Better Than Nuthin: Recent Episodes
Ken Root
Ken Root is at it again! He is unpredictable and biased against both sides. He interviews fascinating people and tells some pretty good stories. BTN is drawn from Ken’s early life on an Oklahoma farm, his fifty years in broadcasting and enchanting people he’s met and kept as friends.
Very Dry weather in the upper Midwest has caused the flow of the Mississippi River to drop to near record lows. The result for barge transportation shows up below the locks and dams of the upper river, in the free flowing portion below St. Louis.
Are there alternatives to increase flow in dry conditions?
Can water from lakes on the Missouri be released to float barges on the Mississippi?
Mike Steenhoek, Executive Director of the Soy Transportation Coalition, speaks to the challenges.
Kenneth Quinn ran a gauntlet for his thirty career in the US Foreign Service. That seemed to prepare him to combine his efforts with Dr Norman Borlaug, Nobel Laureate and father of the Green Revolution. Quinn was hired to expand the World Food Prize and bring recognition and debate to the challenges of feeding a growing world population. A remarkable man with an ability to tell his stories with continuity and facts with a dose of humor mixed in.
Kenneth Quinn did not seem destined for greatness as a young man. He was born in the Bronx (1942) but his family moved to the Midwest when he was ten years old. Intelligent, but with few resources, he worked and lived at home to gain a degree from Loras Collage in Dubuque, Iowa.
After college, he worked in a packing plant with the hope of becoming a lawyer. Without enough money to take the LSAT, he found he could stand for the U.S. Foreign Service Exam, for free, but with almost no chance of passing the test or getting a job. He did, but but was posted to Vietnam in the 1960's.
Under fire, Quinn, as a civilian, began to distinguish himself and show leadership skills. He cheated death several times. His life lessons began to converge with those of Dr. Norman Borlaug but it took almost forty years for the two men to join forces. This podcast is abut Quinn's amazing career before helping found the World Food Prize in Des Moines. He is a story teller, par excellence.
Don Young lives on a half acre of very good soil in Pleasant Hill, Iowa. His pumpkin patch has produced monster pumpkins for almost twenty years. He is a self taught agronomist and attacks each season with new research and tools.
Young has had a lot of fame from his hobby. He was on Good Morning America, The Tonight Show and has won the most prestigious pumpkin contest in America at Half Moon Bay, California. He has yet to grow a world record...But he tries hard every year.
In Rural America, everyone knows that county fairs are about competition. When you advance to state events, the competition gets more intense. The annual contests for the best breeding bull or market steer can mean long term profit or loss for breeders who produce animals that catch the judge's eye in the show ring or score carcass quality that is higher than others.
For each exhibition, an individual is selected to sort through the exhibitors, bottom to top. When he, or she, finishes the task, there may be many who accept the placings of the judge but only one exhibitor gets the purple ribbon.
Dick Burns, an Angus cattle breeder from Peoria, Illinois, talks with me about how he approaches these high pressure events, evaluates the animals, and sleeps at night after doing so.
Daren is the President and CEO of the Agriculture Retailers Association
You may know it as similar to the Fertilizer and Agri-Chemical Retailers Association in your state but he heads up the national association in Washington, D.C.
He has an active relationship with a sister organization in Brazil and also works with Argentina.
I ask Daren if he thinks we remain competitive and the major challenges facing the cooperatives and independent dealerships in your communities.
(In the 1990's, I was the Executive Director of an organization (NARA) that merged and became a part of the current ARA organization.) I give Daren an A+ for the work that he and ARA are doing.
Emily Metz is CEO of the Egg Board. We discuss the ups and downs of the poultry industry, primarily laying hens.
Bird Flu has been devastating to the industry with a big hit last year.
California laws have impacted all egg producers across the country.
Supply and Demand are the real drivers of egg prices in grocery stores.
"An Egg for Everyone" and "Egg Farmers are Price Takers"
I've spent almost fifty years covering the US Department of Agriculture.
During my week in Virginia to visit family, I went to the USDA headquarters in the District of Columbia and spoke with the new Historian for the Department and a member of the communications staff.
Nothing High Level in this visit. The current location of the archives is an office that is unoccupied with a large assortment of historical photos and stories.
It could be the beginning of a much larger effort to capture the spirit of one of the oldest departments of the US government.
Wayne Connelly and Stephanie Ho are my guests with a cameo visit from Layla Ginty, my grand daughter.
A northern landscape with black gumbo soil, a short growing season and a river that flows north. That's the Red River Valley of North Dakota and Minnesota.
Mike Hergert is a retired farm broadcaster from the Red River Farm Network.
He spoke to me while we were at Lake of the Woods on a fishing trip.
Color from Ken. Facts from Mike.
I spoke with Kevin Kimm, CEO of OCP North America
We have been talking since 2020 on efforts to remove the tariff on Moroccan Phosphate (fertilizer) so that it can be competitive with that produced in the U.S. and Saudi Arabia. With Russia and China as other restricted suppliers, the story gets more involved.
Moroccan Phosphate, shipped up the Mississippi River, is not required to pay a tariff to be sold in Canada. It is not restricted in Brazil, nor other grain exporting countries around the world.
The politics here are thick with U.S. farm organizations on one side and the U.S. Fertilizer Industry on the other.
Kevin Kimm is an American, based in St. Louis.
I was a young teacher at Union City, Oklahoma in late May of 1973. At 5:12 pm the town was struck by a very strong tornado. Two people were killed and there was great property damage.
To the east of town, the tornado hit the home of the Ninman family and destroyed it. They sought shelter by driving their car into a trench silo as their only protection. The tornado pulled the car, with four occupants, out of the silo and slung it across the pasture.
Larry Ninman, was almost 16 when the tornado almost killed him and his family. He was one of my students and went on to a 40 year career in coaching, teaching and high school administration. Larry gives his memories of the storm and miraculous survival from a direct hit by one of the most famous tornadoes in history.
Russ Green was an Iowa kid who made his way to the top of the Ag Equipment Industry. Upon Retirement, he didn't slow down. He turned his attention to helping the youth and young professionals develop themselves and their businesses.
A fascinating speaker and a sincere leader. He's still the kind of person I'd like to see in charge of corporate America.
A half hour that will inspire 4-H members and retired farmers.
Gene Millard has observed many years as a farmer. He has keen powers of observation and even greater ability to explain and express how a farm in NW Missouri should operate.
We talk technology that has become very complex and we talk human emotions that are just like they always have been.
He explains the reality of why he put up three wind towers on his farm: "Just another crop." is the short summary. But, of course, there is more.
A delightful half hour with a determined, intellectual and analytical farmer who still has passion for how he, and his family, farm the land.
April 27, 2023
The Mississippi River is near the crest of a historic flood. All along the river, homes are flooded including their septic systems and wells.
Patti Ruff is the Clayton County, Iowa Sanitarian. She is quite familiar with the impact of high water on wells and septic systems.
The interview runs about ten minutes. Very informative if you are worried about your water when you return to the islands.
Ken Root
George is a lawyer and a historian but he loves radio. A great news voice of WHO for years.
We talk of the early days and then we jump to the characters who influenced the business. KMA plays prominently along with WNAX.
I couldn't resist leading him into WKRP and how it seemed like a documentary to those of us in the business.
Doug Spyrison is wealth of knowledge about AM Radios going back to the 1920's. He explains designs, tube count, tube rarity and the progress of development through the 1960's when transistors revolutionized electronics.
He also describes what will be sold at the Iowa Antique Radio and Historical Society Club Auction (IARCHS) at 10 am on May 6 in Anamosa, Iowa. I've been to the event and it is a great learning experience but you have to keep your hands in your pockets or you will buy something.
The website for the auction is www.radio-collector.com
Email for information is 2023auction@radio-collector.com
The Kansas City Southern Railroad will merge with the Canadian Pacific Railroad. They are the smallest two members of the Class 1 Railroad Club. Steenhoek, in his position with the Soy Transportation Alliance, sorts out the reasons the merger was allowed and the first Mexico to Canada ownership of a single railroad.
Rich Keller is a quiet, mild mannered, retired public relations professional. But in the last few years, he has been posting on Facebook that his solo vacations have been in strange places.
Mexico, Central and South America seem to lure him but he stays in sections of cities that most of us consider unsafe. "No," say Rich, as he describes the kind and colorful people he has met. "I don't speak Spanish but I get along just fine."
This conversation is delightful as we go through his recent "adventures" within old and beautiful cities that most tourists will never visit.
In 1999, AgriTalk devoted a program to the status of tobacco farming in the face of a multi-state settlement with cigarette companies to pay for health related damages caused by smoking.
Tobacco farmers were going to lose much of their market in places where tobacco had been grown (legally) for four hundred years. The total Master Settlement Agreement was over 200 billion dollars but growers feared none of that would come to them to assist in moving their farming away from the profitable tobacco crops they grew every year.
Note: I have a posting of the original program from 1999 on my podcast series: "AgriTalk: the Root Years" It has growers, callers and Mr. Graham Boyd, Executive Director of the North Carolina Tobacco Growers Association, He is a guest on both shows.
Should U.S. farmers look at land investment in Africa?
That was the premise of a two week trip to look at land in South Africa, Mozambique and Zambia. My travel companions were Maurice Clark, an investor and business partner of Steve Bruere, President of The People's Company. Also Michael McClean, videographer. We were escorted by Susan Payne and Koos DeKlerk, from Britain and South Africa who were working with a corporation that bought and sold farmland worldwide.
Our take on the countries and the farms. Maurice recommended against proceeding with relationship. We wish Koos and Susan well in their lives.
Major car companies have announced that they will not put AM radios in their electric Vehicles (EV's). The stated reason is electrical interference.
My guests beg to differ. Brian Winnikens is owner of WRDN in Durand, Wisconsin and Gene Millard was manager of KFEQ in St Joseph, Missouri. Both stations are AM. Their arguments are about past value and future threat. Millard is somewhat resigned to his fate, Winnikens is not. He gives a call to action to keep AM and FM radio FREE!
Last summer, I traveled to Great Bend, Kansas and spent three days reporting on Industrial Hemp. You can find in 2 podcast from mid year. The Baldwin family has been growing the crop since 2017 and holding this conference each year to explain how they support growers who want to sign a contract with them to deliver the crop the following fall.
Melissa Nelson-Baldwin remains their spokesperson and a leader in the agronomics of this new, old, crop. She talks of getting rid of the "marijuana" stigma as they focus strictly on showing growers how they can grow and profit from Industrial Hemp.
We discuss the issues facing hemp farming. We talk of the future and the areas to be addressed at the conference.
Kan-Equip Conference Facility (IH dealership)
10 am until 2 pm
January 14, 2023
Southbend Industrial Hemp dot com
Dan plays two songs and talks about his determination to write country music. He brings a lot of guitar skill to the table and a family history that is rock solid.
We swap stories but they all tie together.
He has written a song called: "Sara Gets A Second Chance" It is about waiting for an organ transplant. Very moving. It just takes one miracle.
To download the song: http://danmodlin.hearnow.com
In 1981, Mike Smith founded a private weather forecasting service that soon became computer based in its single location forecast distribution. He enjoyed strong popularity as a television meteorologist beginning in the 1970's at Channel 4 in Oklahoma City, then Wichita, Kansas, St. Louis and back to Wichita where he started Weatherdata.
Smith testified, as an expert witness, in a trial following the crash of United Flight 191 at DFW Airport in the 1980's. The plane flew through a small thunderstorm that produced a strong downburst and pushed the airplane into the ground. His accounting of the events explaining what happened, and who was at fault, is vivid.
He also wrote a book on weather warnings and the science of meteorology as it developed during his career. An excellent read but even better when this animated and excited man tells you what still gets him going every day. Smith pays tribute to Dr Ted Fujita, calling him the smartest meteorological scientist ever born and crediting Fujita with developing the science of forensic meteorology.
I spoke with Mike Smith in an earlier podcast, with this one focusing on the bureaucratic battles within government agencies and between private sector meteorologists and public sector employees.
The Saturday Morning Farmers Market in downtown Des Moines, Iowa is unbelievable. Twenty Five Thousand People stroll through the blocks and blocks of vendors who are selling everything from fresh produce to baked goods to breakfast burritos, to art and specialties. Musicians are on every corner and the atmosphere is stimulating and soothing all at once.
Kelly Foss was the Executive Director of the market for twenty years. She and I became friends near the beginning of her tenure and she tells me the progress that has been made over the two decades since. We also speak of some of the unforgettable people who were at the market each week.
Ranked in the top ten farmers markets in the nation.
Dennis Schneider and his son were unloading a bin that had clumps of corn that would only come out if someone went in with a shovel and broke the crust.
Dennis had a "master plan" to use his cell phone to call son if he got in trouble. His son was in control of the large auger outside. When Dennis slid down into the corn, he couldn't call before he was trapped to his neck.
His rescue took anxious hours as he struggled to breathe. Schneider tells his story because he says God told him to do so.
Ben Nuelle interviewed Schneider in 2015 but the risk of grain entrapment continues today.
This story is current and unabashedly Pro Life. It comes from my encounter with a lady from Iowa City who spoke to a men's religious organization about the need to fund a clinic for "Abortion Minded" women.
Rachel Owen is fearless and remains determined to offer choices to women in crisis.
She highlights the impact of changes in laws and medicine that are reducing the opportunities to develop a relationship with women who have an unplanned pregnancy.
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Mike Johanns, led a small delegation to Baghdad in 2006. It was during the very stormy period following the ouster of the Saddam Hussein Regime.
I was the only reporter in the delegation as we flew from Washington, D.C, to Turkey and then boarded a C-17 cargo plane for Baghdad. The visit was only one day but it was memorable with three attacks on the U.S. Embassy where we were implementing an agreement to bring in agriculturalists to rebuild Iraqi irrigation canals and farms.
Terri Moore was Director of Communications for USDA. She organized the trip and was part of the delegation. Moore now serves as Vice President of Communications for the American Farm Bureau Federation in Washington, D.C.
He has been the Louisiana Commissioner of Agriculture since 2008, a veterinarian since the late 1970's and a smart, articulate bundle of energy.
We talk about crops in his home state. Learn more about sugar than you want to know. We discuss the challenges for farmers. He's on it.
There is talk that Dr Strain might be a future U.S. Secretary of Agriculture or seek elected office above his current pay grade. He is a delightful conversationalist and well versed in all things agricultural.
I have a sponsor for the show. Concept Hearing. They are an Iowa business that has helped me for the past seventeen years. I hope you will listen to their message as it is a fact that untreated hearing loss can lead to several other mental and physical challenges. Get a hearing screening to be sure of your abilities. Most men who grew up on a farm or worked in industry have an occupational hearing loss. A fact of life in the industrial age. Treat it like a diminishing ability to see. But be aware that hearing loss cannot be cured by putting on hearing aids. You have to wear them and work at rediscovering the frequencies you've lost.
I devoted an episode of BTN to hearing loss. "Hearing is a Gift" It is worth a listen to understand the challenges of hearing loss.
Mike Smith was doing prime time weather on WKY-TV in Oklahoma City when he was a sophomore at the University of Oklahoma. His skill was obvious but his plans for the future were even greater. Smith founded WeatherData, a company that predicted severe weather for corporate America. He has stopped trains to let a tornado pass. He has told manufacturers whether they should keep working or take shelter.
Smith's fifty year career has seen the greatest advancement in weather predicting technology in history. He cites the most significant changes in forecasting to save lives.
He has recently published a book: "Warnings" that eloquently deciphers the events of his career. From the Union City tornado of 1973 to the weather related crash of a jumbo jet approaching Dallas Fort Worth airport to the high power computer modeling technology of today.
He's now involved in designing storm shelters and subscriber services to notify you of an approaching storm.
I revisit one of my favorite characters. Gene Millard has managed radio stations and served on boards of farmer owned ethanol and grain cooperatives but he loves farming above all else.
On October 15, Gene and his sons finished corn harvest in Northeast Missouri and he began to send out observations of the season and the harvest. I caught him as he was physically recovering from days of hard work, for a man of any age, and a few moments to relax and relive the year.
Gene has a mind for numbers and a personality that strives to do things right every time. As a farmer, you'd think that would frustrate him. You are right!
A delightful conversation with a driven man. A man who put forth his philosophy: He will never be satisfied.
Hemp is a very versatile plant. It has been used for industrial products, made into clothing and eaten as a plant protein throughout human history.
In the modern day, hemp has been illegal to grow for any purpose due to the THC drug that can be extracted from the plant.
Since marijuana has been decriminalized and legalized in many states, it was proposed that very low TCH hemp be reintroduced as a legal field crop.
Melissa Nelson-Baldwin told us many things about the crop and its products in Episode one. This week we hear from Melissa in a recap of the crop and its uses but we also hear from her farming partners, Aaron and Richard Baldwin.
This story originated on site, near Great Bend, Kansas. I spent two days with three members of Circle K Farming Partnership and South Bend Industrial Hemp.
Melissa Nelson-Baldwin is a thirty-two year old dynamo. She is a research scientist and does work for the agri-chemical industry in proving their products. She also is part of a traditional family farming business raising wheat, corn, soybeans and milo.
Since hemp became a legal crop to grow in 2018, she, Aaron, her husband and Richard, her brother-in-law, have examined this historic plant as a rotational crop and as a manufacturing enterprise. Melissa is the lead on social media, speaker and invites tours to come to their farm to learn of this use of a plant that has been illegal to grow since the end of World War II.
The reality of starting from the ground (literally) and developing production and processing skills are clearly described in a optimistic fashion by Melissa. She speaks as a scientist, business owner and farm woman. Refreshing and inspiring to say the least.
Next week, I will talk with her husband and brother-in-law about their take on hemp and expand on this week's details on how to raise and market the crop.
Russ Green has been an executive with four major agricultural equipment manufacturers. From IHC to Duetz-Allis to Claas to Kubota with many stories of consolidation from AGCO to Deere. He also loves combines. Green is literally an encyclopedia of evolution in this dynamic business. What lies ahead? He's thought of that too.
He hasn't stopped working after taking his last W-2 in 2020. Green is now advising ag equipment companies and he is paying it forward with a dozen young agricultural entrepreneurs. A very inspiring and informative man.
Jeffrey Hardeman and I were part of a U.S. delegation of reporters and farmers who were allowed into the USSR in the last years of the cold war. We produced a TV documentary that is a glimpse of how it was at that time.
It was also the era of Glasnost and Perestroika. An era defined as "openness and reform". The last Soviet Premiere, Mikhail Gorbachev, was showing willingness to ease up on the people under his control. We were, however, handled and watched closely.
We were also in Ukraine, a country with immense natural resources and proud people. They had no idea then that they would be free from Russian dominance in a few years but back under it in a major war in just three decades.
The documentary: “Russia: A Kansan’s Perspective” is twenty five minutes long.
Here is a link to it on UTube: Copy and Paste into browser.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f3zObXTyrI&t=5s
It is a great day when I can take a microphone and impersonate a farm broadcaster to an unsuspecting group of people who are trapped at a booth with the assigned task of talking seriously to every joker who comes by.
I found out what some Agronomy Pros think of the corn crop. I heard from top people at Corteva and Kubota. I was very impressed by two young scientists at Iowa State University. One is working on the Monarch Habitat Program and the other is into a Seed Destructor that is mounted on a combine.
I explored the BIG BANG and how it is about the produce a college graduate. Also several derogatory comments about the artillery range at Ft Sill, Oklahoma.
Finally, I saw the latest in Agricultural Drone Technology. No Toys Here! Wow. But I also found the man who brought the FAA kicking and screaming into the 21st century on allowing drones to fly. Amazing how industry out runs government regulations
Transitions are quick...In 46 minutes you can hear what I saw and your feet won't be tired.
I have had four joints replaced by Dr. Ian Lin, Orthopedic Surgeon at DMOS in Des Moines. He is one of my favorite people of all times, for several reasons, but up front because he helped me regain my mobility.
Most of my generation is either in need of a joint replacement or has a family member that is hobbling around. This interview is instructive about the process and the results. Not too descriptive of the surgery but a realistic view from a man who has done over six thousand knees and a few thousand hips and shoulders.
Dr Lin was born in Iowa and played college baseball at Grinnell before going on to medical school at the University of Iowa and advanced training in North Carolina. He is the best! A family man. He has the energy of a Border Collie.
You'll find out why he loves me and hates me at the same time.
Curt Blades is with the Agricultural Equipment Manufacturers Association. His organization puts out monthly statistics that show sales of a range of farm equipment from small to large.
We go back to his first job with Machinery Link and even to AgriShop as the only paid advertiser. (I invented advertising for Death to America Home Computers and Dead Serious Funeral Homes-Franchises Available.)
Our talk is mostly about the disruption of the machinery industry by the 2020 COVID Pandemic. We project forward to alternative powered vehicles versus diesel. We project the "Carbon Capture Economy" for agriculture.
When you consume a steak or hamburger, you are biting into an industry that is as much politics as beef. It is also a huge part of the rural economy across the plains and cornbelt.
I have known Ron Hays for over forty years. He is the consummate livestock reporter. He began as a radio farm broadcaster but his communications platforms are now on radio and internet. Ron knowns the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA) from the inside out. He also knows the workings of the beef packing industry.
We talk about the current drought in the Southern Plains and then wade into the price disparities in cattle and beef prices. We also explore NCBA politics. He knows it all and a half hour of your time will give you Ron's take on whether small beef slaughter plants are going to be good for cattle producers and why the politics of the beef industry continue to be like a range war.
An update on American Fertilizer Companies blocking Moroccan phosphate from being allowed to sell in the U.S. without a tariff.
U.S. Farmers are now paying almost $1,000 per ton for Mono Ammonium Phosphate. Last year it was $300 per ton.
My interview Guest is Kerry McNamara, CEO of OCP North America. A well spoken gentleman with a background at the World Bank before entering the fertilizer industry.
The issue is more than supply and demand. We talk of demand destruction and of the potential for U.S. farm yields to drop this year and in the future.
Meanwhile, that same Moroccan Phosphate is shipped up the Mississippi River to Canadian farmers who do not have to pay a tariff.
Story 1: My father loved to cut trees. His greatest love was a chain saw. A man, a tree, a house.
Story 2: My mother's conservative nature almost drowned me.
Perhaps stories of my youth will make you feel better about your childhood.
Just seventeen minutes this week.
The "Greatest Spectacle in Racing" is the Indianapolis 500 race each Memorial Sunday. It is seen by millions on TV but the race is far different when setting with over a quarter million people watching cars so so fast you can't read the numbers on them. My friend and former employer, Rich Hull, got me hooked on the race back in the 1980's. He has attended twenty-nine times and I have gone with him for about ten. We went this year for one last time after so many years of preparation and execution of a plan to get to the track, sit in the high bleachers for the race and get home safely. Our commentary is not official nor is our race coverage thorough. Marcus Ericsson won the 106th running of the Indianapolis 500 in a thrilling finish, holding off a hard-charging Pato O'Ward following a green-white-checkered finish. We focused on the color and the history. Rich welcomed me Back Home Again In Indiana.
Linda Cavanaugh recently retired from KFOR-TV. She is one of my most admired journalists. We worked together for six years as she and Pam Henry broke the glass ceiling of television news in Oklahoma City. She won her job in a male dominated era and kept her anchor job until retirement.
Linda has seen it all and done it all. She talks about the people who were the first generation of television journalists and news directors. We discuss journalistic ethics and the basics of being a good reporter. She is sharp, frank and open.
There are some old home week stories and some moments where she recounts her journalistic work in very challenging circumstances. She pays homage to the leaders in TV news and I talk to her about the "shards in her hair" as she gave women the opportunity to do anything they set their mind to do.
Since my first memories, my father had a significant hearing loss. As a little boy, I learned to speak loudly and distinctly while looking at him. That may be why I was suited to be a broadcaster. In my youth, I drove tractors and worked in loud environments, as a result, I damaged my hearing. For the past fifteen years, I have worn hearing aids. This podcast is about being hearing impaired in a world that doesn't care.
My guest is Taylor Parker, President of Concept Hearing. This is not a commercial message but he answers my questions and expresses his expertise about hearing instruments. If you have a hearing loss, you can identify with my stories. If you have a hearing impaired friend or family member, you will be sensitized and relate to our challenges. Hearing is precious. Take care of yours.
In the early years of this new century, my life went through an upheaval: I lost my job at WHO Radio. But at the same time, I was experiencing great emotional fulfillment. I had converted to the Catholic Faith. I became a Knight of Columbus and my reporting switched from farm news to coverage of people who were living their faith in a battle for life.
The timing of this episode has nothing to do with the news that the US Supreme Court may overturn a long standing ruling on abortion rights. But it parallels, as the events and people I reported on from 2009 to 2013 were the vanguard of a non-denominational effort to offer love, hope and help to women with a crisis pregnancy. My guest, Steve Cashman, a Des Moines businessman tells his story.
In the mid-1980's the Soviet Union was softening its stance against foreign journalists in the Glasnost and Perestroika period under Mikhail Gorbachev.. But it was still the cold war and neither side trusted the other. A group of twenty-five farm broadcasters and agricultural specialists headed for the agricultural lands of Ukraine and the big cities of Russia just months after the Chernobyl Nuclear Accident.
We were the first western farm journalists who were able to see the people and farming operations in Ukraine. The comparisons we made to U.S. farming were shocking. We also were watched and controlled like spies as we toured the Soviet monuments and exhibitions in Moscow.
Two weeks of having each other's backs and reporting on a country that was our competitor on many fronts, yet with people who just wanted to live their lives without conflict.
In a few weeks, I'll add to this story by talking with Jeffrey Hardeman, my videographer on this trip and recount our challenges to shoot video and get it home to the U.S.
This is Breaking News (intense music)
I am curious about the politics of Phosphate Shortages and price that is THREE TIMES HIGHER THAN LAST YEAR. I talk to Kevin Kimm, an Iowan who works for OCP North America. He represents a Moroccan based fertilizer producer. He answers several questions but you have to read between the lines to get the dynamics of why some North American companies are exporting fertilizer while the U.S. government is imposing import duties on products coming in from foreign producers. If you want to get involved, there is a call to arms a couple of times during the interview. Runs 12 minutes
The farm crisis of the 1980's was near its peak when Willie Nelson and Friends announced they would host a concert to highlight the plight of the American Farmer. Bands from all over came to Champaign, IL for a twelve hour performance that was called a Country Woodstock.
Ken Root and photographer, Steve Bessemer, spent three days in the area along side colleagues from CBS News. Their stories give perspective to the first Farm Aid Concert and the amazing stretch of years that Willie Nelson and Friends have continued to salute farmers and the working people of America.
America's modernization and change in my lifetime has been breathtaking. Rural America, in the mid 20th century, was very different than today. The social structure was strong and the values were engrained or applied with a switch! The communities kept watch on each other and social norms were expected to be followed. "At any time everybody knew where I was," stated my guest, Gene Millard. How was that possible with a black phone that hung on the wall? Gene's family and mine paralleled each other in how we behaved in our homes, schools and churches. We talk about life and death in a time that many say was much more accountable and moral than today.
Shefqet Meko grew up and was educated under the communist regime of Albania. He was told everything to do but held in his heart the hope that one day he could make the world a better place. That world became "America" when he was able to bring his family here in the late 1990's. A veterinarian by training, a lover of literature and a student of democracy, Shefqet (Chef - Chet) will melt your heart. Few native born Americans are as zealous about freedom as he. His message is clear but his accent is strong. I hope you are inspired by his vision for our shared country.
In 1967, our worlds expanded as farm boys from across Oklahoma went to college. Charlie Freeman was a classmate who has become a lifelong friend. We cannot be more different in our approaches to life. Charlie was a God fearing young man. He was determined to succeed and not disappoint his family or veer away from religious teachings. Me, not so much.
Charles became a veterinarian and I became a farm news broadcaster. He focused narrowly and rose to the top of his profession. Me, not so much.
Note the cost of Charlie attending college our freshman year.
Gary Truitt and Ken Root compare notes on their careers in radio farm broadcasting. Truitt owns the Hoosier Ag Network in Indiana but he started out as just a kid who liked to play Rock and Roll music in the 1970's. He found his niche in radio and became one of the most known agricultural reporters in the Midwest. He and Ken Root began following the trade missions of John Block, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, in the Reagan administration. They traveled to Asia, Europe and South America to see customers and competitors. Block was an Illinois farmer and marathoner and globe trotted for six years with both men in hot pursuit.
In the 1980's Ken lived in Kansas and joined the staff of KWCH Television. He was the farm show host and did daily stories on agriculture. However, the station went through a metamorphosis in a three year period that is still legendary in the industry.
Ken visits with Julie Becker Owens, who was weekend anchor at Channel 12 in that go-go period. They focus on the people and the big stories of the time. Both relate their experiences about when four members of a Hutchinson family were taken hostage on TWA Flight 847. The twists and turns, as well as how Ken was thrust into the story, are colorful.
This is a good news story. You may laugh and you may not believe how everything came together.
Ken and Gene Millard discuss the evolution of farm machinery with emphasis on the 1940’s through the 1990’s. Both men grew up in an era when horse drawn equipment was still around, but it was hooked to tractors. Ken has one poignant example of his father attempting to scoop up Bermuda grass sod with a “Fresno” dirt mover. Let’s just say that nine-year-old Ken and his father were both risking their lives in the endeavor. Caution: there is a lot of laughing and groaning during this story.
Gene Millard is a long-time farmer and farm broadcaster. He spent his entire half century career in the St Joseph, Missouri area while working for KFEQ television and radio stations. Millard is a very active board member of several value-added cooperatives and has even served as a board member of the radio and television committee of the National Association of Broadcasting.
Gene and Ken are not proud of it, but both served as hosts of Agri-Shop, a Saturday morning tradio show heard on a network of stations across Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Colorado.
Jake Redmon was a fertilizer dealer from Georgia who spent 35 years working for Sonny Perdue and serving on state and national association boards in support of the fertilizer/agri-chemical retail sector. Upon retirement, at age seventy-two, Redmon expanded his interest in writing and began to publish books. They range from practical gardening to humor to children’s fantasy. He has just released a novel on the founding of Georgia. “Brier Creek” is delightful and intriguing historical fiction about those who came to the British colony in the seventeenth century. Redmon speaks with a delightful Georgia drawl and exhibits depth of character as well as his ability to communicate with all generations. He also explains the process of publishing a book through research, a fertile mind, and a determined spirit.