Each week, The Extraordinary Times catches up with friends in the historical and cultural scene. This week, it’s our pleasure to catch up with broadcaster and bluegrass music performer Joe Mullins.
In 1995, Joe formed Town and Country Broadcasting, Inc., purchasing WBZI Radio in Xenia, Ohio, and has since expanded into a network of southwest Ohio stations--Real Roots Radio—including WKFI AM 1090, WEDI AM 1130 and three translators - FM 100.3, Xenia, FM 105.5 Eaton and 106.7 Wilmington. Mullins and staff program a unique mix of locally produced programming including country, bluegrass, gospel and Americana music, news, interviews, and information. Joe is on air weekdays 1-3 pm featuring bluegrass and bluegrass gospel music. He performs nationally and internationally with an award-winning Bluegrass band, Joe Mullins and The Radio Ramblers. In 2016, he was named Broadcaster of the Year, and 2019 Entertainer of the Year by the International Bluegrass Music Association. From 2017, the Southwestern Ohio Bluegrass Music Heritage Project—a partnership between Miami University Regionals, Cincinnati Public Library, Greene County Public Library, and the Smith Library of Regional History—has preserved and celebrated the story of bluegrass music in greater Cincinnati and the Miami Valley. 2021 welcomes two landmarks of this project: a groundbreaking book, Industrial Strength Bluegrass: Southwestern Ohio’s Musical Legacy, edited by Curt Ellison and Fred Bartenstein (University of Illinois Press, January 2021). Its companion recording album, Industrial Strength Bluegrass debuts March 25 and is produced by Joe in partnership with Smithsonian Folkways and Miami University Regionals. Featured artists include the Radio Ramblers, Bobby Osborne, Vince Gill, Lee Ann Womack, and Rhonda Vincent. * How has the past year been for you and the Radio Ramblers? Challenging … we have only performed six public appearances since March last year, and the pandemic canceled both of our indoor music festivals (March and November) in Wilmington, Ohio. Four of us in the band contracted the virus last July, at one of our only performances for summer 2020! Thankfully it was mild for the most part and we’re all healthy and fully recovered. With all our extensive travel and touring schedule cancelled, we did get to work this winter on finishing a new Radio Ramblers gospel album, which should be available no later than May this year. * Your new recording project, Industrial Strength Bluegrass, tells the story of Bluegrass music in southwestern Ohio. Why did this story need to be told? So much of the Ohio Bluegrass heritage connects directly to the Bluegrass Hall of Fame. The Osborne Brothers, Red Allen, Jimmy Martin, Jim and Jesse, and Larry Sparks all lived in the region during a portion of their career. Flatt and Scruggs, the Stanley Brothers, and Reno and Smiley all recorded in the region. Others were heard on the radio extensively. The Bluegrass music created and promoted in southwestern Ohio earned the genre audiences all over the world. I am very fortunate to have grown up in the Miami Valley and to begin my career in the middle of Bluegrass history. * How were you able to recruit the amazing artists on this album? I am beginning my 39th year as a broadcaster and performer, having started at age sixteen. My career path has allowed me many friendships throughout the roots community. But I didn’t just call in favors with lifelong friends. When I reached out to most artists featured on the recording and told them the purpose behind the project, they were eager to participate! Their passion and enthusiasm for the songs really shines through in each performance, and I’m very grateful for all those who poured immense talent into creating such a powerful body of work. * How did Smithsonian Folkways get involved with this recording? I asked the Smithsonian Folkways team if they had an interest in the album before I began planning production. Their label maintains historically significant recordings as part of their mission. As long as music is listened to by the public in any format, the Industrial Strength Bluegrass album will be available. * How does this story relate to your roots in Middletown, Ohio? That’s where I grew up. One of my first summer jobs as a kid was mowing the acreage around the old WPFB radio station buildings and tower. I was there constantly when I was growing up because my dad, the late Paul “Moon” Mullins, was their most popular on-air personality from 1964 until early 1989. The station and its property were making Bluegrass history as far back as the late 1940s. The station used to broadcast Bluegrass and “Hillbilly” music in the early days and had a live barndance show that first featured the Osborne Brothers as youngsters from Dayton, Ohio. The show had star guests too, including Bill Monroe a time or two! * What are your plans for 2021? Say goodbye to COVID-19, hopefully soon! I am involved in many promotions locally and nationally to launch the Industrial Strength Bluegrass recording. The second half of the year does have a good variety of Radio Ramblers appearances scheduled as well. The biggest event will be getting a daughter-in-law. My son Daniel will be married to a wonderful young lady in late May—and she’s a Bluegrass singer and songwriter from the Smoky Mountains!
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The Extraordinary Times is back after a brief festive hiatus, wishing readers a happy new year and looking forward to catching up with more fascinating folks in 2021. This week we welcome Walter Stahr. A lawyer and acclaimed historical biographer of John Jay, Edwin Stanton, and William H. Seward, Stahr is working on a new book about Salmon P. Chase, longtime resident of Cincinnati, Ohio. Stahr is a graduate of Stanford University and Harvard Law School, and practiced law for many years, both in the United States and Asia. He lives with his wife in Southern California.
* How have you been keeping this past year? In some sense my life has not changed much. I do most of my work at home, at my kitchen table. But I have missed, a lot, being able to go to libraries to look at sources. There are some sources that are available online, but others, such as the microfilm edition of Chase’s papers, are available only at a few libraries. Although small local libraries have been open, in many places, large research libraries have not. * What inspired your career change from practicing law to writing historical biography? I was reading an American history book one evening in our apartment in Hong Kong, and saying to myself that even I could write a better book. And then there was a response, almost as if it were coming from a speaker in the ceiling: “if you think that, Stahr, do it; write a book.” I started reading with a view to finding a suitable subject for a biography, and landed upon John Jay, who at that point had not been the subject of a full-length biography since the 1930s. * Your latest work-in-progress is a biography of Supreme Court Chief Justice and Secretary Treasury Salmon P. Chase. How did Ohio propel Chase to the national stage? In the winter of 1849-50, there was an almost even split in the Ohio legislature between Whig and Democratic members. The tiny Free Soil party, of which Chase was a leader, held the “balance of power.” A deal was worked out; in return for Free Soil support for Democratic candidates to take control of the legislature, Democrats would give their votes to Chase as the candidate for federal senator. (In those days senators were selected by legislatures not popular elections.) More generally, although he was born in New Hampshire, Ohio was Chase’s home base; he moved to Cincinnati in his early twenties and never changed his residence, although he spent much of the latter part of his life in Washington. * Why did you choose Chase? At first I was not very enthused about Chase: I viewed him as a rival of my man Seward, not to mention Lincoln. But as I researched Chase, I realized that he was incredibly important in turning antislavery from a mere moral movement—sort of an eccentric fringe movement—into a powerful political party. Lincoln could never have been elected president, in 1860, without the groundwork that Chase and others did in creating the Liberty party, then the Free Soil party, then the Republican Party. Chase was also what we would call a public interest lawyer, representing blacks accused of being fugitive slaves, and Chase was in favor of black voting, long before the Civil War. * Is there a pattern or connecting thread to your choice of biographical subjects? So far, at least, all of my subjects have been lawyers, and all have been at the “second tier” of American leadership. They were not presidents, but they were as close to the presidency as one can get without being president. Lincoln did not rely upon Chase, for example, just to manage the federal finances. No: Chase advised Lincoln on politics, military matters, and especially on racial issues. Presidents, in those days, did not have huge White House staffs; so they had to rely more on their cabinet officers. But Lincoln relied even more heavily than usual on Seward, Chase and Stanton, and I think that tells us important things about Lincoln and about each of them. * Tell readers what brought you to Carlisle, Ohio, not long ago? In my Edwin Stanton book there is a brief mention of a political rally in 1868 in Carlisle, Ohio, that attracted 20,000 people. Someone in Carlisle read that and could not believe it; he thought there had NEVER been 20,000 people in Carlisle. We corresponded a bit by email, and then he and others worked to secure an Ohio history plaque to commemorate the rally, and the railroads that allowed people to get to the rally. They invited me to come to say a few words when the plaque was unveiled, which I happily did in October 2019. *** For more on Walter Stahr, visit his website. |
AuthorMatthew Smith, PhD (History). Public Programs at Miami University Regionals. Historian of Appalachia, the Ohio Valley, & the early American republic. Archives
February 2024
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