:20.2] RH: No, I'm not. Again, I could be wrong at this, but I believe he was –
[0:32:24.2] KM: People are so passionate that work over there.
[0:32:26.3] RH: He was working full-time at UCA and then part of his responsibilities became, or his time was spent doing rang VOA and doing that. Yeah, he certainly was key and building a new board. I think putting some structure in place that hadn't been there.
[0:32:51.2] KM: A mystery donor shows up around this time and gives the OA a $100,000. I can guess who that was.
[0:33:00.4] RH: Yeah, to pay back the taxes.
[0:33:02.9] KM: To get them out of the IRS debt.
[0:33:05.0] RH: Yup. We were very fortunate about that.
[0:33:07.0] KM: Okay, here's another one and you don't have to talk very much about this. Here we are right before Ryan's about to come to work, you're just about to come to work for Oxford America and the guy that we've been talking about, Marc Smirnoff has a disgruntled employee that quits and slaps a sexual harassment case on him.
[0:33:26.4] RH: Yeah, I mean –
[0:33:27.0] KM: I’m telling you it’s a Netflix mini-series.
[0:33:29.5] RH: Maybe you should produce it, Kerry.
[0:33:31.9] KM: No, because I’ll just tell it because they're producing we just learned and publishing cost money. I'll just tell it, because I have researched it. It's a convoluted story. You get the sexual harassment case against Marc Smirnoff and his managing editor, Carol Ann Fitzgerald.
[0:33:50.0] RH: Yeah. What I know is basically what's known publicly, what's been written publicly, but that's – you've said it as I understand and –
[0:33:59.8] KM: He denies it.
[0:34:00.9] RH: That was very – that made national news and this article in New York Times and it was very traumatic moment for the organization, not only because the founding editor who'd been with the organization 20 years and was – in many ways, this big personality and this lifeblood that was determined to keep this thing going all of a sudden was out. I think there was a lot of publicity around that that was generated by Smirnoff that was bashing the regime and it was this moment, I think this pivotal moment where people, writers had lost their confidence on well gosh, can the OA exist without its founding editor, and da, da, da, da, da.
Low and behold we were fortunate that during that transition period Roger Hodge was hired who had formerly been the editor of Harper's Magazine in New York.
[0:34:59.8] KM: Oh, really.
[0:35:01.5] Attendee 4: Roger brought a lot of stabilization. He redesigned the magazine, brought a lot of grace to it and many ways helped again move us toward professionalizing and consistency of the output and the writing and things like that.
[0:35:16.0] KM: Where did he live? Did he move here?
[0:35:17.7] RH: H did not know. Roger was based in Brooklyn. It’s one of these interesting phenomena about business these days, especially things that can be done remotely over the internet is that when I started at the OA, we had employees, or contractors, or affiliates who were involved in making the magazine probably in six, or seven different locations around the country.
[0:35:41.0] KM: This editor didn't move.
[0:35:42.8] RH: Editor didn't move.
[0:35:44.2] KM: Had stayed where he was.
[0:35:45.5] RH: Stayed where he was, but provided some great stabilization. You trained and hired some excellent young editors, brought them into the fold. Shortly after Had was hired, I was hired to come down. While the magazine stuff was being stabilized and reimagined following Smirnoff's departure, we also had this vision and this obligation to follow through and open the venue space.
[0:36:20.4] KM: Because you had already gotten the grant.
[0:36:21.8] RH: We already gotten the grant. There are a lot of moving pieces going on at that time. We had also not – yeah, not too much before then had started this video series called so lost, which was shot and produced by a brilliant man named Dave Anderson who lives here in Little Rock that won a national magazine award. Work really helped the OA expand its thinking and expand its footprint as being more than a magazine and starting to be a multimedia, really just a media company that was leveraging the brand, the brand's equity and curatorial instincts and relationships to be existing in these other places, like a live event experience, like a video series. They've done some radio things in conjunction with NPR, etc., etc.
[0:37:16.7] KM: That's wonderful. This is a great place to take a break. When we come back, we'll continue our conversation with Mr. Ryan Harrison, executive director and program director of Oxford American Literary Project. We’ll talk about his passion music and his jazz series, ain’t it called jazz series? What’s your Thursday night called?
[0:37:31.7] RH: That we just called the concert series at South on Main.
[0:37:36.0] RH: The concert. We’ll talk about his passion the concert series, which is a music, and bands that he's booked and heard in St. Louis and in Little Rock and we’ll be back after the break. First, I want to remind everybody we're broadcasting live every Friday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. central time on KABF 88.3 FM, the voice of the people. I guess, we're broadcasting live.
[0:37:57.6] CC: Well, I –
[0:37:58.8] KM: I don't know. I told everybody on Facebook earlier that we – that the tower had been struck by lightning, so we may not be broadcasting live, but we are broadcasting live on FlagandBanner.com’s Facebook page, and that after one week of every showing, of every shows airing, a podcast is made available, so anybody can go and see it later, and we will replay this again on the air on KABF. You can listen to it and on the podcast on all popular listening sites and YouTube,
[BREAK]
[0:38:26.8] KM: Boost morale and patriotism with a new flag or flagpole from Arkansas’ FlagandBanner.com. We have poles, hardware, accessories, maintenance support, installation and custom flags. We have flags of all kind; for the sports enthusiast, the world traveler, or history buff, we have them all. Bring in your old flag and get $5 off a new one. Consult the experts at Arkansas’ FlagandBanner.com. Come shop at our historic location at 800 West 9th Street in Little Rock, or visit us online at FlagandBanner.com.
[0:38:58.7] CC: FlagandBanner.com is proud to underwrite Up In your Business with Kerry McCoy. This weekly radio show and podcast offers listeners firsthand insight into starting and running a business, the ups and downs of risk-taking and the commonalities of successful people shared in a conversational interview with Kerry.
Along with this radio show, FlagandBanner.com publishes a free bi-annual magazine called Brave. First published in October in 2014, this magazine features every day people’s real-life stories of bravery. It’s goal, to inspire you to celebrate your own bravery and challenge you to recognize it in others.
The Department of Arkansas Heritage recognized Brave magazine’s documentation of American life and micro-fishes all additions for the Arkansas state archives. Brave Magazine will be in your mailbox and hitting newsstands October 2018. Free subscriptions and advertising opportunities are available at FlagandBanner.com by selecting Magazine, where you can read previous stories and learn about advertising opportunities.
[INTERVIEW CONTINUED]
[0:40:04.8] KM: You're listening to Up In your Business with me, Kerry McCoy and I'm speaking today with Mr. Ryan Harris, executive director and program director for Oxford American Literary Project in Little Rock, Arkansas. An outreach program, that in conjunction with UCA, South on Main restaurant and Oxford American magazine supports and celebrates regional, mostly southern musicians, writers and visual artists. We liftoff videographers you were just talking about.
[0:40:26.1] RH: Yeah, Dave Anderson. So lost series.
[0:40:30.0] KM: Yes. I want to take this opportunity to give a big shout out and a big thank you to Centennial Bank for partnering with the Friends of Dreamland Ballroom and sponsoring this year's dancing into dreamland, which is Friday November the 2nd. Tickets and a few tables are still available online. Before the break, we talked about how you're a business major, then we talked about the history of Oxford American Magazine and how it should be a Netflix series. It's really crazy. Now we want to talk about Ryan Harris and how you – you said you came here, because your wife was a doctor and she was coming here. What about Oxford American sold you on the idea?
[0:41:14.9] RH: Yeah. I’d been working at this concert hall, the prior four or five years. Like I said, was just in the right place at the right time where the Oxford American was opening new venue space and they needed somebody to program it. What that actually meant was they needed somebody with operations experience to start –
[0:41:39.4] RH: You were a facility and event operations person.
[0:41:41.9] RH: Yup.
[0:41:42.5] KM: Did you apply for the job, or did he come and find you, Warwick?
[0:41:45.9] RH: How did that happen? Yeah, I applied for the job. I was introduced to Warwick by some colleagues of my wife who knew him through Hendrix, or something. I had coffee with him in late 2012 and he –
[0:42:06.8] KM: Laid the groundwork.
[0:42:06.9] RH: Told me what his vision was and I said, “Well yeah. I think I can do that. Here's what I've been doing the last five years on this level.” To be honest, I didn't think that I'd be a candidate for the job.
[0:42:20.3] KM: Why?
[0:42:21.4] RH: Because what was described was very, very programming heavy. Though I did have a little bit of talent buying experience at the Sheldon, most of my job was operations. I was a little bit surprised when he said, “I'm considering you to be a serious candidate for this position,” so I went ahead and applied and put a plan together and was hired in late 2013, and then started – I'm sorry, late 2012 and started in early 2013. Where was I going with all that, Kerry?
[0:42:54.0] KM: Did he throw out Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen’s names when he did that?
[0:42:57.5] RH: He did not. No.
[0:42:58.9] KM: Because I can tell everybody how they're involved in this.
[0:43:01.5] RH: Sure. Oxford American does not own South on Main, We helped create the space through a grant, through tenant improvements, some things like thatm but our partners met Amy Bell who operates the South on Main the restaurant. They are family with Mary Steenburgen, whose of course married to Ted Danson. Mary and Ted became involved with the restaurant as masters.
[0:43:32.4] KM: Friends and family.
[0:43:33.7] RH: Yup, friends and family.
[0:43:34.6] KM: It’s the best way.
[0:43:35.8] RH: Yeah. The original vision for the space programming seven nights a week, all this stuff, literary, music, film, culinary, you name it. As our as our mutual friend Kathleen King sometimes says, you got to turn on the hot water and the cold water to get the temperature right. We adjusted some things after it got started, and I figured out way to make South on Main work. It works best for music events. Given my background the prior a few years, I was able to bring some relationships and some curatorial maybe sensibilities to bring in stuff to Little Rock that really wasn't appearing here previously and being very careful to curate those experiences to what the acoustical properties and the environment is in the room.
[0:44:40.7] KM: I've heard some great bands. How many people sit in this? How many is it able to sit?
[0:44:45.0] RH: It’s around 200.
[0:44:45.6] KM: It doesn't look that big.
[0:44:47.4] RH: Yeah. I try to focus the Oxford American booking on what I would call listening music. Little Rock really didn't have a proper listening room when I moved here. My understanding is the afterthought for years and years was a listening experience, but it really wasn't doing a whole lot of national stuff when I moved here. We've been really fortunate to built an audience of appreciative music lovers over the last five years who enjoy coming and having this really intimate experience.
[0:45:17.6] KM: The dreamland ballroom had a lot of great play there, because it was a stop on the touring Chitlin’ Circuit people drove. Maybe people fly now, or do they still drive in their buses?
[0:45:28.6] RH: The majority of people drive.
[0:45:31.9] KM: Are we still the stop between New Orleans and St. Louis? New Orleans, Chicago, New Orleans and Memphis, so you pick up a lot of good – because it seems like you have some really good talent there on Thursday nights.
[0:45:41.6] RH: Yeah. An interesting conspiracy of circumstances that came together to make this all possible, but the short of it is yeah, geographically, you got to drive through Arkansas to get between Texas and Tennessee. Many, many tours start –
[0:45:58.2] KM: Oh, Memphis.
[0:45:59.1] RH: Many, many tours start in Nashville. Texas is such a huge market. People can spend two weeks playing there. One or the other going and from –
[0:46:11.9] KM: Going and froming.
[0:46:12.7] RH: Going and froming.
[0:46:13.5] CC: That’s good. Going and froming.
[0:46:15.9] KM: I think I’m going to do it tonight.
[0:46:17.2] KM: Can’t wait you going and froming. Brought to you by FlagandBanner.com.
[0:46:24.4] RH: Yeah. Interestingly yeah, we're able to grab some artists who are traveling through maybe to play bigger paying shows and bigger markets between Texas and Tennessee, or maybe between, you know.
[0:46:35.8] KM: You've got some great stuff. This has got to be – I didn't really know about the sexual harassment thing about how big of a deal it was till I read about it. I knew it happened, because I know all of you all and I knew it happened. Warwick Sabin leaving I thought was a shocker to everybody. You've been there about a year and Warwick comes in and says –
[0:46:58.3] RH: Not even a year.
[0:46:59.2] KM: Not even a year. He's hired you –
[0:47:00.7] RH: South on Main hadn't even opened yet.
[0:47:02.3] KM: Oh, has it not even opened yet?
[0:47:04.1] RH: No.
[0:47:04.9] KM: He comes and says, “I’ve done my stint. I want to run for office. I'm going to resign as the editor.” Tell us about that day.
[0:47:15.1] RH: Yeah. I don't think that I – I don't think I fully realized the impact of that situation at that point. It was until a little bit later that I think I realized what that meant, because I was so new there and had been so head down on this other thing, getting this venue space going. Literally meeting with contractors every day and getting the flooring done.
Yeah. I mean, Warwick had done – he brought this vision that really, like I said expanded the OA into a media company. It was surprising to many of us that that he left. It was a big hole to fill. I mean, he’s a very intelligent person, he's a brilliant fundraiser and knows a lot of people and so –
[0:48:06.4] KM: Well-connected.
[0:48:07.2] RH: Yeah.
[0:48:08.0] KM: I just want to take a real quick break and tell everybody you're listening to Up In your Business with me, Kerry McCoy and I'm speaking today with Mr. Ryan Harris, executive director and program director of the nonprofit Oxford American literary project in Little Rock, Arkansas an outreach program, in conjunction with UCA, South on Main restaurant and Oxford American Magazine. Supports and celebrates regional musicians, writers, videographers and visual artists. All right, so in walks the savior, Eliza Borne, a 30-year-old to fill Warwick Sabin’s huge shoes.
[0:48:40.3] RH: Sort of. A slight correction there. Actually, Ray Wittenberg became the interim publisher after Warwick left.
[0:48:49.6] KM: That’s right. I forgot. He had been that before.
[0:48:52.4] RH: He had been that before.
[0:48:53.8] KM: He knew the role.
[0:48:55.6] RH: Ray knew the role. The board had Ray be the interim publisher for a while. Shortly thereafter, the editor Roger Hodge decided to resign because he was offered a new job working with a company called The Intercept in Brooklyn.
[0:49:10.9] KM: You've lost your core people. You've lost Roger the editor, you've lost Warren the publisher, you're brand new, you're thinking, “I'm going down on the ship.”
[0:49:20.2] RH: Yeah. Well again, I don't – because I was so head down focused on this venue thing, I don't think I realized how big of a deal it was at the time looking back on it now, how crazy it was. Maybe I'm just not that smart. At any rate yeah, that was a very serious moment for the organization. There was some board restructuring that was done at the time. Like this phoenix rising from the ashes, it's really the core group of people who really cared about the mission and about seeing the thing continue that some of the younger and newer folks that Roger had brought in and me that really buckle down.
[0:49:59.9] KM: Was Eliza already working there?
[0:50:01.5] RH: Yeah. Interestingly, Eliza Borne and I started on the exact same day.
[0:50:04.7] KM: I didn't realize that.
[0:50:06.1] RH: She was hired either as an associate, or assistant editor. She's a Little Rock native, but she had been working in Nashville for a company called Book Page and had run into Roger Hodge at a conference. Hodge chatted her up and discovered she had been an intern at the OA five or six years prior and that she was from Little Rock. She casually said, “Well, the only thing that would get me to move back to Little Rock would be working for the Oxford American,” and so he hired her. Interestingly, Eliza and I didn't know each other. We lived in different parts of the country, but we started on the same day.
[0:50:40.6] KM: Then she left.
[0:50:42.2] RH: She did not leave.
[0:50:43.3] KM: She went to Nashville I thought you said.
[0:50:44.4] RH: No, no, no. She was recruited from Nashville –
[0:50:47.4] KM: On that day.
[0:50:48.3] RH: - to start working –
[0:50:49.0] KM: On that day.
[0:50:49.8] RH: Yeah, to start working in Little Rock. Anyway yeah, so she worked her way up through the ranks on the editorial side, along with some other young folks who have now been with us five, six years that just really had the passion and the commitment –
[0:51:03.0] KM: She started a writer?
[0:51:04.7] RH: An editor, yeah. Assistant or associate editor. I don’t know what her official title was, but when Hodge leaves, she became the interim editor and we did a national search for an editor and interviewed several people. Ultimately, the board decided that Eliza was the most qualified, best fit for where we were as an organization. In fall of 2015, she becomes the first female editor of the organization and –
[0:51:31.5] KM: 30-years-old.
[0:51:33.1] RH: The third editor in the organization's history. She's done a brilliant job.
[0:51:37.7] KM: Her co-worker is Jay Jennings who is a rock star really.
[0:51:44.0] RH: Jay is a rock star in many ways.
[0:51:45.2] KM: In many ways. He's done Sports Illustrated in tennis, he's the author of carry the rock, race football in the soul of American city about the Central High football team 50 years after the 1957 integration crisis, which was nationally acclaimed. He's worked in New York, he's done lots of things. He's also a Little Rock native. He says this about Eliza, which I just love her named Eliza, it's such an old-fashioned name. He says, “As a person who has worked for New York magazines for the past 20 years, I can say Eliza is the equal of any editor I've worked with.” He continues to say, “And I feel so lucky that this place where I can come and do what I love is just five blocks away from where I live in my own hometown.”
[0:52:32.7] RH: Yeah. Yeah, having that endorsement from Jay Jennings is a big deal. He's a prince of a guy. I've never met anybody who he didn't instantly light up and say, “Oh, I love Jay Jennings.” More than that, he's a brilliant editor and –
[0:52:45.3] KM: Really? He’s her assistant editor, or senior editor.
[0:52:48.4] RH: Yeah. Jay is a senior editor. He's brought a lot of relationships, a lot of again life experience to the big picture of where the magazine goes, what place that it has and the literary and arts landscape nationally, and he's just been a wonderful advocate and I think mentor to many of us, myself included.
[0:53:13.3] KM: It's interesting to me that you're right, it's like that Eagle song, once you get there, you can never leave. What's that song?
[0:53:19.5] RH: Oh, you're talking about that line from Hotel California. You can check out any time you'd like, but you can't never leave.
[0:53:24.9] KM: That is your – we practiced that. That is the Oxford American’s motto to me, because Ray is still there, and he's been publisher down two times. Eliza came back. You'll have Smirnoff back before you know it. No. Think about John Grisham, he came back twice.
[0:53:54.7] RH: Did he?
[0:53:55.5] KM: Well, you did it first with Smirnoff and he came back and published it himself second time. Think about that.
[0:54:03.1] RH: Yeah, that –
[0:54:05.3] KM: No comment. All right
[0:54:06.5] RH: Okay. No comment.
[0:54:07.3] KM: Thursday music series. What do you got planned? What's coming up?
[0:54:13.0] RH: Yeah. Believe it or not, this is our I think fifth season, or sixth season. We’ve been doing this six –
[0:54:20.1] KM: How do people sign up and get involved and learn about it?
[0:54:22.7] RH: Yeah. Visit oxfordamerican.org/events and that'll show you all the events that we have that we're doing here in Little Rock and/or anyplace else in the country. Actually, we're about to announce the six nights of events that we're doing in North Carolina to accompany our North Carolina Music Issue. Yeah, so we'll be announcing that next week.
[0:54:44.4] RH: You’re all hard workers. Arlo Guthrie?
[0:54:47.7] RH: Yeah. Our gala this year, so our biggest fundraiser helps keep the lights on at the OA. We've got the legendary folky Arlo Guthrie coming to Little Rock.
[0:54:57.1] KM: I mean, that’s a big deal.
[0:54:58.9] RH: Yeah. Arlo is wonderful.
[0:54:59.9] KM: What day is that?
[0:55:01.1] RH: It’s Wednesday, November 7th. It’s down at Ron Robinson Theater.
[0:55:04.6] KM: Great venue. You sit down and watch him?
[0:55:07.2] RH: Yeah.
[0:55:08.0] KM: It’s a sit down and watch Arlo Guthrie on the stage. You don't have to dance for people who don't want to dance. You have to get up and swing, sway.
[0:55:14.9] RH: No, no. To be a pre-concert reception. Yeah, tickets are at Oxford American –
[0:55:19.7] KM: How much?
[0:55:20.5] RH: I’m sorry, tickets are at metrotix.com, but for more information, oxfordamerican.org/events.
[0:55:26.4] KM: You know how much they are?
[0:55:27.4] RH: Yeah, they're $200 for the orchestra level and a 150 for the balcony.
[0:55:32.8] KM: That would be a great night. What times it start to? Because I like to do it early.
[0:55:35.7] RH: Doors open at 6:00. You got a reception for two hours and then Arlo goes on stage at 8.
[0:55:42.0] KM: That's good. You know I don't like it when they start at 9. That's too late for me.
[0:55:45.0] RH: Yeah. It's bedtime.
[0:55:46.6] KM: Well, Arlo’s people are all bedtime people too, right? You’re not going to get a bunch of 20-year-olds down there. They don’t got any money anyway.
[0:55:53.3] RH: What’s that, 20-year-olds or –
[0:55:54.0] KM: Yeah.
[0:55:54.7] RH: Okay. Yeah.
[0:55:55.1] KM: You want the older people that go to bed early and have the deep pockets.
[0:55:57.9] RH: The old folkies.
[0:55:59.8] KM: That’s what you want. I love it. Thank you. I've enjoyed visiting with you so much.
[0:56:04.1] RH: Thank you, Kerry.
[0:56:05.2] KM: I love you. You know I do.
[0:56:06.3] RH: As always, you're looking and sounding fabulous.
[0:56:09.0] KM: Well, thank you. Look what I have for you, a desk set.
[0:56:12.9] RH: Oh, Kerry McCoy.
[0:56:13.1] KM: Arkansas, US and what’s that?
[0:56:16.2] RH: Missouri.
[0:56:16.9] KM: Yeah.
[0:56:18.6] RH: Boy, you almost got me in there because I am like, “I haven’t seen that. I haven’t seen that in the middle. Wait, I know that one.”
[0:56:23.6] KM: I know. You had that deer in the headlights look when I said that it was like, “Oh, she’s going to bust me out.”
[0:56:28.4] RH: Friends.
[0:56:29.6] KM: Friends. Who is my guest next week, Chris?
[0:56:33.3] CC: That's going to be P. Allen Smith who is the current host of two television shows on PBS, P. Allen Smith's Garden Home and P. Allen Smith's Garden to Table.
[0:56:43.2] KM: I have been trying to get him for two years. He's hard to pin down. You noticed that about him?
[0:56:48.6] CC: He’s been – Hey, I'm glad I'm not coming after him. He's a tough act to follow.
[0:56:51.7] KM: He's a great guy. I've known P. Allen Smith before he had the P. He was just Allen. He really, I have known him for so long and I have beat up on him to come on the radio show. He's finally agreed. I'm really, really excited. I think he's trying to get another show syndicated, so we'll find out what that's all about. Again Chris, I mean, Chris. I mean, thank you.
[0:57:16.7] RH: Thank you, Kerry. Congratulations on the show and on –
[0:57:21.7] KM: How about my grant?
[0:57:23.1] RH: - on everything that's going on at Dreamland. Yeah, the grant and on Up In your Business and on Flag and Banner. We appreciate you. You're an asset to the community. Thanks for doing this show.
[0:57:31.7] KM: You’re so nice. Well, thank you very.
[0:57:33.8] RH: You bet.
[0:57:34.2] KM: You’re welcome. Listen, I want to again tell everybody a big shout out to Centennial Bank and thank them again for sponsoring dancing into dreamland this year November the 2nd, they’re our sponsor. Thank you very much.
I want to say if you've got a great entrepreneurial story that you would like to share, I'd love to hear from you. Send a brief, or your contact information to –
[0:57:56.9] CC: That would be, I’m sorry –
[0:57:58.1] KM: Questions.
[0:57:58.6] CC: Questions
[0:57:59.5] KM: With an S.
[0:58:00.3] CC: With an S, @upyourbusiness.org.
[0:58:03.9] KM: Finally, to our listeners thank you for spending time with me and Ryan and Chris. My hope today is that you've heard or learn something that's been inspiring or enlightening, and that it whatever it is, will help you up your business, your independence, or your life. I'm Kerry McCoy and I'll see you next time on Up In your Business. Until then, be brave and keep it up.
[END OF INTERVIEW]
[0:58:24.8] CC: You’ve been listening to Up In your Business with Kerry McCoy, a production of FlagandBanner.com. If you missed any part of the show, or want to learn more about UIYB, go to FlagandBanner.com and click on “Radio Show.” Or subscribe to her weekly podcast wherever you like, where you like to listen. All the interviews are recorded and posted the following week with links to resources you heard discussed on today’s show. Kerry’s goal is to help you live the American Dream.
