November 5, 2025 • 15 mins
Ever wondered what quirky habits shaped America’s most powerful leaders? In this episode, Grace Boykin reveals the untold stories and eccentric routines behind her book, Self-Made Paths—from presidential bathroom meetings to family secrets unearthed in a barn. Discover how history’s icons were shaped by their oddities, and why their journeys matter to every generation. Get ready to see leadership—and yourself—in a whole new light.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hey is Benji col Son of Alcohol from CBS Radio
and host of the syndicated talk show People of Distinction.
Talk gives you an in depth view of some of
the most dynamic, intelligent, and successful people on the planet.
Run to our website Alcohol Enterprises dot com for more info.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Email me through Benji.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
At Alcohol Enterprises dot com if you'd like to get
involved with what we have going, and as always, please
continue to like and follow our broadcasts. People of Distinction
is internationally syndicated solely due to the love and support
that you all continue to give. We're available across all
major distributors, and as long as you keep following, we're
going to continue to put out the content. Now sit
(00:47):
back and strap in because on the line with us
today we.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Have the impressive Grace Browder Boykin. Now we're gonna be
discussing Grace's incredible book, Self Made Paths. It's Amazon's, Barnes
and Noble, It's a lot of other places, man type
it into a search bar, but one place you're gonna
wanna check out above all else. Yeah, that's her personal website,
Graceboykinmedia dot org. There gather more information on her on
(01:16):
this book. Hyperlink set up to take it to the
purchasing pages. Man, I'm telling you that's exactly where you
need to go again, Graceboycinmedia dot Org. Yeah, that's the place.
And listen, people, have you ever felt like your man like,
your weird morning routine is actually the secret to your success? Okay,
(01:38):
if you do join the club, because I'm sure we
all have those quirks, right, what if that were actually
true for some of the most powerful people in history?
See in her book Self Made Paths, Grace Man, she
digs into the undult stories and the surprising idiosyncrasies of
past presidents in more and this isn't just about policies
(02:03):
and speeches. It's about the hidden daily rituals, personal obsessions
that truly shaped America. You're never gonna look at leadership
or even your own quirks the same again after reading
the book, this is going to be a good one. Grace.
Welcome to the network, and thank you very much for
(02:24):
being a guest. How you doing today, I'm doing well.
Thank you absolutely, Grace. It's a pleasure to have you here.
I love what you've done by comprising this and it's
something for a history buff like myself. Man, I'm looking
forward to it. Let's start off first and foremost before
we jump into history. Let's learn about your history. Tell
us a little bit more about your background.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
It started in high schooling withessay tests and when I
learned that I could really write concisely and Pea Sitely
and that started my Germany to writing books. And I
had written over eight different books. And this Self Made
(03:06):
path also is written as a screenplay by Jimmy Traynor,
and so it's not only a book, it's a screenplay also.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Wow, Okay, let's learn more about it. Tell us more
about your book, Self Made Paths.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
It starts with the different generations, the Greatest generation, the
Silent Generation, the Baby Billers, Generation CS, the Millennials, Generation Z,
and the Generation Alpha, and probably the greatest generation nineteen
oh one to nineteen twenty seven was the Great Depression.
(03:47):
And all know about the history of the Great Depression,
but some of it is untold. In my book, you
can see where money was really tight back then. For relaxation,
the first natural movie, Colar movie was released and it
(04:10):
was a Visit to the Seaside and it was a
British film. And then it won the Best Picture at
the Academy Awards in nineteen sixty and in nineteen nineteen
was The Woman's Suffrage. And of course many of the
presidents have, as you mentioned, the many idio secrecies. George
(04:32):
Washington have wooden teeth. And then you have my favorite,
which is kipping way ahead to President Johnson, who actually
installed telephones into bathrooms at the White House while he
was president after Kennedy died, and he would actually hold
(04:56):
cabinet meetings in his bathroom malcoan hitting on the toilet,
which many people don't realize that, but he was able
to produce a lot of legislation about doing that, and
of course the Secret Service was very uncomfortable and watching
(05:17):
him do But that's probably my favorite idio secrecy of
the president.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
I love it. That is one that's going to stick
in people's minds. Right, there's one way to conduct a meeting, Grace.
Let's go now into inspiration here for a second, because listen,
this is obviously something that's very entertaining to you, something
very interesting to you. But it could have stayed within
your own mind, it could have stayed on your personal shelf.
(05:46):
Tell us why you felt compelled to make sure the
public knew about it.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Frank to be a boyk in. My grandfather was a
US congressman for twenty eight years and he was Hunter Fisherman.
He was actually a congressman from the nineteen thirties to
the nineteen sixties, and he would tell me stories about
(06:13):
these presidents, especially Kennedy and Johnson, and Johnson was one
that actually was able to help my grandfather as he
had a real estate deal in Virginia and Maryland and
he was deposed a gout DA a real estate fraud,
(06:35):
which I want to prove was not true. And so
he was pardoned by Johnson. And he was eighty years
old at the time. And he had a lodge in
Alabama McIntosh, Alabama where everything is made for love, and
(06:57):
that was his motto and his campaign slogan in the
nineteen thirties in which actually presidents felt that was probably
one of the most unique campaign slogans anybody has ever had,
and they loved it, especially Eisenhower. As he walked through line,
Eisenhower congratulated, you're the man from Alabama. You're the one
(07:21):
that has everything's made for Look, yes, sir, that's me
And he just lit up, and he's very robust and
was loved by many a man and especially the state
of Alabama. But his stories came to me from a barn.
(07:41):
And my sister had found an old fowl cabinet in
which was in a barn, and she and the care
taker called me because I knew I loved history, So
I go and get these troves of what because he
was quite a letter writer, and I'm just immersed in
(08:05):
my haven as I'm reading them, and all this untold
history that I didn't know about, and so it was
a treasure trove of life to me about my family
in my history. And therefore I wanted to tell the
stories because so many people do not know all the history,
(08:28):
untold history. For instance, world during World War Two, my
grandfather was reading a magazine article with his wife in Washington, DC, Overkee,
and they looked at each other and they saw where
Indians on the tom Bigbie River in Alabama had burned
(08:52):
the channel had burned it, and they thought, perhaps the
English Channel can be burned, And so they go to
the Prime to the President and he shows him the
article as he had a letter of five hundred ways
to burn the English Channel from an oil man in Texas,
(09:17):
and he shows it to him and he says, you
got to get over to the ambassador immediately, the English ambassador.
So he takes a taxi over to the embassy and
they get Churchill on the line and see they send
this five hundred page telegram to Churchill from the oil
(09:39):
man in Texas of how to burn the English Channel
during World War two. And it was utilized during the war.
And that's how England was saved by putting all these
barrels of gas in the English Channel and burning it
and Belgium. It's very well known.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
People understand, we've barely scratched the service man. There are
a lot of other stories in the book that you're
gonna need to get your hands on. All right, we're
not gonna give it all away here today, but I'm
curious to know these are the stories found within the
book are a mixture of a lot of people, presidents
and other figures. But one thing is certain is that
(10:23):
these are their public figures, correct. So I want to
now know as we close out, in your opinion, which
untold story revealed the greatest contradiction between the public persona
that a lot of people know any individual figure for
and then what you were able to find that they
(10:45):
were doing behind this scene. Talk to us a little
bit more about that juxtaposition and a figure that comes
to mind.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Of course, there were many of them successfully during the
Industrial Revolution and not doing prohibition, and Black was one
that comes to mind. He was unethical as could be
and became a judge in the United States federal judge
(11:16):
and he was crooked and my wire and you have
to read the story in the book to learn about it.
I'm not going to give it away. Got to keep
some of these secrets and now hopefully it will come
out in the movie and the screenplay.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Absolutely it was a smart woman. Their grace for cutting
it short right there. I love it. This was my
final question for you. This is something obviously tailored for history,
buffs right. People out there listening in that are interested
in history, they're salivating for a book of this magnitude.
But I want to know, and I'm curious, what are
(11:54):
you hoping your readers take from the book after they've
completed the last page.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
I hope to take all the generations because I go
into the baby boomers, in which I was they need
Boomer and I go into the Generation X and the
Millennial generation and of course Alpha generation and Generation Z,
and I think they can all learn from this as
(12:21):
well as what they were famous for the movies, and
how times had changed during from each generation to another generation,
and they continue to change, but they get of course
now with this generation, it's all about technology and how
(12:42):
far we have come. And you got the three D printing,
you have annabis. There's so much to deal with this
Alpha generation and even though they're young, very young, but
you look at the Baby Boomers and how we changed.
So I really just think that all the generations have
(13:04):
so much to contribute to history and to the world
as life goes.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
On, Grace wonderfully said, and people listen. First and foremost,
you got to pick up copies of the book, all right,
I said it before. It's Amazon as part as of Noble.
It's Graceboykinmedia dot Org. Head on over there and purchase
your copies today. But what I love about this, aside
from the specific stories, aside from the paths that you're
(13:33):
going to be uncovering from history, it leaves me with
a very important message, Like it's a powerful reminder that
the people who shaped our world were first and foremost,
they were just that they were people. The next time
you look at a history book or a presidential portrait,
(13:55):
I challenge each and every one of you to ask,
what's the story behind the story, What self made path
are we not seeing? Because at the heart of this book,
it's not just about understanding them, it's about understanding ourselves
and the often messy paths that we travel to achieve
(14:17):
something meaningful. And I love that because I think what
it does is it disarms almost in a sense, like
we see these monumental figures, and by learning these quirky,
unorthodox things, it really humanizes them to a certain degree.
And I think that ultimately shows that the feat that
they were able to accomplish and reach, it's attainable, and that,
(14:40):
I think, above all, is such a powerful notion. Head
on over there, Finches, your copies today, Let the journey begin, Grace.
This has been an absolute pleasure, such an honor. Thank
you once again for being a guest on People of Distinction.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Thank you. I enjoyed it very much and I appreciate
your radio show. What you do is absolutely wonderful.
Hey is Benji col Son of Alcohol from CBS Radio
and host of the syndicated talk show People of Distinction.
Talk gives you an in depth view of some of
the most dynamic, intelligent, and successful people on the planet.
Run to our website Alcohol Enterprises dot com for more info.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Email me through Benji.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
At Alcohol Enterprises dot com if you'd like to get
involved with what we have going, and as always, please
continue to like and follow our broadcasts. People of Distinction
is internationally syndicated solely due to the love and support
that you all continue to give. We're available across all
major distributors, and as long as you keep following, we're
going to continue to put out the content. Now sit
(00:47):
back and strap in because on the line with us
today we.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Have the impressive Grace Browder Boykin. Now we're gonna be
discussing Grace's incredible book, Self Made Paths. It's Amazon's, Barnes
and Noble, It's a lot of other places, man type
it into a search bar, but one place you're gonna
wanna check out above all else. Yeah, that's her personal website,
Graceboykinmedia dot org. There gather more information on her on
(01:16):
this book. Hyperlink set up to take it to the
purchasing pages. Man, I'm telling you that's exactly where you
need to go again, Graceboycinmedia dot Org. Yeah, that's the place.
And listen, people, have you ever felt like your man like,
your weird morning routine is actually the secret to your success? Okay,
(01:38):
if you do join the club, because I'm sure we
all have those quirks, right, what if that were actually
true for some of the most powerful people in history?
See in her book Self Made Paths, Grace Man, she
digs into the undult stories and the surprising idiosyncrasies of
past presidents in more and this isn't just about policies
(02:03):
and speeches. It's about the hidden daily rituals, personal obsessions
that truly shaped America. You're never gonna look at leadership
or even your own quirks the same again after reading
the book, this is going to be a good one. Grace.
Welcome to the network, and thank you very much for
(02:24):
being a guest. How you doing today, I'm doing well.
Thank you absolutely, Grace. It's a pleasure to have you here.
I love what you've done by comprising this and it's
something for a history buff like myself. Man, I'm looking
forward to it. Let's start off first and foremost before
we jump into history. Let's learn about your history. Tell
us a little bit more about your background.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
It started in high schooling withessay tests and when I
learned that I could really write concisely and Pea Sitely
and that started my Germany to writing books. And I
had written over eight different books. And this Self Made
(03:06):
path also is written as a screenplay by Jimmy Traynor,
and so it's not only a book, it's a screenplay also.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Wow, Okay, let's learn more about it. Tell us more
about your book, Self Made Paths.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
It starts with the different generations, the Greatest generation, the
Silent Generation, the Baby Billers, Generation CS, the Millennials, Generation Z,
and the Generation Alpha, and probably the greatest generation nineteen
oh one to nineteen twenty seven was the Great Depression.
(03:47):
And all know about the history of the Great Depression,
but some of it is untold. In my book, you
can see where money was really tight back then. For relaxation,
the first natural movie, Colar movie was released and it
(04:10):
was a Visit to the Seaside and it was a
British film. And then it won the Best Picture at
the Academy Awards in nineteen sixty and in nineteen nineteen
was The Woman's Suffrage. And of course many of the
presidents have, as you mentioned, the many idio secrecies. George
(04:32):
Washington have wooden teeth. And then you have my favorite,
which is kipping way ahead to President Johnson, who actually
installed telephones into bathrooms at the White House while he
was president after Kennedy died, and he would actually hold
(04:56):
cabinet meetings in his bathroom malcoan hitting on the toilet,
which many people don't realize that, but he was able
to produce a lot of legislation about doing that, and
of course the Secret Service was very uncomfortable and watching
(05:17):
him do But that's probably my favorite idio secrecy of
the president.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
I love it. That is one that's going to stick
in people's minds. Right, there's one way to conduct a meeting, Grace.
Let's go now into inspiration here for a second, because listen,
this is obviously something that's very entertaining to you, something
very interesting to you. But it could have stayed within
your own mind, it could have stayed on your personal shelf.
(05:46):
Tell us why you felt compelled to make sure the
public knew about it.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Frank to be a boyk in. My grandfather was a
US congressman for twenty eight years and he was Hunter Fisherman.
He was actually a congressman from the nineteen thirties to
the nineteen sixties, and he would tell me stories about
(06:13):
these presidents, especially Kennedy and Johnson, and Johnson was one
that actually was able to help my grandfather as he
had a real estate deal in Virginia and Maryland and
he was deposed a gout DA a real estate fraud,
(06:35):
which I want to prove was not true. And so
he was pardoned by Johnson. And he was eighty years
old at the time. And he had a lodge in
Alabama McIntosh, Alabama where everything is made for love, and
(06:57):
that was his motto and his campaign slogan in the
nineteen thirties in which actually presidents felt that was probably
one of the most unique campaign slogans anybody has ever had,
and they loved it, especially Eisenhower. As he walked through line,
Eisenhower congratulated, you're the man from Alabama. You're the one
(07:21):
that has everything's made for Look, yes, sir, that's me
And he just lit up, and he's very robust and
was loved by many a man and especially the state
of Alabama. But his stories came to me from a barn.
(07:41):
And my sister had found an old fowl cabinet in
which was in a barn, and she and the care
taker called me because I knew I loved history, So
I go and get these troves of what because he
was quite a letter writer, and I'm just immersed in
(08:05):
my haven as I'm reading them, and all this untold
history that I didn't know about, and so it was
a treasure trove of life to me about my family
in my history. And therefore I wanted to tell the
stories because so many people do not know all the history,
(08:28):
untold history. For instance, world during World War Two, my
grandfather was reading a magazine article with his wife in Washington, DC, Overkee,
and they looked at each other and they saw where
Indians on the tom Bigbie River in Alabama had burned
(08:52):
the channel had burned it, and they thought, perhaps the
English Channel can be burned, And so they go to
the Prime to the President and he shows him the
article as he had a letter of five hundred ways
to burn the English Channel from an oil man in Texas,
(09:17):
and he shows it to him and he says, you
got to get over to the ambassador immediately, the English ambassador.
So he takes a taxi over to the embassy and
they get Churchill on the line and see they send
this five hundred page telegram to Churchill from the oil
(09:39):
man in Texas of how to burn the English Channel
during World War two. And it was utilized during the war.
And that's how England was saved by putting all these
barrels of gas in the English Channel and burning it
and Belgium. It's very well known.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
People understand, we've barely scratched the service man. There are
a lot of other stories in the book that you're
gonna need to get your hands on. All right, we're
not gonna give it all away here today, but I'm
curious to know these are the stories found within the
book are a mixture of a lot of people, presidents
and other figures. But one thing is certain is that
(10:23):
these are their public figures, correct. So I want to
now know as we close out, in your opinion, which
untold story revealed the greatest contradiction between the public persona
that a lot of people know any individual figure for
and then what you were able to find that they
(10:45):
were doing behind this scene. Talk to us a little
bit more about that juxtaposition and a figure that comes
to mind.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Of course, there were many of them successfully during the
Industrial Revolution and not doing prohibition, and Black was one
that comes to mind. He was unethical as could be
and became a judge in the United States federal judge
(11:16):
and he was crooked and my wire and you have
to read the story in the book to learn about it.
I'm not going to give it away. Got to keep
some of these secrets and now hopefully it will come
out in the movie and the screenplay.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Absolutely it was a smart woman. Their grace for cutting
it short right there. I love it. This was my
final question for you. This is something obviously tailored for history,
buffs right. People out there listening in that are interested
in history, they're salivating for a book of this magnitude.
But I want to know, and I'm curious, what are
(11:54):
you hoping your readers take from the book after they've
completed the last page.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
I hope to take all the generations because I go
into the baby boomers, in which I was they need
Boomer and I go into the Generation X and the
Millennial generation and of course Alpha generation and Generation Z,
and I think they can all learn from this as
(12:21):
well as what they were famous for the movies, and
how times had changed during from each generation to another generation,
and they continue to change, but they get of course
now with this generation, it's all about technology and how
(12:42):
far we have come. And you got the three D printing,
you have annabis. There's so much to deal with this
Alpha generation and even though they're young, very young, but
you look at the Baby Boomers and how we changed.
So I really just think that all the generations have
(13:04):
so much to contribute to history and to the world
as life goes.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
On, Grace wonderfully said, and people listen. First and foremost,
you got to pick up copies of the book, all right,
I said it before. It's Amazon as part as of Noble.
It's Graceboykinmedia dot Org. Head on over there and purchase
your copies today. But what I love about this, aside
from the specific stories, aside from the paths that you're
(13:33):
going to be uncovering from history, it leaves me with
a very important message, Like it's a powerful reminder that
the people who shaped our world were first and foremost,
they were just that they were people. The next time
you look at a history book or a presidential portrait,
(13:55):
I challenge each and every one of you to ask,
what's the story behind the story, What self made path
are we not seeing? Because at the heart of this book,
it's not just about understanding them, it's about understanding ourselves
and the often messy paths that we travel to achieve
(14:17):
something meaningful. And I love that because I think what
it does is it disarms almost in a sense, like
we see these monumental figures, and by learning these quirky,
unorthodox things, it really humanizes them to a certain degree.
And I think that ultimately shows that the feat that
they were able to accomplish and reach, it's attainable, and that,
(14:40):
I think, above all, is such a powerful notion. Head
on over there, Finches, your copies today, Let the journey begin, Grace.
This has been an absolute pleasure, such an honor. Thank
you once again for being a guest on People of Distinction.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Thank you. I enjoyed it very much and I appreciate
your radio show. What you do is absolutely wonderful.
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