News from rural America.

This week, we start out with a story from KFF Health News about the ongoing rollout of the Rural Health Transformation Program. Reporter Sarah Jane Tribble explains how large companies are well-positioned to benefit, as states scramble to meet deadlines for administering the funds. Then, we head to rural Nebraska to learn about the social benefits of livestock sale barns. And the Ag and Water Desk reports on corn belt farmers who are banding together to create regenerative farming practices. Next, Whitney Kimball Coe interviews Reverend Claire Brown about southern rural churches that are welcoming LGBTQ+ members. Also, Frankie Felegy takes us on a midwestern punk rock odyssey to Minot, North Dakota. Our featured musician is Trevor McKenzie, an old-time singer, storyteller, and multi-instrumentalist out of Boone, North Carolina.

TRANSCRIPT

Hey, I'm Jared Ewey, the host of Yonder Radio.

Every week we bring you rural conversations with National Reach because we have help with the likes of KFF Health News.

They're doing the work like Sarah Jane Tribble, diving into the details of the Rural Health Transformation Program and emerging unscathed and with information for all of us.

And then rural Nebraska reporting with the social benefits of livestock, sale barns, and then the Ag and Water Desk, upping our game by providing regular reports.

This week, Corn Belt Farmers and their Regenerative Farming Practices.

And then Whitney Kimble Co. interviews Reverend Claire Brown about southern rural churches that are welcoming LGBT members.

And then Frankie Falleghi brings us the story, Midwestern Punk Rock Odyssey.

She brings this right to you, wherever you are, with our featured musician Trevor McKenzie, an old-time singer, storyteller, and multi-instrumentalist out of Boone, North Carolina.

Tune in for all of that and more on this week's Yonder Radio.

Thank you.

We'll be right back.

Yonder Radio, Rural Conversations with National Reach.

Hello, I'm your host, Jared Ewee.

Coming up, we're going to talk to Trevor McKenzie.

He is a professor who uses not just the stories of Appalachia, but the music to share his roots.

And it's a great conversation.

And the magic of regenerative farming.

We're going into the dirt, people.

We're getting our hands dirty to see how we can help this planet.

And we're going to kick things off with the rural health transformation from the big, beautiful bill.

How is that rollout going?

That's on the way.

But first, Jan Patalski, the news editor for the Daily Yonder, brings us the latest from rural America.

What is going on, Jan?

Howdy, Jared.

This week, we start with Civil Eats reporting on interesting research about how U.S. farmers vote.

Michael Shepard, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan, looked at the issue and concluded that if you look beyond Midwestern farmers who farm really on really huge acreages and tend to be more conservative and Republican, the image quickly gets much more complicated.

The overarching conclusion of the story was that, like many Americans, U.S. farmers tend to vote similarly to their neighbors and neighborhoods.

All right.

Thank you, Jan.

That's a growing story.

And now from High Country News, people, oh boy, people are betting on wildfires.

Should this be a thing?

Well, that's up to our listeners to decide.

However, High Country News reported on the so-called prediction markets, which have been a thing in the tech world for a while now.

Those are essentially gambling websites where you can bet real money on almost anything and everything.

One of the biggest ones called Polymarket allowed for betting on, at the time, developing Palisades fire down in Southern California.

About $1.2 million were spent on those bets.

You know, while we can debate the morality of engaging in such betting, it's one thing to bet on tornadoes or tsunamis where we can't affect where they go and what they do.

The worry here is that people could try to influence wildfires in order to make some quick and easy money.

I can't believe I have to say this, but polymarket bettors, we don't want your hot streak.

Yeah, those dollars could literally burn a hole in your pocket.

Boom.

The Texas Tribune, Governor Greg Abbott coming out to say that he's got some ideas on data centers.

Yes.

So according to Texas Tribune, Governor Greg Abbott called for blocking new data center development in rural parts of his state.

It's an interesting reversal from previous support.

He even has a recorded history of accepting contributions from people and companies related to the tech industry.

However, now he's calling for a prohibition of those new developments until the companies can provide funds and money to build out the necessary infrastructure, things such as updating the power grid, making sure that they can recycle their own water, etc.

When more news develops about the developing news about developers wanting to develop, it will develop here. with Jan Patalski, news editor of the Daily Yonder, dailyyonder.com.

Thanks so much.

Thanks, Jared.

That was Jan Patalski, news editor for the Daily Yonder.

And this story we're going to do now with Sarah Jane Tribble of KFF Health News.

She's doing the work to find out more on the Rural Health Transformation Program.

So we're going to talk about that.

And also you might glean from this if you know someone who is a rural health administrator trying to get money to fund health care, buy them gifts because they're going through it right now.

You're going to hear more now on the Rural Health Transformation Program from KFF Health News and Sarah Jane Tribble.

When we last left off, you were dipping our proverbial toes into the ongoing saga of America's rural health transformation.

Could you just give us a little reminder of why is that a Yeah, this is sort of exciting.

I like to think of it as good news amid a lot of negative stuff out there right now.

There's $50 billion going to rule America for the purpose of improving health care, transforming health care.

That's the name of the program, the Rule Health Transformation Program.

It's being doled out over five years, $10 billion a year to the states, all 50 states who pitched plans on how to spend this money.

And now that money is in action.

States are putting out grants for proposals and things like that.

So it's happening.

It's going out there and we're watching the states try to figure out this transformation very quickly.

I seem to detect some anxiety about this.

A couple reasons why.

One, you have states competing.

Another, this doesn't necessarily fund what I guess we would think it would fund.

I mean, this isn't covering coverage.

This is covering the guidelines as stated by the transformation, which I think has a lot to do with tech.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You hit on a couple of different points, big ones.

There is a lot of anxiety out there.

While it's exciting, and while you will talk to many people who are very elated to get this money, there's a lot of caveats, if you will.

For one, there is anxiety around the timing.

It's being pushed out very quickly.

States have to meet very tight deadlines in order to win more money next year.

So that kind of competition that you mentioned, right?

The states are all competing for this money.

Then also, this law was approved in the same bill that approved a big cut in Medicaid spending across the U.S. HB1, or what many people know as the big, beautiful bill that passed last July, it approved nearly a trillion dollars in cuts in spending to Medicaid.

In rural America alone, that's expected to be $137 billion over a decade.

That cut is going to really hurt rural providers because rural providers provide a lot of Medicaid patients with coverage.

In fact, a higher percentage of Medicaid patients with coverage than, say, urban or metro providers do.

So the anxiety you're hearing is both because states are rushing and they hope to meet some deadlines, but also because states are staring down the barrel at having one of their legs cut off when it comes to providing health care to rural Americans, even though they're getting this money.

Yeah, you know how to paint that picture, Sarah Jane Tribble, on KFF Health News.

You'll find the article big companies position themselves for payday from $50 billion federal rural health fund.

That seems to insinuate that big companies are in a better position to get this federal money.

And if so, is that a bad thing?

Yeah, we're not insinuating it.

We are saying they are in a good position to get some of this federal money.

And that is from our reporting, right?

We've talked to big companies, Fortune 500 companies who are forming collaborations, coalitions to go after this money.

They've hired specialists on their staff to go after this money.

So they're in conversations with the states even before the applications go out.

And that's because they already work with the states.

A lot of these big consulting firms like the Gainwells and others, they have contracts with the state through their Medicaid programs or other programs.

And you'll see the main application when they initially put it forth, they had Gainwell listed as one of the companies that would get some of the contracts.

So part of this is just the way business is done.

And it harkens back to these deadlines that we mentioned.

Because the states are on a tight deadline, many of them, and I've talked to state officials who said, we have to go with the lowest hanging fruit to meet these deadlines.

We need to make sure that we are doing things we know can make happen, right?

So you go with the vendors, you go with the people and the programs you already have operating, and you then extend those a little bit.

So these big companies, they're in a position to get the money.

Is that a bad thing?

It's not necessarily a bad thing.

If you think about the idea of transforming the way healthcare is provided, you want to look at the payment systems.

You want to make sure that there are dollars flowing to elevate changes in the way care is given.

So if I want to add payments for new emergency paramedicine folks, I'd have to work with my technology companies to make that happen in some cases.

So I think it's a case-by-case basis, but you can't just say it's a bad thing that big companies are positioned to get this money.

You can ask, well, does that then get in the way of the smaller rural providers getting the money?

And I think that's a question to keep asking.

One thing, though, I do question is if they're leaning into tech, are rural health care entities worried they're at a disadvantage?

This is a great question.

If you talk to rural hospitals, their big fear is they're at a disadvantage because they already are struggling to pay the bills, right?

They struggle to have enough nurses, enough doctors.

They struggle to have their revenues not in the negative for the year compared to their expenses.

And so when they think about getting new technology, getting a new fancy piece of equipment over here that could help with ultrasounds is not the same as making sure I have enough staff to run those ultrasounds.

Rural providers are being creative and thinking of ways to use this technology.

At the same time, they're worried about the lack of funding they have for the basic services they need to provide.

And the Rural Transformation Fund isn't supposed to make up for those basic services.

Well, it's like staring into an actual oracle of rural transformation, healthcare.

Sarah, Jane, Tribble, what's next on the beat?

The number one thing that we're following here at KFF Health News is accountability.

Those questions you're asking about, hmm, how's this money really going to be spent?

We're going to keep watching that and following it.

Right now, we're collecting revised budgets from all the states.

If you go to KFF Health News, we have a map with all of the application states filed.

So if you want to know what your state wants to do with the money, you can go there and see it.

They had to file revised budgets and narratives in some cases.

So we're collecting those and we'll be looking at, hey, what changed?

What did CMS and the state work out to change and how they're going to plan to spend the money?

And then we'll be watching the deadlines.

You know, states have to have their first annual reports filed by the end of August.

They have to obligate all of their money for the first year of funding by the end of October.

And so we're going to be watching those deadlines to see if states meet those deadlines and what happens if they don't.

Well, if you are clueless and or consternated, the cure for that is KFF Health News and working there, Sarah Jane Tribble.

And I think you're a regular on Yonder Radio now, if you're good with that.

I sure hope to be.

Well, thank you so much.

Thank you, Jared.

That was reporter Sarah Jane Tribble.

You can find her reporting on the Rural Health Transformation Program and much more at kffhealthnews.org.

And now our featured musician of the week, Trevor McKenzie out of Boone, North Carolina.

He wears a lot of hats, and that's not just because he's out in the sun living the Appalachian life.

It's because he is an old-time musician and faculty at Appalachian State University.

And he loves history.

He loves music.

It runs so deep that he was a kid, maybe about eight years old, listening to his favorite cassette, which was Civil War era music.

We'll find out if that set him apart or not. okay so you are a musician and you teach music and you are now the director of Appalachian studies at Appalachian State yes which it seems to be the matrix of Appalachia do you get more Appalachia than what you are right now I'm not sure I definitely it's a word that I've probably said more in my life than most people yeah working at Appalachian State working with the Center for Appalachian studies growing up in Appalachia.

Yeah.

And it's an interesting term.

It's one that, you know, I feel like has become a real kind of cultural pride, a hinge for cultural pride here in, you know, the last 30, 40 years.

And definitely within my lifetime, it's something that's kind of taken off.

Let's talk about you as a kid.

When you were a child, were there any other of your peers listening to a tape of Civil War era songs?

I would say not, but I've always been interested in history.

I grew up on a farm, a beef cattle farm in Wythe County.

My folks still are there.

It's 200 acres.

They raise Angus beef cattle, but that had been a farm since the first European settlement.

Growing up in that environment, that kind of landscape, growing up in that, with that around me, When I got into traditional music, it really explained that environment to me.

And it seemed familiar in that way.

And so I've been interested in older things, traditions, and how those can be carried into the future since a very young age.

Yeah, speaking of tradition, I wonder which gives you more credibility for your current position.

Your rigorous academic studies or the fact that you learned guitar in a barbershop?

Well, I got to say the barbershop, my dad took me there when I was around nine or 10 years old.

And my dad played music growing up, but he thought it was a good idea for me to take lessons.

And so, I mean, that was a great environment.

I wouldn't really call it formal lessons so much as more.

It was just kind of a revolving jam session that went on.

And so, yeah, a lot of great musicians from North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, West Virginia. you know, you're kind of right there in that thin part of southwestern Virginia where all the states converge within Appalachia.

And so it was just kind of a revolving door of people to learn from, which is pretty invaluable to making a start as a musician.

In the month of July, in the year of 16, Where tropical storm that ever was seen, So you say you consider yourself a historian who uses music as a conveyance to share stories.

How are you doing that at school?

To answer that, I have to circle back a little bit to when I was in high school.

I was fortunate to have a teacher that went a little bit rogue and taught an Appalachian Studies class every semester.

She added it as an extra course load to her own teaching duties, you know.

Deborah Wilkerson.

I was in her class and it was the first time that I saw Appalachian studies in a classroom setting and saw these local stories and traditions really celebrated and local knowledge celebrated.

And so I feel like my role both as a musician and a teacher is to create that space for people.

You know, Appalachian history, local histories in general are not really taught in school, I mean, even beyond the Appalachian region.

And so having a place where you can say that, you know, the place where you come from is important.

Knowledge outside of the classroom can be brought into that space and appreciated in the same way.

How does one get extra credit in one of your classes?

Is it music?

I've always added in a portion of like, hey, go out to a traditional music venue.

And I give them a list of places to go, some suggestions, and write a short essay on it, or do a little sort of almost radio piece or a quick video or a short presentation and talk about what it was like in that space, what you learned, what the importance of this tradition is to you and what you think it means to our region more broadly and where you think it's going.

What do you think the future of it is?

Let's get into your music here because I think you started guitar.

And then your bio just casually says at some point you picked up fiddle and banjo.

Is this you?

Is this who you are?

A frustrating human for the rest of us who just grabs instruments and plays them?

Oh, well, I have to say that really fiddle is the instrument that made everything take off for me in a way.

And that was sort of a slow burn as far as my pathway into traditional music.

I mean, I grew up playing guitar behind fiddle players, so I had an understanding of the tune. but I really wasn't around anyone that taught lessons formally.

Fiddle was kind of interesting to me and I picked up bits and pieces there from these older fiddlers that I really admired who were around playing at dances or venues, school houses, concerts, those types of things.

And of course, Southwest Virginia and this part of Western North Carolina where I live now is a really fertile ground for a lot of dance band traditions, fiddling, old-time music traditions.

And so I had a lot to draw from, but it was mainly just out of imitation and kind of watching people that I admired and stealing licks where I could.

We talk to more and more people who are younger playing music.

We typically associate with, you know, Bill Monroe or maybe people who aren't around anymore.

You're seeing a natural movement of young people into Appalachian music and culture.

I think so.

And I'm seeing it among some of the people that are my students now, especially the what they call the Gen Z generation of people.

I think there's an entire group of younger people there looking for authentic experiences that are not bound up in, you know, sort of the digital spaces of online and iPhones.

And they're looking for these communities that in a way people used to automatically have, especially in these rural areas. and these rural traditions are all about communities and work parties and ways to support each other in these informal settings.

And there's been a real resurgence of interest in things like square dances.

Right outside of our campus here at Appalachian, there's a little community called Todd that has these monthly square dances.

And when I was playing those about 15 years ago, there were maybe 20 people would come out to those.

Now, it's 150 people, mostly young people, that will show up.

I think you're one of the lightning rods attracting people to the culture and the music.

Well, Jared, I'm glad to be able to speak with y'all today.

I really appreciate any chance I get to talk about Appalachia and our music traditions here and my own work and involvement in that.

That was multi-talented, multi-instrumentalist Trevor McKenzie from Boone, North Carolina.

You can find his music on bandcamp.com.

Just look up Trevor McKenzie.

Now it's time for our first trivia clue of the week.

We'll give you three clues throughout the episode and reveal the answer at the end.

So here we go.

The answer to this week's trivia is a unique sporting event that was first held in 1961 in Fairbanks, Alaska. more trivia clues coming up and we're going to talk to a woman who yeah she's an academic yeah she gets rural america but there's something about her her keen curiosity and where that's taken her and how that informs us that's coming up on yonder radio Thank you. guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo Yonder Radio, rural conversations with National Reach.

We're about to get our hands dirty with some regenerative farming, and it's just great to hear people on the ground actually doing it.

We have that coming up and more trivia clues.

And now talking to Dr. Cheryl Burkhart Kreisel, a professor of agricultural economics at the University of Nebraska.

She helped author a study called Beyond the Auction, Social Impacts of Nebraska's Livestock Sale Barns.

You know, I grew up with sail barns, Cheryl, and I love seeing this research and these stories about it because I hadn't realized how important they were until you take it to this whole new depth.

How does this even come about that someone says, you know what, we need to go deeper on the sail barn?

What happened was a colleague and I actually attended an international community development conference in Australia.

And one of the sessions that we sat in on was a gal from Australia who did this kind of research with their Livestock Marketing Association.

We were fascinated with the idea of actually that social component.

The logic for us is if she's finding some interesting things in Australia, I wonder what they're like in the U.S. And then one step more, I wonder what they're like in Nebraska.

I'm going to paint a picture of what I remember from sale barns as a kid, because I would go to a sale barn with my friend who was just another 10 year old, say, and a few clicks of an auctioneer's tongue later, they were thousandaires.

And I couldn't believe I knew a kid with that kind of money from a sheep.

It's weird.

This is one of these studies that it once is like, wow, this is a remarkable discovery.

But also, duh, like this is where people come together to share in their gains from all their work.

Absolutely, they do.

And you might have the ranchers and the farmers that are selling their livestock, but you also have people there that are buying.

And you also have folks that maybe work in the feed industry and you have sale barn employees.

And then you might have grandpa and grandma that are also there.

Maybe they're doing a little babysitting of the kids.

There's a lot of intergenerational family pieces that goes along with that sale barn experience and social sale barn experience.

And to top it all off, quite often these sale barns have cafes.

And that's a great place for people to spend a little downtime with a cup of coffee and a piece of pie and get to cultivate those friendships and those relationships.

Well, now I want a cup of coffee and a piece of pie, but I'm going to forge forth.

Cheryl, why?

Why are you looking into the social and mental and socio-emotional impact of sale barn experiences?

We understood that there was something going on.

It's about curiosity, I think.

What is going on?

What does this mean for people?

And so we understood that there were probably some social connections.

Those social connections lead to social capital.

I mean, you have networks and you have value. but one of the things in Australia that they were trying to do is actually take it one step further and identify what are some of those impacts maybe they're not quantifiable maybe they are that really make a difference in people's lives and so that was the piece we wanted to get to because we think gathering places like this are really important in the literature they talk about third places.

And so you may have these social interactions, these social experiences in the home, in the family, you have them at work, but then there are these third places.

Quite often you'll see them iconically in cafes, but sale barns can be third places as well.

And so it's worth taking a look at and really discovering what do they contribute?

And then can we lift up some of those things to actually share that with other people and use them in a better way?

So what happens in the sale barn does not stay in the sale barn.

And not just because Cheryl's taking notes.

Okay, this is a known factor.

It is an important community centerpiece that expands outward into the community.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

So, you know, one of the things that really, I guess, struck us and surprised us a little bit was that when we ask people, and I'm going back into my notes here a little bit.

Oh, yeah, you've broken out the sale barn Bible there.

Why did they come to the sale barn?

The reason I attend is for socializing. 60% of them, I acknowledge that.

For networking, 20%.

Attending has helped me gain new friendships, 63%.

And attending has provided me a social place to gather, 50%.

You can't ignore some of those numbers.

That tells me something.

Let's know more.

Let's find out more.

And there's this piece, too, the sale barn offers spaces that support mental health.

I think that's a really important piece.

Well, especially when you get into areas of the U.S. that are pretty isolated, pretty ranching dominated.

There's a lot of space in between your farmsteads, your ranches.

And so you don't you're not interacting with people regularly.

So, I mean, to give you an idea, here's a quote.

I think that helps mentally knowing that there are other people that feel the same way I do, that they're going through the same things we're going through.

I think it helps you mentally and health-wise.

So that came from one of the people that we interviewed.

One person, for instance, talked about a challenge with alcoholism.

And it was through a friendship, through an acquaintance at the sale barn, that they really started talking and really won that battle a bit.

Well, you have just tapped into a wealth of information.

It's like sale barn paleontology.

Is that what?

It could be.

The reality is this was just a pilot study.

We went to four locations in Nebraska.

One of them was a smaller sale barn in between Lincoln and Omaha.

And it had a whole different kind of clientele, A much more immigrant-focused group got some feedback from people that were, you know, long-time residents in the community saying that, yeah, we kind of like them here.

I mean, they're learning about our culture.

They feel comfortable in that buying and selling environment because even in their home countries, that was a piece of it.

But this opens the way for them to kind of understand the American culture a little bit and get kind of accustomed to some of those things that we do.

So I think, you know, that could be a whole study in itself.

Dr. Burkhart Kreisel, or Cheryl, as she's also known, or the woman in the barn asking questions and not about cattle.

Thank you so much for the time.

Thank you.

I appreciate it.

You can find Cheryl's report about the social impacts of sale barns online through the Center for Agricultural Profitability.

And now another song from Trevor McKenzie.

This one's a traditional ballad called Shoals Mills, written about a thriving Appalachian logging community at the turn of the 20th century.

Trevor made this song with his friend and fellow musician Steve Kruger.

I'm going back to Shoals Mills Give me some biscuits brown Cause them women on beaver dance Don't go there damn put down I am long and I'm tall And I'm skinny and I'm mean Shows male women seem to come You can hear them holler and scream Cause them girls on shows there Got that loving on them eyes Put them women on beef redairs I hate you can't make no time guitar solo I won't have a nickel When they come next May Day Cause them girls on shows They got loving on them eyes But them women on beaver dance Once money all the time My old double baby That was Shulz Mills from Trevor McKenzie's album, The Fresh It, with his friend Steve Kruger.

They recorded it several years ago, but released a vinyl and digital version after Hurricane Helene, with proceeds going to the Lost Province Center for the Cultural Arts.

You can find the Fresh It album online at bandcamp.com.

Farmers across the Corn Belt are learning from each other and developing new practices to promote regenerative agriculture.

People, it's not just a buzz phrase, it's real and it's happening. and just savage.

I'm happy to introduce this team with the Mississippi River Basin Ag and Water Desk.

They have the story and they'll have more stories as regular contributors to Yonder Radio.

Let's get started with this.

It's calving season for cow farmers.

Greg Thorin tools around his pastures in an old pickup truck looking for baby cows that were born overnight that need an identifying ear tag.

That little calf was born this morning or last night.

Hi.

Hi, sweetie.

Thorin is what's called a regenerative farmer.

He produces almost everything he needs to raise healthy cows, but he's even more focused on healthy soil.

He quit synthetic fertilizers and pesticides cold turkey years ago.

That's saving him a lot compared to conventional farmers.

The fascinating thing about regenerative farming is people just share things.

Because we're not, nobody knows the exact answer to us.

Thorin's always trying something new on his farm to improve the soil.

He loves sharing what he's learned with other farmers, which he gets to do with a group called the Joe Davis County Soil and Water Health Coalition.

It works together to protect the farming community and farmland.

They're all trying new things and sharing what they learned.

This work is at the heart of the farmer-led movement.

It's offering an alternative to intensive agriculture, which is driving soil loss, water pollution, and financial crisis for farmers in the Midwest.

Change is what needs to happen.

Beth Baranski is the organizing secretary for the coalition.

Farmer-led movement allows people to share the risk and minimize the risk.

Conventional farmers are facing intense pressures to just make it to the next growing season.

Even if they wanted to try regenerative farming practices, razor-thin margins make it financially risky to make the switch.

But groups like this call on farmers to learn from each other and share the load.

The key is the farmers on their farms in their fields figuring out the practices that will work for them to achieve these goals.

And while there are plenty of government programs and grants and incentives that could help in theory, Baranski says many farmers are skeptical about how well they actually work.

She said that generally they're more likely to trust another farmer.

Somebody coming from the corporate world or from an institution, even higher education, and saying this is what you need to do is not as effective as a neighboring farmer who has tried to practice and found it beneficial.

The coalition offers connection and tested solutions to some of agriculture's biggest problems.

But it's a slow-growing movement, and so much of the industry is set up to work in opposition to the coalition's goals.

Jonathan Koppis is an associate professor of ag policy at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

He says the industry doesn't give them the support they really need in this economic moment.

When things are tight and margins are tough, what we've seen historically is farmers tend to push it, right?

You push the land, you try to put more land in production.

He says policy coming from the government should make conservation practices easier, so farmers don't have to choose between protecting soil and water and a profit.

But he says policies act like a barrier instead.

That makes it hard for farmers to move away from conventional practices.

In theory, farmers could just decide to put less nitrogen on.

The risk of doing that is pretty significant.

So we may make it worse that way, but we're also not addressing those issues.

It's almost like paradoxes within paradoxes wrapped in irony.

The farmer-led movement does have some federal backing.

The coalition got some seed money from an organization called the Fishers and Farmers Partnership, which uses Congress-appropriated money to support similar projects in the Midwest.

So far, they've aided 70 projects with more than $2 million in funding.

As Thorin turns his truck onto the dirt road towards home, he says even though farming this way isn't exactly easy, when you think about it, it's pretty simple.

It's not about the people.

It's about farming.

It's about the land.

It's about the soil.

That's why I tell these young people coming in with me, I said, it's not about me, it's not about you, it's about the soil.

Now the growing season is starting up, farmers with the coalition are hosting field days throughout the summer to share what they've learned.

From the Ag and Water Desk, I'm Jess Savage.

You can find more reporting on the Mississippi River Basin at agwaterdesk.org.

And we'll have more of them on Yonder Radio, and we're excited about it.

We got another break coming up, but first it's time for our second trivia clue.

I know we didn't give you much first.

That's what we do.

You already know we're talking about a unique sporting event that takes place in Fairbanks, Alaska.

Here's some more information.

This event includes competitions like Nalukotok, or blanket toss, ear pull, and seal skinning.

This is a real thing, and we have the answer on the way.

Also, Whitney Kimble Co., she brings up something that's remarkably not remarkable.

We'll talk about that and what it means to be inclusive at a church on the way. on Yonder Radio.

Thank you.

Yonder Radio, rural conversations with National Reach.

I just want to say hello to Sarah, who emailed to say she was listening and was happy to hear us.

And we're happy to hear from you, too, info at yonderradio.com.

My name is Jared, and we're going to wrap this show up with a couple of great conversations.

This segment comes from our partners at the Rural Faith Initiative, Whitney Kimble Coe.

She's the director, and she's an ordained minister in the Episcopal Church.

Welcome back to our series on rural faith and LGBTQ plus affirming churches in the rural South.

We're back with Reverend Claire Brown.

In this segment, we're going to look at the values of Southern hospitality and Christian welcome that inform LGBTQ plus affirming churches in the rural South.

From a general attitude of acceptance to specific invitations to coffee hour, baby showers, and more, these congregations have grown in their theology and community by simply practicing what churches have always done for everyone.

So, Claire, I'm sure a lot of our listeners know the phrase Southern hospitality.

Of course, people from all different cultures offer really beautiful hospitality, but welcoming people with food and shelter and conversation is a Southern specialty.

And in the rural South, we're especially proud of this as a part of our culture.

So I know you found this to be a really important part of the ministry of the churches that you've interviewed.

Yes, it was crucial.

So when we think about a church being open and affirming, fully inclusive, we often go right to the sacraments and the sort of official positions in theology.

You know, can someone get married in your church?

Can they be ordained?

What do we think about their life?

And while these questions are important, they're really huge and they're really specifically professional and mostly get airtime from pastors and bishops and academics and boards.

So, yes, the churches that I interviewed are welcoming in those ways.

But what I saw first, what was really essential for these communities, was that the atmosphere and the big and small actions of church hospitality were truly welcoming.

People were delighted and unfazed and consistent in their welcome to LGBTQ plus visitors and members.

I want to hear more about that.

What did it really look like?

Honestly, it's pretty boring in the best way.

So it was a lot of small things that should be ubiquitous in most little southern churches, but offered with intention across diversity of gender and sexuality.

So for example, one of the places that I visited in my work was in Water Valley, Mississippi, a little Episcopal church there.

It was a little A-frame parish that had a tiny little rainbow painted on the corner of their sign.

So immediately I was curious.

I knew I had to go there on Sunday.

So walking into the church, I realized there were some other visitors.

There was a gay couple, two youngish men.

And the welcome to me and the people I was visiting with and the welcome to this couple were identical. no one blinked and then after the service after you know lovely sermon that acknowledged that it was pride weekend and singing and communion and all the regular pieces we all ended up across the street in this church's little flex-based parish hall for the coffee hour honestly those guys got way more attention as soon as people in the church realized that they were local they were truly open truly prepared to have all kinds of visitors and they weren't interested in being performative or tokenizing someone.

They didn't overdo it or underdo it.

They're just being an inclusive church for everyone.

Or there was the Congregational Church in Tryon, North Carolina.

This congregation was very much in the process of discernment and decision-making about whether they would have formal policy to be open and affirming when their pastor, Megan, discerned her call to go and be their pastor.

Megan is queer and at the time as a bi woman was single and she didn't really think that her orientation or relationship was anyone's business.

But when she came out and announced her engagement to a woman in the congregation a few years later, one big old Sunday morning announcement.

Well, everyone was really joyful, but it was just kind of ordinary.

It was the same kind of celebration and excitement that they offered to any other couple announcing their engagement.

The church hospitality crew just immediately wanted to know if there were some etiquette details about throwing a bride and bride shower for them and when they would get to meet her.

Oh, I love those examples.

And the ordinary celebration or the ordinary way of hospitality is what stuck out to you and what felt distinctly important about the way this was operating in these churches.

Yes, yes, because it's a way of seeing the church as being fully alive in its mission.

I also got to hear some really remarkable stories from a friend of mine, the Reverend Kelsey Davis, that really flipped the script on this theme of hospitality.

So Kelsey is also an Episcopal priest, and I've known her and her wife for years.

They live over in Asheville, North Carolina, where Kelsey serves as the bishop's deputy for disaster response and recovery after Hurricane Helene.

And so they're in Asheville, which is a larger southern city.

It's known for a progressive culture.

But after the hurricane, Kelsey's work in the disaster response ministry of the Episcopal Church there has pulled her over into rural counties and communities in the area.

Now, Kels is a woman, a lesbian.

She also identifies as two-spirit, a non-binary identity that's connected to her Choctaw heritage and is more masculine presenting.

And she's experienced some pretty painful and frightening misgendering and homophobia in her larger community and as she's gone out and about doing her work.

But what she also had to share were some really remarkable encounters of mutuality because she's going into these rural Carolina Appalachian communities that are not sort of politically, culturally aligned with her life, though people are receiving her presence and her gifts with real thankfulness and joy and collaboration.

I mean, as she put it to me, people are less concerned that you have a wife if you also have the resources that they need.

So she's getting to step into these spaces that might assume they're unfriendly toward her.

And yet she is the bearer of good news and generators and water purificators and gets to be the person who connects communities back together and offer hospitality to those folks.

Well, what I've really appreciated about this conversation, what you call flipping the script in some ways on hospitality, but also that LGBTQ affirming churches and parishes are finding ways to just lean into what is in some ways the normative expectation around Southern hospitality culture.

Absolutely.

We throw each other showers.

We welcome each other to the coffee hour.

We help each other when a disaster strikes.

This is who we are.

And to see this as a vision of a fully enfleshed, diverse, affirming church is a beautiful, hopeful, and ordinary thing.

Today's conversation is part of a rural faith series that looks at research and stories from LGBTQ plus affirming churches in the rural South.

This research and stories are collected by the Reverend Claire Brown, an Episcopal priest in rural Tennessee.

We hope you'll tune in for our next segment of this series in which we'll talk about some of the worries and the challenges these congregations have faced and how they're overcoming them.

That was Whitney Kimble Coe talking with Reverend Claire Brown out of East Tennessee.

And we'll hear more from Whitney as she traverses the countryside and finding great conversations to enlighten us all.

And now we're going on a Midwestern punk rock odyssey.

If you didn't foresee hearing those words today, well, that's the kind of unpredictable awesomeness we bring you at Yonder Radio.

What we say here is we're bringing in a ringer because Frankie Flagey, she tells the stories and she's at Arts Midwest.

And today you tell us of Minot, North Dakota with this incredible title, Prairie Weirdos Doing Their S*** to Create Inclusive Youth Art Scene.

What is that, Frankie?

What are we talking about?

Why are we cussing?

First off, kudos to my editor, Angela Z, for being so cool and letting me keep that in the headlines.

Yeah.

The whole tagline behind the city of Minot, North Dakota, which has a population of just under 40,000, is why not Minot?

And they live up to that legitimately every single day.

So the Red Willow Collective formed in 2023 in Minot, North Dakota.

And it's a native run music and arts program, but it's super, super grassroots.

They started with $100 and just a love for showing and showcasing and sharing native queer BIPOC stories.

So basically what it is, it's an all ages sober community.

And it's all about how punk, the noise, the culture, the community, the raw joy of it just connects and saves and heals us.

So the person behind this is Maria Cree.

They describe themselves as an old punk.

I'm not saying that.

I don't think they're old.

Maria told me that my not like a lot of places in the rural Midwest and rural America and just America at large have not been the friendliest to native people and have these sort of stereotypes and stories about them so it's really beautiful to have a native-run non-profit that runs this no walls inclusive space for and by native people to just come and be and to be silly and to have fun and to scream and to wear whatever they want to wear.

Well, I love this philosophy from Maria Cree.

Off the cuff ideas, $100 in the bank account and a love for showing Native kids they can make art.

And I think that's so poignant because there's all this negative chatter, you know, idle hands and wayward children, and they just want to do something, give them something to do.

What did you see?

What was a project that you saw that put this on display?

So they did goth prom or punk prom, if you will.

And you just show up and bring your studs and bring your black gowns and outfits and just rock out and just have fun.

It's for anybody, all ages, any identity, live in Minot, don't live in Minot, to just come and express yourself and be in a space that's really curated to have that collective joy. there's this photo and they're in a mosh pit and they're running amok.

And it looks so freeing and fun.

There was a time I would look at this and be like, oh, geez, I'm worried.

And now I'm like, you know what?

I could be right there.

Let me pitch in for the next goth prom.

Jared, let's get you signed up.

I'm so excited.

Okay, I got to get you to extrapolate this incredible last line in your story.

It's a quote.

North Dakota has a lot.

The Midwest has a lot.

A lot of weirdos doing their shit.

It's just getting them in one spot.

It's cool to watch it.

It's like cracking the glow stick, you know?

Yeah, no.

In the prairie and in one of the coldest places in the U.S. other than Alaska, it's really easy to isolate.

And it's really easy to just do your garage band thing.

But when all of those people come together across the map, across North Dakota, from Bismarck to Jamestown to Fargo to Grand Forks, and then even into Minnesota, it's just explosive.

It's just explosive because you get all of this energy and all of these people who want to do art.

And the beauty of art is that it's better when you do it together.

It's like, yeah, all of these identities that can be sidelined in mainstream music production and in mainstream shows just are at the forefront and are celebrated and loved and have arms wrapped around them.

Have fun.

Nobody's judging.

I love it.

Yeah.

Even if it's bad, just make something people can thrash to.

We need that right now.

Like we need to be in our bodies together.

Frankie Flegi, always bringing it from artsmidwest.org.

The article is one more bleep editor, Prairie Weirdos doing their s*** to create inclusive youth art scene.

Thank you so much.

You guys go to Minot.

Seriously, you won't regret it.

Frankie Flegi.

Is it okay to say we love her?

I'm not sure.

That's, you know, I'm just saying it.

We do.

Okay.

And we hope you do as well because we're going to bring her back regularly because she is prolific in the storytelling.

Okay, we're getting to the end of the show, which means it's time for our third and final trivia clue.

This four-day competition seeks to preserve and celebrate the cultural traditions of circumpolar native peoples.

And the answer is the World Eskimo Indian Olympics.

Every July, hundreds of athletes and spectators gather in Fairbanks, Alaska, to compete in games that have been played for time immemorial.

Many of the games require skills that were necessary to survive traditional whaling and fishing villages.

For example, the two-foot-high kick was how messengers signaled the village that a whale had been caught, according to the governing body of the World Eskimo Indian Olympics.

In addition to sports competitions, the Olympics also include dance performances, craft showcases, a pageant, and a muktuk, or whale blubber, eating contest.

This year's Olympics will take place from July 15th through the 18th.

And this has been another hour.

Might I say, a whale of an episode of Yonder Radio.

You can learn more and listen to all our episodes at yonderradio.com.

And thank you for listening.

Thank you for listening to Yonder Radio, a production of the Center for Rural Strategies, publisher of The Daily Yonder.

I'm your host, Jared Ewe.

Thanks to Don Castle and the Tennessee Sheiks, Steph Gunno and the Lone Tones, Quincy Ponfair, Leo Pozel, and Tim Merima for the great music.

Our editor and producer is Susanna Brown.

This episode was also produced by Anya Patron-Slepian, with additional support from Alana Newman and Julia Tilton.

Our executive producer is Joel Cohen.

The executive in charge of production is Adam Georgie.

Yonder Radio, rural conversations with National Reach.

Thank you.