The Journey to Freedom Podcast
Journey to Freedom serves as an exclusive extension of the Living Boldly with Purpose podcast series—a platform that inspires powerful transformation and growth. Journey freedom is a podcast hosted by Brian E. Arnold. The Journey to Freedom is an our best life blueprint exclusively designed for black men where we create a foundational freedom plan. There are five pillars: Identity, Trust, Finances, Health and Faith.
The Journey to Freedom Podcast
Why This Trip Made Me Fight for History: From Birmingham to Selma: A Journey That Changed Everything
Ready to explore history that hits home? Visit www.brianearnold.com to join the journey!
Kelyn Lanier shares his eye-opening experience on a civil rights trip to Alabama, from Birmingham’s heavy past to Selma’s iconic bridge.
Hear how meeting Janice Kelsey and visiting the Equal Justice Museum shifted his perspective and fueled his drive to act.
What happens when history stops being just words in a book and becomes something you can touch, feel, and walk through? In this powerful episode, business owner Kellen Lanier takes us through his transformative journey to Alabama's civil rights landmarks and how it fundamentally changed his understanding of America.
From an unexpected barbecue vending machine that brought strangers together to the soul-shaking experience of standing on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Kellen's vivid recollections bring us along on a journey that's both deeply personal and universally important. The encounter with Janice Kelsey, who participated in the Children's Marches as a teenager, proves particularly haunting. Her challenge – asking what we're doing with the vastly greater resources we have compared to what she had in the 1960s – echoes throughout the conversation.
Most moving is Kellen's description of the Equal Justice Initiative's Legacy Museum, where history becomes impossible to intellectualize away. "I think about that museum at least once or twice a week, every week, since then," he reveals. His raw, honest emotion watching others confront this history – "Good, I hope she cries the entire time and tells everybody about this" – reflects the necessary discomfort required for genuine understanding.
This isn't just a travelogue but a testament to how confronting our past changes how we live in the present. Since returning, Kellen has become more politically engaged, testifying at the state capitol and advocating for comprehensive Black history education. As he puts it, "Knowing that you have, comparatively, infinitely more resources than Janice and her brother did... but knowing that you're facing the same thing. I'm like, it's just their grandkids, but it's the same thing."
Join us for this moving conversation that will make you question what you know about American history and what responsibility we all bear in creating a more just future. Have you truly confronted our shared history?
This story connects history to today’s challenges, inspiring action in your own community.
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There's this abstract concept of history that there were these people that did these things and that lived through these things, or perhaps did not live through these things, I think, through just education you're so desensitized from.
Speaker 2:George Washington.
Speaker 1:Abraham Lincoln. You know, just, they're just names, but then to see it, to feel it, to touch it, to smell it, you know to, to be in it. It brings it to life in a way that no book, no audio book, no video can replicate and it drives it home to a point where you can do something with it and I think that's why I get so frustrated. The second part is with Janice Kelsey, because she's a part of that history for her to be like nobody's doing anything. I now question the way that people regard me and think about me, because I know the history of why they're doing that. It makes you want to push harder. Knowing that you have, comparatively, infinitely more resources than Janice and her brother did, you know, but knowing that you're facing the same thing, the same thing, I'm like it's just, it's just their grandkids, but it's the same thing. The same thing. I'm like it's just, it's just their grandkids, but it's the same thing. You know and just like, okay, so what can I do with more?
Speaker 2:I should be All right, welcome to another edition of the Journey to Freedom podcast.
Speaker 2:And today we're really talking about all things Alabama, and the reason I say that is because we got the opportunity to have several men and women go with us to Alabama back in January and at the end of January, first of February we are now just about at the end of May podcast a little bit so that the folks that went on the trip could be able to tell us a little bit about what happened before, what their thought process was before, what their thought process was after, and then what they've been able to do as a result of maybe just learning some things that they didn't know and so I know. For me, you know, I was able to go, this was my second trip that I was able to go on has just been an amazing time, because when we think about the journey to freedom, when we think about being able to move forward and whether you know folks were stuck or not, you know, or whether folks were just going, I haven't had this experience, or for some people they have.
Speaker 2:I know, like you know, we just got done with jobs. I was telling Caitlin that we just got done with Josh Mays and Jason Tucker and both of them had not had a lot of experiences in the South and what that was like Like a few times that I'd even been, you know, maybe to Florida, to Disney World or you know, maybe a track meet. So we're in Arkansas, that kind of stuff I knew. I went to Georgia back in the 90s when the Olympics and stuff were there, but other than that not spent a lot of my time in the life, in my life in the South and kind of understanding, read a lot of books and you know, just tied. Oh, you know Frederick Douglass did this or Harriet Tubman did this, but not realizing and then just feeling the atmosphere in Alabama.
Speaker 2:And so what I've asked him to do today he went with us on the trip.
Speaker 2:He's since come back and just been trying to follow all the wonderful things that he's been doing, but really wanted to get some insights from him, and so I've asked him to tell his story up until we went on the trip, a little bit about his life, so you can kind of know who he is, and then we're going to chop it up and talk about the trip and some of our experiences, what we've done, and so thank you for tuning in today.
Speaker 2:I hope this is something. It was kind of nice. We had Grand Design Inc who helped sponsor us and did some stuff to help us get there. So so appreciate to them here in the Aurora area that allowed us to go, but just wanted to I thought I wanted to acknowledge them but at the same time, you know, be able to talk about what we're doing in our community, here at least in the Denver Metro area. And so, hey, thank you for being on today. I can't wait to spend more time with you as we continue to move forward and maybe take our wives back at a certain time or do something, but maybe you can just kind of start with your story and just go from there.
Speaker 1:I appreciate you. Yeah, yeah, my name is Kellen Lanier. I always struggle with introducing what I do because, as my family, I do I do too much. So a brief history, a brief background, just to get some context or what I'm, where I'm coming from with the Alabama trip. I'm a business owner. I'm also a business consultant. You know, it wasn't always that way. I actually started out my career path kind of weird and ended up being a business owner just because nothing else really seemed to fit. Ran a pharmacy consulting and then eventually just outright pharmacy management company throughout the nation with my brother up until 2020. And we sold it off and now we're just doing different things that are a lot less stressful. During that path, a lot of things happened Learned a lot about the world, a lot about how people perceive you, which is very important for the trip for me Also got married and learned responsibility with children and so on. I thought I knew responsibility with a company that large but kids.
Speaker 2:The whole real world ended After.
Speaker 1:Sarah, oh my gosh, yeah. So that's just a very gloss over history of who I am. Yeah, and then gotten to the journey to freedom. Where did you grow up?
Speaker 2:Oh, I grew up here in. Colorado. So you were raised. Where'd you go to high school?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I went to Grandview High School.
Speaker 2:Grandview High School, toppies, aurora School, graduated and had all these things your family makeup. Maybe talk about that a little bit to give some context, background, and then we'll jump into Journey to Freedom you mean my current family.
Speaker 1:I have two girls they're both toddlers and my wife we've been married for seven years. She says nine because you know, I guess, from the day we met, we were married.
Speaker 2:I love it. I love it. Did she grow up in Colorado as well?
Speaker 2:No, no, she is from Albuquerque, so we're still in the southwest of the United States, so you know a little bit different than you know what it is. I don't know. You know I talk about this sometimes when we think about the population of the United States, you know, I mean think about the population of the United States. You know, 65% of all folks that live in the United States live in the eastern time zone and so there is a huge amount of population that's there. I mean, it makes sense because you know that's where people moved west and you know not as many. A lot of people stayed there. Central time zone has about 15%. The western time zone, which Central time zone, has about 15%. The western time zone, which is specific, has about 15%, and here in the mountain time zone, which would include Albuquerque and Wyoming and Montana, there's only 5% of the population that lives in our time zone, which kind of gives, you know, I get some context to like what our experiences are compared to the rest of the United States, because there's just not as many people.
Speaker 2:You know Albuquerque is smaller than Denver and if you think of like Cheyenne, it's way way smaller than Denver. You think of like Bozeman, then there's not even people there, right, you know, and so when we think about, you know, the last 400 years of history, the last 200 years of history, although there were things that happened here in the United, you know in the Colorado-Denver, you know mountain time zone, you know, I don't know if the impact was, the impact probably is still as great, but the amount of incidents, the amount of where you can tie it back, to, where family stuff may not be there. So thank you for sharing that. I just kind of want to give some of that context as you're doing stuff. So journey of freedom. So somebody gave you a call, probably me, and said I want you to go on this trip, or BJ, or somebody did. So let's kind of talk about this whole process here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I guess a little bit more context. So I have really in the recent years, been getting into politics and just wanting to understand what's happening at the local level to politics. And just wanting to understand what's happening at the local level just because things didn't seem right and they're not right, but not, you know, just hiding your head in the sand didn't do anything. So my friend BJ was just like, hey, you know, this is something you're into. I'm not really into that, but you might want to check out this trip. And I'm like, oh boy, what is this? Um, so he had been kind of bugging me for a while and then I'm like, okay, fine, I'll go, I'll go. I'll go, um, because then my wife somehow I was talking to her about it and she was like you should go. I'm like, okay, well, now I don't have any excuses. That's usually my excuse.
Speaker 2:Um, so that's that's how I got into it and I'm very grateful, very grateful so before you went and you know you had bj who's telling you to go you have maybe a couple conversations with me about maybe what it's going to be like, and not really a whole lot because you know, hey, we're just going to go on this trip and somebody else you know said to go. What were your kind of pre thought processes of what you thought you were going to learn, what you thought you might be getting into?
Speaker 1:kind of walk through that with me a little bit so my only frame of reference is like a is like a men's church retreat or something like that. So that's kind of what I was thinking. I'm like, okay, you know, I've never had a bad experience at one. So like, okay, whatever, it didn't seem anything other than that really.
Speaker 2:So that's, that's exactly what I was thinking but this is the right, this is the right we that's exactly what I was thinking, but civil rights, we might run into something. This is going to be a retreat be able to talk, come back and probably be more educated about whatever we're doing, but it should be a good time. So get to the airport and you see the group that's there. Does anything change as you're starting to have conversations and you know you know, not really not at the airport.
Speaker 1:You know, I had to expect that there was going to be other people. I guess the biggest question I had was like OK, did they book a whole bunch of different flights? That would seem kind of not logical. I was just like I wonder who's going to be here.
Speaker 2:So we get there. Our first encounter with the South and the shuttle, with the airport, is a barbecue machine down and we're all standing around a machine or a vending machine that has barbecues and we're just scratching our heads going what are we doing here? I've never seen in my life, I've never seen a vending machine that actually cooks the meat. I wasn't sure how it worked, maybe just warmed it up after it was already cooked. We're thinking how long can it be in here and how long can it go, beginning the process of relationships and trying to fill out the people that were there. Any thoughts with me in the airport portion of it?
Speaker 2:Well, I learned that BJ does not like to fly, I didn't use it for that.
Speaker 1:That was new for as long as I've known him. I was like, oh okay, yeah, you're really, you know. But yeah, you're right, it was a lot of relationship building in unconventional ways, you know. So trying to keep his mind off of thinking that you know everything was going to go down in flames and that landing was really rough, mind off of thinking that you know everything was gonna go down in flames and, um that that landing was really rough. Uh, yeah, that lightning was special. But you know, the uh, the barbecue machine, I think, was like the beginning of all the relationship building, because everybody was like who's who's gonna go first, who's gonna get? How does this thing work? Maybe we shouldn't all get something here just in case.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, it really kind of was. It was kind of where we decided that we liked each other, because it was something that was to me just this out of order thing that's just stuck here. But we all had who were able to have common ground around. We all had. We all knew what barbecue tastes like. We all started talking about our likes and dislikes around barbecue. So it kind of made this like common ground around who we were to be able to talk about something that all of us had an experience with. You know whether it was thinking about a McRib at McDonald's that was going to come out like that, or you know Texas barbecue or Southern barbecue or Missouri barbecue. It was just. I don't think we have those conversations if we don't look at a barbecue vending machine.
Speaker 1:That's why I bring that up, you know, because you know you would think, well, why would you even talk about that?
Speaker 2:But it was. It was the beginning of, I think, a relationship. There's 27 of us on the trip and by that time I believe no, my kids, the folks that came from California, hadn't got, we hadn't met them yet. It was just the folks that had been. No, no, cool. So we get to the hotel, we kind of start our first meeting. So we get to the hotel and we kind of start our first meeting, we have Jeff Campbell, the Emancipation Theater guy, who is a theater guy, who is going to teach us about story, kind of walk us through or maybe you know some of your thought process as we begin to think about story and why we're there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that was still. That still threw me off because I'm like, oh yeah, it is like a church retreat and we're doing all these icebreakers and everything and it was cool. Um, I really liked Jeff. Um, you know, and I I think I said this then um, I'm like, okay, this part that we're talking about now is vastly different from everything else, but now I understand why we did that Gotcha. Yeah, but it was an interesting experience. It was deepening those conversations with other people, because we just kind of I didn't know people were coming from California and we just saw some people in the hotel lobby and they're like oh, you're the Colorado people, california, and we just saw some people in the hotel lobby and they're like oh, you're the.
Speaker 2:Colorado people, A couple from Atlanta, you know, from the Atlanta came, and so, yeah, from my town. So, yeah, it was a different. You know, a little bit all over the country and we didn't know each other. You know, that was the. You know, I think that was the biggest. You know, hey, we're going to have this time where, because we are going to go through some experiences together and we want to have some of that relationship built where we can withstand, you know, some of the things that happen. All right, so get through. Then the next day we get the tour. So we got Clay I can't remember his last name, but Clay Tours, yeah, Ray Clay Tours, and this is a white gentleman who is going to teach us about civil rights in the South. Walk us through that portion of this part.
Speaker 1:That was very interesting and I wonder what the experience was like for people that weren't on that bus. That was very interesting.
Speaker 1:And I wonder what the experience was like for people that weren't on that bus and were on that bus, because just seeing him yeah, his dad From how he dressed to how he talked, it was just, it was unique. It was an experience and I was just like who is this guy and what kind of tour are we going on? It kind of gave me some what do you call it magic school bus vibes for a second there and then went a completely different direction. Yeah, he was very interesting just to see the effect of learning history and when I look at it it's kind of more foreshadowing. You know, that's looking at how he responded to learning so much and turning that into a business where he had to relive that history day after day after day.
Speaker 1:And he had this sense of humor. But it wasn't humor, I don't. I don't know how to describe that um, where people would try to vibe with him and tell a joke and he's like this is not funny, and then it would be something that was situationally funny that he would say but then he didn't want to laugh.
Speaker 2:He's going to come back with how he interpreted history. You know from his viewpoint from growing up there and from you know his dad and you know the mixture.
Speaker 2:Just, I've been on a couple of tours with him now you know, I kind of handpicked some people to be on that bus that I think would be receptive to you know his it's just darkness, like the, the, the, you know the work, hoppable, or just you could feel the atmosphere when clay was speaking and you know the places that you know, whether we were at the you know 16th street church or we were, you know at shuttleworth's house that that was bombed, you know, and trying and trying to decide is this something that he thinks is, you know, humorous, or is this something that we, we can't?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know how to have a relationship with him, because to think that he's done a thousand of those tours, over a thousand of tours, and said this same story over and over again, how does he move out of that to where we're at in life now? Did you feel, as we were going through that tour, that we had gone back in time, you know 50 or 60 years, or did you feel like we were in 2025, just living in a different part of the country?
Speaker 1:I don't know. I don't feel like we went back in time, and I think that's because of Clay, because you could constantly see the effect of time, how he was dressed and how he was acting. Originally I thought he was just playing a periodic piece, sort of, but to see that, yeah, this repetition has really, really gotten to him, underscore the gravity of the experience that we were having and enriched it in a way that I don't think you could really, you can't really replicate. And it brought so much more depth because you can see what it does to a human being you know and, and when he's telling the story, you can see the effect on him and you can extrapolate the effect on the people that were there. This is how a person who has studied it is viewing this.
Speaker 2:Imagine what it's like to have lived that well, and then when we were out of the bus and you know you can tell you know the part that impacted you the most during that part. But it was amazing because this is the first time the first time I went, his dad wasn't on the tour, so I was really looking to see how his dad was trying to tell some of the same stories, because I don't think his dad is as impacted. But but to hear his dad say I grew up 25 miles from where we're standing, and to say that he had very rarely interacted with any black folks his whole life until they started doing this, and knowing that we're in a town that is 85% black, and knowing that we're in a town that is 85% black, and to say how is it possible, 30 miles away, that you were isolated so much that your whole thought process about the world was kind of from the perspective we saw stuff at, but you're 30 miles away?
Speaker 2:That was just so interesting to me, and then for him to be able to do this with his son and see how it's impacted his son, because he seemed like he was a little bit more I guess not as affected maybe, as his son was, so maybe he hasn't told the story as much. What's your thought on that?
Speaker 1:I don't know. The psychologist in me says well, he was closer to it than Clay was. Perhaps it's some sort of defense mechanism where he just blocks that part out and he dissociates from it Clay. There was zero dissociation. He was just like this is what happened. What did he say? He said this hound deserves to die. It was something along those lines of there's nothing good here in Birmingham because of this history.
Speaker 2:Was there any one part of Birmingham that you just remembered and have gone over Maybe you've talked to other people about that stood out more than any of the other pieces or just as a whole to see this town.
Speaker 1:There were a few parts. So Dynamite Hill, just because he kind of just snuck it up on us and I did not know that Angela Davis lived so close to everybody else. You know, it's just again so tight-knit in these huge, huge figures in history and it's like, oh right there right there.
Speaker 1:It was just like they could walk to each other's house and then just have like a little historical meeting. It was weird to know that everything was right there. So there was that. The story of Judge, that one really got to me, the lynching, and then the statue in the park Was it West Park or East Park? The book, the little book that the little girl had. The world is more full of suffering than they can understand, and that poem I looked it up afterwards pretty much embodies how Clay his whole demeanor. And to see that these were written. You know he developed independently of this poem, uh, this poem and like, but it's so. That is the history and I think that's the takeaway from all of that. History is that the suffering goes so deep you cannot fully take it in without going insane, almost you know, or being compelled to do something about it.
Speaker 2:So we get done with the tour and then we go see Miss Janice Kelsey and Janice Kelsey and her brother are talking to us and are saying we live through these children's marches. Our parents didn't go on the march because they were afraid they would lose jobs and they wouldn't be able to support us. But we decided. Janice said I'm in high school, I'm going to walk out of school and I'm going to go to this march. What impacted any of that story or any? What do you remember from from her talking to us about that time?
Speaker 1:You know I, I asked her some questions at the Q and a and I think that's where I just, I think I brought it more back to where we are now and I just can't, I can't, can't keep from thinking, wow, how far have we fallen. You know that that when people without the resources to protect themselves to, you know, provide a lot for themselves that had all of these things stacked against us, had the wherewithal and the bravery and the courage to do that, and today everybody is so focused on themselves and and you know she had, she had kind of reflected that too, of like I worry about today's youth and being so complacent, and I think that's really an indictment of you know, this person has lived it. You can't be like, oh, what do you know? You know she lived it and she made those sacrifices, her and her brother, you know they went to jail for this. They risked potentially their lives.
Speaker 1:Well, not potentially, they risked their lives for stuff like this. And to hear someone say, well, why can't you do that? Today? I am old, I am now a source of knowledge for you and you're not taking advantage of it, that one hit me. Yeah, that one really, really hit me and it makes me concerned, because this stuff really hasn't gone away, it's just transformed. And they pass the baton to us and we're like hey, look at me me, me, me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one of the thing that hit me and I, like I said, I've had the opportunity to have conversations with her twice now and when we went the year before, all the political uneasiness and unrest of our country hadn't happened yet. So, from her perspective, when she told her story to us a year over a year ago, it was more of the historical. This would happen, happen to me, and her brother wasn't there. Um, what amazed me this time was she was now putting it into the context of all the stuff that has happened to us politically right now.
Speaker 2:And there was some anger, there was some you guys are not doing stuff, and I'm seeing this go backwards and I'm seeing it go backwards in front of my eyes, like I literally could have died, I could have stayed in jail and, like you just said, me, me, me, we don't care. And you know what are we doing, what are we standing up for. You know, to hear her brother say, I outran the fire hose. I was fast enough where I wasn't tumbling down the streets. I was like, oh yeah, they were willing to sacrifice and I thought with my own soul, am I willing to sacrifice at that level? Maybe I don't need to, and maybe I'm sacrificing a different way, and this is. You know how I'm trying to do that, but it really touched home to me to see her anger show up in the way that it did. Just you know from the time that I'd seen her before, and so I know BJ had known her. I don't know if he ever said anything I'm looking forward to because he kind of grew up with knowing her.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I've met her son before I met her. Yeah, I mean, but it's, I think, another part of that that frustrated me and I'll, if we get to the whole, what word did you write down? I'll share it because I think it's still you can just hear it is that we only hear about Martin Luther King. We only hear about the big names, but they weren't in that instance. They weren't the ones that we only hear about Martin Luther King. We only hear about the big names, but they weren't in that instance. They weren't the ones to make the sacrifice. And you have to dig so deep for that story. And it's just the intersection of, yeah, she met him in passing at these events, but then the story, the greatness of that story that's attributed to him, was carried out by her and her brother and her classmates. And I find that wild that there's such buried information there.
Speaker 2:So you talk about the word. What was the word that?
Speaker 1:So the word that was, what was the word that? So the word that I wrote down and I forgot what exercise that was, but it was kind of like poem sort of thing um was anathema. That was, that was my word, and it still is uh, whenever I think about this but it's not of the moment, it's of every effort that has gone into burying this information, how hard it is to access this, how hard it is for people to accept this, and how much people fight against this history as if it will harm them All of that A little bit got into schools.
Speaker 2:We need to make sure we take it out so that we can act like we forget it or it never happened. Exactly, I like that. Yeah, I do, I do. All right, so get back. We're just, you know, we're still, you know, processing thinking hey, we just had Clay all day, we just had Janice Kelsey. We decide the next day we meet together, kind of go through some more story stuff, and then we decide to drive to Selma. And so are you having the expectations of Selma other than that we're going there, we're going to see a different part of history, or are you trying to look at Selma from different lens now, because you now see Birmingham? What is your?
Speaker 1:I didn't really know what to expect. So a lot of my family lives in Alabama, so family reunions, so I'm used to the Alabama vibe, but the country, country, country, part of it. So see, in Birmingham I was like, oh, they have a building here. I didn't know what to expect, you know. So I was thinking Selma would be a little bit closer to that, but I still I didn't know what to expect. And actually on that ride I really got to connect with Christine. So I didn't really have time to like have expectations, just because we were just talking about life and mostly like kids, because I'm just like how do you handle two girls?
Speaker 1:So she was like help me out a little bit there, um, you know. But yeah, I mean, when we got there, I was like, okay, this is closer to what I expected. I don't know how I felt about the bridge still.
Speaker 2:I mean, it's a you know, we just, I think you just turn back to the movie Selma and realize all that happened on this bridge that literally only takes 10 minutes to walk over. I mean, it's not, you know, it's just a bridge like any other bridge in the country, except for the historical context, you know. And you know, as I've watched Selma several times now and watching it after I've been on the bridge. So the first time I watched it before I got to the bridge. And then I'm trying to remember stuff Now I've walked on the bridge, stood on the bridge, and I'm now watching the movie again and then seeing and I don't know how historically correct the movie is like what part of the bridge they were actually milling on, or you know, when they walk back out and you know, at the other end of the bridge where the you know, the Army and everybody else National Guard folks were at and then trying to get past it, and then that walk back to the AME church where they started the march from to get to the bridge.
Speaker 2:It just the bridge, doesn't mean a lot until you kind of you're kind of putting yourself where the thing other than for me the big thing about the bridge is why can't we change the name of the bridge? Why do we have to keep calling it the Pettus Bridge?
Speaker 1:Well, the historical title of Alabama has decided.
Speaker 2:you know, this man or this figure in history is more important than what happened there and everything was named Pettus there. I mean, it was like it was down you know Anything at the. So we walked from the bridge to the AME church and then we're kind of sitting on the steps at the AME church and just kind of talking around there. Was there anything?
Speaker 1:thoughts come to your mind, anything as we're at the church or Not necessarily come to your mind anything as we're at the church or um, not necessarily I mean it was late, I think I was. Just I was surprised at how quiet the town was, even though I mean it was late, but it wasn't that late. We didn't see any other people.
Speaker 2:The project housing was right across the street from the church.
Speaker 2:So there's a little bit of activity and you usually see at least most of the project housing that I've been to on an evening. That's warm and everything and there's usually a lot happening and I was surprised as well that everybody was inside. I don't know if summer is any different. I don't know if they shut down those streets at a certain time for any reason. That's true, it was very quiet. The next day we're getting in the vans and we're heading out to the museum. We have Dr Mack on the. I don't know if you were able to hear him. I think in some of the bands he wasn't very what was your thought about?
Speaker 2:him giving us a preview of what's expected in the museum and how it's going to go through the museum or just history in general.
Speaker 1:I didn't really get any what to expect in the museum. I was more interested in just his research methodology for his calendar. I still have it up. It's on my nightstand, yeah, you know. So I looked there and I'm just like, wow, this is again history that you have to. Someone had to dig and dig and dig for this, you know, and and refine it over years and I'm just like, wow, you know, this seems like stuff that you should just have readily available. Why is it all?
Speaker 2:of that. Why is it that his calendar, after he does all the digging, is what now Google uses for all these figures? Because nobody else was willing to do that research. And for him to find a person that had a significance on every single day, knowing that he had to find a thousand people to get 365 days that something significant about their life is on that day in history, just you know. And for him, I mean he's got to relive it kind of like Clay did you know, every day, as he's writing about these people, because you know we take great stuff about him, but he's got to learn all the other stuff that happened to him in order for him to put that calendar together. Oh my gosh, yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:So, then now we get to the museum, and so are you already. Have you researched or known anything about the museum at this point? So you have no clue what to expect whatsoever when we go to the Equal Justice Museum.
Speaker 1:I had no idea. You know, I saw we got there and the politics head in me was like ooh, look, how close is the capital. Is it state capital? Because that's like one of my goals If I'm in a state capital, I want to see their capital building.
Speaker 2:So that's where I was.
Speaker 1:I'm like, okay, hey, it's right there. And then Scott was like, hey, maybe we can go see it. So that's where I was. And then I was like, ooh, some food. Uh, so you can see how blindsided I was about to be because I was buildings and food. And then boom, um, you know, and I was just like why are these people so uptight? You know this, you know, like the, the people working there, I'm like, okay, I get it, it's a museum. But you know, it's like that threshold, like once, once you get to that counter, it's just like the whole vibe changes, like over here it's fun and food and it's sunny, and then it's just dark and they were just real solemn and I was like that was my first warning. I was like uh-oh, what's about to happen? And then you walk around that wall and then that big ocean wall.
Speaker 2:I was like no, I already know what this is about well, you can just talk about a few of the things that that impacted you in the museum.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you said maybe two of them. Yeah, yeah, I don't know. I don't know Everything. Everything, I think about that museum at least once or twice a week, every week, since then. You know the ocean, that one, I think, and it didn't really have much, it was just ocean waves, and you know people make serenity soundtracks about ocean waves and stuff. There was nothing serene about this because you knew, you knew exactly what that meant and I think after going around that wall and then the, the sculpture exhibit, was, I'm like okay, yeah, um, seeing the, seeing the numbers, and I I watched the whole the trade and I'm just like, wow, I knew the number. But to see the number and to see the path and to know that one of those lines carried me in it somehow, some way, was just like. I watched it a few times and I was just like why can't I record this? So I just kept looking at it and looking at it. What else? The?
Speaker 2:You go to where they're waiting to be shipped and you're in those bars and they have, like the ghost or whatever that they're giving to you. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that one we didn't take as much time with. We didn't listen to every single one because I forgot there was something before that that we were just fixated on.
Speaker 1:I think it was still just a sculpture on the hole on the wall where it said slavery is what did it say? Slavery is the closest thing to hell on earth. It was something like that and that that just threw me. And then I was just looking at all the little articles and just like the really little stuff and by that time my mind was so fixated on that. I was just looking at all the little articles and just like the really little stuff and by that time my mind was so fixated on that I was like, oh hey, this is. I kind of withdrew for a second. I was like, oh cool, this is a weird construction. How did they do? That's where my mind was with those Like how did they get that? They have two panes of glass and then they shoot a projection.
Speaker 1:And then is like pay attention.
Speaker 2:Oh okay, it's like a defense mechanism, right, because you've been hit. Wait a minute. I got to step back for a second, so let me find something else that my mind can just think before I jump in, because if the rest of this, we've only been here for 10 minutes in this first section, if the rest of this is like this, there's something I got to. I have to think about something else for a second before I can jump back into it Is that yeah, yeah, it's, it probably was.
Speaker 1:You know, being honest, and I think at that point you know now, knowing what was going to come next, you knowing it's like I don't know. I I guess I grew up old school and hopefully I don't offend anybody but you know when you're about to get a woman, you know the pain and you know that it was coming, because you know. But the anticipation it was like that, you know, but emotional, like I know what's next. I know after the slave trade, I know you know all the way up they're probably going to end with prison. But see, walking through it, I'm like I'm gonna have to walk through this, I can't go backwards.
Speaker 1:And yeah, so that you know, sitting in the theater and looking at the sculpture, the sculpture one, um. And then there was the other, the lynching one, um. The little theaters that they have. We did skip one just cause we're like um time and we wanted to go get some other stuff. But again, I think the part that stood out to me the most, which I, uh, I told my wife and she was like that was really mean, kellen, I'm like, hey, it was honest, um was when I saw the white woman leaving the theater crying and the it just came out and I was like good and it was like I was like good, I hope she cries the entire time and I hope she tells everybody about this. You know, and I still by that, I'm just like this. Yeah, this is trauma that we deal with in so many insidious ways today.
Speaker 2:They have the segregation section that has all the signs. These signs are real. These signs were hanging somewhere. This isn't like it's made up a museum and put the stuff in there. This is for real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then the jars. I think that was one for everybody we almost missed it. We almost missed the jars. It was like in a pocket and then we walked past it. I'm like, wait, what were those? Bj was like, oh, I don't know. I'm like no, no, no, let's go back. And then we were looking at it. We were just like huh, we were just trying to see how many were in Colorado and just the fact that there were Colorado jars up there, I know.
Speaker 2:And, like you said, we think because of the population being so small that stuff didn't happen. But a lot of history that's here that we don't even think about because we just think about the South, and to see those jars and to see Josh go through and find his actual family was just oh my God. They allowed him to take a picture next to the jar of his family which is like oh, my gosh. It was there the voting section right Did you?
Speaker 2:you know when you think about, because you're now in politics and you're thinking about a right to vote and what you know. I really got to guess these jelly beans.
Speaker 1:That one really got me, because Colorado we're going through some of that actively. They're doing those same things now and I testified in front of our House and Senate about this stuff and I'm like you guys are literally doing the same thing and you don't learn. You don't learn, you just keep doing destructive stuff. And you know, just seeing that and that's exactly what was in my mind is these jars and how, how asinine it seems. Now you know, but they just changed a few things, but it's the same thing.
Speaker 2:Well, and I think that the folks that are even at the polling place, that are the poll workers, they couldn't have figured any of that out, they couldn't have answered any of those questions. They yeah, how many polls were there? So, oh, it was just, it was just so blatant how they just would figure out any possible, like you said, which is happening now. How do we stop people from participating in our democratic process? It's just, oh my gosh. Then you said we get to the prison side right Now we're in the sea. The mass incarceration. Did you listen to some of the stories from I listened to two.
Speaker 1:At that point, I think my mind was just so blown. I'm just like I know what this is about, because this is something that's more, more tangible, you know, and I'm just like I can't sit here and listen to every single one of these. I think, by that point, I was just like I was so mad at that lady laughing, laughing. But yeah, I was like it at that lady.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I was like it's time to go. The reflection room was that kind of cool to see all the figures in history that are all the way up to the top of the wall. It's just a lot of figures, I mean. We've seen those.
Speaker 1:Yeah, by that point I think I was just like oh, now they're trying to make you feel better. But I was just like but look at how it ended before they're like hey you know, here's some art, exactly.
Speaker 2:Here's some people who got through it, yeah.
Speaker 1:Did you guys go?
Speaker 2:over to the lynching pillar. Things that are hanging.
Speaker 1:We did not do the ceiling one, we did the sculpture park. I didn't know where that one was. I think it was inside.
Speaker 1:We were looking and I think we were both done. We were like we'll come back another year or something. We did the sculpture park, that one. That was a hard one too, you know, because I can't. That one brought me back. So we're talking about going back in history and seeing, like the holding cells and I'm like, as big as I am, I'm like I couldn't. I couldn't imagine. I couldn't imagine being in this little shack. I couldn't imagine doing all of these things. And yeah, I, yeah. And then the book and seeing every single one of my family names up there, I was just like wow, and they were all like high level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so overall the trip, you said you were glad that you went on the trip and I know what two or three insights from the trip that you came back with that you said, um, either I have to do something, or this is how it impacted me, or when you're telling this story to your wife and you're letting her know the parts of it.
Speaker 1:It's really just history made tangible. There's this abstract history made tangible. I think that's the you know there's, there's this abstract concept of history. You know that there were these people that did these things and that lived through these things or perhaps did not live through these things, and I think, through just education, you're so desensitized from George Washington, abraham Lincoln, you know just, they're just names, they're just things, but then to see it, to feel it, to touch it, to smell it, you know to be in it is it brings it to life in a way that you just can't no book, no audio book, no video can replicate, and it drives it home to a point where you can do something with it. And I think that's why I get so frustrated.
Speaker 1:The second part is with Janice Kelsey, because she has always been that, because she's a part of that history, and for people to be, for her, to be like nobody's doing anything, and then to see all this and to realize nobody did anything. Why is this book the size of an office building, with all of these names on here that are in size maybe 72 font. Nobody did anything. And I'm just like that's what is go, kept going, like, okay, somebody should do something. You should do something about this. You should do something.
Speaker 2:No, just sit there well, and I know that you are and you know I. It was fun. We did the NAACP day at the Capitol and I got to see you and you know the things that you're. You know just knowing that you're down there, that you're doing stuff. So when you come back and you're and you're saying I want to make a difference and not do anything, what has it been like since you've come?
Speaker 1:back and the things that you've been trying to be part of Hard. You know it's a different type of hard. You know there is. This is definitely one of those moments of before this and after this. You know where I now question the way that people regard me and think about me, because I know the history of why they're doing that. You know, and it becomes so obvious. You know some things and it makes you want to push harder. Knowing that you have comparatively infinitely more resources than janice and her brother did, um, you know, but knowing that you're facing the same thing, yeah the same thing.
Speaker 1:I'm like it's just, it's just their grandkids, but it's the same thing, you know, and just like, okay, so what can I do with more? I should be doing more um, and that's. I think that's yeah, so it's. It's been hard, but I think I've pushed further and harder. I've definitely pissed off a lot of people, um, but again I feel like the lady leaving the theater good Good, you should be mad. Um, you know, and I. I think in that way it has also galvanized and allowed me to push harder, because I know what's at stake.
Speaker 2:That's huge. That is huge. Yeah, cause you, when we think about you, know, when you're Janice Kelsey's age and now you're telling the story of what you did and how it impacted, do I want to be sitting mad because things haven't changed? You don't right? You want to say what can I do in my community? What can I do?
Speaker 2:And you can't do everything, but even that one little thing, like you're saying you go to testify, you and you're, and you're saying, because you're now embedded and you may have been a little bit before, but just maybe in a different way, um, you know one of the things, yeah, like I went to the day and I had it just assured. You just said naacp out, it didn't say anything else, it just said naac, state conference on it. And I get to go into that, go into the house, and there's somebody in the house that wants me to turn my shirt around and inside out, because I guess apparently they think the NAACP is a political statement and you can't have any political. And then to hear the story of last week there were people that were wearing shirts about gun control, which is a political issue, and that they were okay, no-transcript, and to just go.
Speaker 1:we can't Wow. Yeah yeah, they made you guys turn your shirts inside out.
Speaker 2:I was going to be in that room Now. The other group was with Senator Coleman and he went to the Senate and they had the same shirt on and they even got to go up where the dais was and then they got to take pictures up there with their shirts on in the Senate.
Speaker 2:It was the House that somebody in the House had an issue with and they went to security and the security you know, and I'm like, and they went to security and the security you know, and I'm like, so you know, obviously they didn't tell me who it was, just because then that would be.
Speaker 1:you know, I don't know who it is they can figure it out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, just to be there and go. Okay, where have we come to? Is there anything else that you're doing in the community or ways that you're.
Speaker 1:You know I've been. I've been working kind of on two things concurrently I think a lot of politicians. The reason I make them so mad is because I can't figure out where to place me. So one that I think still lot of politicians. The reason I make them so mad is because I can't figure out where to place me. So one that I think still needs some more work is the Black History Bill from this year.
Speaker 1:That one had a lot of opposition from both sides, unfortunately, and that's one that I was really hoping would get far this year, and that was just to have some standardized history for students that teachers can choose to draw from. It wasn't forcing them and it was just again listening to that of Martin Luther King is enough. That was a real public statement by a representative in Colorado from 2025. That's crazy to me. I don't know why that wasn't unanimous. It passed out of both, or passed out of the House, for sure the Senate. I have to double check and see where it cause it. Kind of everybody kept slow playing it, um, you know.
Speaker 1:And then the other one was the gun control stuff. Just because I'm I really after walking through that park and looking at all of the war stuff, and there was a one plaque that said if they had guns they would not be in this situation, and that's one thing that the state's trying to take away. And I'm like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Have we not learned our history here? You know so it's, it's it's been. You know, being on both sides of that has been really interesting, you know.
Speaker 1:So I've been trying to really show people where, you know, gun rights are civil rights. You know, do you really think that people would have been rolling up and down Dynamite Hill if they were armed like that? You know there were a few. There were a few, but not the numbers that we have today, you know. So you know things like that. And bringing it outside of this weird culture war that's going on now, it's like thinking that it's all rednecks and everything like that. You know, I'm I'm trying to introduce people to ida b wells. Um, there's a reason that she said the stuff that she said, and I feel like we should really take in that part of our history too. Even I think janice kelsey was saying some of the same thing. She was a little bit more hesitant but she was like kind of has its place, so just bringing more awareness to it in a larger context and grounding that in history and not just obsession, but history there's a historical purpose.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you so much for being willing to share today and talk about your trip and your.
Speaker 2:You know through your eyes which is so important and I'm assuming you would go back again at some point to go see it and I want to make that happen.
Speaker 2:And so if you're watching and you're a person who's seeing this and saying I would love to go through this trip, please contact me. Or if you know Kellen and you contact him and we want to take a trip, we're looking at paying another trip in September and then again in January, maybe one that has spouses on it, one that has spouses on it, one that has, you know, to kind of process that and so just trying to figure out what that looks like. But the main thing is that we come back and we make a difference and that we try to make an impact and we don't just say, oh, it was a nice trip. It's really a trip that I think has enlightened all of us in a way that says or just called us to action in so many things, and so our journey together is not nowhere near completely there being done, because we are going to continue to spend time together. And do you have any closing thoughts as we, as we in the show today that you would love for everybody who's listening to hear.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, if you have a chance to go, go, don't have expectations, just go. I'm definitely going to try and get all of my friends that I can, especially those in business. I think that business people need to hear this too. Politicians, yeah, but they're not going to listen. But business people. I really hope that more business people go they make an impact on the ground.
Speaker 2:They're not screwing around and that kind of stuff, and they actually influence our politicians to create the bills and the laws based on what's going to help our economy and our ability to culture itself. Well, thank you. If you haven't subscribed yet, go ahead and subscribe and notifications, as we have just so much incredible content from people that are just like him that we get to talk and tell their stories. So I thank you for being part of the Alabama edition and I look forward to having you guys look at more shows and then being on trips with you. So don't forget to teach your God's greatest gift he loves you, if you allow him to, and then we'll talk to you on the next one.