July 28, 2025 • 49 mins
On this week’s episode, WWIA Founder and CEO, John McDaniel, is proud to welcome a great American Patriot, and one of his closest lifelong friends to the podcast. We are honored to have Colonel (Retired) Joel T. Suenkel join John for an engaging and timely conversation. Joel hails from Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Oshkosh as a Distinguished Military Graduate in 1988. He was commissioned as a 2LT in the Armor branch and went on to graduate from the Command and General Staff College and the Army War College Fellowship Program. He holds a Master of Arts Degree in Organizational Behavior from the University of Phoenix, and during his 28+ year career in the Army, held a number of key positions to include:
• Strategic Plans Chief for Stabilization Force 11, Bosnia-Herzegovina (Operation Joint Forge).
• Joint Logistics Command Operations Officer, (CJTF 76), Afghanistan.
• Commander, 83rd Ordnance Battalion, Japan.
• (and) Chief of Logistics, 25th Infantry Division and Multi-National Division-North, Iraq.
Upon retirement from the Army, he accepted the position of Chief of Operations with the Logistics Data Analysis Center, Army Materiel Command, Redstone Arsenal, AL.
In 2020, Joel purchased 75 acres of land in Moulton, Alabama, and embarked on a journey to establish a working cattle ranch, driven by a need to build something lasting with his own two hands. His vision didn’t stop at personal fulfillment. He began to realize the profound therapeutic benefits of working the land, the grounding power of physical labor, and the sense of purpose that came from providing for oneself. It struck him that this experience could be incredibly valuable for others, especially those who had served our country and were navigating the challenges of transitioning back to civilian life. This realization led to Joe’s most meaningful venture: the establishment of Rally Point Veterans’ Ranch, a non-profit organization dedicated to empowering veterans through comprehensive sustainable living skills training.
It is a high privilege to have Joel on the podcast, and we know you’re going to enjoy learning more about him and his story.
Takeaways:
- The WWIA Podcast serves to honor and support America's combat-wounded Veterans, fostering healing and connection.
- Colonel Joel T. Suenkel, a dedicated Veteran, shares his transformative journey into cattle ranching.
- The establishment of Rally Point Veterans Ranch emphasizes empowering veterans with sustainable living skills.
- The podcast highlights the challenges Veterans face during their transition to civilian life after military service.
- The conversation underscores the therapeutic benefits of engaging with the land and livestock for Veterans' mental health.
- Listeners are encouraged to support the WWIA Foundation and its mission to benefit Wounded Warriors.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Begin.
Hello and welcome to the WWIAPodcast. We're honored to have you
join us in our mission tobring honor, connection and healing
to America's combat woundedPurple Heart heroes. If this is your
first time listening to thispodcast, we welcome you. If you're
(00:21):
a returning listener. Thanksfor coming back. Please be sure to
tell others about our podcastand leave us a review if you're enjoying
what you're hearing on thisweek's episode. WWIA Founder and
CEO John McDaniel is proud towelcome a great American patriot
and one of his closestlifelong friends to the podcast.
We're honored to have ColonelRetired Joel T. Sunkel join John
(00:45):
for an engaging and timelyconversation. Joel hails from Oshkosh,
Wisconsin and graduated fromthe University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh
as a Distinguished militarygraduate in 1988. He was commissioned
as a second lieutenant in theArmor Branch and went on to graduate
from the Command and GeneralStaff College and the Army War College
(01:05):
Fellowship Program. Joel holdsa Master of Arts degree in Organizational
Behavior from the Universityof Phoenix and during his 28 year
career in the army held anumber of key positions to Strategic
Plans Chief for stabilizationforce 11, Bosnia Herzegovina, operation
Joint Forge, Joint LogisticsCommand, Operations Officer, Combined
(01:28):
joint Task Force 76,Afghanistan, Commander 83rd Ordnance
Battalion, Japan, and Chief ofLogistics, 25th Infantry Division
and Multinational DivisionNorth, Iraq. Upon retirement from
the Army, Joel accepted theposition of Chief of Operations with
the Logistics Data AnalysisCenter, Army Materiel Command, Redstone
(01:50):
Arsenal, Alabama. In 2020,Joel purchased 75 acres of land in
Moulton, Alabama and embarkedon a journey to establish a working
cattle ranch. Driven by a needto build something lasting with his
own two hands, his visiondidn't stop at personal fulfillment.
He began to realize theprofound therapeutic benefits of
working the land, thegrounding power of physical labor,
(02:12):
and the sense of purpose thatcame from providing for oneself.
It struck him that thisexperience could be incredibly valuable
for others, especially thosewho had served our country and were
navig navigating thechallenges of transitioning back
to civilian life. Thisrealization led to Joel's most meaningful
venture, the establishment ofRaleigh Point Veterans Ranch, a non
(02:33):
profit organization dedicatedto empowering veterans through comprehensive
sustainable living skillstraining. It's a high privilege to
have Joel on the podcast andwe know you're going to enjoy learning
more about him and his story.Let's jump right into the conversation
with John and Joel now.
(02:56):
Hi, I'm John McDaniel, founderand CEO of the Wounded warriors in
Action foundation, and this isour podcast Honor Connect, heal.
So geez, it's early part ofJuly 2026. I don't know when this
is going to air, but I havewith me today my best buddy. Okay.
Guy that I grew up with. Wefirst met what, middle school, I
(03:22):
think seventh grade. Seventhgrade. Webster Stanley. Webster Stanley,
Oshkosh, Wisconsin. So with metoday is Joel Sunkel. He is a. His
military career, I think, wasmore illustrious than mine. He went
on to serve for what, 28 years.
(03:43):
28 and some change.
Yeah, 28 and some change. Andmade it to the rank of full colonel.
But here's the best part ofthis. You and I went to basic training
together. We were privatestogether. Together on Tank Hill in
Fort Jackson, South Carolina,in the same platoon. Basic training.
Right, Same platoon. And wewere both squad leaders.
Squid leaders together.
(04:04):
Sure were.
What a great story that is. Soour platoon, our drill sergeant was
a guy by the name of SergeantLyle. And he was an old infantryman.
He was a stray leginfantryman. And he was hard, like
Russian roll call and. But youknow, wow. I mean, that was 1983.
(04:28):
Yep, 1983.
1983. It's crazy. You know, weshare stories about that all the
time, you know.
Yeah.
And then we went on and becameofficers and, you know, served our
country. I did for 20, Joeldid for 28. You were, you're a professional
logistician. Right. But youstarted out as a tanker.
Started out as a tanker for.Well, I got commissioned and my first
(04:53):
duty assignment was in Korea.Yeah. And I was a tanker through
that tour, which was about twoyears. And then funny enough, talking
about going to basic training,when I PCs from Korea, I went back
to Fort Jackson, back to basictraining as a company.
(05:15):
Commander or as a captain.
Company XO as a training.
Right back to where westarted. What was your impression
when you got there? Were youlike, holy crap.
So they don't keep, they don'tkeep soldiers on Tank Hill anymore.
They keep them in these new.
Yeah.
You know, so when we were, when.
We were there, it was WorldWar II barracks.
Yeah, yeah. And they're still.Well, they were at that time, but
(05:37):
they weren't being. Well, theywere utilized when reservists came
in for two weeks at a time.But as far as, you know, soldiers
rotating through basictraining, they had new facilities
at that time, but yeah.Anyway, back to tanker and logistician.
(05:57):
So it was during that tour asa company XO that I did a branch
transfer to logistics. Well,back, back in those days, logistics
had different branches withinit. Now it's just logistics. So I
(06:17):
went to be an ammunition officer.
Okay.
So I was an ammunition officer until.
Beans and bullets, man.
Well, okay, so within theOrdinance Corps, there was ammunition
and there was maintenance. Iwent the ammunition route and then
I can't remember what year it was.
(06:39):
I didn't know that.
And then at some point,whenever they combined, you know,
quartermaster, ordinance,transportation into the logistics
Corps, that's when I switched.
But you met your lifelongbride, Young sue, when you were in
(07:01):
Korea, right?
I did.
Got married, have two boys whoare now in their mid.
Well, they're one's 32, one's 34.
Okay, so early 30. And Jacobis the youngest and he.
He's currently on active duty.
(07:22):
Yeah. As a engineer.
He's an engineer combat.
Yeah. Very, very fine officerfrom what I understand. Very good,
Very good. Wow. Yeah. So wejust got off the water, by the way.
So we're in Apollo Beach.We're in my house. We're recording
this here. It's a hot Julyday. We got out on the water about
(07:42):
9 o' clock this morning. Baitwas everywhere, but it was hard to
catch. And so we went out tothis, I guess it's a tower, they
call it a tower. It's nearApollo Beach. It's a big navigational
tower and it usually holdsbait. So we got some bait there and
ended up seeing big, you know,big fish on the. Getting marking
(08:06):
big fish on the sonar. So Iput one of these big old slab thread
fin herrings that we caught inthe net, cast net on a jig head and
ran it down and we were justdrifting and all of a sudden I picked
up the rod and it's doublingover. And I was like, surprised,
(08:29):
very surprised that we hadsomething that large. But Joel, chime
in here, man. And we foughtthat fish. We fought it for an hour.
And at a trade off multipletimes, right?
At least five times.
At least five times it was onfor an hour. And I was. And as we
were battling this beast, andthis is all on light tackle, 20 pound
(08:53):
test. Okay. I had 20 poundbraid, 20 pound fluorocarbon tippet
material on there. And youknow, a custom rod from Chippewa,
custom rods. Thanks, Tommy.That rod did amazing, by the way.
And a pen slammer on there, anopen face pen slammer. And we fought
(09:16):
that fish for an hour. And Iwas like, I don't know what this
is. And about halfway throughthe battle, this giant tarpon, probably
150 pound tarpon, I'm notkidding, porpoises comes clean out
of the water five feet fromthe boat, Right. And we looked at
each other, and I thought itwas the fish maybe, but you know,
(09:37):
that. That's. That it had. Ithad come up and bellied the line
and porpoise right in front ofthe boat. Jumped right in front of
the boat, but it wasn't. Andso, long story short, you know, we
finally get this thing upafter an hour off the bottom, and
I said, I think, you know, itmight be, you know, one of those
sawfish. It might be.
You put a hair up through its back.
(09:57):
Yeah, I did. I had to. I wasgoing to leave that part out, but
now that it's. Now that it'sbeing. But hey, it big. I reckon
it was between 70 and 90pounds. Okay. There was no way we
were going to get that. Thatthing aboard without some assistance,
so I did bring my bow with me.And so it's an unregulated species,
(10:22):
and so the only way we got itin was that way. But anyway, what
a giant, beautiful fish. So wehad a good time. Now we came back
and we're doing this podcast.But here's what I want to talk about.
I got Joel with me here,obviously at my house, and he served
our country, did an amazingjob. And now you're still a contractor.
(10:45):
I want to talk a little bitabout that maybe, too. But you bought
some land a few years ago, andyou told me you were going to do
this. I said, what are youdoing with that land? You're like,
I'm going to start raisingcattle. I'm going to be a cattle
rancher. I'm like, what thehell do you know about cattle ranching?
You go, nothing. I don't knowanything, but I'm going to learn.
(11:09):
And you dang sure did. Didn'tyou tell us about that, man?
So, yeah, it was about. It'sprobably been four years ago. Four
years ago, I bought the land.Now it took me a year to prepare
the land to be able to receivecattle on it because I had to put
watering systems in there.
How'd you learn about that?
(11:31):
Well, number. Number one, my.My son. My oldest son Joshua is.
It works for the USDA up inWisconsin, specifically in the nrcs,
which is a natural resourceconservation something. And he knows.
(11:56):
He knows of all these programsthat the NRCS will support local
farmers with. And he told me,you know, hey, you need to get with
your local nrcs. They can helpyou get your land set up to receive
cattle. So I went down there,and I happen to have just this NRCS
(12:19):
OPS that works in Moulton, Alabama.
You're in Alabama?
I'm in Alabama. I live inMadison. The farm is in malton, which
is 45 minutes drive from my home.
I've been there.
You have?
It's nice property.
And so I went down to the NRCSoffice and said, yeah, we do cost
(12:41):
shares on these programs. Andhere's the things you're going to
need to get cattle on there.Number one, you need to water them
because. And they discourageponds, right?
A lot of stagnant water. Yep.
But they discourage thatbecause it's just not good for the
environment. It's not good forthe cattle.
(13:02):
No.
They're pissing and shittingon it all day long and then drinking
them. So we put in thesewater. Water wells.
That's all defecating and urinating.
Yeah. Is that what I said?
Yeah.
I don't know what defecatingmeans. That's H. But yeah, they,
(13:24):
they, they told me how to putin that.
So you got to put a well in,or is this, Is this.
I, I, I'm off of meter. Off acounty meter.
Okay.
I put it in.
You pipe in city water. Butit, it's on demand when they need
it or what?
It's on demand. It's kind oflike, you know, it's got a float
in it that automatically feeds when.
So why are you doing this? Whydid you do that?
(13:47):
Why did I do that?
I know you got an idea. We'lltalk about your idea in a little
bit, but why'd you do that?Yeah, why did you do that?
Well, again, I mean, becauseI've always, as, you know, we love
the outdoors.
Yes.
Just being outside.
That's right.
And you also remember, well,when, When John and I were young
(14:07):
in, say, high school.
Oh, yeah. You're gonna talk.
We went hunting at my uncle's farm.
Uncle Norby.
Uncle Norbert. And Norbertalways had cattle, if you remember.
He did.
He had Herefords.
Mm.
And I just kind of, you know.You know, at the time, was I interested
about the cattle? No. But Iguess as time passes, it just.
(14:29):
Do you, do you remember thattime that he put us in the back of
the. It was a combine orsomething. I don't know what it was.
It was. He was. He washarvesting corn. Remember that? And
the corn was flying back intothis bin that we were in and getting
waylaid by this corn.
Yeah.
(14:50):
We were shooting arrow at hishay bales. I mean, we had so much
fun. He had 40 acres, and wewould go up there and we would hunt
and.
No, he had hundreds of acres.We hunted 40 acres.
Oh, that was his 40 or. No,that was your parents 40, wasn't
it?
Well, in the future. But backwhen we were in high school, he owned
(15:14):
that 40 and he owned probably300 acres surrounding.
Oh, I didn't see. I didn'tknow that.
Yeah. So he used to be a crop farmer.
And, you know, I went to gofind that place. When I go by it,
I go by Westfield every time Igo to camp, you know, and I. And
I've drove, I've taken the offroad to try to find his old farmhouse.
(15:37):
And I think I. I'm alwaysthinking, I think I know that's.
That's it, but I'm not suresomeday we should go there. And when
I drive, is it still.
There when I go to see my sonup in Wisconsin?
Yeah. Is it still there?
I see the farmhouse is still there.
Yeah. And that. Thatrestaurant that we used to go to,
it's still the pioneer.
(15:59):
And the pioneer dude stillstanding up.
It is, it is. So. So you hadthis idea, you know, but you like
to be outside, but cattle, Imean, you could. I mean, you're growing
mushrooms over, you know, yougot all kinds of stuff going on there,
man. But what are you doingwith the cattle?
Okay, the cattle. So I had. Iknew I wanted to do cattle because
(16:21):
I had, you know, to be honestwith you, I thought, you can ask
my wife. I talked about when Iretire, I want to raise cattle. I
don't know why you said that.
For a long time.
I said it for a long time.
You like. You like steak?
I like steak. So I guess Iwant to raise cattle. So.
That's funny.
So I got out, I retired, Ibought that land. You know, not as
(16:42):
quick as I just said that.
Right.
I mean, it took a little time.Yeah, yeah. So then I had to decide,
do I want to go into a cowcalf operation or feeder cattle operation
and a cow.
What's the difference?
Well, cow calf operation iswhere you have your, you know, your
(17:02):
base set of cows.
Yeah.
Female.
They're just producing calvesand they produce calves.
And you either one, grow thosecalves to butcher them when they
get big enough.
About 350 or 400, 500.
No, I try to get them betweena thousand and twelve.
(17:23):
Oh, you got them that big?
Thousand to twelve hundredpounds before they go to the butcher.
Okay. But a lot of guys arebuying them at 250, 300, and then
sell them at a thousand andthey're probably.
Going to feeder lots.
Yeah.
Where they put them on feedand grow them to 1200 pounds and
then take them to the butcher.
Right.
And that's the, that's theother half that I was going to tell
you. So I'm the cow calf guy.
(17:45):
Yeah.
And there's people that just,you know, they take cattle through,
they buy the three 400 poundcalves, they'll grow them to 1200,
they'll take them to slaughter.
So you, and your, your landhas got deer on it and turkey. I
mean, it's, it's prime Alabamacountry for deer and wild game and
(18:09):
whatnot.
I mean, it's, it's, you know,you don't see the deer there that
you see in northern Wisconsinup at Camp Hackett, but you see deer
as you can.
Oh, yeah. Well, you let me andDylan. Dylan, my oldest son, shot
his first, you know, deer onyour property. And I'm, you know,
(18:29):
completely honored by them. Itwas a very, I mean, one of the greatest
experiences of my life, youknow, certainly as a dad. And to
do that on your property, Imean, that was, that was very cool.
I really appreciate it. AndDylan certainly talks about that
all the time. But anyhow, soyou have this idea that you've shared
(18:54):
with me that we've beenchatting about over the last, I don't
know, some time, but certainlythis weekend we spent a lot of time
talking about it where youwant to give back. And we know that
veterans in general canstruggle. Some of them do struggle
(19:16):
a lot with this transitionfrom the service, whether they were
in for three years or 30years. It's an identity issue. A
lot of them don't know whothey should be once they get out,
what should I do? Andespecially after a combat experience,
(19:39):
I think that idea is certainlymore, you know, it's intensified.
Who am I? What do I want todo? Who should I be? You know, all
these really, you know, verybasic questions. But you have this
idea that you want to helpthem transition. You want to talk
about that a little bit? Ithink it's great. You're considering
(20:01):
starting a charity, Right. Youhave Rally Point Ranch. That's what
you call it, right? RallyPoint. So tell us about that, Joel.
So how I, I mean, to be honestwith you, how I got the idea was
from you. You know, we, weprobably. You have, you have mentioned
(20:22):
that to me for, I mean, well,I followed your foundation for years,
of course, and you've beendoing this for years. But you, you
said to me, I don't know ifit's two, three Four years ago, you
know, you should, you shouldthink about, I mean, it was. I don't
know if it's your idea, butyou had the idea that, you know,
(20:44):
you could, you could do sometype of charity with this ranch and
Yeah, I, I always nodded myhead and say, you're right. And I
never did anything with itbecause to be honest with you, I
mean, I. So right now I'mstill working full time for the army,
not as a soldier, but as acivilian and also trying to maintain
(21:07):
that ranch.
It's a lot of work.
I didn't have the bandwidth toput the effort into it. But now my
son who is in the army,decided that he wants to take a different
route in life, so he's goingto be transitioning. And he, you
(21:30):
know, him and I were talkingand I said, did you ever think about
doing something with a ranch?And he says, yeah, that's exactly
what I want to do, but Ididn't want to ask you and impose
on you.
What a wonderful son. Yeah.
And I said, well, no, I'd loveit. So. So he's going to be going
(21:55):
through the transition too.Right. All he's done his adult life
has been in the army.
So he's a leader. Yeah, he'scommand. He commanded as a company
commander, as.
An engineer, two commands,command. And then, you know, the
hhc, which.
They don't give that to,that's the second command.
(22:15):
Right.
They give that to the bestguys. They get that. Yeah, that's
good. That's good.
So he said, yeah, we do. So wedecided, you know, what is it that
we want to do? And actually,this was his idea. He goes, I want
to help. I want to helppeople. I want to help soldiers who
are getting out of the armythat don't know what to do with their
(22:38):
lives and help them intransition. And you know what a.
Not everyone's going to getout of the army and become ranchers,
you know, cattle farmers. It'snot easy, to be honest with you.
Yeah, you got to have somecapital to get some land and cows
aren't free.
(22:58):
But there are, there are quitea few people who would be interested
because there's nothing morecalming than working out there with
your cattle. You're just outthere with your cat.
That's right.
I mean, there's a sense ofcalmness about it and satisfaction.
(23:19):
Right.
When you're taking care ofyour cows, you're watching calves
be burnt, etc. Etc.
Yeah.
So, I mean, that's. So whynot, why not bring in veterans and
kind of, you know, our focuswould be. Our focus would be primarily,
(23:46):
you know, showing them how toranch cattle, to be honest with you.
Well, you know, I gotta. Igotta tell you, you know, I was thinking
about that, man, and I wasthinking, you know, Alabama, first
off, I love Alabama. Alabamais just a great. There are great
people in Alabama, and we'vegot a couple. We've got a mission
(24:08):
in Alabama now, and I've got alot of good friends. Matt Brandon
and who? His crew. Yeah, youdid. You did meet him. Yeah. And
they're just tremendous folk.And I would imagine that when people
start hearing or when peoplehear that there's a charity out there
(24:29):
that's going to help veteransin their transition, and you're going
to do that. The stepping stonefor that is teaching them or making
them aware of this idea ofranching the land, because it doesn't
just have to be cattle, butthat's what you do. And you've got
(24:51):
so many people that'll, Ithink, eventually get behind you
to help veterans. There's alot of people actually already kind
of doing that, thisagricultural piece, transition with
veterans. I know my phone'sgoing to start ringing off the hook
as soon as we launch thispodcast, but we have people in our
network, I think, that aregoing to want to help you, and I
(25:14):
think you're going to end upwith a lot of help, and I think that's
great. And you can. Obviously,one of the hooks there can be, you
can fish and hunt with them onyour land mostly. Probably hunt,
because I don't think you havea pond. But this idea of getting
veterans together, thisconnecting them with each other and
giving them a path. Teach aman to. The old proverb, teach a
(25:40):
man to fish. Give a man afish, he eats for a day. Teach him
to fish, he eats for alifetime. And that's kind of the
basic idea. But I don't thinkyou're going to be short at all on
people wanting to help you andveterans interested in getting into
your program. I think it'sgoing to be wildly successful, especially
(26:01):
with somebody like you andyour son running it.
I would hope so. And as youknow, of course, I couldn't just.
I mean, we do more than just,you know, ranch cattle, too. I mean,
if you ask, you know, a cattlefarmer, you know, what kind of farmer
(26:23):
is it? What kind of farmer areyou? Normally they say a grass farmer.
Really?
Your grass is one of your mostimportant. I mean, you gotta take
care of.
Your grass because that's whatthey eat, you know, up in Wisconsin.
You know what's funny is youprobably realize this. They take
those fields and they cutthem. They call it hay. It's grass.
(26:45):
It's native grass. And thenthey bail it up and they put it in,
like, wrap it in cellophane orwhatever. They wrap it in plastic
so that in the wintertime theycan feed their cattle.
Yeah, I do that.
You do that. Why would you dothat? When your grass goes year round
in Alabama, I don't get.
Goes dormant.
It does. Your grass in Alabamagoes dormant.
(27:07):
Yeah, I have to feed. I haveto feed hay. Not at the length that
they do in Wisconsin, but fromusually mid November to the end of
March, I'm feeding hay.
Really? But that's what youcall it hay.
(27:30):
Yeah.
That you've. You've caught and bailed.
Yeah.
Do you got a baler?
My neighbor does.
You use his baler?
I. I have a. I have a haycutter. I have a rake. You need three
things. You need a. Yeah, youneed a mower.
Yeah. You use your brush hogto mow it.
(27:50):
No, you need a hay mower really.
Just to cut grass just cuts itup too much.
It's just gonna pulverize it.You need a nice clean. That cuts
it clean.
How much do you let it growbefore you cut it?
You let it. You let it get upto about knee high. And then there's
(28:12):
different philosophies outthere, too. At what time do you cut
it? Do you cut it when it'sall green or do you let the. Do you
let it seed out, let the seedsfall onto the ground for next year?
Right.
And then cut it. My neighbor,who I've learned everything from,
my neighbor's name is Tommyand he's a cattle farmer and has
(28:36):
been his entire life. He's.
Is this the electrician dude?
Yeah. He's roughly 70 yearsold. So everything I know about raising
cattle is from him. So hisphilosophy is you let the grass seed
out and then. And then you cut it.
So.
(28:56):
In fact, when I get back fromnext week, when I get back from visiting
you, I'm going to be cuttinghay, cutting my grass and making
bales. But for the.
For November through what?Yeah, January or something like that.
February before it started. Ican't believe I didn't know that
(29:18):
the grass goes dormant.
I thought it's brown. It wasbrown when you were there.
Yeah, I guess you're right. Ididn't think about it. I just thought
you were a bad grass farmer.
No, actually, I Spend quite. Ispend a lot of time on my grass.
That's interesting.
Fertilizing, weed killing.
(29:40):
Yeah. And then now. But you'realso selling. I mean you're butchering
some of your cattle now andselling it, right?
The heifer calves, the femalecalves. I will usually I'll keep
them for six months tillthey're weaned off their mom.
(30:03):
Yeah.
And then I'll, I'll take themto auction. And right now cattle
prices are incredibly high. Imean you could sell. Well, I hesitate
to say what price, but let'sjust say 300 pound calf, three 400
pound calf will sell for, youknow, 15, $1800 at an auction. And
(30:28):
only when I got into thisbusiness, you know, three years ago,
that same calf would havebrought three or $400. That's how.
Well, there's a shortage right now.
That's how steep beef prices are.
Yeah.
Now the bulls, the bulls I'llgrow out, I'll put them on, I separate
(30:48):
them, keep them separate andgrow them out to a thousand twelve
hundred pounds and then I'llbutcher them and I sell, I usually
sell a quarter, a quartersteer, so you know, I cut them up
into fours and I sell it. Andto be honest with you, I never have
(31:13):
had to advertise. I mean, I'mhaving one butchered the day after
I get back from here. Thatsteer has been sold for months now.
People have bought the quarters.
How do they know about it? Howdo they find out about that right
(31:34):
there locally, it's going toget some assimilators going to consume
it for child, for their family.
People are grass. I wouldn'tsay grass. You see in the grocery
store it says grass fed beef,right? Well, yeah, every cow is grass
fed. I mean every single one.So it means nothing.
(31:56):
Right.
But the point is people areturning more and more to local farmers
for their beef because it'snot injected with byproducts, hormones
and all that other, you know,where it's coming from. Every calf,
every, every bull I sell forme has been born and raised on my
(32:17):
ranch. And I can, I canguarantee you there's never been
a single shot put into one ofthose. The only.
It's organic, Right. And wecan call it organic, right?
Yeah. You know, I don't knowall the rules of organic, you know,
but it's.
Sounds pretty organic to me.Interesting. Well, that's great,
(32:39):
man.
Because they use fertilizer.I'm like, they're eating fertilizer?
I don't know, I don't know.But the point being. The point being
this is that the beef soldfrom local farmers and myself is
so much higher quality thanwhat you get in a grocery store.
(32:59):
I'm sure that is.
It's not as. You know, itdoesn't look as pretty because they
put food. They put dyes inthat red meat in the grocery store
to make it.
Look appetizing nice and red.
Put it under special lightingso it makes it look even more red.
Well, I'm impressed by whatyou've done in such a short period
of time, Joel. It's reallyquite incredible. And. And like you
(33:23):
said, you're still workingfull time. You did 28 years in active
duty, and then you got out andstarted, went back to the army and
working as a contractor. Howlong have you been doing that?
Well, I'm not a contractor.
I beg your pardon. Yeah, butpeople don't know what that means.
That means you work for thearmy as a civilian, but you're a
(33:44):
GS14, which is the equivalentof a what? Colonel.
Lieutenant colonel.
Lieutenant colonel. And thenext level is GS15. And then it goes
SES after that, which is likea general officer equivalent.
And I mean, I have.
You're not doing that. Yeah, I understand.
(34:06):
I don't have time. Yeah, I'mpretty comfortable.
Well, let's switch gears andtalk about. This is a curveball for
you. Go back to. How aboutyour favorite. Your favorite. Oh,
man, I don't even want to sayfavorite John McDaniel story. That's
no good. That's probably not.We probably don't want to go there,
(34:28):
but favorite story thatinvolved both basic training or something
else.
I'm sorry. You put me on thespot. Now let me think.
I got one for you. Okay. Okay.All right. I got.
Always spin offs.
Of course. Yeah. So I've gotone. This one happened when we were
(34:50):
in basic training. We wereboth privates. You got selected squad
leader right off the bat. AndI did not. And I noted it. Trust
me, I noted it. You know, Iwas like, all right, you know, his
squad leader. What was there,three squads?
I think four.
Four squad leaders was seniorsquad leader Morgan.
(35:10):
Oh, yeah, Morgan.
So he didn't do anythingbesides be big in himself. But anyway,
so there was three actualsquad leaders and then the senior
squad leader, Morgan. Sothat's how that worked. But I remember
you got selected early, and Iwas like, okay, you know, I wonder
when I'm going to get my headnod, you know? And so finally, eventually,
(35:32):
he fired somebody else andthen put me in as squad Leader. I'm
like, okay, now the world isright again. Joel and I are leading.
Each leading a squad right asit should be, you know? And so I
remember Sergeant Lyle oneday, pulled us, the two of us, maybe
you'll remember. We had justgot out of the field. We were doing
(35:54):
something, and he sat on theold steps of the cement steps of
the World War II barracks. AndI always had a rubber band. I have
one in my hand right now. It'sfunny, but he always had a rubber
band, and he was alwaystwisting it between his fingers,
you know? And so he had thisrubber band in his hand, and he called
us both. He goes, squidLeader, come here. Come here, you
(36:17):
two. He's called the SquidLeaders. Not squad leader. Squid
leader. Come here, SquidLeader. And he pulls us over, and
he's sitting on the steps, andwe're standing there at probably
parade rest, and he puts us atease. And then he says, I want to
tell you guys something rightnow. I've never had two squad leaders
make it all the way through.Get out of here. And we left. That
(36:40):
was all he wanted to tell us.He pulled me and you. Not the senior
squad leader, not the othersquad leader, whoever that was, but
just the two of us. FrickingFrack called us over and told us
that he'd never had two squadleaders make it all the way through
basic training. And we did it.
Well, I'll tell you. Okay,here's an example of that, of why
(37:01):
that was.
Yeah.
Do you remember this? We're.We're probably. We're. I mean, I
don't. We were probably in themarksmanship phase, and we were probably
just got done with a. With arock march back from the range to
the Bears. And for some,maybe, maybe not. Maybe we came back
(37:25):
early, but I think it waslunchtime. Anyway, the point being,
everybody in the tune toinclude the drill sergeants. You
know, their boot. You knowwhat your boots look like.
After you've been marchingthrough. They're covered in.
They're just covered in dirt.
Yeah.
And we got back and, you know,it was lunchtime, and, you know,
(37:47):
everyone goes to lunch. And ifI remember correctly, you had.
Whatever, 10, 15, smoke afterlunch, smoke break time, something
like that.
Sit back on the bleachers andshoot the.
Right.
You went into the barracks andwe brush shined our boots. You remember
that?
I do.
And they were shiny. And thenthey called us to formation. And
(38:10):
we're the only. Everyone inthat formation had dusty boots except
you and me had shiny boots on.I remember Senator Miles. So damn
proud of us. He called. Do youremember? He called.
That might be when he calledus over.
He called. He called the otherdrill sergeants over. Look at those
two.
I don't remember that, butthat's cool. Do you remember that
(38:33):
one senior drill sergeant, theguy that was the Vietnam, he had
a cib. Scary. Scary. I don'tremember, but he was scary looking.
And he. Yeah, I thought, letme tell you this story. I'll tell
a story because I don't thinkI've ever told it before, maybe,
(38:53):
but I don't recall. Anyway, sowe were standing in formation and
it was early in basictraining, like week one or two. And
we went there in the summer.So we're in South Carolina, Port
Jackson in the summer. It'sAugust, it's July, August. It's brutal,
(39:13):
right? And all of a sudden,Sir Lyle tone dance. And we snapped.
And he goes, you know, thebig, big smokey, the brown hair,
the drill di hat. Morning,sir. And he cocks his head a little
bit and kicks out a reallynice salute. And I was like, what
(39:35):
just happened? And I'm lookingout of the corner of my eye, not
moving because we're still atattention, you know. And then he.
And he gives us that ease andI kind of. I turn around and I look
and here's this young snotnosed cadet who was a cadet, wasn't
even a lieutenant. He had ashiny little pip on his. I swear
to God, on his hat and on hislapel. And I just remember thinking
(40:01):
to myself, sergeant Lyle justcalled all of us to attention and
saluted that dude that lookslike a punk, you know? He did. He
just looked like a little snotnosed punk. And I just thought to
myself, what's that all about?I honestly, I didn't even know the
difference between an officerand enlisted. I had no clue. Right.
(40:25):
You always did fail the flashcard.
Yeah, I did. Yeah. I failedthe flashcard test. Do you remember
those little. Those bags wehad to carry? Remember those bags
squad leaders had to carryThese little army green bags that
had had all the trainingmaterial in it for hip pocket training
(40:48):
flashcards and whatnot. Yeah.Anyway, remember the. Also we had
two canteens as squad leaders.Salt. Salt water. How about that?
We used to. That was real goodfor you, the salt water. And you
were to give. It wasn't. Itwas for your guys. Is anybody passed
out on you? Which guys did allthe time back then, you know, started
(41:09):
to get woozy from heat stroke.You just give him salt water. That's
a good idea. Let's give himsome salt water. True story, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, true.
I hope that's a recommendedcourse of action.
I don't believe it is. Justpour salt in the canteen, put add
water. Some dudes passed outon the side of the road. Just pour
(41:31):
it in his mouth. It'll be allright. That's just too funny, man.
I swear. But I think, honestto God, because after we graduated
basic training and went backto college, I joined the rotc. That
got me out of. I joined theROTC as a junior. I mean, I didn't
(42:00):
have to go to freshmansophomore year. Rotc, joined as a
junior. And so now you'reahead of your peer group by quite
a bit because basic trainingwas awesome to learn about the army
and the cadets that go torotc. They, you know, they don't.
You know, they have to learn.You know, I mean, they might go to
(42:20):
basic camp or something, butthey're not going to Fort Jackson,
South Carolina, Tank Hill.Yeah. Interesting. Well, Joel, I
appreciate you very, verymuch, buddy. I always have admired
you and your service to thisnation. You went on and made the
rank of colonel right belowgeneral. I mean, that's an amazing
(42:44):
accomplishment. You've got abeautiful family, and you and I have
been best of buds forever. AndI do appreciate you sharing your
story with us. And I want towish you all the best of luck out
there, you know, doing yourthing with Rally Point Ranch. And,
(43:05):
you know, we're here for you.I got an amazing network of people
that'll, I'm sure, have gottheir wheels turning already on how,
you know, we can, you know,get behind you and help you if you
choose to go down that road inearnest. You know, I think it's a
great idea you've got andappreciate your time today. I'll
give you the last whack at thepinata there, Bunny.
(43:28):
Well, I guess my. My last.What I'm kind of excited to get into.
And I appreciate you. Youknow, I don't think John said. But
the. Certainly not. The solepurpose of the strip down to see
John was to talk aboutnonprofit. But that was, you know,
(43:48):
the driving thing because I'mstarting to get serious about it
now. I come to see anywaybecause it's fun to hang out, but,
yeah, I'm looking forward to,you know, getting involved in it,
helping people transition. Imean, I do, you know, I've seen.
I've seen the great thingsthat wounded warriors in action have
(44:12):
done. And, you know, I guessI'd like to be part of it. And here's
something for. Here'ssomething for the people. Listen
to this. It's incredible theamount of things. You and I have
done the same in our lives.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, when we were kids,what you did, I did what I did.
(44:33):
You did all of it. Wewrestled, baseball, football, baseball,
Went to college, joined ROTC.Well, went to basic training, then
joined ROTC, becamecommissioned, served our country
for, in my case, 20 years. Youfor 28. And our big time sportsman.
(44:57):
We used to hunt, fish. We justdid everything together, man. We
each have two boys.
Yeah, we each have two boys.I'm always like a step behind you.
And some people may look atthat as you know, that's not true.
You're more of a risk taker, aleader, but it's not really like
(45:19):
you. You went into ROTCprobably a year before I did. And
that's because really, look atthis. Look at this guy. You know,
he ain't gonna beat me. So Iwent into rotc and then both in the
army, our careers. And heretired as a lieutenant colonel.
I said, watch this, watch this.
(45:41):
Yeah, I figured you were. Ifigured you were.
And so now. And then youstarted your Wounded warriors of
Action. And now I'm coming inbehind, but back to back, some people
may say, well, John's reallykind of guy, but it's not. I. I let
you do go first. So I see.
(46:01):
So where I screw up and thenmake it better, it's a mistake. Then
there you go. There you go.Well, I certainly. My perspective
is different than yourperspective on a lot of that, but.
(46:21):
And I'd also like to. One last thing.
There's no time limit. This isour show.
I don't remember what you saidabout. John was talking about our
fishing trip this morning.Some of what he said was true. We
were out fishing and. And wedid hook onto a very large stingray.
(46:48):
But I remember hooking themand I remember for real. I remember
handing John the bowl just sohe could see what it felt like. But
the majority of the time I wasfighting it. And John was sitting
there watching.
What?
(47:08):
Okay, that's how I remember.
That's. Well, you know,history is best remembered by those
who write or talk about it.But if that's the story you want
to go with, we'll go withthat. Joel. That works for me. But,
you know, I'll tell you, forthe longest part, I'm just being
honest. You know, that when wehooked into that thing and he made
(47:32):
his first couple of runs I hadno idea what that was. And that was
a giant. That was a giantstingray. It really was. Just. Because
normally if it's a bigstingray, you can get it up. You
can get it up off the bottomof the ocean. And this one was just
(47:57):
not doing that. And it wasmaking runs for us. So it was. I
wasn't exactly sure. I thoughtmaybe, like I said, it was a, you
know, one of those, you know,sawtooth sharks or something like
that big skate. I don't know.Anyway, lots of experience.
I mean, I. Yeah, it's like Ihave never.
We won.
(48:17):
I've never fought a fish.
Yeah. Yeah. And we returnedhim safely to the water. He had a
little mark on him, but he wasgood to go. Just. Yeah. Well, he's
got a story now, too.
He does. Well, from what Iunderstand, you know, the female
stingrays think that's pretty cool.
(48:40):
He's a wounded stingray. He'sa veteran now. Awesome. Well, hey,
listen, Joel, you're going todo great things. Honored to have
you here. It was a great dayto day and thanks for being on the
program, buddy. We genuinelyappreciate it.
All right, thanks, John.Appreciate it.
(49:01):
Thank you for listening to theWWIA podcast. To learn more about
the Wounded warriors in Actionfoundation and how you can get involved,
please visit ourwebsite@wwiaf.org or follow us on
Media Social social media onFacebook, Instagram, Twitter and
LinkedIn. If you'd like tocomment or offer feedback about our
(49:24):
podcast or if you have asuggestion for a future episode,
please email us at podcast@wwiaf.org
Thank you for your support andfor helping us honor, connect and
heal our combat wounded PurpleHeart heroes through the power of
the great outdoors.
Begin.
Hello and welcome to the WWIAPodcast. We're honored to have you
join us in our mission tobring honor, connection and healing
to America's combat woundedPurple Heart heroes. If this is your
first time listening to thispodcast, we welcome you. If you're
(00:21):
a returning listener. Thanksfor coming back. Please be sure to
tell others about our podcastand leave us a review if you're enjoying
what you're hearing on thisweek's episode. WWIA Founder and
CEO John McDaniel is proud towelcome a great American patriot
and one of his closestlifelong friends to the podcast.
We're honored to have ColonelRetired Joel T. Sunkel join John
(00:45):
for an engaging and timelyconversation. Joel hails from Oshkosh,
Wisconsin and graduated fromthe University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh
as a Distinguished militarygraduate in 1988. He was commissioned
as a second lieutenant in theArmor Branch and went on to graduate
from the Command and GeneralStaff College and the Army War College
(01:05):
Fellowship Program. Joel holdsa Master of Arts degree in Organizational
Behavior from the Universityof Phoenix and during his 28 year
career in the army held anumber of key positions to Strategic
Plans Chief for stabilizationforce 11, Bosnia Herzegovina, operation
Joint Forge, Joint LogisticsCommand, Operations Officer, Combined
(01:28):
joint Task Force 76,Afghanistan, Commander 83rd Ordnance
Battalion, Japan, and Chief ofLogistics, 25th Infantry Division
and Multinational DivisionNorth, Iraq. Upon retirement from
the Army, Joel accepted theposition of Chief of Operations with
the Logistics Data AnalysisCenter, Army Materiel Command, Redstone
(01:50):
Arsenal, Alabama. In 2020,Joel purchased 75 acres of land in
Moulton, Alabama and embarkedon a journey to establish a working
cattle ranch. Driven by a needto build something lasting with his
own two hands, his visiondidn't stop at personal fulfillment.
He began to realize theprofound therapeutic benefits of
working the land, thegrounding power of physical labor,
(02:12):
and the sense of purpose thatcame from providing for oneself.
It struck him that thisexperience could be incredibly valuable
for others, especially thosewho had served our country and were
navig navigating thechallenges of transitioning back
to civilian life. Thisrealization led to Joel's most meaningful
venture, the establishment ofRaleigh Point Veterans Ranch, a non
(02:33):
profit organization dedicatedto empowering veterans through comprehensive
sustainable living skillstraining. It's a high privilege to
have Joel on the podcast andwe know you're going to enjoy learning
more about him and his story.Let's jump right into the conversation
with John and Joel now.
(02:56):
Hi, I'm John McDaniel, founderand CEO of the Wounded warriors in
Action foundation, and this isour podcast Honor Connect, heal.
So geez, it's early part ofJuly 2026. I don't know when this
is going to air, but I havewith me today my best buddy. Okay.
Guy that I grew up with. Wefirst met what, middle school, I
(03:22):
think seventh grade. Seventhgrade. Webster Stanley. Webster Stanley,
Oshkosh, Wisconsin. So with metoday is Joel Sunkel. He is a. His
military career, I think, wasmore illustrious than mine. He went
on to serve for what, 28 years.
(03:43):
28 and some change.
Yeah, 28 and some change. Andmade it to the rank of full colonel.
But here's the best part ofthis. You and I went to basic training
together. We were privatestogether. Together on Tank Hill in
Fort Jackson, South Carolina,in the same platoon. Basic training.
Right, Same platoon. And wewere both squad leaders.
Squid leaders together.
(04:04):
Sure were.
What a great story that is. Soour platoon, our drill sergeant was
a guy by the name of SergeantLyle. And he was an old infantryman.
He was a stray leginfantryman. And he was hard, like
Russian roll call and. But youknow, wow. I mean, that was 1983.
(04:28):
Yep, 1983.
1983. It's crazy. You know, weshare stories about that all the
time, you know.
Yeah.
And then we went on and becameofficers and, you know, served our
country. I did for 20, Joeldid for 28. You were, you're a professional
logistician. Right. But youstarted out as a tanker.
Started out as a tanker for.Well, I got commissioned and my first
(04:53):
duty assignment was in Korea.Yeah. And I was a tanker through
that tour, which was about twoyears. And then funny enough, talking
about going to basic training,when I PCs from Korea, I went back
to Fort Jackson, back to basictraining as a company.
(05:15):
Commander or as a captain.
Company XO as a training.
Right back to where westarted. What was your impression
when you got there? Were youlike, holy crap.
So they don't keep, they don'tkeep soldiers on Tank Hill anymore.
They keep them in these new.
Yeah.
You know, so when we were, when.
We were there, it was WorldWar II barracks.
Yeah, yeah. And they're still.Well, they were at that time, but
(05:37):
they weren't being. Well, theywere utilized when reservists came
in for two weeks at a time.But as far as, you know, soldiers
rotating through basictraining, they had new facilities
at that time, but yeah.Anyway, back to tanker and logistician.
(05:57):
So it was during that tour asa company XO that I did a branch
transfer to logistics. Well,back, back in those days, logistics
had different branches withinit. Now it's just logistics. So I
(06:17):
went to be an ammunition officer.
Okay.
So I was an ammunition officer until.
Beans and bullets, man.
Well, okay, so within theOrdinance Corps, there was ammunition
and there was maintenance. Iwent the ammunition route and then
I can't remember what year it was.
(06:39):
I didn't know that.
And then at some point,whenever they combined, you know,
quartermaster, ordinance,transportation into the logistics
Corps, that's when I switched.
But you met your lifelongbride, Young sue, when you were in
(07:01):
Korea, right?
I did.
Got married, have two boys whoare now in their mid.
Well, they're one's 32, one's 34.
Okay, so early 30. And Jacobis the youngest and he.
He's currently on active duty.
(07:22):
Yeah. As a engineer.
He's an engineer combat.
Yeah. Very, very fine officerfrom what I understand. Very good,
Very good. Wow. Yeah. So wejust got off the water, by the way.
So we're in Apollo Beach.We're in my house. We're recording
this here. It's a hot Julyday. We got out on the water about
(07:42):
9 o' clock this morning. Baitwas everywhere, but it was hard to
catch. And so we went out tothis, I guess it's a tower, they
call it a tower. It's nearApollo Beach. It's a big navigational
tower and it usually holdsbait. So we got some bait there and
ended up seeing big, you know,big fish on the. Getting marking
(08:06):
big fish on the sonar. So Iput one of these big old slab thread
fin herrings that we caught inthe net, cast net on a jig head and
ran it down and we were justdrifting and all of a sudden I picked
up the rod and it's doublingover. And I was like, surprised,
(08:29):
very surprised that we hadsomething that large. But Joel, chime
in here, man. And we foughtthat fish. We fought it for an hour.
And at a trade off multipletimes, right?
At least five times.
At least five times it was onfor an hour. And I was. And as we
were battling this beast, andthis is all on light tackle, 20 pound
(08:53):
test. Okay. I had 20 poundbraid, 20 pound fluorocarbon tippet
material on there. And youknow, a custom rod from Chippewa,
custom rods. Thanks, Tommy.That rod did amazing, by the way.
And a pen slammer on there, anopen face pen slammer. And we fought
(09:16):
that fish for an hour. And Iwas like, I don't know what this
is. And about halfway throughthe battle, this giant tarpon, probably
150 pound tarpon, I'm notkidding, porpoises comes clean out
of the water five feet fromthe boat, Right. And we looked at
each other, and I thought itwas the fish maybe, but you know,
(09:37):
that. That's. That it had. Ithad come up and bellied the line
and porpoise right in front ofthe boat. Jumped right in front of
the boat, but it wasn't. Andso, long story short, you know, we
finally get this thing upafter an hour off the bottom, and
I said, I think, you know, itmight be, you know, one of those
sawfish. It might be.
You put a hair up through its back.
(09:57):
Yeah, I did. I had to. I wasgoing to leave that part out, but
now that it's. Now that it'sbeing. But hey, it big. I reckon
it was between 70 and 90pounds. Okay. There was no way we
were going to get that. Thatthing aboard without some assistance,
so I did bring my bow with me.And so it's an unregulated species,
(10:22):
and so the only way we got itin was that way. But anyway, what
a giant, beautiful fish. So wehad a good time. Now we came back
and we're doing this podcast.But here's what I want to talk about.
I got Joel with me here,obviously at my house, and he served
our country, did an amazingjob. And now you're still a contractor.
(10:45):
I want to talk a little bitabout that maybe, too. But you bought
some land a few years ago, andyou told me you were going to do
this. I said, what are youdoing with that land? You're like,
I'm going to start raisingcattle. I'm going to be a cattle
rancher. I'm like, what thehell do you know about cattle ranching?
You go, nothing. I don't knowanything, but I'm going to learn.
(11:09):
And you dang sure did. Didn'tyou tell us about that, man?
So, yeah, it was about. It'sprobably been four years ago. Four
years ago, I bought the land.Now it took me a year to prepare
the land to be able to receivecattle on it because I had to put
watering systems in there.
How'd you learn about that?
(11:31):
Well, number. Number one, my.My son. My oldest son Joshua is.
It works for the USDA up inWisconsin, specifically in the nrcs,
which is a natural resourceconservation something. And he knows.
(11:56):
He knows of all these programsthat the NRCS will support local
farmers with. And he told me,you know, hey, you need to get with
your local nrcs. They can helpyou get your land set up to receive
cattle. So I went down there,and I happen to have just this NRCS
(12:19):
OPS that works in Moulton, Alabama.
You're in Alabama?
I'm in Alabama. I live inMadison. The farm is in malton, which
is 45 minutes drive from my home.
I've been there.
You have?
It's nice property.
And so I went down to the NRCSoffice and said, yeah, we do cost
(12:41):
shares on these programs. Andhere's the things you're going to
need to get cattle on there.Number one, you need to water them
because. And they discourageponds, right?
A lot of stagnant water. Yep.
But they discourage thatbecause it's just not good for the
environment. It's not good forthe cattle.
(13:02):
No.
They're pissing and shittingon it all day long and then drinking
them. So we put in thesewater. Water wells.
That's all defecating and urinating.
Yeah. Is that what I said?
Yeah.
I don't know what defecatingmeans. That's H. But yeah, they,
(13:24):
they, they told me how to putin that.
So you got to put a well in,or is this, Is this.
I, I, I'm off of meter. Off acounty meter.
Okay.
I put it in.
You pipe in city water. Butit, it's on demand when they need
it or what?
It's on demand. It's kind oflike, you know, it's got a float
in it that automatically feeds when.
So why are you doing this? Whydid you do that?
(13:47):
Why did I do that?
I know you got an idea. We'lltalk about your idea in a little
bit, but why'd you do that?Yeah, why did you do that?
Well, again, I mean, becauseI've always, as, you know, we love
the outdoors.
Yes.
Just being outside.
That's right.
And you also remember, well,when, When John and I were young
(14:07):
in, say, high school.
Oh, yeah. You're gonna talk.
We went hunting at my uncle's farm.
Uncle Norby.
Uncle Norbert. And Norbertalways had cattle, if you remember.
He did.
He had Herefords.
Mm.
And I just kind of, you know.You know, at the time, was I interested
about the cattle? No. But Iguess as time passes, it just.
(14:29):
Do you, do you remember thattime that he put us in the back of
the. It was a combine orsomething. I don't know what it was.
It was. He was. He washarvesting corn. Remember that? And
the corn was flying back intothis bin that we were in and getting
waylaid by this corn.
Yeah.
(14:50):
We were shooting arrow at hishay bales. I mean, we had so much
fun. He had 40 acres, and wewould go up there and we would hunt
and.
No, he had hundreds of acres.We hunted 40 acres.
Oh, that was his 40 or. No,that was your parents 40, wasn't
it?
Well, in the future. But backwhen we were in high school, he owned
(15:14):
that 40 and he owned probably300 acres surrounding.
Oh, I didn't see. I didn'tknow that.
Yeah. So he used to be a crop farmer.
And, you know, I went to gofind that place. When I go by it,
I go by Westfield every time Igo to camp, you know, and I. And
I've drove, I've taken the offroad to try to find his old farmhouse.
(15:37):
And I think I. I'm alwaysthinking, I think I know that's.
That's it, but I'm not suresomeday we should go there. And when
I drive, is it still.
There when I go to see my sonup in Wisconsin?
Yeah. Is it still there?
I see the farmhouse is still there.
Yeah. And that. Thatrestaurant that we used to go to,
it's still the pioneer.
(15:59):
And the pioneer dude stillstanding up.
It is, it is. So. So you hadthis idea, you know, but you like
to be outside, but cattle, Imean, you could. I mean, you're growing
mushrooms over, you know, yougot all kinds of stuff going on there,
man. But what are you doingwith the cattle?
Okay, the cattle. So I had. Iknew I wanted to do cattle because
(16:21):
I had, you know, to be honestwith you, I thought, you can ask
my wife. I talked about when Iretire, I want to raise cattle. I
don't know why you said that.
For a long time.
I said it for a long time.
You like. You like steak?
I like steak. So I guess Iwant to raise cattle. So.
That's funny.
So I got out, I retired, Ibought that land. You know, not as
(16:42):
quick as I just said that.
Right.
I mean, it took a little time.Yeah, yeah. So then I had to decide,
do I want to go into a cowcalf operation or feeder cattle operation
and a cow.
What's the difference?
Well, cow calf operation iswhere you have your, you know, your
(17:02):
base set of cows.
Yeah.
Female.
They're just producing calvesand they produce calves.
And you either one, grow thosecalves to butcher them when they
get big enough.
About 350 or 400, 500.
No, I try to get them betweena thousand and twelve.
(17:23):
Oh, you got them that big?
Thousand to twelve hundredpounds before they go to the butcher.
Okay. But a lot of guys arebuying them at 250, 300, and then
sell them at a thousand andthey're probably.
Going to feeder lots.
Yeah.
Where they put them on feedand grow them to 1200 pounds and
then take them to the butcher.
Right.
And that's the, that's theother half that I was going to tell
you. So I'm the cow calf guy.
(17:45):
Yeah.
And there's people that just,you know, they take cattle through,
they buy the three 400 poundcalves, they'll grow them to 1200,
they'll take them to slaughter.
So you, and your, your landhas got deer on it and turkey. I
mean, it's, it's prime Alabamacountry for deer and wild game and
(18:09):
whatnot.
I mean, it's, it's, you know,you don't see the deer there that
you see in northern Wisconsinup at Camp Hackett, but you see deer
as you can.
Oh, yeah. Well, you let me andDylan. Dylan, my oldest son, shot
his first, you know, deer onyour property. And I'm, you know,
(18:29):
completely honored by them. Itwas a very, I mean, one of the greatest
experiences of my life, youknow, certainly as a dad. And to
do that on your property, Imean, that was, that was very cool.
I really appreciate it. AndDylan certainly talks about that
all the time. But anyhow, soyou have this idea that you've shared
(18:54):
with me that we've beenchatting about over the last, I don't
know, some time, but certainlythis weekend we spent a lot of time
talking about it where youwant to give back. And we know that
veterans in general canstruggle. Some of them do struggle
(19:16):
a lot with this transitionfrom the service, whether they were
in for three years or 30years. It's an identity issue. A
lot of them don't know whothey should be once they get out,
what should I do? Andespecially after a combat experience,
(19:39):
I think that idea is certainlymore, you know, it's intensified.
Who am I? What do I want todo? Who should I be? You know, all
these really, you know, verybasic questions. But you have this
idea that you want to helpthem transition. You want to talk
about that a little bit? Ithink it's great. You're considering
(20:01):
starting a charity, Right. Youhave Rally Point Ranch. That's what
you call it, right? RallyPoint. So tell us about that, Joel.
So how I, I mean, to be honestwith you, how I got the idea was
from you. You know, we, weprobably. You have, you have mentioned
(20:22):
that to me for, I mean, well,I followed your foundation for years,
of course, and you've beendoing this for years. But you, you
said to me, I don't know ifit's two, three Four years ago, you
know, you should, you shouldthink about, I mean, it was. I don't
know if it's your idea, butyou had the idea that, you know,
(20:44):
you could, you could do sometype of charity with this ranch and
Yeah, I, I always nodded myhead and say, you're right. And I
never did anything with itbecause to be honest with you, I
mean, I. So right now I'mstill working full time for the army,
not as a soldier, but as acivilian and also trying to maintain
(21:07):
that ranch.
It's a lot of work.
I didn't have the bandwidth toput the effort into it. But now my
son who is in the army,decided that he wants to take a different
route in life, so he's goingto be transitioning. And he, you
(21:30):
know, him and I were talkingand I said, did you ever think about
doing something with a ranch?And he says, yeah, that's exactly
what I want to do, but Ididn't want to ask you and impose
on you.
What a wonderful son. Yeah.
And I said, well, no, I'd loveit. So. So he's going to be going
(21:55):
through the transition too.Right. All he's done his adult life
has been in the army.
So he's a leader. Yeah, he'scommand. He commanded as a company
commander, as.
An engineer, two commands,command. And then, you know, the
hhc, which.
They don't give that to,that's the second command.
(22:15):
Right.
They give that to the bestguys. They get that. Yeah, that's
good. That's good.
So he said, yeah, we do. So wedecided, you know, what is it that
we want to do? And actually,this was his idea. He goes, I want
to help. I want to helppeople. I want to help soldiers who
are getting out of the armythat don't know what to do with their
(22:38):
lives and help them intransition. And you know what a.
Not everyone's going to getout of the army and become ranchers,
you know, cattle farmers. It'snot easy, to be honest with you.
Yeah, you got to have somecapital to get some land and cows
aren't free.
(22:58):
But there are, there are quitea few people who would be interested
because there's nothing morecalming than working out there with
your cattle. You're just outthere with your cat.
That's right.
I mean, there's a sense ofcalmness about it and satisfaction.
(23:19):
Right.
When you're taking care ofyour cows, you're watching calves
be burnt, etc. Etc.
Yeah.
So, I mean, that's. So whynot, why not bring in veterans and
kind of, you know, our focuswould be. Our focus would be primarily,
(23:46):
you know, showing them how toranch cattle, to be honest with you.
Well, you know, I gotta. Igotta tell you, you know, I was thinking
about that, man, and I wasthinking, you know, Alabama, first
off, I love Alabama. Alabamais just a great. There are great
people in Alabama, and we'vegot a couple. We've got a mission
(24:08):
in Alabama now, and I've got alot of good friends. Matt Brandon
and who? His crew. Yeah, youdid. You did meet him. Yeah. And
they're just tremendous folk.And I would imagine that when people
start hearing or when peoplehear that there's a charity out there
(24:29):
that's going to help veteransin their transition, and you're going
to do that. The stepping stonefor that is teaching them or making
them aware of this idea ofranching the land, because it doesn't
just have to be cattle, butthat's what you do. And you've got
(24:51):
so many people that'll, Ithink, eventually get behind you
to help veterans. There's alot of people actually already kind
of doing that, thisagricultural piece, transition with
veterans. I know my phone'sgoing to start ringing off the hook
as soon as we launch thispodcast, but we have people in our
network, I think, that aregoing to want to help you, and I
(25:14):
think you're going to end upwith a lot of help, and I think that's
great. And you can. Obviously,one of the hooks there can be, you
can fish and hunt with them onyour land mostly. Probably hunt,
because I don't think you havea pond. But this idea of getting
veterans together, thisconnecting them with each other and
giving them a path. Teach aman to. The old proverb, teach a
(25:40):
man to fish. Give a man afish, he eats for a day. Teach him
to fish, he eats for alifetime. And that's kind of the
basic idea. But I don't thinkyou're going to be short at all on
people wanting to help you andveterans interested in getting into
your program. I think it'sgoing to be wildly successful, especially
(26:01):
with somebody like you andyour son running it.
I would hope so. And as youknow, of course, I couldn't just.
I mean, we do more than just,you know, ranch cattle, too. I mean,
if you ask, you know, a cattlefarmer, you know, what kind of farmer
(26:23):
is it? What kind of farmer areyou? Normally they say a grass farmer.
Really?
Your grass is one of your mostimportant. I mean, you gotta take
care of.
Your grass because that's whatthey eat, you know, up in Wisconsin.
You know what's funny is youprobably realize this. They take
those fields and they cutthem. They call it hay. It's grass.
(26:45):
It's native grass. And thenthey bail it up and they put it in,
like, wrap it in cellophane orwhatever. They wrap it in plastic
so that in the wintertime theycan feed their cattle.
Yeah, I do that.
You do that. Why would you dothat? When your grass goes year round
in Alabama, I don't get.
Goes dormant.
It does. Your grass in Alabamagoes dormant.
(27:07):
Yeah, I have to feed. I haveto feed hay. Not at the length that
they do in Wisconsin, but fromusually mid November to the end of
March, I'm feeding hay.
Really? But that's what youcall it hay.
(27:30):
Yeah.
That you've. You've caught and bailed.
Yeah.
Do you got a baler?
My neighbor does.
You use his baler?
I. I have a. I have a haycutter. I have a rake. You need three
things. You need a. Yeah, youneed a mower.
Yeah. You use your brush hogto mow it.
(27:50):
No, you need a hay mower really.
Just to cut grass just cuts itup too much.
It's just gonna pulverize it.You need a nice clean. That cuts
it clean.
How much do you let it growbefore you cut it?
You let it. You let it get upto about knee high. And then there's
(28:12):
different philosophies outthere, too. At what time do you cut
it? Do you cut it when it'sall green or do you let the. Do you
let it seed out, let the seedsfall onto the ground for next year?
Right.
And then cut it. My neighbor,who I've learned everything from,
my neighbor's name is Tommyand he's a cattle farmer and has
(28:36):
been his entire life. He's.
Is this the electrician dude?
Yeah. He's roughly 70 yearsold. So everything I know about raising
cattle is from him. So hisphilosophy is you let the grass seed
out and then. And then you cut it.
So.
(28:56):
In fact, when I get back fromnext week, when I get back from visiting
you, I'm going to be cuttinghay, cutting my grass and making
bales. But for the.
For November through what?Yeah, January or something like that.
February before it started. Ican't believe I didn't know that
(29:18):
the grass goes dormant.
I thought it's brown. It wasbrown when you were there.
Yeah, I guess you're right. Ididn't think about it. I just thought
you were a bad grass farmer.
No, actually, I Spend quite. Ispend a lot of time on my grass.
That's interesting.
Fertilizing, weed killing.
(29:40):
Yeah. And then now. But you'realso selling. I mean you're butchering
some of your cattle now andselling it, right?
The heifer calves, the femalecalves. I will usually I'll keep
them for six months tillthey're weaned off their mom.
(30:03):
Yeah.
And then I'll, I'll take themto auction. And right now cattle
prices are incredibly high. Imean you could sell. Well, I hesitate
to say what price, but let'sjust say 300 pound calf, three 400
pound calf will sell for, youknow, 15, $1800 at an auction. And
(30:28):
only when I got into thisbusiness, you know, three years ago,
that same calf would havebrought three or $400. That's how.
Well, there's a shortage right now.
That's how steep beef prices are.
Yeah.
Now the bulls, the bulls I'llgrow out, I'll put them on, I separate
(30:48):
them, keep them separate andgrow them out to a thousand twelve
hundred pounds and then I'llbutcher them and I sell, I usually
sell a quarter, a quartersteer, so you know, I cut them up
into fours and I sell it. Andto be honest with you, I never have
(31:13):
had to advertise. I mean, I'mhaving one butchered the day after
I get back from here. Thatsteer has been sold for months now.
People have bought the quarters.
How do they know about it? Howdo they find out about that right
(31:34):
there locally, it's going toget some assimilators going to consume
it for child, for their family.
People are grass. I wouldn'tsay grass. You see in the grocery
store it says grass fed beef,right? Well, yeah, every cow is grass
fed. I mean every single one.So it means nothing.
(31:56):
Right.
But the point is people areturning more and more to local farmers
for their beef because it'snot injected with byproducts, hormones
and all that other, you know,where it's coming from. Every calf,
every, every bull I sell forme has been born and raised on my
(32:17):
ranch. And I can, I canguarantee you there's never been
a single shot put into one ofthose. The only.
It's organic, Right. And wecan call it organic, right?
Yeah. You know, I don't knowall the rules of organic, you know,
but it's.
Sounds pretty organic to me.Interesting. Well, that's great,
(32:39):
man.
Because they use fertilizer.I'm like, they're eating fertilizer?
I don't know, I don't know.But the point being. The point being
this is that the beef soldfrom local farmers and myself is
so much higher quality thanwhat you get in a grocery store.
(32:59):
I'm sure that is.
It's not as. You know, itdoesn't look as pretty because they
put food. They put dyes inthat red meat in the grocery store
to make it.
Look appetizing nice and red.
Put it under special lightingso it makes it look even more red.
Well, I'm impressed by whatyou've done in such a short period
of time, Joel. It's reallyquite incredible. And. And like you
(33:23):
said, you're still workingfull time. You did 28 years in active
duty, and then you got out andstarted, went back to the army and
working as a contractor. Howlong have you been doing that?
Well, I'm not a contractor.
I beg your pardon. Yeah, butpeople don't know what that means.
That means you work for thearmy as a civilian, but you're a
(33:44):
GS14, which is the equivalentof a what? Colonel.
Lieutenant colonel.
Lieutenant colonel. And thenext level is GS15. And then it goes
SES after that, which is likea general officer equivalent.
And I mean, I have.
You're not doing that. Yeah, I understand.
(34:06):
I don't have time. Yeah, I'mpretty comfortable.
Well, let's switch gears andtalk about. This is a curveball for
you. Go back to. How aboutyour favorite. Your favorite. Oh,
man, I don't even want to sayfavorite John McDaniel story. That's
no good. That's probably not.We probably don't want to go there,
(34:28):
but favorite story thatinvolved both basic training or something
else.
I'm sorry. You put me on thespot. Now let me think.
I got one for you. Okay. Okay.All right. I got.
Always spin offs.
Of course. Yeah. So I've gotone. This one happened when we were
(34:50):
in basic training. We wereboth privates. You got selected squad
leader right off the bat. AndI did not. And I noted it. Trust
me, I noted it. You know, Iwas like, all right, you know, his
squad leader. What was there,three squads?
I think four.
Four squad leaders was seniorsquad leader Morgan.
(35:10):
Oh, yeah, Morgan.
So he didn't do anythingbesides be big in himself. But anyway,
so there was three actualsquad leaders and then the senior
squad leader, Morgan. Sothat's how that worked. But I remember
you got selected early, and Iwas like, okay, you know, I wonder
when I'm going to get my headnod, you know? And so finally, eventually,
(35:32):
he fired somebody else andthen put me in as squad Leader. I'm
like, okay, now the world isright again. Joel and I are leading.
Each leading a squad right asit should be, you know? And so I
remember Sergeant Lyle oneday, pulled us, the two of us, maybe
you'll remember. We had justgot out of the field. We were doing
(35:54):
something, and he sat on theold steps of the cement steps of
the World War II barracks. AndI always had a rubber band. I have
one in my hand right now. It'sfunny, but he always had a rubber
band, and he was alwaystwisting it between his fingers,
you know? And so he had thisrubber band in his hand, and he called
us both. He goes, squidLeader, come here. Come here, you
(36:17):
two. He's called the SquidLeaders. Not squad leader. Squid
leader. Come here, SquidLeader. And he pulls us over, and
he's sitting on the steps, andwe're standing there at probably
parade rest, and he puts us atease. And then he says, I want to
tell you guys something rightnow. I've never had two squad leaders
make it all the way through.Get out of here. And we left. That
(36:40):
was all he wanted to tell us.He pulled me and you. Not the senior
squad leader, not the othersquad leader, whoever that was, but
just the two of us. FrickingFrack called us over and told us
that he'd never had two squadleaders make it all the way through
basic training. And we did it.
Well, I'll tell you. Okay,here's an example of that, of why
(37:01):
that was.
Yeah.
Do you remember this? We're.We're probably. We're. I mean, I
don't. We were probably in themarksmanship phase, and we were probably
just got done with a. With arock march back from the range to
the Bears. And for some,maybe, maybe not. Maybe we came back
(37:25):
early, but I think it waslunchtime. Anyway, the point being,
everybody in the tune toinclude the drill sergeants. You
know, their boot. You knowwhat your boots look like.
After you've been marchingthrough. They're covered in.
They're just covered in dirt.
Yeah.
And we got back and, you know,it was lunchtime, and, you know,
(37:47):
everyone goes to lunch. And ifI remember correctly, you had.
Whatever, 10, 15, smoke afterlunch, smoke break time, something
like that.
Sit back on the bleachers andshoot the.
Right.
You went into the barracks andwe brush shined our boots. You remember
that?
I do.
And they were shiny. And thenthey called us to formation. And
(38:10):
we're the only. Everyone inthat formation had dusty boots except
you and me had shiny boots on.I remember Senator Miles. So damn
proud of us. He called. Do youremember? He called.
That might be when he calledus over.
He called. He called the otherdrill sergeants over. Look at those
two.
I don't remember that, butthat's cool. Do you remember that
(38:33):
one senior drill sergeant, theguy that was the Vietnam, he had
a cib. Scary. Scary. I don'tremember, but he was scary looking.
And he. Yeah, I thought, letme tell you this story. I'll tell
a story because I don't thinkI've ever told it before, maybe,
(38:53):
but I don't recall. Anyway, sowe were standing in formation and
it was early in basictraining, like week one or two. And
we went there in the summer.So we're in South Carolina, Port
Jackson in the summer. It'sAugust, it's July, August. It's brutal,
(39:13):
right? And all of a sudden,Sir Lyle tone dance. And we snapped.
And he goes, you know, thebig, big smokey, the brown hair,
the drill di hat. Morning,sir. And he cocks his head a little
bit and kicks out a reallynice salute. And I was like, what
(39:35):
just happened? And I'm lookingout of the corner of my eye, not
moving because we're still atattention, you know. And then he.
And he gives us that ease andI kind of. I turn around and I look
and here's this young snotnosed cadet who was a cadet, wasn't
even a lieutenant. He had ashiny little pip on his. I swear
to God, on his hat and on hislapel. And I just remember thinking
(40:01):
to myself, sergeant Lyle justcalled all of us to attention and
saluted that dude that lookslike a punk, you know? He did. He
just looked like a little snotnosed punk. And I just thought to
myself, what's that all about?I honestly, I didn't even know the
difference between an officerand enlisted. I had no clue. Right.
(40:25):
You always did fail the flashcard.
Yeah, I did. Yeah. I failedthe flashcard test. Do you remember
those little. Those bags wehad to carry? Remember those bags
squad leaders had to carryThese little army green bags that
had had all the trainingmaterial in it for hip pocket training
(40:48):
flashcards and whatnot. Yeah.Anyway, remember the. Also we had
two canteens as squad leaders.Salt. Salt water. How about that?
We used to. That was real goodfor you, the salt water. And you
were to give. It wasn't. Itwas for your guys. Is anybody passed
out on you? Which guys did allthe time back then, you know, started
(41:09):
to get woozy from heat stroke.You just give him salt water. That's
a good idea. Let's give himsome salt water. True story, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, true.
I hope that's a recommendedcourse of action.
I don't believe it is. Justpour salt in the canteen, put add
water. Some dudes passed outon the side of the road. Just pour
(41:31):
it in his mouth. It'll be allright. That's just too funny, man.
I swear. But I think, honestto God, because after we graduated
basic training and went backto college, I joined the rotc. That
got me out of. I joined theROTC as a junior. I mean, I didn't
(42:00):
have to go to freshmansophomore year. Rotc, joined as a
junior. And so now you'reahead of your peer group by quite
a bit because basic trainingwas awesome to learn about the army
and the cadets that go torotc. They, you know, they don't.
You know, they have to learn.You know, I mean, they might go to
(42:20):
basic camp or something, butthey're not going to Fort Jackson,
South Carolina, Tank Hill.Yeah. Interesting. Well, Joel, I
appreciate you very, verymuch, buddy. I always have admired
you and your service to thisnation. You went on and made the
rank of colonel right belowgeneral. I mean, that's an amazing
(42:44):
accomplishment. You've got abeautiful family, and you and I have
been best of buds forever. AndI do appreciate you sharing your
story with us. And I want towish you all the best of luck out
there, you know, doing yourthing with Rally Point Ranch. And,
(43:05):
you know, we're here for you.I got an amazing network of people
that'll, I'm sure, have gottheir wheels turning already on how,
you know, we can, you know,get behind you and help you if you
choose to go down that road inearnest. You know, I think it's a
great idea you've got andappreciate your time today. I'll
give you the last whack at thepinata there, Bunny.
(43:28):
Well, I guess my. My last.What I'm kind of excited to get into.
And I appreciate you. Youknow, I don't think John said. But
the. Certainly not. The solepurpose of the strip down to see
John was to talk aboutnonprofit. But that was, you know,
(43:48):
the driving thing because I'mstarting to get serious about it
now. I come to see anywaybecause it's fun to hang out, but,
yeah, I'm looking forward to,you know, getting involved in it,
helping people transition. Imean, I do, you know, I've seen.
I've seen the great thingsthat wounded warriors in action have
(44:12):
done. And, you know, I guessI'd like to be part of it. And here's
something for. Here'ssomething for the people. Listen
to this. It's incredible theamount of things. You and I have
done the same in our lives.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, when we were kids,what you did, I did what I did.
(44:33):
You did all of it. Wewrestled, baseball, football, baseball,
Went to college, joined ROTC.Well, went to basic training, then
joined ROTC, becamecommissioned, served our country
for, in my case, 20 years. Youfor 28. And our big time sportsman.
(44:57):
We used to hunt, fish. We justdid everything together, man. We
each have two boys.
Yeah, we each have two boys.I'm always like a step behind you.
And some people may look atthat as you know, that's not true.
You're more of a risk taker, aleader, but it's not really like
(45:19):
you. You went into ROTCprobably a year before I did. And
that's because really, look atthis. Look at this guy. You know,
he ain't gonna beat me. So Iwent into rotc and then both in the
army, our careers. And heretired as a lieutenant colonel.
I said, watch this, watch this.
(45:41):
Yeah, I figured you were. Ifigured you were.
And so now. And then youstarted your Wounded warriors of
Action. And now I'm coming inbehind, but back to back, some people
may say, well, John's reallykind of guy, but it's not. I. I let
you do go first. So I see.
(46:01):
So where I screw up and thenmake it better, it's a mistake. Then
there you go. There you go.Well, I certainly. My perspective
is different than yourperspective on a lot of that, but.
(46:21):
And I'd also like to. One last thing.
There's no time limit. This isour show.
I don't remember what you saidabout. John was talking about our
fishing trip this morning.Some of what he said was true. We
were out fishing and. And wedid hook onto a very large stingray.
(46:48):
But I remember hooking themand I remember for real. I remember
handing John the bowl just sohe could see what it felt like. But
the majority of the time I wasfighting it. And John was sitting
there watching.
What?
(47:08):
Okay, that's how I remember.
That's. Well, you know,history is best remembered by those
who write or talk about it.But if that's the story you want
to go with, we'll go withthat. Joel. That works for me. But,
you know, I'll tell you, forthe longest part, I'm just being
honest. You know, that when wehooked into that thing and he made
(47:32):
his first couple of runs I hadno idea what that was. And that was
a giant. That was a giantstingray. It really was. Just. Because
normally if it's a bigstingray, you can get it up. You
can get it up off the bottomof the ocean. And this one was just
(47:57):
not doing that. And it wasmaking runs for us. So it was. I
wasn't exactly sure. I thoughtmaybe, like I said, it was a, you
know, one of those, you know,sawtooth sharks or something like
that big skate. I don't know.Anyway, lots of experience.
I mean, I. Yeah, it's like Ihave never.
We won.
(48:17):
I've never fought a fish.
Yeah. Yeah. And we returnedhim safely to the water. He had a
little mark on him, but he wasgood to go. Just. Yeah. Well, he's
got a story now, too.
He does. Well, from what Iunderstand, you know, the female
stingrays think that's pretty cool.
(48:40):
He's a wounded stingray. He'sa veteran now. Awesome. Well, hey,
listen, Joel, you're going todo great things. Honored to have
you here. It was a great dayto day and thanks for being on the
program, buddy. We genuinelyappreciate it.
All right, thanks, John.Appreciate it.
(49:01):
Thank you for listening to theWWIA podcast. To learn more about
the Wounded warriors in Actionfoundation and how you can get involved,
please visit ourwebsite@wwiaf.org or follow us on
Media Social social media onFacebook, Instagram, Twitter and
LinkedIn. If you'd like tocomment or offer feedback about our
(49:24):
podcast or if you have asuggestion for a future episode,
please email us at podcast@wwiaf.org
Thank you for your support andfor helping us honor, connect and
heal our combat wounded PurpleHeart heroes through the power of
the great outdoors.
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