Latest / Ripple Makers / Ripple Makers Ep. #7 | Honoring History, Heritage & Sports Legends

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Ripple Makers Ep. #7 | Honoring History, Heritage & Sports Legends · Ripple Makers

• 0:10
  Charles Davis: Welcome back to Ripple Makers here on Streaming Creek and wherever you can listen to podcast. I am Charles Davis joined by Susan Cowan. How are you?
• 0:17
  Susie Cowan: I am feeling fantastic.
• 0:19
  Charles Davis: Good. Good. Good. Well, this week, we're gonna be talking about some things that help make the city what it is, and it talks about the museums. Have you been to any of the museums
• 0:26
  Susie Cowan: I have been to a few of them. Okay.
• 0:28
  Charles Davis: Alright. Well, today we'll be talking about two of the really, really good ones. One will be talking to mister Harold Young with the Tubman African American Museum and then we'll be talking to a good friend of mine as well, miss Lisa Holmes of the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame, two great places right across the street from each other where you can learn so much and kids can get so much enjoyment out of it. So on this show, Susan, you know, we've talked about multiple times about different organizations and things of that nature, but I do not know if you have been through this building yet. And if you have not, that needs to change because it is one of the best museums that we have in town.
• 0:59
  The Tubman Museum has a long history, in this town and some very cool things in it. So I cannot wait for you to hear about all these things. And we are joined by mister Harold Young, the executive director of said Tubman Museum. Good morning, sir. How are you?
• 1:12
  Harold Young: How are you all doing today?
• 1:14
  Charles Davis: Good, my guy. Good. Good. Good. As I said before, I set it up, I step out of the way so Susie can learn all the things.
• 1:19
  So Susie, the floor is yours.
• 1:20
  Susie Cowan: Yeah, I'm so excited to learn more. Can you tell me a little bit about the history of the museum?
• 1:23
  Harold Young: Well, museum was created forty three years ago by Father Richard Kyle. He was a Catholic priest, actually no disrespect, a white Catholic priest, you know, that wanted to make sure that African American young people knew their history. And he was an advocate. He worked a lot in the community. And he put his own money up to create a museum on Walnut Street.
• 1:50
  Somehow years later, we moved into 310 Cherry Street. We went from 8,000 square feet to a 45,000 square feet building. And now we're still here and we're excited about what we're doing.
• 2:02
  Susie Cowan: That is fantastic. So why is the museum relevant to the Macon community?
• 2:07
  Harold Young: Tubman African American Museum is part of American history. It's not just for African Americans, it's for That's part of Harold. Yes. I wanna make sure that everyone understands that, that even though the official name is Tubman African American Museum. The museum is not there to make anyone feel bad about history.
• 2:28
  We just don't want to repeat it again, some of the negative, you know, and learn from it.
• 2:32
  Charles Davis: For a lot of African Americans, looking back at that history is tough for us to look back at. Mhmm.
• 2:36
  Susie Cowan: Mhmm.
• 2:37
  Charles Davis: To go, this is what our grandparents and great grandparents went
• 2:40
  Harold Young: through.
• 2:40
  Charles Davis: And so there's part of it is like there's a bit of a denial piece of not wanting to dredge up or dig up those those memories. But on the other half of that, there are tons tons of kids who know nothing about their history.
• 2:57
  Harold Young: Every culture or every demographic had their struggles whatever, but ours just happened to be in America happened to be... Well, slavery was just a black eye on America Yeah. For me. And... But you know what?
• 3:08
  I learned from it and I said, listen, this is where you came from, and look where you're going
• 3:13
  Charles Davis: at. Look what's in your DNA. I tell that to my nephew all the time, I was like, bro, understand what you got in your DNA, dog. You got strengths you haven't even tapped into, my brother.
• 3:22
  Harold Young: But you know, slavery was a a black item, but now we gain from it, we learn from it, we will strive from it, they they survived through it. Yes. American history is not beautiful all the time. That part. It's not beautiful.
• 3:35
  But you know what? You learn from your mistakes and grow on.
• 3:38
  Susie Cowan: So what can the visitors expect when they go to the museum?
• 3:41
  Harold Young: First of it's a beautiful retardant when you walk in the building. So it's really beautiful. And then one of the rooms that we have is our local history. And then we have an, I guess, an adventures gallery upstairs. We also have the mural from Africa to America.
• 3:57
  And we also have a changing gallery, which changes all the time. And we also have an exhibit of Harriet Tubman. Also, we just put back out our music history, is oldest reading James Brown significant history here in Macon, Georgia. But the one thing that we are really proud of is the Tyler Perry exhibit. Yes.
• 4:14
  That took me three years to make that happen. I've actually went to the the studio, knocked on the doors, got all kind of push backs, and I contacted his publicist in California. So one day I was watching one of his television shows, and I saw one of his executive assistant, something way down the bottom of the I sent an email to that person. It was at 09:00 at night. She sent me right back and she said, hold on a second.
• 4:42
  She called me, she said, what is this all about? I told her, and so she said, hold on. She put me on hold, but actually laid the phone down. Tyler was in the room at that time at 09:00 at night, and she said Tyler said yes.
• 4:56
  Charles Davis: Because you found the person closest Yeah, to them at that
• 5:01
  Harold Young: yeah, yeah, Which I did not know.
• 5:03
  Charles Davis: Yeah. I mean, who...
• 5:04
  Harold Young: 09:00 at night, you're like, hey, listen. I'm trying to do this this exhibit. She said... Tyler said, yes. That's one of the things that has brought a lot of attention, national
• 5:14
  Charles Davis: Yeah.
• 5:14
  Harold Young: Attention to the museum.
• 5:15
  Charles Davis: Talk a little bit more about the significance of the architecture of the new space.
• 5:20
  Harold Young: It's so amazing. Even the colors of the... It's actually an African color from Nigeria. So so that that those are significance. Yeah.
• 5:32
  Even when you walk in there, you'll see train tracks. It looks like a train track. That's significant of the rail... The underground railroad, you know, and then the the African hut at the top, it looks like a top of a hat. It is an African hat.
• 5:46
  Yeah. So everything's significant.
• 5:48
  Charles Davis: Having that space and and having the opportunity to do things, it gives you all the ability to do things throughout the year. Yes, So let's talk about the events that y'all have throughout the year, but make sure we get into the Pan African Festival and All That Jazz.
• 6:00
  Harold Young: We have two major signature events. All That Jazz is our black tie event. Over the years, we've had Smokey Robinson. Uh-huh. We've had Sheila E.
• 6:09
  Fantasia played one year. Yeah. We have all of them. Yeah. We have had Stephanie Mills and Will Downey.
• 6:14
  Charles Davis: I'm finna say something. Didn't Patty play one year?
• 6:16
  Harold Young: Patty was our year.
• 6:17
  Charles Davis: I knew that.
• 6:18
  Harold Young: Patty LaBelle was our year. Yeah. She did. We had to take her to the Coliseum. We've had some, I mean, some significant people that really came through to support the Tubman.
• 6:27
  And I wanna thank the community as a whole, a lot of businesses, you know, a lot of individuals by tables and get dressed up. You know, we have the... They get a a meal, a concert, and then after party with AJ, the DJ, they party all night long with him. And then we got the Pan African Festival take place the end of April every year, the fourth weekend of April. That's a significant...
• 6:49
  In fact, both of them, they're celebrating the thirtieth year of Easter. So we're really excited about what's happening this year. It's for the community. Yes. You know, it's for our growth and our knowledge and our, you know, for us to come together as one, you know?
• 7:03
  Susie Cowan: And speaking of the community, what are some other ways that the community can get involved?
• 7:07
  Harold Young: Our memberships for annual is like starting like $25 a And they get discounts on different things, the store, they come there anytime when we have exhibit openings for free. And if the businesses want to be one of our partners, we definitely welcome that as well. You know, Tubman needs funding. And just like any other organization, nonprofit, we need funding. You know, there's no state funding, we would appreciate the hotel motel tax we do get, but you know, we still have to raise all the money that we get.
• 7:36
  So we... And whatever organizations, you know, people that come in, the rentals help out a lot. Yeah. Know, so...
• 7:44
  Charles Davis: Use the building for what it is.
• 7:45
  Harold Young: Yes, The Teller Museum is here for you all, you know, and we wanna make sure the community knows...
• 7:50
  Charles Davis: That part, it just really circles back to what we talked about in the very beginning of this. Just because it says the Tubman African American Museum on the front of it doesn't mean it's exclusive No. To African American. This is a this is a museum that should be used by every single solitary person in this community. And talk about your history with the museum because you've been here while I've done a lot of things.
• 8:15
  Harold Young: A friend of mine had a church here in Pleasant Hill, Community Church of God's name, and so he said, I said, where is Macon? And he said, look on the map. And I said, okay, I see Savannah, don't see Atlanta. He said, look on the dead center, that little dot right there. I said, you got to be kidding me.
• 8:33
  Coming from a big city of Los Angeles, I'm born and raised in Los so it was like, no, I'm good, I'm good. So, but I came here and met a few people and I'm like, wow.
• 8:44
  Charles Davis: That's what happens.
• 8:45
  Harold Young: I understand that there was a position for an events manager at the Tubman, because my background... You have it, yeah. Yeah, my background, you know, I saw entertainment, put together festivals. So my first job there was, I was the events manager. So I started January 15.
• 9:04
  The week of of all that jazz that... I started that Monday. Wow. All that jazz was that Saturday. That Monday, I went to work.
• 9:11
  He said, you know we're moving. Where? Around the corner to the building. And said, need you to plan the grand opening. And then he said, hey, let's connect the Pan African Festival to the grand opening.
• 9:21
  Charles Davis: And I see the reason why the Pan African Festival and all that jazz are important to you because you walked in the door and had that handed to you like here. Yeah. You go so I can understand why those are your babies Yeah. Because of what you had to do from the jump to know that you've basically worked your way
• 9:36
  Harold Young: through Yeah.
• 9:37
  Charles Davis: The the building and to be the executive director now.
• 9:40
  Harold Young: Being the first African American director of the Tupper Museum, you know, I was like, wow. I came out from LA to get the fur... Be the first.
• 9:47
  Charles Davis: Ain't that ain't that special?
• 9:48
  Harold Young: Yeah. I I said, I'm fine with that. I'm like, no. Just say, Harold, you're the first.
• 9:52
  Charles Davis: Who don't like being the first? As we do with everybody that comes onto this show, we have them bring a song and you brought a good one. So talk about the song and why you chose that song, but I think we've kinda hit on that already.
• 10:01
  Harold Young: Listen. The the song, Frankie Beverly and May's, we are one Yeah. Talks about, you know, why we treat each other the way we do.
• 10:09
  Charles Davis: I don't have to understand you to recognize you as a human being and that we all are in this together.
• 10:14
  Harold Young: And and if if one day the whole world snaps and say, you know what? We're one.
• 10:21
  Charles Davis: Yeah. What could happen? My god. Harold Young, executive
• 10:25
  Harold Young: director at
• 10:25
  Charles Davis: the Tuckman Museum. Thank you so much once again for what you do and who you are.
• 10:28
  Harold Young: And we greatly appreciate you being here. Bless y'all, man. Thank you all for everything y'all doing in the community. Appreciate it. That's what needs to happen.
• 10:34
  Thank you very much for the invitation. And I'm... You know, call me anytime if.
• 11:08
  Charles Davis: Welcome back to Ripple Makers here on stream the creek and all your favorite podcast platforms. Charles Davis and Susie Cowan here. Okay, Susie. Now I need you to meet another one of my best friends. You've been talking a lot...
• 11:18
  To a lot of my friends here recently. I love that. Is another one. This woman here is one of my favorite people in the world. What she does with the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame is absolutely amazing.
• 11:27
  Miss Lisa Holmes, the communication selections chair and induction planner for the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame. Good morning, ma'am. How are you?
• 11:34
  Lisa Holmes: Good morning. I'm well.
• 11:35
  Charles Davis: Good. Good. Good. It's always good to see you. Always good to be in your presence.
• 11:39
  And I can't wait for Susie to learn more about the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame. So Susie, it's on you.
• 11:43
  Susie Cowan: Yeah. So tell me all about the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
• 11:46
  Lisa Holmes: All right, Susie. We are the largest state sports Hall of Fame in the country. Lot of people do not realize that. We are 44,000 square feet. We've been here in Macon since 1999.
• 11:58
  That's when they elected to have a brick and mortar sports hall of fame. The actual sports hall of fame has been around since the fifties. It was more of an idea, a theory. I think there were plaques on walls somewhere, but 1999 is when it came to Macon. In total, since the beginning of the hall of fame in the fifties, we have had about 600 inductees.
• 12:17
  Susie Cowan: Wow.
• 12:18
  Lisa Holmes: And we now induct 10 every year. And additionally, we'll induct two to four posthumous nominees as well that have already passed on but weren't able to make it into the Hall of Fame while they were living.
• 12:29
  Susie Cowan: Right. So you touched on it a little bit. What is the history? Like what was the inspiration behind putting it in Macon?
• 12:36
  Lisa Holmes: Most things here in Georgia are located in Atlanta when it comes to the big ticket items. They wanted to maybe move that around a little bit, make things an option, a viable option for people that are down in the southern part of the state.
• 12:47
  Susie Cowan: Spreading the load.
• 12:48
  Lisa Holmes: Other parts of the state. So we're very centrally located, as you know, and this way we can get people from Savannah, Columbus Mhmm. Albany, Augusta, all over the state. They won't have to go to Atlanta for every sports related activity. And we do have some some people that come from pretty far every year.
• 13:04
  Charles Davis: Every single year.
• 13:04
  Harold Young: Every
• 13:05
  Lisa Holmes: year to see who's coming in, to meet who's coming in. They love it. They return all the time. So it's it's a really great central location.
• 13:11
  Charles Davis: Yeah. Let let's speak on that because you kinda touched upon a little bit, but let's let's talk about the big event... The biggest event that that happens every year. There's tons of other events that we'll talk about that, but induction weekend is a huge weekend here in town and it's not just the induction ceremony as well. So kinda talk about the entire weekend and what what you all plan every single year when it comes
• 13:32
  Lisa Holmes: to Absolutely. Every year, our induction ceremony is at the end of February. It generally begins on Friday morning with a golf tournament. Returning inductees and new inductees are invited to that, and it's also a ticketed event, so anyone that wants to play golf with them can do that. Then Friday evening, always, we have the private reception at the hall, which Charles has been to probably the last ten years because Yes.
• 13:53
  That's how long I've been there.
• 13:54
  Charles Davis: Yes, Susie. She is not lying. I have been been to every single one of those parties because as the sports nerd within me, Lisa has been so gracious as to allow me to be in that space and I love it so much because it is literally a couple of sponsors, the the organization from the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame and the inductees and the former inductees. And so I have gotten to meet some of my heroes. I got to meet Calvin Johnson, former Georgia Tech player, Hall of Famer for the NFL for the Detroit Lions.
• 14:26
  I got to meet one of my grandmother's favorite baseball players of all time in Mark Tushera and to tell him Mark Tushera, my grandmother loves you. If you go to that party, get to see them look at their exhibits for the first time.
• 14:40
  Lisa Holmes: Right, that's when they get to see their exhibits.
• 14:42
  Charles Davis: And see them really absorb, I feel,
• 14:46
  Lisa Holmes: It is what it that they have no idea of what they're walking into. Now we try to give them an idea of it, and we do have a few athletes or sports personalities that have been maybe for a friend or a colleague or a teammate's induction, so they're somewhat familiar. But most of the time, they get to town, they see that museum, they just have no idea of what we have here. Yeah. After we have that reception on Friday evening, we do a small jacket ceremony, very private, because that Friday evening thing is for the athletes, their friends and family, the staff
• 15:13
  Charles Davis: Yeah.
• 15:14
  Lisa Holmes: Local community people. Yeah. But Saturday
• 15:16
  Harold Young: Oh, boy.
• 15:17
  Lisa Holmes: Saturday starts with Fan Fest at the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame. That is a free event, non ticketed. Everyone is welcome. It goes from one to 02:30. The...
• 15:26
  Any returning inductee that wants to come and all of the incoming inductees, generally, unless there's a scheduling error, we don't really have those, though. Yeah. They get up there and sign autographs, take photos. Every person that gets in that building gets to meet them. It is wonderful.
• 15:39
  Charles Davis: It is a
• 15:39
  Lisa Holmes: great And then we quick hurry, get everyone out, and we get ready for the big deal at the auditorium that night.
• 15:44
  Charles Davis: Yeah. And then and then the induction ceremony is is absolutely phenomenal. The big induction ceremony weekend is not the only thing that happens Right. There. And it's not just these exhibits as well.
• 15:54
  There's not a lot of stagnant stuff. So talk about the interactive stuff that y'all have there and some of the other events that y'all throw Absolutely. At the
• 16:00
  Lisa Holmes: far as the actual museum is concerned, another thing we're trying to do, obviously, is appeal to and inspire the youth in the state of Georgia. We love to get the kids in there. We have tons of field trips. We see just about every middle schooler in Bibb County every year.
• 16:14
  Charles Davis: Yeah.
• 16:15
  Lisa Holmes: We have a ton of kids in there. We have a great interactive area, which has a small basketball court. We've got football and soccer goals. We've got hula hoops and trivia, a race car simulator, a lot of fun stuff for the We kids to have a full theater. So the first part of your experience at the hall, if you've not been there for a tour, is you'll come in, get introduced, get shown around, but then you'll get taken to our theater.
• 16:38
  And we have a wonderful fifteen minute film, Dare to Be Great, features a lot of our hall of famers.
• 16:43
  Charles Davis: Do you have in the ten years that you've been there a favorite item that is in the hall?
• 16:48
  Lisa Holmes: Tell you about my favorite item that came to the hall. Okay. That works keep it forever.
• 16:51
  Charles Davis: That works too though.
• 16:52
  Lisa Holmes: But a few years ago after the Braves won that series, you know, Brian Snitker came through. Snit came through on his way, I believe, to vacation in Florida and was gracious enough to leave his real trophy Wow. With us for a good long time, several months. I wanna say the entire spring and summer he stayed. And we had that on display.
• 17:15
  It was absolutely amazing. People came from everywhere just to get a picture with it. That's definitely my favorite.
• 17:22
  Susie Cowan: Yeah. That's such a fun story.
• 17:24
  Lisa Holmes: It's really... There's a lot of fun stuff.
• 17:25
  Charles Davis: There's a lot of
• 17:26
  Lisa Holmes: stuff There's lot in stuff there. I'll tell you, so when I first got there, they let me jump right in to everything.
• 17:33
  Harold Young: Yeah.
• 17:33
  Lisa Holmes: To everything. So I wrote up these bios on the players for their exhibits and for our program. I worked on all of that, but then when they started showing up induction weekend is when I was like, Oh my goodness, this really happening. That first class that was coming in, Kenny Walker. Kenny Skywalker And is in that first my partner, Andy, is from Crawford County.
• 17:58
  And he said, Lisa Kenny Walker is from Crawford County. He went to my school, not when Andy was there, before that. But the fun story is that Coach Zach there had also coached Kenny before he coached Andy and his three brothers and everyone else that came through that school. And what what coach Zach would do was on, a rain day, a day they couldn't, you know, get outside for whatever reason, they would sit in the gym and watch Kenny Walker highlight reel videos. And it was for their entire high school.
• 18:29
  So when I met Kenny, I was like, I've got the best story for you. I was able to reach out to the coach and use an original quote from him about Kenny Yeah. For Kenny's exhibit board and for his page in our program. We don't just want to know what their statistics are. We want know what kind of person they were on the field, off the field, who they inspired, what other accomplishments do they have.
• 18:51
  I mean, these people have accomplished many, many things.
• 18:53
  Charles Davis: More things than just sports.
• 18:54
  Lisa Holmes: Not just being an athlete. So we're celebrating them as a person, and that's really fun to find out. So as part of that application packet or nomination packet, we want all the cool sports stuff that And then we want some letters of support, letters of recommendation from their colleagues, players that played for them, coaches that coached them, someone that was in their bible study class. These are real people.
• 19:15
  Charles Davis: Yeah. Yeah.
• 19:16
  Lisa Holmes: And and you just don't realize that till you really get in there, but it's it's been remarkable to see.
• 19:20
  Susie Cowan: So how can the public get involved with the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame?
• 19:23
  Lisa Holmes: That is a wonderful question. First of all, please come see us. That's the best way to support us. Come see us. Tickets are obviously very affordable, and we can work with you if for some reason, you know, special needs groups come in, school groups get a a huge discount.
• 19:37
  We want people to be able to see the hall of fame. Never let that keep you from coming. You can volunteer. You can donate on our on our website, on any of our social media. Support us.
• 19:48
  We need your support. And we want to keep bringing this to you. That's that's the only way we can do it.
• 19:53
  Charles Davis: Me and Lisa had a conversation about this last night because she texted me. Charles Davis. She's come by my full name so I know it was serious then. The whole thing. The whole thing.
• 20:03
  Charles Davis, you better help me think of a song tomorrow morning or I'm gonna embarrass all of us. And I'm like, no. One, no, you're not gonna embarrass anybody. Two, it's a it's a... It should be a song about what...
• 20:16
  That should be connected to the overall thing of the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame. You're And a great person. You know music. So I was not worried about it, but I had some in my back pocket. But you chose something absolutely great, and I love the choice.
• 20:28
  Lisa Holmes: I'm very excited about it. Our mission statement, again, not only are we celebrating the athletes and and the other sports personalities and everything they've done, but we wanna inspire the kids. We want everyone to know that that you can work and achieve just about anything. Yeah. And and we wanna help you do that.
• 20:43
  So this song is a sports song, but it's also very inspirational and I don't know that you hear it quite as much anymore. Sure don't. And it is the Rocky theme song.
• 20:55
  Charles Davis: I absolutely love because like you said, it hits upon a a bunch of things.
• 20:58
  Lisa Holmes: It does.
• 20:59
  Charles Davis: Yes. It takes care of the sports thing. Like I said, Lisa, to you and everybody over at the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame for what you all do, not only for induction, but as as you said, showing kids possibilities.
• 21:09
  Lisa Holmes: Right.
• 21:09
  Charles Davis: And that's what it really is about. So thank you to you and everybody over there, and keep up the good work.
• 21:15
  Lisa Holmes: Absolutely. We love it. And thank you all so much. Thank you for having me.
• 21:18
  Susie Cowan: Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for coming in.
• 21:48
  Charles Davis: Okay. Welcome back. That was absolutely phenomenal talking to Harold and Lisa about all the things. Thank you to Harold Young. Thank you to Lisa Holmes.
• 21:56
  And thank you for listening to Ripple Makers stream all of these shows and many more on streamthecreek.com. But until next time, we'll see y'all later.
• 22:04
  Susie Cowan: Ripple Makers is a podcast by Creek Media hosted by Charles Davis and Susie This show is produced and edited by Big Hair Productions. Follow us on social media at stream the creek. Engage with us, like, subscribe, share with a friend. Be sure to stream this and more podcasts you may love at streamthecreek.com.