July 8, 2025 • 46 mins
Co Hosting for the 1st time, JLJ and Doug Hess speak with Actor/Writer/Producer and Ernie Pyle Legacy Foundation Board Member Michael Brainard. He has a Substack which is compiling and archiving and releasing to the public, the Complete Works of Ernie Pyle. goto michaelbrainard.substack.com
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Hello everyone, and welcome to the Ernie Pile World War
Two Museum Podcast, your podcast of Ernie Pile, the voice
of the American soldier during World War Two. My name
is Doug Hesse and if you're tuning into the Ernie
Pole World War Tube Museum podcast, what we do on
this podcast is share with you pieces of Pile's life,
from its humble beginnings on the Indiana farm to becoming
(00:24):
a potent, surprise winning American journalist and war correspondent who
is best known for his stories about ordinary American soldiers
during World War Two. And today we have some very
special guests with us today. One is James Junior, the
president and CEO of jail J Media. Most of you
(00:45):
will probably recognize him and his voice because he co
hosts with me from time to time. James, this is
the first time we've actually been on an episode together
doing the World War two podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Yeah, we are going together either I step in, Yeah,
when you're away. So yes, our first time since we
are we are starting new ground.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
I love it absolutely, kind of tag team in it today.
And James, why don't you go ahead and introduce our
our other special guests that we have here today.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Why there are two of us because he he needs
two of us because he is that important. Okay, you know,
so many of you guys know out there we have
the Airy Pile World Wards TiO Museum in Dada, Indiana.
That's where his popcor podcast started. That's our collaborate, that's
our collaborator. Shout to them. But there are also other
Ernie Pile stuff going on, the Early Pile Schools throughout
(01:40):
New Mexico, California, another place like that lot and then
I took some of them too. But here's also the
Ernie Pile Foundation, who has been always very kind to
me online when I've shared certain things. We both like
Ernie Pile, so that's like hello, there we go. But
we're so fortunate to have someone who actually is working
with them and also has a He's a multi hyphennit himself,
(02:03):
just like me and Doug. He does all kinds of
stuff and if you have a keen eye, he and
I have something in common the soap operas and television.
He is. He is a mean film, television, theater, audio dramas.
You know, we have a few of those here in
the media. Audio dramas work with shows like all my children.
(02:25):
My favorite so of all time, Santa Barbara. Uh. He's
done shows like Disease, Invincible, American Heiress, but he's also
done He's he's a TV film he's also a writer,
an audio storyteller. And what he did recently was he
didn't create a sake and starred in because he can
do that. He can do both the award winning series
the Any Pile Experiment for NPR. Now you had a
(02:47):
little network radio kind of network at NPR affiliate w
f IU, and Bloue me to Indiana because because of
he piles from Indiana. All makes sense, right. He's a
current board member of the both Theory Piles Foundation and
the National Audio Theater Foundations. I've never heard of before
until all this, so I'm very excited. Another thing that
(03:07):
they also did too was the with the Ernie Pile
Legacy Foundation is the complete works of Ernie Pyle, a
project hosted on substack. Some new thing I'm learning about substack.
I have friends on the air learn about that where
one Pile column is posted every day. That's dedication as
a writer every day. Eventually, the whole goal is to
(03:29):
have everything Ernie Pile, and they're written will be in
one place. I love that idea. Archivists added to his
title also help us. Welcome and I hope I'm not
butchering your name, Michael Brainer.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
That's it. Hello, gentlemen. Wow, that was quite the introduction.
I probably don't even need to be here anymore.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Thanks for coming by everybody. Well see you next time. Bye.
And also he's also a handsome dude. Great mustache, great hair.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
I have a mustache made for radio.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Also I have a face made for I was told
that it's right too. So we're all in the one
to the show. Michael. We're actually glad to have our
worlds come together.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Yeah. Yeah, me too, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
I so Doug.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
No, I was just gonna say, Michael, you know, uh,
I think a lot of people understand what a museum is.
You know. So we had the Ernie Poweer World War
two Museum, But sometimes when people here foundation, what does
that mean? And what do you guys do? If maybe
we could just start off by having you explain a
little bit about what the foundation is.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Sure, sure, And I've been to the museum and I
love the museum in Dana, Indiana. I mean, anybody involved
in the pile universe, you know, has to have made
the pilgrimage. Yes, Uh, it's yeah. And if you haven't,
please do go.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
The Areny Pile Legacy Foundation was set up by some
existing family members of Ernie's down the line. Ernie didn't
have any kids, so these are cousins and such. And uh,
Jerry Machina, his wife Wynn Macho, is the niece of Ernie.
I don't know exactly what the the lineage is, but uh,
(05:14):
and she remembers meeting him. They are both have been
around a while. And Jerry was a vice president of
marketing at Levi Strauss company.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
And so he is just a natural salesman. He's a
force of nature. I don't know if you guys have
ever met him or talked to him. And he got
me onto the board. There's a long story there, but
I was I think I was the first non family
member that was asked asked to be on the board.
There's a couple of us now, uh, but they we are.
(05:51):
The foundation is around to simply raise awareness of the
life of the great Ernie Pyle, to raise awareness of
his life and works and uh, and so we are
involved in projects that that do that we went to
a couple of years ago. We went down to Belton,
Texas to Henry Wasco's hometown. Uh, which is Ernie's most famous,
(06:17):
you know piece from World War Two. It's in Brave Men,
the book Brave Men, and it's what he possibly won
the Pulitic for that and other things. And the family
of of Captain Wasco lives down there still. And we
did a day at the school at the Henry wasco
auditorium of Belton High School and also at the VFW.
(06:41):
The the Henry wasco VFW in Belton and uh yeah,
so we we were responsible for putting that together. Uh,
And we got I got to speak in front of
a auditorium full of high school kids and tell them
about Ernie and read that particular story. And then I
also got to read something else which was a gift.
(07:06):
I had never heard it before. It is the deployment
letter of Henry Wasco, or the last letter that was
sent home to him after he was killed. And I
put it up on the Complete Works of Ernie Pyle,
which is on substack. I'll get to that later and
get everybody there who needs to go and see it.
But on Memorial Day, I posted that letter, and it's remarkable.
(07:34):
Everybody back there who was educated knew how to was
taught how to write, how to write in cursive. Everybody
had to flourish to their writing. Their letter writing was,
you know, on point, and so was this guy's. And
not only that he was just a wordsmith. You could
tell he was a reader because he was able to
(07:56):
put it out in and the form that he did
it was it's a it's an amazing piece, uh. And
it talks about his desire not to die for his country,
but to live for it, and and that meant live
a life of service. And it's no wonder that his
men loved him. You read that and you get to
(08:16):
really know and understand that. So I implore you, anybody
who's an Erny fan, to get out there and read that.
You'll see what I mean. So that's one of the
things we did.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
We all.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Jerry was also responsible for putting together the National Arning
Pile Day in twenty eighteen. Excuse me, which Congress they
all voted on or they I don't know what the
word there, but they said.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Okay, this is that It's right.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Yeah, And Jerry was sort of the impetus there and
also the complete Works of Ernie Pyle is is sponsored
by the Ernie Pyle Legacy Foundation. And yeah, we have
things that we do every year on April eighteenth and
August third, the two Ernie's birthday and the day he
(09:07):
was killed. This last year it was the eightieth anniversary
of his death, and so we were in Honolulu at
the Punch Bowl where Ernie is buried, and we had
a day there to memory, to memorialize him. So we
(09:30):
do things like that, and we're good friends of the
museum and everybody involved there, Steve Key and your cousin, right, Doug,
is Phil. You gave me a tour there at the
museum which was second to none. He's amazing.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Yeah, Phil will probably in all honestly. I mean he
put a lot of effort and time in to learning things.
He was a big help win creating that museum after
the state kind of walked away from it, making sure
that it was still.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
In tech and I remember that.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Yeah, and he'll probably forget more than most people will
ever know when it comes to Nile just knowledge.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
I would take him on in the Erny Pile category
of jeopardy though. No, he's a wonder himself, and I
wrote a character based on him for the Erni Pile Experiment.
I think it's episode three. I'll let you know which
one it is and his name. It takes place in
(10:36):
the barbershop of Dana, Indiana, and he's in there because
I remember walking around. He was there for National Earning
Pile Day in Bloomington and he's walking around Indiana University
and he's a Purdue grad I know. And he all
he did was like, was was just rail against IU,
saying what where do you think they got those who
(10:58):
do you think drew up the plans for these nice
fine buildings here? You know, Purdue grads. It's so funny.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
He was, Oh, yeah, he loves to do a good ribbing. Uh.
In terms of all the fun absolutely, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
But I have a question because this is this is
that's all great and good, but like you're in Los
Angeles like me, the fans already know where I came from,
how I got there obviously and our work together, but
how did you get involved with them? With what with
withy pile?
Speaker 3 (11:34):
Again? Found like how all right here, I'll do it quickly.
I first when I was on All My Children back
in the eighties. I'm going to do this quickly, right,
I'm going back to the eighties.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
We're all there.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
Fortunately, being an avid reader, especially back then, I'm not
distracted by an iPhone. I went to a use bookstore
and I was just perusing things and I pulled the
book off the shelf and attached stuck to that book
was an Ernie Pile book and it fell to the floor.
(12:10):
It's one of those moments, and I picked it up
and it was the I can't Remember Nichols David Nichols book,
and it was a compilation of Ernie's pre war writings
and then also a little bit of a bio that
he wrote. In the beginning. Of course, I didn't know
who Ernie was at the time, and it led me
(12:32):
to Ernie's biography by Lee Miller, and I came to
Ernie in his pre war writings. That's how I discovered him.
I didn't know, but I didn't read the war stuff
until years later, and I was a huge fan. Became
a huge fan of his writing then. And so I've
(12:56):
been tooling around with the idea, wouldn't it be a
great idea to have Ernie Pile movie? You know, there
should be a biopic out there of him. I thought
about that a long time ago, and so I sort
of like compartmentalized that throughout the years. And i'd been
doing in the early two thousands, I had been doing
(13:17):
a guest artist spot at a college of Missouri Canton,
Missouri called Culver Stockton College, and so they'd have me
in like every four years after the students had cycled out,
and I got to be the guest artist in a
play with the students and other actors and celebrities. Would
do that on a revolving basis, and then somewhere around
(13:40):
twenty fifteen, they asked me if I had any plays
that I had written, because they knew I write. I
said I do. They said, why don't you come out
as a guest artist, but this time we'll do your play,
And it was The play is called War's Coming Ernie Pyle,
and it's about Ernie and Jerry pre war, heading toward war.
(14:00):
She doesn't want him to go, of course, and he
wants to go. And I get a phone call from
the school. We're in rehearsal, and they said they're any
Pile Legacy Foundation called and they wanted to talk to you.
And I said, oh no, they're gonna shut me down,
you know. And so I get on the phone and
(14:22):
it's Jerry, and of course he's just he found the
Google alert that we're doing this thing, and he just
wanted to know about it, and he was all for it,
loved the idea of it. And fast forward Turney Pile day.
He asked me if I wanted to come out there
to Indiana, and I did, and I read two of
(14:44):
Bernie's pieces, pre war pieces, the Snake Story and what
was the other one? I don't remember, And so so
I did. I went out there and it went overwhelm.
We all had a good time, and then he asked
me to be on the board. That's the short version, guys.
(15:06):
I could I could go into.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
Well, but the thing is, I just it's funny because
you're not Both examples are how small this world is
and that you you could be located somewhere and then
be somewhere else involved. That's what I was asking. If
you're not in New Mexico stuff, you're not in Central
California where some learning pile schools there too. You're not
(15:28):
in Texas, you're not Indiana. Yeah, you're not neither of
my I mean, I neither mine. There here we are about.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Right, did you grow up in California? You know, in
elementary school, we're all taught, like in the third grade,
to about the missions, the California Missions, and we're all
made to make a sculpture of a mission. And I
made mine out of mud. Most people make them them
there's out of like sugar cubes and such. But I
(16:00):
say that because I think that everybody in Indiana had
to do something like that about any pile in the
third grade, so everybody owns who Ernie is.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Yeah, And what's really nice is we have a lot
of school kids and a lot of schools around our
area that'll come to the Earning Pile Museum. Unfortunately, I
think things are getting tighter and tighter with school budgets
and travel, and I'm afraid that those days are going
to probably be coming to an end before we know it,
(16:33):
which is very unfortunate because I mean, for a lot
of these kids, they don't realize the history they have
in their own backyard. And I've always said, and I
think James would agree that he's heard me say this
from time to time, is there's a lot of hidden
gyms in our communities that we just don't even take
(16:53):
the time to know what's in our own community, in
our own backyard.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
A lot of times, I always say that because I
was to school for journal so and we used to
we studied some war journalists, but he wasn't one of them.
But not in California, California, cal state Chi. So what
they didn't they didn't teach him there. So why so
what turns me on about him is all the journalism stuff.
I mean all of that, I mean all, but just
the person of all and you know, the way he wrote,
(17:17):
and just like that's what got me hooked in, you know,
and it's only been a couple of years. I'm not
even I'm a newer. I'm a newer fan. You're like,
you're you're a longtime fan, you're from the place. But
I'm finding I was called the Flyover States. There's a
lot of history of our country in the Flyover States.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
So much, so much much.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
What's the mind from.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
Every every place has their their own little heroes, or
every states have have their favorite sons, and you know,
we don't necessarily get to hear of it in major
media or storytelling or any of that, because it's not
in our own person background. It's hard to stir interest
(18:03):
in that. A lot of times, there's a guy and
my wife was in an art show in Prescott, Arizona,
and there's a a statue in the courthouse square there
of a guy named Bucky O'Neill who was a part
of Roosevelt Teddy Roosevelt's you know, Cuban campaign, and his
(18:26):
story is so fantastic. And it's a great sculpture by
Solen Borglum, who is good guts In Borglum's brother who
he's the guy who did the Mount Rushmore.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Ah.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Incredible sculptors, and I just love that idea. I don't
know why I bring it up other than I might
want to dive into that one at some point.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
But here's the thing. This leads to my next question
kind of, and that is what is connecting you to
him so hard that you are creating audio stuff with him?
Speaker 3 (19:00):
And dude, I have no idea. I have no idea.
I'm people call me obsessed. I think I am obsessed.
I don't know why. Wow, I don't know why it's
stuck with me. But I also I'm a huge fan
of writers you know John Stettinbeck Fave. I mean, all
(19:22):
of those writers from that part of the of the
last century in that time, you know, from nineteen ten
to nineteen fifty, are amazing. And Ernie wrote during that time.
But if he wrote in long form, if he wrote novels,
we would know him. Everybody would know his name down
(19:43):
in the pantheon writers of that era. But he wrote
four newspapers. It's different. And his stuff gets published once
and it's done, it gets put in the compilations. You
can find a copy of Home Country on eBay, you know,
you can find Brave Men is back out by the way.
You can find those books. But also those are curated,
(20:06):
they're edited down. We don't know what the real columns were,
which is leads me to the complete works of Ernie Pile.
It's why we're doing it. We're putting those things in
the form that they were originally published in his original paper,
because even paper to paper he was edited. So this
we get the most of exactly what his stuff was.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
So I.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
And I also think that you know, the way we
read things nowadays, it's in such they're so compartmentalized. We
only have certain amount of time on our iPhones to
read these things, these stories, well, he wrote blog posts
one a day, six days a week for years, ten
straight years. They're out there.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
And so.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
When you read these, it's like, gosh, yeah, I can
get into the habit or reading one Ernie Pyle story
a day. For sure, it's his life was cut short.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
I mean it was like, oh yeah, I also does too, right,
and it cut short.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
Yeah, there's everybody always wonders that what what would he
have done if he if he went on, would he
have gone into television like some of the other guys
Edward R. Moureau, you know, probably not. And he was
contemplating quitting. He wanted to go and open up a
jewelry store in Albuquerque.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah he was there. He was down there.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Yeah, Native Native American jewelry, right, yeah, yeah, So who
knows what he would have done. He wouldn't have been
able to get away from writing. That's just who he was.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
Yeah. Well, and I think it's amazing that here we
are still talking about him eighty years, eighty years after
his death. H And Michael, like you said, I think
there is a resurgent in who Ernie Pine is or was,
I should say, I'm out there. But it also amazes
me people who are even in the state of Indiana
(22:10):
go to IU for journalism and still do not know
who Ernie Powell was. Yeah right, I mean, well.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
It's only because they only read what they're told to read,
the big hits, you know, Captain Moscow, the D Day stuff,
and only a couple of his pre war stuff makes
it through, uh, to the zeitgeist. But they are taught
these things. And I'm sure that there are teachers out
(22:42):
there teaching writing looking at Ernie's stuff and saying, you, guys,
pay attention. Look how he writes this. Look how the
he opens it with the sentence that is almost a query,
and then he goes into it. Nowadays, you know, you
click on anything on the Internet and you get you
get the headline, and then you're looking for the answer
(23:03):
to the headline. This is why I'm clicked. Is that
damn headline. And it's like, at least four paragraphs down
you finally get close to the answer, and maybe it's
in the fifth, but there's a bunch of blowney in
the first three or four paragraphs that that is redundant, unnecessary, uh.
And it's all designed to make us do something some
(23:28):
kind of behavior, this this clickbait stuff. You know, you
look at Ernie's stuff and you really want to learn
how to write. You writers out there, you want to
learn how to write in this way and have a
successful sub stack yourself. Look at the way he writes
and get into the habit.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
I do a blog every day, so I bless's on
my weapon.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
You got to be in the chair man, You got
to be in the chair.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
Well, here's the thing. I mean, i'd say this, gentlemen,
we are dinosaurs. We are dinosaurs. I mean you just
said newspaper Like, what's that? I mean, like my kids,
my grand Yeah, I don't even know what that is.
And who's that name?
Speaker 3 (24:10):
A name a columnist out there that's but that's working, George.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Will you right? I was saying a few.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Every paper had many.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
I know absolutely. My old stepfather he passed me a
couple of years ago. He was he was his late eighties.
He still got the newspaper. He got smaller and smaller
in La La Times got which is said La Times
was a reputable Yeah. Yeah, it got smaller and smaller,
and it's like wow, it's like it's just not happening.
It's it's not happening anymore. It's just not you like,
(24:43):
the columnists are gone. It's all. It's all Op adds
now have the papers are just like people writing something
and they put it in the paper.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Yeah, well, I think you're exactly right. Not only his
newspaper dying, but you know, our children didn't get the
experience a newspaper, you know, in terms of that. But
something else is even television. You know, when we were
growing up, there was only a handful of television stations
out there, and then you had some cable and you
(25:12):
had to be lucky to get cable depending on where
you live, you know. And now, and I'm exaggerating, probably
not by much, but there's literally hundreds of different channels
out there. And when we were kids, you'd get up
on a Saturday morning to watch your cartoons, and you
had to be in that time frame, yeah, in order
(25:32):
to catch that now, and.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
If you didn't, you were out of the conversation for
the week at school, right, Yes, I had to be there.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Yeah, yeah, So I had to think that between you
and the foundation and US and the museum were being
early alive, the conversation out there because no one's writing cursive.
My kids don't know how to write curse the on
to write cursive. They're not they're not teaching that. I
actually be curious, And I don't know if you have
bro Michael's a question. Have you been in some colleges
(26:04):
and some of the latest journalism classes. I don't even
know what they look like these days. I don't know
what they're teaching them. I don't just do it this way,
you know, words and a I I'll do it for it.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
At the Foundation, we we have a relationship with the
Media School at Indiana University, so we know some people
there and occasionally we you know, we visit. But that's
an amazing building that they have. You walk in though
there's screens everywhere. Oh wow, right, it seems like, uh impressive.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
It is.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Yeah, it's it's like a center for like NASA, you know,
people putting people on. You walk in, there's all these
screens everywhere. And yeah, and they still have the Daily Student,
which is the newspaper there that Ernie was the editor
of famously. And and so they still put out a newspaper,
(26:58):
I believe, a hard copy. Uh. So it's being taught,
it's like, uh, it's it's like you have to keep
teaching them how to make the hard copy because maybe
some day we.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Go back to that.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
We don't want to lose that, right. It's like horsemanship.
You can't forget how to ride horses and take care
of them because who knows, there might be a day
we don't have cars again.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
But you know, and that's and see when you say that,
just I want to get you off topic. But when
I mentioned the folks, I'm a I'm a I like vinyl,
I like cassettes, I like you know, physical media. Physical
media is come back. It's a huge it's caliback. Should sales,
book sales are all just like you know, because you're right,
(27:43):
one of these things are gonna shut down. These phones
sometimes not just work streusers are taking down stuff and
you're like, I want to hear that song. I want
to I want to read that book. Right, So now people,
physical media is come back in So it's funny you
say that I write horses also not to write hor like.
You can't just not. You know, it's not gonna make
you run a horse. You have to know how to
(28:03):
share people.
Speaker 3 (28:04):
I don't know how to hunt.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
I know how to fish right right, Yes, yes, the
basic So while we're designed, while our grandkids are signed
their their decisions with X's, there's still us out there
who know that there's other stuff that you have to
kind of, you know, keep it going. I think between
between the three of us and the organizations we're with,
we're helping keep reading piles legacy alive. And in the conversation, yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
I think you're right. I'm a I'm a big fan
of this podcast and I love the people that you
guys get on and even though it's peripheral sometimes it's
still it's still very interesting.
Speaker 1 (28:39):
And uh yeah, well we appreciate you saying that because
one of the things that you know, I'm a big
believer in is just keeping World War two alive. Yeah,
and there's a lot of great stories out there that
they need to be shared.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
You guys know that that Brave Men is back in print, right, yes, that,
and that we were at the foundation, We were uh
partly responsible for that. We control the rights to earn
these books. And so Penguin came to us, Penguin Classics
came to us and they said we want to and
(29:18):
we said, oh, of course, we would love that and
uh yeah, and so we've we've done that. It's doing
really well, selling really well. And then a couple of
months after they were getting the getting it going, they said,
we need to record the audio book. Do you know
anybody who would who you would like to read that?
Speaker 1 (29:37):
You know?
Speaker 3 (29:37):
I said, I know somebody, somebody, So I uh, I
put I laid down uh the death of Captain wasscow
on on pro tools, sent it into them and I
got the gig. So that's me, that's my voice on on.
(30:00):
If you go to audible and you get Brave Man,
it's kind in the reviews. Please really in my acting career,
it's it's a highlight. It's an absolute highlight. So I
was there for almost seven days, eight hours a day,
clouding it and it was really special. I'm surprised I
(30:21):
still have my voice left.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
Michael. A couple of other things that I think people
would be surprised about. Ernie Pyle. Now those that really
know and steady are not surprised. But you know, he
covered aviation before he got into.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
The water that he's probably for two and a half years.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Yeah. And the other thing is, you know him and
Jerry traveled the country and right before he was if
you will, became famous. I mean I think he was
already famous, you could make that that statement, but really
solidified his reputation. It's World War Two in Termson, so
(31:02):
he looks an individual.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
You could see his progression from the aviation column, which
was from nineteen twenty nine to thirty two, and then
he was promoted to editor and he edited for a
few years, and then in nineteen thirty five he's like,
I got to get out, and he got the gig
of being a travel writer. So he jumped in a
(31:27):
car nineteen thirty four coup Ford Coop with his wife
and they toured the States for five years and wrote,
and she was a part of it. To what extent
nobody really knows. It's interesting for me to read through
some of the complete works of Ernie Pyle, and I
(31:47):
discovered some a couple of columns that were like not
necessarily in Ernie's voice, And I'm wondering if she was
sitting at the typewriter. Yeah, there's speculations, there's all speculations.
Everybody knows, but she was there and and Ernie, and
(32:08):
what she knew about Ernie is that he had this
special talent of just being able to stand somewhere and
people walking up, walk up to him and start talking.
He just was a magnet for interesting people. You know,
there's a guy, Bossy oh gosh, darn it, I can't
remember his name up in MASSACHUSETTSS that there's a a
(32:33):
story and it's it's it's it's I printed it. It's
out there. I'll find it for you, and I'll sudden
you can put it in the notes. Bossy Gillis is
the guy's name. And he was the mayor of this town,
Newburyport newbury Report in Massachusetts and had gas stations on
both sides of the road because he wanted to get
all of the commerce. And what a character. And I
(32:53):
found an old photograph of him and I put him
up and he just absolutely looks like an old Hollywood
character actor and and it's hilarious what you know, Ernie
wrote about him. And so these are the kinds of
people that he would find, and that's what he developed.
And he certainly did that in the wartime, and you
(33:15):
go through Brave Men and those characters pop up all
over the place, and people loved him. The soldiers, we
already know this. They loved him dearly. They read him
every day. They felt that he was a part of
the family. And that's how everybody else felt about it too.
Here in America, you know, all of our grandparents and
(33:36):
they all knew who he was. He was the most
famous guy in America. When he died four days after
the President Roosevelt. His death usurped the death of the
president in the hearts of the people. You know, we
we experienced that every now and then. I remember when
Prince died, the musician Prince died. Everyboddy just was like,
(33:57):
oh my god, you're.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
A Prince fan, you know, that's right.
Speaker 3 (34:00):
It hit everybody. And that's the kind of thing that
it hit. It hit America part because you know, they
felt like because he wasn't writing about troop movements and
all that, he was writing about the guys, and and
they felt that it was a family member, you know
that died. I thought like, that is worth saving, right,
(34:24):
a guy like that is worth propping him up to
the to the new world and letting him see what
he was all about.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Well that's my that's my connection to him.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
I tried to do my own shows, my own work.
Is how a personal to make I have like a
fan base on whatever I tried to like connect to that.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
Yeah. My other thing. One other thing, the stuff that
we're printing right now we started on April eighteenth, is
we started in August of August of nineteen thirty five,
which is his pre war writings, And this is going
to take probably four or five years to get to
the wartime writing, so we're not even there yet. And
(35:10):
and what if you want to know what life was
like back in the thirties, read this column every day.
It's a history lesson, for sure, but also we are
all reliving the politics of that time right now. Not
not just the politics but the policy. You know, the
(35:31):
the work the WPA that that Roosevelt put together back
then has been trying They've been trying to dismantle that
ever since. And we've been going to battle on those
issues and at those lines, you know, ever since. So
if you really want to know what the time was like,
you're going to read this stuff and draw comparisons to
(35:53):
what life is like now. So that's why I think
it's important. That's why I think the complete works of
Berney Pile is important as well.
Speaker 1 (36:01):
Well. The other thing that I think is important that
Pole didn't right just in the certain region or for
a certain state, but he covered everything and we got
a good balance out there. I mean we wasn't biased. No,
mean that in the since you went.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
To Mexico, you went down to South America, you went
to Alaska.
Speaker 1 (36:19):
The main name it, in everything in between, and we
got a good balance of what life was like.
Speaker 3 (36:26):
Yeah, and here's here's a little easter egg, the ones
that I was just working on today that will be dropping,
I believe just some July twenty seven, twenty at twenty
ninth is a story about how PanAm or no continent
I can't remember the name of the airways that became
American Airlines. They are they were trying to open a
(36:48):
route from the United States to Australia. And so they're
going to all of these little islands like Midway Island
or these islands out in the Pacific. And he's writing
it as such, is like they're putting Hawaiian boys out
there to stay there while while the supply ships come
(37:08):
to create airports for the airlines to land and gas
up and keep going to Australia. Well on, what do
you think they were really doing? What do you think
they were really doing there?
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Right?
Speaker 2 (37:25):
They were?
Speaker 3 (37:26):
That was the US government setting those islands up for war,
the coming war, right, I mean, that's obvious. So go
and read those things, and that's a thing there you go.
I mean, if you are a World War two enthusiast,
those are the kinds of things that, well, you hear
about in books. I suppose you pick it up here
and there, But here is in real time a description
(37:49):
of what these you know, these Hawaiian boys were doing
out there, preparing the way for building these these landing zones,
you know, where the Navy would patrol out there. And
of course they are part of the war in the Pacific.
So that's coming in July, end of July to twenty
(38:10):
twenty five. It will be July twenty seventh, twentieth, and
twenty ninth on substacks. If you go in there and subscribe,
you'll be able to get them in your email, one
a day, every day, a reminder to come and read Ernie.
So yeah, subscribe, please, absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (38:32):
Fascinating.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
That's Michael.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
What are some of the things that that the foundation
is looking to do in the future.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
How how can people help the foundation?
Speaker 3 (38:47):
Yeah, well, if you go to Ernie Pyle Foundation dot org,
you will learn about us. We do have a scholarship
at the Universe to be in New Mexico that we
are trying to a journalism scholarship, uh, that we're it's
evolving there. It's evolving that we've had it for a while.
(39:10):
But but it's kind of what's happening is that students
aren't going to school for journalism anymore.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
That's true. Yeah, and and.
Speaker 3 (39:19):
So the classes aren't that full of uh with with
students to to learn about this stuff because there's no
jobs in it right, There's just no jobs of journalism anymore.
So anyways, we're we are trying to evolve that with
(39:40):
the that university uh and uh and perhaps others other
places you know.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
For that.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
We we like I said, we did the the the
Captain Osco Day. We might do another one of those
Ernie Pile Days coming up on August third, and we're
trying to get something going uh every the other year
with that, either in Honolulu, which we did this year,
or in Bloomington, or in Albuquerque or maybe even in Dana.
(40:09):
Maybe you guys we ought to team up or.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Go to Albuquerque. I go there all the time. Yeah,
I love it. I love it. That library there too.
The library is there too. I would say, go to
Alberque is not that far from LA I'll go over there
real quick. I do too.
Speaker 3 (40:23):
I love New Mexico. I could easily live there. I
absolutely see why he and his wife Jerry loved it
there too.
Speaker 2 (40:32):
Yeah. I mean when he says I'd love to be
involved with some kind of any pile day, when do
you think that. Absolutely?
Speaker 1 (40:38):
Well, yes, let's keep the lines of communication open because
I think there's a lot of things that the two
of us and I mean organization.
Speaker 3 (40:47):
Yeah, we talk about you guys a lot. We are
We are big admirers of the museum and the friends
of Ernie Pyle, and so maybe we should do something together.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Absolutely, I do want to give a huge shout out
to help helped each e LT township because they provide
financial support to the museum, so we are able to
keep it free so when you come to the museum
you don't have to worry about paying anything. They've been
(41:19):
very gracious making sure that we have the funds needed
to keep the place open. Now, we do take donations
full disclosure, because it does take a lot of money
to be able to run operation. We have staft that
we have to pay. Unfortunately, we're not able to keep
it open, you know, forty hours a week or seven
(41:40):
days a week or anything like and it's seasonal. But
without financial support, we wouldn't be able to do what
we do there in data at the Bernie Palm Museum.
So a huge thank you in a shout out to
the trustees.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
Yes, well I think we got it. We could talk
forever I could, but I think we got I think
the folks at home now have an idea. Yeah, what's
going on thy Pile Foundation.
Speaker 3 (42:13):
Yeah, you're gonna you're gonna set up the show notes
and put in the complete works any pile link. Great
complete works are any pile at sub Stack. Go in
there and get one every single day to read. There's
Brave Men is out again. And also the Ernie Pile
experiment is out there and available. You just do a
(42:36):
search on that and uh it's you'd be able to
hear them. I think it's on YouTube as well. But
just the Ernie Pile experiment at w f i U
and you can hear those. Those are all fictionalized. It's
about Ernie and his wife traveling the States before the war.
(42:56):
And uh, and at the end of each and I
get to play Ernie because you know it's radio. No,
I don't look anything like him. It's the only chance
I'll ever get. So, but I get to read everyone
I got. At the end of every episode, I read
one of Ernie's pieces.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
So at a time, anybody wants to do it Ernie
Pyle esque thing to go through the Foundation.
Speaker 1 (43:19):
Don't they?
Speaker 2 (43:22):
Uh? Is the domain? Is is it open to like
anybody can do a story on them kind of thing?
Speaker 3 (43:28):
Well, there's it's complicated. But but we yeah, we we
are image holders, image right holders, and and the books
and the writings and stuff. You know, so those title
names and such are are controlled by us. But uh,
but look we're it's uh, it's it's not it's I'm
(43:53):
glad it's still around. And if nobody did it, you know,
where would it be. Nobody knows where that stuff. It's
all in one place now it's with the Foundation, and
we do good things. There's nothing selfish about this.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
Yeah, that's good. I love it. Yeah, you take us
out all right?
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Well, James and Michael, thank you both for coming on
spending some time with us here the sound Forternoon to
talk about not only the museum, but more importantly the
foundation as well. You guys are doing great works out there,
and I hope that the museum and the Foundation can
find a way to partner because we're both doing the
(44:32):
work of preserving not only piles writing, but his image
and getting that history out making sure it's correct out there.
So hopefully we can find something here in the near future.
Speaker 3 (44:44):
It got Jerry on here too. Get Jerry mash absolutely,
I tell you what you mentioned that to him and
he'll have ten ideas in the first minute you're talking
about how that can happen.
Speaker 1 (44:58):
Like stuff like that. That's what we right and like
I said, we're doing great work here. So Michael again,
thank you so much for coming out and spending some
time with us, and James, thank you for jumping on
with us as well. As it's always a pleasure to
be able to talk with other Pile enthusiasts and really
get that message out of what Pile does and what
(45:20):
he's still doing today all these years later, eighty years
after his death, is still inspiring some people to go
out into generalism and know how to properly write.
Speaker 3 (45:31):
Yeah, yeah, very good.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
All right, guys, everybody follow, follow all of us, follow him,
follow them, follow all of us on social media platforms,
and Ernie Pyle is out there. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (45:46):
Bane
Hello everyone, and welcome to the Ernie Pile World War
Two Museum Podcast, your podcast of Ernie Pile, the voice
of the American soldier during World War Two. My name
is Doug Hesse and if you're tuning into the Ernie
Pole World War Tube Museum podcast, what we do on
this podcast is share with you pieces of Pile's life,
from its humble beginnings on the Indiana farm to becoming
(00:24):
a potent, surprise winning American journalist and war correspondent who
is best known for his stories about ordinary American soldiers
during World War Two. And today we have some very
special guests with us today. One is James Junior, the
president and CEO of jail J Media. Most of you
(00:45):
will probably recognize him and his voice because he co
hosts with me from time to time. James, this is
the first time we've actually been on an episode together
doing the World War two podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Yeah, we are going together either I step in, Yeah,
when you're away. So yes, our first time since we
are we are starting new ground.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
I love it absolutely, kind of tag team in it today.
And James, why don't you go ahead and introduce our
our other special guests that we have here today.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Why there are two of us because he he needs
two of us because he is that important. Okay, you know,
so many of you guys know out there we have
the Airy Pile World Wards TiO Museum in Dada, Indiana.
That's where his popcor podcast started. That's our collaborate, that's
our collaborator. Shout to them. But there are also other
Ernie Pile stuff going on, the Early Pile Schools throughout
(01:40):
New Mexico, California, another place like that lot and then
I took some of them too. But here's also the
Ernie Pile Foundation, who has been always very kind to
me online when I've shared certain things. We both like
Ernie Pile, so that's like hello, there we go. But
we're so fortunate to have someone who actually is working
with them and also has a He's a multi hyphennit himself,
(02:03):
just like me and Doug. He does all kinds of
stuff and if you have a keen eye, he and
I have something in common the soap operas and television.
He is. He is a mean film, television, theater, audio dramas.
You know, we have a few of those here in
the media. Audio dramas work with shows like all my children.
(02:25):
My favorite so of all time, Santa Barbara. Uh. He's
done shows like Disease, Invincible, American Heiress, but he's also
done He's he's a TV film he's also a writer,
an audio storyteller. And what he did recently was he
didn't create a sake and starred in because he can
do that. He can do both the award winning series
the Any Pile Experiment for NPR. Now you had a
(02:47):
little network radio kind of network at NPR affiliate w
f IU, and Bloue me to Indiana because because of
he piles from Indiana. All makes sense, right. He's a
current board member of the both Theory Piles Foundation and
the National Audio Theater Foundations. I've never heard of before
until all this, so I'm very excited. Another thing that
(03:07):
they also did too was the with the Ernie Pile
Legacy Foundation is the complete works of Ernie Pyle, a
project hosted on substack. Some new thing I'm learning about substack.
I have friends on the air learn about that where
one Pile column is posted every day. That's dedication as
a writer every day. Eventually, the whole goal is to
(03:29):
have everything Ernie Pile, and they're written will be in
one place. I love that idea. Archivists added to his
title also help us. Welcome and I hope I'm not
butchering your name, Michael Brainer.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
That's it. Hello, gentlemen. Wow, that was quite the introduction.
I probably don't even need to be here anymore.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Thanks for coming by everybody. Well see you next time. Bye.
And also he's also a handsome dude. Great mustache, great hair.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
I have a mustache made for radio.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Also I have a face made for I was told
that it's right too. So we're all in the one
to the show. Michael. We're actually glad to have our
worlds come together.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Yeah. Yeah, me too, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
I so Doug.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
No, I was just gonna say, Michael, you know, uh,
I think a lot of people understand what a museum is.
You know. So we had the Ernie Poweer World War
two Museum, But sometimes when people here foundation, what does
that mean? And what do you guys do? If maybe
we could just start off by having you explain a
little bit about what the foundation is.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Sure, sure, And I've been to the museum and I
love the museum in Dana, Indiana. I mean, anybody involved
in the pile universe, you know, has to have made
the pilgrimage. Yes, Uh, it's yeah. And if you haven't,
please do go.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
The Areny Pile Legacy Foundation was set up by some
existing family members of Ernie's down the line. Ernie didn't
have any kids, so these are cousins and such. And uh,
Jerry Machina, his wife Wynn Macho, is the niece of Ernie.
I don't know exactly what the the lineage is, but uh,
(05:14):
and she remembers meeting him. They are both have been
around a while. And Jerry was a vice president of
marketing at Levi Strauss company.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
And so he is just a natural salesman. He's a
force of nature. I don't know if you guys have
ever met him or talked to him. And he got
me onto the board. There's a long story there, but
I was I think I was the first non family
member that was asked asked to be on the board.
There's a couple of us now, uh, but they we are.
(05:51):
The foundation is around to simply raise awareness of the
life of the great Ernie Pyle, to raise awareness of
his life and works and uh, and so we are
involved in projects that that do that we went to
a couple of years ago. We went down to Belton,
Texas to Henry Wasco's hometown. Uh, which is Ernie's most famous,
(06:17):
you know piece from World War Two. It's in Brave Men,
the book Brave Men, and it's what he possibly won
the Pulitic for that and other things. And the family
of of Captain Wasco lives down there still. And we
did a day at the school at the Henry wasco
auditorium of Belton High School and also at the VFW.
(06:41):
The the Henry wasco VFW in Belton and uh yeah,
so we we were responsible for putting that together. Uh,
And we got I got to speak in front of
a auditorium full of high school kids and tell them
about Ernie and read that particular story. And then I
also got to read something else which was a gift.
(07:06):
I had never heard it before. It is the deployment
letter of Henry Wasco, or the last letter that was
sent home to him after he was killed. And I
put it up on the Complete Works of Ernie Pyle,
which is on substack. I'll get to that later and
get everybody there who needs to go and see it.
But on Memorial Day, I posted that letter, and it's remarkable.
(07:34):
Everybody back there who was educated knew how to was
taught how to write, how to write in cursive. Everybody
had to flourish to their writing. Their letter writing was,
you know, on point, and so was this guy's. And
not only that he was just a wordsmith. You could
tell he was a reader because he was able to
(07:56):
put it out in and the form that he did
it was it's a it's an amazing piece, uh. And
it talks about his desire not to die for his country,
but to live for it, and and that meant live
a life of service. And it's no wonder that his
men loved him. You read that and you get to
(08:16):
really know and understand that. So I implore you, anybody
who's an Erny fan, to get out there and read that.
You'll see what I mean. So that's one of the
things we did.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
We all.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Jerry was also responsible for putting together the National Arning
Pile Day in twenty eighteen. Excuse me, which Congress they
all voted on or they I don't know what the
word there, but they said.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Okay, this is that It's right.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Yeah, And Jerry was sort of the impetus there and
also the complete Works of Ernie Pyle is is sponsored
by the Ernie Pyle Legacy Foundation. And yeah, we have
things that we do every year on April eighteenth and
August third, the two Ernie's birthday and the day he
(09:07):
was killed. This last year it was the eightieth anniversary
of his death, and so we were in Honolulu at
the Punch Bowl where Ernie is buried, and we had
a day there to memory, to memorialize him. So we
(09:30):
do things like that, and we're good friends of the
museum and everybody involved there, Steve Key and your cousin, right, Doug,
is Phil. You gave me a tour there at the
museum which was second to none. He's amazing.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Yeah, Phil will probably in all honestly. I mean he
put a lot of effort and time in to learning things.
He was a big help win creating that museum after
the state kind of walked away from it, making sure
that it was still.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
In tech and I remember that.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Yeah, and he'll probably forget more than most people will
ever know when it comes to Nile just knowledge.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
I would take him on in the Erny Pile category
of jeopardy though. No, he's a wonder himself, and I
wrote a character based on him for the Erni Pile Experiment.
I think it's episode three. I'll let you know which
one it is and his name. It takes place in
(10:36):
the barbershop of Dana, Indiana, and he's in there because
I remember walking around. He was there for National Earning
Pile Day in Bloomington and he's walking around Indiana University
and he's a Purdue grad I know. And he all
he did was like, was was just rail against IU,
saying what where do you think they got those who
(10:58):
do you think drew up the plans for these nice
fine buildings here? You know, Purdue grads. It's so funny.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
He was, Oh, yeah, he loves to do a good ribbing. Uh.
In terms of all the fun absolutely, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
But I have a question because this is this is
that's all great and good, but like you're in Los
Angeles like me, the fans already know where I came from,
how I got there obviously and our work together, but
how did you get involved with them? With what with
withy pile?
Speaker 3 (11:34):
Again? Found like how all right here, I'll do it quickly.
I first when I was on All My Children back
in the eighties. I'm going to do this quickly, right,
I'm going back to the eighties.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
We're all there.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
Fortunately, being an avid reader, especially back then, I'm not
distracted by an iPhone. I went to a use bookstore
and I was just perusing things and I pulled the
book off the shelf and attached stuck to that book
was an Ernie Pile book and it fell to the floor.
(12:10):
It's one of those moments, and I picked it up
and it was the I can't Remember Nichols David Nichols book,
and it was a compilation of Ernie's pre war writings
and then also a little bit of a bio that
he wrote. In the beginning. Of course, I didn't know
who Ernie was at the time, and it led me
(12:32):
to Ernie's biography by Lee Miller, and I came to
Ernie in his pre war writings. That's how I discovered him.
I didn't know, but I didn't read the war stuff
until years later, and I was a huge fan. Became
a huge fan of his writing then. And so I've
(12:56):
been tooling around with the idea, wouldn't it be a
great idea to have Ernie Pile movie? You know, there
should be a biopic out there of him. I thought
about that a long time ago, and so I sort
of like compartmentalized that throughout the years. And i'd been
doing in the early two thousands, I had been doing
(13:17):
a guest artist spot at a college of Missouri Canton,
Missouri called Culver Stockton College, and so they'd have me
in like every four years after the students had cycled out,
and I got to be the guest artist in a
play with the students and other actors and celebrities. Would
do that on a revolving basis, and then somewhere around
(13:40):
twenty fifteen, they asked me if I had any plays
that I had written, because they knew I write. I
said I do. They said, why don't you come out
as a guest artist, but this time we'll do your play,
And it was The play is called War's Coming Ernie Pyle,
and it's about Ernie and Jerry pre war, heading toward war.
(14:00):
She doesn't want him to go, of course, and he
wants to go. And I get a phone call from
the school. We're in rehearsal, and they said they're any
Pile Legacy Foundation called and they wanted to talk to you.
And I said, oh no, they're gonna shut me down,
you know. And so I get on the phone and
(14:22):
it's Jerry, and of course he's just he found the
Google alert that we're doing this thing, and he just
wanted to know about it, and he was all for it,
loved the idea of it. And fast forward Turney Pile day.
He asked me if I wanted to come out there
to Indiana, and I did, and I read two of
(14:44):
Bernie's pieces, pre war pieces, the Snake Story and what
was the other one? I don't remember, And so so
I did. I went out there and it went overwhelm.
We all had a good time, and then he asked
me to be on the board. That's the short version, guys.
(15:06):
I could I could go into.
Speaker 2 (15:08):
Well, but the thing is, I just it's funny because
you're not Both examples are how small this world is
and that you you could be located somewhere and then
be somewhere else involved. That's what I was asking. If
you're not in New Mexico stuff, you're not in Central
California where some learning pile schools there too. You're not
(15:28):
in Texas, you're not Indiana. Yeah, you're not neither of
my I mean, I neither mine. There here we are about.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Right, did you grow up in California? You know, in
elementary school, we're all taught, like in the third grade,
to about the missions, the California Missions, and we're all
made to make a sculpture of a mission. And I
made mine out of mud. Most people make them them
there's out of like sugar cubes and such. But I
(16:00):
say that because I think that everybody in Indiana had
to do something like that about any pile in the
third grade, so everybody owns who Ernie is.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Yeah, And what's really nice is we have a lot
of school kids and a lot of schools around our
area that'll come to the Earning Pile Museum. Unfortunately, I
think things are getting tighter and tighter with school budgets
and travel, and I'm afraid that those days are going
to probably be coming to an end before we know it,
(16:33):
which is very unfortunate because I mean, for a lot
of these kids, they don't realize the history they have
in their own backyard. And I've always said, and I
think James would agree that he's heard me say this
from time to time, is there's a lot of hidden
gyms in our communities that we just don't even take
(16:53):
the time to know what's in our own community, in
our own backyard.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
A lot of times, I always say that because I
was to school for journal so and we used to
we studied some war journalists, but he wasn't one of them.
But not in California, California, cal state Chi. So what
they didn't they didn't teach him there. So why so
what turns me on about him is all the journalism stuff.
I mean all of that, I mean all, but just
the person of all and you know, the way he wrote,
(17:17):
and just like that's what got me hooked in, you know,
and it's only been a couple of years. I'm not
even I'm a newer. I'm a newer fan. You're like,
you're you're a longtime fan, you're from the place. But
I'm finding I was called the Flyover States. There's a
lot of history of our country in the Flyover States.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
So much, so much much.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
What's the mind from.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
Every every place has their their own little heroes, or
every states have have their favorite sons, and you know,
we don't necessarily get to hear of it in major
media or storytelling or any of that, because it's not
in our own person background. It's hard to stir interest
(18:03):
in that. A lot of times, there's a guy and
my wife was in an art show in Prescott, Arizona,
and there's a a statue in the courthouse square there
of a guy named Bucky O'Neill who was a part
of Roosevelt Teddy Roosevelt's you know, Cuban campaign, and his
(18:26):
story is so fantastic. And it's a great sculpture by
Solen Borglum, who is good guts In Borglum's brother who
he's the guy who did the Mount Rushmore.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Ah.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Incredible sculptors, and I just love that idea. I don't
know why I bring it up other than I might
want to dive into that one at some point.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
But here's the thing. This leads to my next question
kind of, and that is what is connecting you to
him so hard that you are creating audio stuff with him?
Speaker 3 (19:00):
And dude, I have no idea. I have no idea.
I'm people call me obsessed. I think I am obsessed.
I don't know why. Wow, I don't know why it's
stuck with me. But I also I'm a huge fan
of writers you know John Stettinbeck Fave. I mean, all
(19:22):
of those writers from that part of the of the
last century in that time, you know, from nineteen ten
to nineteen fifty, are amazing. And Ernie wrote during that time.
But if he wrote in long form, if he wrote novels,
we would know him. Everybody would know his name down
(19:43):
in the pantheon writers of that era. But he wrote
four newspapers. It's different. And his stuff gets published once
and it's done, it gets put in the compilations. You
can find a copy of Home Country on eBay, you know,
you can find Brave Men is back out by the way.
You can find those books. But also those are curated,
(20:06):
they're edited down. We don't know what the real columns were,
which is leads me to the complete works of Ernie Pile.
It's why we're doing it. We're putting those things in
the form that they were originally published in his original paper,
because even paper to paper he was edited. So this
we get the most of exactly what his stuff was.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
So I.
Speaker 3 (20:32):
And I also think that you know, the way we
read things nowadays, it's in such they're so compartmentalized. We
only have certain amount of time on our iPhones to
read these things, these stories, well, he wrote blog posts
one a day, six days a week for years, ten
straight years. They're out there.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
And so.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
When you read these, it's like, gosh, yeah, I can
get into the habit or reading one Ernie Pyle story
a day. For sure, it's his life was cut short.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
I mean it was like, oh yeah, I also does too, right,
and it cut short.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
Yeah, there's everybody always wonders that what what would he
have done if he if he went on, would he
have gone into television like some of the other guys
Edward R. Moureau, you know, probably not. And he was
contemplating quitting. He wanted to go and open up a
jewelry store in Albuquerque.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah he was there. He was down there.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Yeah, Native Native American jewelry, right, yeah, yeah, So who
knows what he would have done. He wouldn't have been
able to get away from writing. That's just who he was.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
Yeah. Well, and I think it's amazing that here we
are still talking about him eighty years, eighty years after
his death. H And Michael, like you said, I think
there is a resurgent in who Ernie Pine is or was,
I should say, I'm out there. But it also amazes
me people who are even in the state of Indiana
(22:10):
go to IU for journalism and still do not know
who Ernie Powell was. Yeah right, I mean, well.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
It's only because they only read what they're told to read,
the big hits, you know, Captain Moscow, the D Day stuff,
and only a couple of his pre war stuff makes
it through, uh, to the zeitgeist. But they are taught
these things. And I'm sure that there are teachers out
(22:42):
there teaching writing looking at Ernie's stuff and saying, you, guys,
pay attention. Look how he writes this. Look how the
he opens it with the sentence that is almost a query,
and then he goes into it. Nowadays, you know, you
click on anything on the Internet and you get you
get the headline, and then you're looking for the answer
(23:03):
to the headline. This is why I'm clicked. Is that
damn headline. And it's like, at least four paragraphs down
you finally get close to the answer, and maybe it's
in the fifth, but there's a bunch of blowney in
the first three or four paragraphs that that is redundant, unnecessary, uh.
And it's all designed to make us do something some
(23:28):
kind of behavior, this this clickbait stuff. You know, you
look at Ernie's stuff and you really want to learn
how to write. You writers out there, you want to
learn how to write in this way and have a
successful sub stack yourself. Look at the way he writes
and get into the habit.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
I do a blog every day, so I bless's on
my weapon.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
You got to be in the chair man, You got
to be in the chair.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
Well, here's the thing. I mean, i'd say this, gentlemen,
we are dinosaurs. We are dinosaurs. I mean you just
said newspaper Like, what's that? I mean, like my kids,
my grand Yeah, I don't even know what that is.
And who's that name?
Speaker 3 (24:10):
A name a columnist out there that's but that's working, George.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Will you right? I was saying a few.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Every paper had many.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
I know absolutely. My old stepfather he passed me a
couple of years ago. He was he was his late eighties.
He still got the newspaper. He got smaller and smaller
in La La Times got which is said La Times
was a reputable Yeah. Yeah, it got smaller and smaller,
and it's like wow, it's like it's just not happening.
It's it's not happening anymore. It's just not you like,
(24:43):
the columnists are gone. It's all. It's all Op adds
now have the papers are just like people writing something
and they put it in the paper.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Yeah, well, I think you're exactly right. Not only his
newspaper dying, but you know, our children didn't get the
experience a newspaper, you know, in terms of that. But
something else is even television. You know, when we were
growing up, there was only a handful of television stations
out there, and then you had some cable and you
(25:12):
had to be lucky to get cable depending on where
you live, you know. And now, and I'm exaggerating, probably
not by much, but there's literally hundreds of different channels
out there. And when we were kids, you'd get up
on a Saturday morning to watch your cartoons, and you
had to be in that time frame, yeah, in order
(25:32):
to catch that now, and.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
If you didn't, you were out of the conversation for
the week at school, right, Yes, I had to be there.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Yeah, yeah, So I had to think that between you
and the foundation and US and the museum were being
early alive, the conversation out there because no one's writing cursive.
My kids don't know how to write curse the on
to write cursive. They're not they're not teaching that. I
actually be curious, And I don't know if you have
bro Michael's a question. Have you been in some colleges
(26:04):
and some of the latest journalism classes. I don't even
know what they look like these days. I don't know
what they're teaching them. I don't just do it this way,
you know, words and a I I'll do it for it.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
At the Foundation, we we have a relationship with the
Media School at Indiana University, so we know some people
there and occasionally we you know, we visit. But that's
an amazing building that they have. You walk in though
there's screens everywhere. Oh wow, right, it seems like, uh impressive.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
It is.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Yeah, it's it's like a center for like NASA, you know,
people putting people on. You walk in, there's all these
screens everywhere. And yeah, and they still have the Daily Student,
which is the newspaper there that Ernie was the editor
of famously. And and so they still put out a newspaper,
(26:58):
I believe, a hard copy. Uh. So it's being taught,
it's like, uh, it's it's like you have to keep
teaching them how to make the hard copy because maybe
some day we.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Go back to that.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
We don't want to lose that, right. It's like horsemanship.
You can't forget how to ride horses and take care
of them because who knows, there might be a day
we don't have cars again.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
But you know, and that's and see when you say that,
just I want to get you off topic. But when
I mentioned the folks, I'm a I'm a I like vinyl,
I like cassettes, I like you know, physical media. Physical
media is come back. It's a huge it's caliback. Should sales,
book sales are all just like you know, because you're right,
(27:43):
one of these things are gonna shut down. These phones
sometimes not just work streusers are taking down stuff and
you're like, I want to hear that song. I want
to I want to read that book. Right, So now people,
physical media is come back in So it's funny you
say that I write horses also not to write hor like.
You can't just not. You know, it's not gonna make
you run a horse. You have to know how to
(28:03):
share people.
Speaker 3 (28:04):
I don't know how to hunt.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
I know how to fish right right, Yes, yes, the
basic So while we're designed, while our grandkids are signed
their their decisions with X's, there's still us out there
who know that there's other stuff that you have to
kind of, you know, keep it going. I think between
between the three of us and the organizations we're with,
we're helping keep reading piles legacy alive. And in the conversation, yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
I think you're right. I'm a I'm a big fan
of this podcast and I love the people that you
guys get on and even though it's peripheral sometimes it's
still it's still very interesting.
Speaker 1 (28:39):
And uh yeah, well we appreciate you saying that because
one of the things that you know, I'm a big
believer in is just keeping World War two alive. Yeah,
and there's a lot of great stories out there that
they need to be shared.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
You guys know that that Brave Men is back in print, right, yes, that,
and that we were at the foundation, We were uh
partly responsible for that. We control the rights to earn
these books. And so Penguin came to us, Penguin Classics
came to us and they said we want to and
(29:18):
we said, oh, of course, we would love that and
uh yeah, and so we've we've done that. It's doing
really well, selling really well. And then a couple of
months after they were getting the getting it going, they said,
we need to record the audio book. Do you know
anybody who would who you would like to read that?
Speaker 1 (29:37):
You know?
Speaker 3 (29:37):
I said, I know somebody, somebody, So I uh, I
put I laid down uh the death of Captain wasscow
on on pro tools, sent it into them and I
got the gig. So that's me, that's my voice on on.
(30:00):
If you go to audible and you get Brave Man,
it's kind in the reviews. Please really in my acting career,
it's it's a highlight. It's an absolute highlight. So I
was there for almost seven days, eight hours a day,
clouding it and it was really special. I'm surprised I
(30:21):
still have my voice left.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
Michael. A couple of other things that I think people
would be surprised about. Ernie Pyle. Now those that really
know and steady are not surprised. But you know, he
covered aviation before he got into.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
The water that he's probably for two and a half years.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
Yeah. And the other thing is, you know him and
Jerry traveled the country and right before he was if
you will, became famous. I mean I think he was
already famous, you could make that that statement, but really
solidified his reputation. It's World War Two in Termson, so
(31:02):
he looks an individual.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
You could see his progression from the aviation column, which
was from nineteen twenty nine to thirty two, and then
he was promoted to editor and he edited for a
few years, and then in nineteen thirty five he's like,
I got to get out, and he got the gig
of being a travel writer. So he jumped in a
(31:27):
car nineteen thirty four coup Ford Coop with his wife
and they toured the States for five years and wrote,
and she was a part of it. To what extent
nobody really knows. It's interesting for me to read through
some of the complete works of Ernie Pyle, and I
(31:47):
discovered some a couple of columns that were like not
necessarily in Ernie's voice, And I'm wondering if she was
sitting at the typewriter. Yeah, there's speculations, there's all speculations.
Everybody knows, but she was there and and Ernie, and
(32:08):
what she knew about Ernie is that he had this
special talent of just being able to stand somewhere and
people walking up, walk up to him and start talking.
He just was a magnet for interesting people. You know,
there's a guy, Bossy oh gosh, darn it, I can't
remember his name up in MASSACHUSETTSS that there's a a
(32:33):
story and it's it's it's it's I printed it. It's
out there. I'll find it for you, and I'll sudden
you can put it in the notes. Bossy Gillis is
the guy's name. And he was the mayor of this town,
Newburyport newbury Report in Massachusetts and had gas stations on
both sides of the road because he wanted to get
all of the commerce. And what a character. And I
(32:53):
found an old photograph of him and I put him
up and he just absolutely looks like an old Hollywood
character actor and and it's hilarious what you know, Ernie
wrote about him. And so these are the kinds of
people that he would find, and that's what he developed.
And he certainly did that in the wartime, and you
(33:15):
go through Brave Men and those characters pop up all
over the place, and people loved him. The soldiers, we
already know this. They loved him dearly. They read him
every day. They felt that he was a part of
the family. And that's how everybody else felt about it too.
Here in America, you know, all of our grandparents and
(33:36):
they all knew who he was. He was the most
famous guy in America. When he died four days after
the President Roosevelt. His death usurped the death of the
president in the hearts of the people. You know, we
we experienced that every now and then. I remember when
Prince died, the musician Prince died. Everyboddy just was like,
(33:57):
oh my god, you're.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
A Prince fan, you know, that's right.
Speaker 3 (34:00):
It hit everybody. And that's the kind of thing that
it hit. It hit America part because you know, they
felt like because he wasn't writing about troop movements and
all that, he was writing about the guys, and and
they felt that it was a family member, you know
that died. I thought like, that is worth saving, right,
(34:24):
a guy like that is worth propping him up to
the to the new world and letting him see what
he was all about.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Well that's my that's my connection to him.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
I tried to do my own shows, my own work.
Is how a personal to make I have like a
fan base on whatever I tried to like connect to that.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
Yeah. My other thing. One other thing, the stuff that
we're printing right now we started on April eighteenth, is
we started in August of August of nineteen thirty five,
which is his pre war writings, And this is going
to take probably four or five years to get to
the wartime writing, so we're not even there yet. And
(35:10):
and what if you want to know what life was
like back in the thirties, read this column every day.
It's a history lesson, for sure, but also we are
all reliving the politics of that time right now. Not
not just the politics but the policy. You know, the
(35:31):
the work the WPA that that Roosevelt put together back
then has been trying They've been trying to dismantle that
ever since. And we've been going to battle on those
issues and at those lines, you know, ever since. So
if you really want to know what the time was like,
you're going to read this stuff and draw comparisons to
(35:53):
what life is like now. So that's why I think
it's important. That's why I think the complete works of
Berney Pile is important as well.
Speaker 1 (36:01):
Well. The other thing that I think is important that
Pole didn't right just in the certain region or for
a certain state, but he covered everything and we got
a good balance out there. I mean we wasn't biased. No,
mean that in the since you went.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
To Mexico, you went down to South America, you went
to Alaska.
Speaker 1 (36:19):
The main name it, in everything in between, and we
got a good balance of what life was like.
Speaker 3 (36:26):
Yeah, and here's here's a little easter egg, the ones
that I was just working on today that will be dropping,
I believe just some July twenty seven, twenty at twenty
ninth is a story about how PanAm or no continent
I can't remember the name of the airways that became
American Airlines. They are they were trying to open a
(36:48):
route from the United States to Australia. And so they're
going to all of these little islands like Midway Island
or these islands out in the Pacific. And he's writing
it as such, is like they're putting Hawaiian boys out
there to stay there while while the supply ships come
(37:08):
to create airports for the airlines to land and gas
up and keep going to Australia. Well on, what do
you think they were really doing? What do you think
they were really doing there?
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Right?
Speaker 2 (37:25):
They were?
Speaker 3 (37:26):
That was the US government setting those islands up for war,
the coming war, right, I mean, that's obvious. So go
and read those things, and that's a thing there you go.
I mean, if you are a World War two enthusiast,
those are the kinds of things that, well, you hear
about in books. I suppose you pick it up here
and there, But here is in real time a description
(37:49):
of what these you know, these Hawaiian boys were doing
out there, preparing the way for building these these landing zones,
you know, where the Navy would patrol out there. And
of course they are part of the war in the Pacific.
So that's coming in July, end of July to twenty
(38:10):
twenty five. It will be July twenty seventh, twentieth, and
twenty ninth on substacks. If you go in there and subscribe,
you'll be able to get them in your email, one
a day, every day, a reminder to come and read Ernie.
So yeah, subscribe, please, absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (38:32):
Fascinating.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
That's Michael.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
What are some of the things that that the foundation
is looking to do in the future.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
How how can people help the foundation?
Speaker 3 (38:47):
Yeah, well, if you go to Ernie Pyle Foundation dot org,
you will learn about us. We do have a scholarship
at the Universe to be in New Mexico that we
are trying to a journalism scholarship, uh, that we're it's
evolving there. It's evolving that we've had it for a while.
(39:10):
But but it's kind of what's happening is that students
aren't going to school for journalism anymore.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
That's true. Yeah, and and.
Speaker 3 (39:19):
So the classes aren't that full of uh with with
students to to learn about this stuff because there's no
jobs in it right, There's just no jobs of journalism anymore.
So anyways, we're we are trying to evolve that with
(39:40):
the that university uh and uh and perhaps others other
places you know.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
For that.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
We we like I said, we did the the the
Captain Osco Day. We might do another one of those
Ernie Pile Days coming up on August third, and we're
trying to get something going uh every the other year
with that, either in Honolulu, which we did this year,
or in Bloomington, or in Albuquerque or maybe even in Dana.
(40:09):
Maybe you guys we ought to team up or.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Go to Albuquerque. I go there all the time. Yeah,
I love it. I love it. That library there too.
The library is there too. I would say, go to
Alberque is not that far from LA I'll go over there
real quick. I do too.
Speaker 3 (40:23):
I love New Mexico. I could easily live there. I
absolutely see why he and his wife Jerry loved it
there too.
Speaker 2 (40:32):
Yeah. I mean when he says I'd love to be
involved with some kind of any pile day, when do
you think that. Absolutely?
Speaker 1 (40:38):
Well, yes, let's keep the lines of communication open because
I think there's a lot of things that the two
of us and I mean organization.
Speaker 3 (40:47):
Yeah, we talk about you guys a lot. We are
We are big admirers of the museum and the friends
of Ernie Pyle, and so maybe we should do something together.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
Absolutely, I do want to give a huge shout out
to help helped each e LT township because they provide
financial support to the museum, so we are able to
keep it free so when you come to the museum
you don't have to worry about paying anything. They've been
(41:19):
very gracious making sure that we have the funds needed
to keep the place open. Now, we do take donations
full disclosure, because it does take a lot of money
to be able to run operation. We have staft that
we have to pay. Unfortunately, we're not able to keep
it open, you know, forty hours a week or seven
(41:40):
days a week or anything like and it's seasonal. But
without financial support, we wouldn't be able to do what
we do there in data at the Bernie Palm Museum.
So a huge thank you in a shout out to
the trustees.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
Yes, well I think we got it. We could talk
forever I could, but I think we got I think
the folks at home now have an idea. Yeah, what's
going on thy Pile Foundation.
Speaker 3 (42:13):
Yeah, you're gonna you're gonna set up the show notes
and put in the complete works any pile link. Great
complete works are any pile at sub Stack. Go in
there and get one every single day to read. There's
Brave Men is out again. And also the Ernie Pile
experiment is out there and available. You just do a
(42:36):
search on that and uh it's you'd be able to
hear them. I think it's on YouTube as well. But
just the Ernie Pile experiment at w f i U
and you can hear those. Those are all fictionalized. It's
about Ernie and his wife traveling the States before the war.
(42:56):
And uh, and at the end of each and I
get to play Ernie because you know it's radio. No,
I don't look anything like him. It's the only chance
I'll ever get. So, but I get to read everyone
I got. At the end of every episode, I read
one of Ernie's pieces.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
So at a time, anybody wants to do it Ernie
Pyle esque thing to go through the Foundation.
Speaker 1 (43:19):
Don't they?
Speaker 2 (43:22):
Uh? Is the domain? Is is it open to like
anybody can do a story on them kind of thing?
Speaker 3 (43:28):
Well, there's it's complicated. But but we yeah, we we
are image holders, image right holders, and and the books
and the writings and stuff. You know, so those title
names and such are are controlled by us. But uh,
but look we're it's uh, it's it's not it's I'm
(43:53):
glad it's still around. And if nobody did it, you know,
where would it be. Nobody knows where that stuff. It's
all in one place now it's with the Foundation, and
we do good things. There's nothing selfish about this.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
Yeah, that's good. I love it. Yeah, you take us
out all right?
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Well, James and Michael, thank you both for coming on
spending some time with us here the sound Forternoon to
talk about not only the museum, but more importantly the
foundation as well. You guys are doing great works out there,
and I hope that the museum and the Foundation can
find a way to partner because we're both doing the
(44:32):
work of preserving not only piles writing, but his image
and getting that history out making sure it's correct out there.
So hopefully we can find something here in the near future.
Speaker 3 (44:44):
It got Jerry on here too. Get Jerry mash absolutely,
I tell you what you mentioned that to him and
he'll have ten ideas in the first minute you're talking
about how that can happen.
Speaker 1 (44:58):
Like stuff like that. That's what we right and like
I said, we're doing great work here. So Michael again,
thank you so much for coming out and spending some
time with us, and James, thank you for jumping on
with us as well. As it's always a pleasure to
be able to talk with other Pile enthusiasts and really
get that message out of what Pile does and what
(45:20):
he's still doing today all these years later, eighty years
after his death, is still inspiring some people to go
out into generalism and know how to properly write.
Speaker 3 (45:31):
Yeah, yeah, very good.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
All right, guys, everybody follow, follow all of us, follow him,
follow them, follow all of us on social media platforms,
and Ernie Pyle is out there. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (45:46):
Bane
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