19. Althea Gibson: How to become a Champion against the odds

Recorded July 2024 (One of our first ever episodes!) 

Althea Gibson: A champion against the odds 

In this episode, hosts Simon and Vicky dive into the inspiring life and career of Althea Gibson, the first Black woman to win a Grand Slam tennis tournament. They explore her challenging upbringing in a sharecropping family, her move to Harlem, and the various obstacles she overcame due to segregation and racism. Despite numerous barriers, Gibson excelled in tennis, winning prestigious titles like Wimbledon and the US Open, and becoming a trailblazer for future generations. The episode also touches on the societal context of her era, her subsequent efforts to mentor young athletes, and her lasting legacy in the world of sports.

Book referenced: I always wanted to be somebody, Gibson (1958)

00:00 Getting Started: Introduction and Excitement
00:29 Introducing Althea Gibson
02:56 The Harsh Realities of Sharecropping
04:42 Althea's Early Life and Move to Harlem
08:38 Discovering Paddle Tennis
12:08 Rising Through the Ranks
13:27 Breaking Barriers in Tennis
15:23 The Hidden Barriers in Tennis
15:56 Modern Voter Suppression Tactics
16:17 A Heated Debate on Voting Systems
18:31 Althea Gibson's Historic Invitation
19:29 Triumphs and Challenges Abroad
20:44 Dominating the Grand Slams
23:14 The Harsh Realities of Amateur Tennis
26:23 A Legacy Beyond Tennis
29:50 Honoring Althea Gibson's Impact
31:28 Closing Thoughts and Call to Action

Transcript

0:06

shall we get cracking? Shall we do it? Let's do it. My first, my first reading. I'm so excited for you. It's going to be amazing. It's so full on edge. You'll be fine. You've got this, you've got this. I need to learn. Oh, hi everyone. Welcome back. Simon here and Vicky. Hello. Nice. Hello. That was slick, wasn't it? Super slick. Okay. Today we are going to talk about a lady called Althea Gibson. Great name, by the way, Althea. Why aren't there more people called Althea? The only one I've ever heard. Yeah! It sounds almost like Roman, like Greek y, Roman y, like Athena. Yeah, it does, it's got a proper goddess vibe. Yeah. So, to start off with, I just want you to pick a sport, any sport you like. Maybe an Olympic one as Paris has just begun. Oh my gosh, you know what, I saw hockey on the telly the other day. Olympic hockey, that was cool. So hockey, who wins out of the team? Well, the people who get the most. The people who get the most, yeah. And so, like, naively, I always like to think that the best player, well the best players rise to the top. The sport is like the ultimate meritocracy. The best person wins the medal. That's cool. Yeah, but that's naive. That's a naive point of view. How ridiculous. That's a stupid notion. I think it happens. It's mad, isn't it? Because like, yeah, natural talent happens. Yeah. You have natural talent. How do you hone it? How do you afford the kit? How do you train? How do you get access to these things? Yeah, yeah. You can be the best in the world, but not allowed to play in the same tournaments as other competitors. You can't win if you can't enter. Um, so today's subject, Althea Gibson, became, well, not only became one of the top ladies tennis players in the world in the late 1950s, rising to the number one rank, winning major tournaments, being the first black woman to win one of the sort of big three Grand Slam tournaments. But because of her background, her upbringing, where she grew up, she had to fight every single part of the way just to get access, even to the tennis courts. Yeah. 1950s. Yeah. 1950s. Yeah. Well, I want to take back to 1927. Okay. In South Carolina, a lady in junk called Daniel and Annie Bell Gibson. And they are Great names. Loving all these names. Annie Bell Gibson. Annie Bell Gibson, yeah. That's such a cool name. It's like a, like a, like a deodorant or something, like a shower gel. Love that. Love that. They are Annie Bell Gibson. What was the guy's name? Daniel. Daniel. Wow. He let the side down. It's a bit boring, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The cool names only go down one side of the family. They're what's known as sharecroppers. Okay. So, think back to slavery in the U. S. Technically abolished in 1865, this thing called sharecropping continues for decades and decades afterwards, right up 1910s, 20s, 30s, all the way through to the 70s. It only came to an end. Really partly because of the Great Depression, partly because of the mechanization of farming. And what's sharecropping? So sharecroppers, it's, it feels to me reading about it like slavery by another name. It's where people get allocated a patch of land and they get to farm that land and they get to keep some of the crops that they farm from it. And in return they get provided tools and accommodation and food. But the landowner Can force them to sell them their crops at manipulated prices, so they maybe don't make a profit and they're in debt to the landowner for the accommodation and food that they have and the tools that they use. So it's like perpetual debt. They're still fully under the control of, of the landowner, you know? Okay, I was going really well into the last sentence there. Wasn't it? I was like, oh, that sounds like a pretty, oh, okay. Yeah, so like this, strictly speaking, not slavery, but all of these sort of freed men, it's, it's a loophole, yeah, and it's, uh, they would be able to provide for their families, not really get anything else out of it, no opportunities really to escape. And this is the environment into which Althea was born. Oh, shut up. And then she went. Yeah. Oh my God. Okay. Okay. I'm excited. Yeah. August 25th, 1927. Um, Annie Bell gave birth to Althea and this was a time of the Great Depression starting to hit in the U. S. and affected these southern states, these southern farming states. It affected them before anywhere else. So they were really badly hit by this Great Depression, couldn't sell their crops for enough money, could no longer make the living off it. They had to make a decision to move somewhere. And so they moved to Harlem in New York. Okay. Now, at the time, Harlem was sort of the slums of Manhattan. There was one nice area of it, Sugar Hill, which was home to sort of wealthy African Americans, but Harlem largely was a sort of poverty stricken slum area, few opportunities for work, poor living conditions, still better than where they were, where they couldn't earn anything. And 1930s, of course, segregation was still in full swing. This was segregated America. There is, it would. It would be over 20 years until segregation in schools was outlawed. It would be, so that was 1954. 1955 was when Rosa Parks refused to leave her seat on the bus. So we're still 25 years away from all of this. And even when segregation was technically outlawed, there were still mass protests about it. Thousands of people rioting on the streets because they didn't want white kids to go to school with black kids. Well, a lot can change in 25 years, can't it? Because if you think 25 years ago from here, we're 1999, like so much has happened in the last five years. Oh, yeah. We've got mobile phones. Well, yeah. Plus Facebook. And Facebook, right? Yeah, okay, so we're away. There's a big gap between Big gap, yeah. Like, poor surroundings, minimal rights, outrageous racism, and Althea grew up in an environment where everything was stacked against her, like, to make it even worse, she was a woman, so she had even less chance of succeeding. Bloody hell. You told me she was a woman. I know. Oh, God. As if she didn't have enough to deal with at the same time. But what she did have, what she did have was fight. Okay. She had fight in the literal sense, because her dad taught her how to box. Right. Right. Right. He was quite an aggressive man, but he taught her to box, taught her how to look after herself on the streets. Do you think that? Yeah. So it's self defense. Yeah. Like, protect yourself. Okay. And this gave her, you know, fight. Everything that she was going through as a kid gave her fight in that sort of mental sense as well. She wanted to win. Okay. Whether that was street fighting or basketball or paddle tennis, she had that determination. In her own words, she always wanted to be somebody. Yeah. Yeah. Um. I'm not competitive with you. I'm not very competitive at all. And even at like board games and stuff, I'm always a bit like, yeah, okay, as long as we're all having a nice time. And also competitive people put me on edge a little bit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I don't think we would have been friends. I haven't had the mindset to be an athlete. Maybe not ruthless enough. But she said, but I think that's different. So what was the quote? She always wanted to be somebody. Yeah, I think that's different. being competitive to one. I think you can want to be somebody and not be competitive because you're almost I guess you're being competitive for yourself aren't you if you want to go a bit deep but like I think they're like mutually exclusive aren't they they're like yeah very different things growing up where her family her they have no status they have no rights in society being somebody of course gives you that protection gives you that elevated status isn't it yeah okay so she's probably competitive on top of all that Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So in Harlem and around New York at this time, they used to have play areas where some streets in the daytime, they would close them to traffic and set out sporting apparatus for the kids to go and play. That's sweet. And hone their talents and get some exercise. Because they didn't have parks. Yeah. Didn't have parks, didn't have access. So paddle tennis, which is much like normal tennis, but you play it with a solid bat rather than a stringed one. Okay. So it's not table tennis? Not table tennis. No. Still done on a court with a net that's a bit lower. The paddle tennis court was right outside of her house. So she could walk out the door straight onto the paddle tennis court, challenge any kid that came along. And she was, she was amazing at paddle tennis and she was amazing at a lot of sports. She was really good at basketball. She was very good at fighting. She later became really good at golf, like paddle tennis, that was her thing. Okay. And then at the age of 12, she became New York City's women's paddle tennis champion. Nice. I love that they had a paddle tennis champion. We didn't have that, did we? There's no Forrest of Dean paddle tennis champions. There is. There should be. Well, that's true that we know of. We'll have to invite them on. Special guest. Um, so seeing her talent. Paddle tennis champion. Um, some of her neighbors went around and collected up funds and got together the finances to center, uh, to pay for her membership and lessons. At the Cosmopolitan Tennis Club. Oh, this is cute. Now, Cosmopolitan Tennis Club was located in the Sugar Hill area of Harlem. So it was the one nice part of Harlem. That was the posh bit, home to many wealthy African Americans, still a predominantly African American neighborhood, home to them. And many of these wealthy people living there were involved in the American Tennis Association. And they had this fancy tennis club, and it was one of the few tennis clubs that she was able. Now that they'd raised the finances that she was even allowed to go and play in. Cause back in these times, tennis was still like a middle upper class. Okay. It wasn't a good class. I see. Sport, much like golf clubs, have been up until recently, but often men only. If it wasn't men only, it was definitely whites only. No Jews, no blacks, no Irish, that sort of thing was still very predominant. So with the majority of the clubs still white only, black players weren't allowed to join or partake in tournaments. Okay. They found it difficult to train. They couldn't get coaches. There's really poor access for it. In 1916, a group of wealthy African American business people and members of the highest society founded the American Tennis Association specifically to put into place the infrastructure for black Americans, black kids who get interested in tennis to have access to it, and also provide a place for fans to, to Go and see them safely because like you couldn't even go in as a spectator to the normal places. So just to provide I don't think it's done by that dean. No, it's mad. It might be immediate nuclear. Yeah. So they formed this association to promote the game to players and fans alike. These days it's for any race, whatever your color. But back then it was, it was focused on promoting it. The black players and Althea trained up at the cosmopolitan tennis club and switched over to tennis from paddle tennis at first, she didn't like it. She thought it was a game for winks and just wanted to fight everyone when she lost a point. An anger issue. She anger issues going up there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, when she was younger she even had to go to, she went to a Catholic, not school, but sort of a refuge for people.'cause her dad was so violent to her. So like a really mixed relationship with her father, yo, to her out of box and Right. Looked out for her, but also he was, no, no, he was abusive. Okay. Not cool. Yeah. Okay. And then the ata, so it's kind of like a learned behavior then? Yeah, definitely. That's what she was used to, the A PA ran tournaments. Okay. Players couldn't enter tournaments held at other clubs. Yep. So in 1944 and 1945, Althea won the ATA girls title. Oh my god, so you've got World War II, haven't you? Yeah. Oh, there's the background. Bloody hell. So probably around the same time, as long as our previous subjects were smuggling, uh, smuggling kids out of the dentist. Yeah, Irina was doing, yeah, she was doing her thing and Althea was, you know, fighting oppression in the dentist world. Okay, sweet. Love it. Love these timelines. 1946. She moved on to the women's tournament. She lost her first one, but then won in 1947 and won 10 further titles back to back. Back to back. So she was like dominating. And is she playing, is this just a black tournament or is that? Just black tournaments in the ATA. So it's still second head. Okay, cool. The, like the word of her as an elite tennis player, that's still one of the best. She was dominating so much in the ATA. Okay. Sort of word for getting out, she caught the attention of a physician named Walter Johnson. Someone who was really active in the African American tennis community, and under his patronage, she then had access to better coaching and more prestigious tournaments. So he would get her into more tournaments around the country, pay more of her expenses. Because you've got to remember at the time, tennis is an amateur sport. This is not, there's no prize money, you play in the tournament and you win the tournament and you get a trophy or a prize or something, but it's sort of, yeah, there's no big pot, um, the prize money, there's no sort of fame outside of tennis. They weren't competitive. Yeah, okay, so he kind of picks her up as a prodigy. Picks her up, yeah. Mentors her. She's very, like, she's got a lot of people on board, doesn't she? Like, she has a lot of people fighting her corner. And she's really, she's really got this drive and she's people are seeing athletic woman. She's nearly six feet tall and she's got the sort of determination. I can see it in her and she's got the back of it as well. Yeah. She's clearly very, you know, she's got the talent. Yeah. The most prestigious tennis tournament, tennis championship in the U. S. is the U. S. National Championships, now called the U. S. Open. This really is where she should have been playing because she's beaten all of the rest of the competition. She's up there at that level. And 1950, there is no explicit rule in place preventing black players from entering. So, the tournament is open to anyone. However, to qualify for the tournament, you need to accumulate tournament points in other tournaments. And all of the other tournaments are white only. So the US Open can sort of comply with society and say, Oh, well, we're not putting any restrictions in place. It's open to everyone. Oh, yeah. And it's like, you see the same thing just repeated over and over again. It reminds me of sort of tactics used to suppress voters in the US to this day around sort of voter ID and how they split up boundaries. And yeah, the rule for voter ID isn't explicitly saying stop black votes. But it is unfairly prejudicing, disadvantaging really specific members of society. Wait a minute, have you spoken to Cara about this recently? No. Me and Cara had a whole to do on WhatsApp because Cara, our friend, is American and she's been voting her entire life. And, but we were talking about the electoral system for the coming US election and Cara was like, Oh, I see. I don't know if I actually do vote for, for Harris or whoever. We did some research into it and it is so messed up, the voting system, and she, Cara didn't know. And Cara is a very intelligent, very, you know, contributed to society and she just had no idea of how their electoral system works because they don't talk about it. And the fact that like, you're right, Puerto Rico is very exclusive. There's so many communities that are excluded from having a right to say on their governing body. Yeah. And it's. Absolutely, like Cara was absolutely shocked, like understandably, but it's also not like Yeah, it's insane. Not long ago, so we've had our election here in the UK and we've got the face past the post system. Yeah. Which again, isn't proportionate representation. Oh my gosh, it's not right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Labour won, cool. They didn't get the proportion of the votes that is, that represents the number of MPs they actually have. And that's something that Tories have tried to cut up different sort of constituency boundaries to make it easier for them to win certain places. In America, even. It's, I cannot believe it. If you haven't looked it up, there's a great YouTube video. It's like five minutes. Yeah. Maybe we can link it or something. That is a really good explainer. And like, it comes, it comes down to these. three or four battleground states, isn't it? Because all the other states are locked in. So it's just these swing states that they're really focusing on. And then different things that they can do to disenfranchise particular voters in those areas to swing it their way. And no one's talking about it as well. Like no one's saying, actually, let's, let's change that. Let's bring them on. But it's so sickening. Nuts. 2024. So it's that bad in 2024. We're seeing it with, you know, 74 years ago, if you wanted to play in a tennis tournament, you had similar issues. But the ATA lobbied really, really hard. And with the help as well of a retired champion named Alice Marble. Althea did receive an invite to the national championship. So 1950, she is the first African American player to ever step foot on that court. She's the first person to enter that tournament. She didn't win, but you know, she held her own. She, she got there. She wasn't allowed to use the front door. She had to go in the back door. She wasn't allowed to eat in the canteen. She wasn't allowed to use the changing rooms. She had to turn up through the back door, play the match and then leave immediately. So it's like, yeah, yeah. But she completed. Yeah. So she would have been 23. Yeah. At this point, next few years, she won her international title. She thought about giving up and entering the women's army corps, but got convinced by the army to do a tour of Asia where she went around and did exhibition matches. Um, she played 18 tournaments abroad. 16 of which she won. So this is like her full time gig, right? This is now her full time gig. Yeah. And kicked off really by the army, trying, taking her over to Asia to do exhibition matches out there. And this was important for her. It really built her confidence and gave her a lot more experience playing competitively against more varied opponents. I think it was really good for her because she went over there and saw like non white fans. So all these different people from different ethnic backgrounds were coming to watch her and impressed by her and not shunning away at every, shunning her away every turn, every opportunity, but welcoming her. And it was really important for the spectators and the other players, the up and coming players out there to see, Oh my gosh, America has actually put this woman forward and she's black and that she's coming out here and smashing it, kicking ass. Yeah. So she sort of really. honed her game over these few years. Um, and then in 1956, she finally got into and won the French Open. Come on. And the same year. So she won at the French Open and then shortly after won the doubles at the French Open as well. And I went to Wimbledon and won in Wimbledon, the doubles. This is like Serena level, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, she was dominating. Well, they're called Grand Slams, aren't they? Grand Slams, yeah. So, as well as myriad other, like the Italian one, I think the Hungarian Championship, she won all of these tournaments across Europe. The key ones being the French Oak, and then doubles at the French and Wimbledon. 1957, though, was, in her own words, Althea Gibson's year. That's when it really came together for her. When do I get one of those? She was seeded first for Wimbledon. And at the time, Wimbledon, I mean, Wimbledon is still a big deal. But at the time it was still seeded like the pinnacle. And the winner in Wimbledon was the world number one. How did she win it? Then she was seeded first, and she won, in the final, against her fellow American Darlene Hard. After that, the same afternoon as her match, she won her match in the morning, that afternoon she won the doubles. Yeah, got a day. Partnering with the woman that she'd beat in the singles final. Oh, that's nice. But she became the first black champion at Wimbledon, and the first of any of the champions to be handed the trophy by the queen. Ah, this is so cool! And she said shaking hands with the queen of England was a long way from being forced to sit in the coloured section of the bus. Damn right. So you think how far she's come along. And afterwards they had like a champion's dinner at the Dorchester. Oh my god. So people took her to get a dress and she was up there and talking to all of these lords and But she got where she wanted to, she wanted to be somebody and that is it, isn't it? Yeah, she got there. Same year, 1957, she then won the US Open. Okay, she's on a high, she's flying, lovely. She's on a high, and the following year, 1958, she did the same again. She won Wimbledon and the US Open once more. She was, she was so talented. So she's, you know, up against the best in the world, at last, allowed to be on a level playing field with them. And smashing it, and holding her own, and succeeding, and you know. Oh my god, what a story. I mean, as I said, the tennis was still an amateur sport, but it remained so until the open era began in 1968. So there wasn't prize money. Isn't that funny that it's amateur? Oh okay, is that what amateur means? Because I was saying, the game doesn't turn up to everything. Okay, okay, yeah. Still a prestigious tournament, but no prize pot. Prestigious, but amateur. Okay, got you, got you. They would receive sort of a meagre amount just to cover some expenses, but this often wasn't enough so it could cost them money to go to a tournament. I bet people were paying to participate though. No, what's the word? Spectate. Yeah. Yeah. The players wouldn't see that money. No. So Wimbledon would have been making money out of it, but the players. We weren't getting that. There wasn't the crosswalk. Sounds like that. She received a ticker tape parade through the streets of New York. No. Oh, that's so cool. So like footballers do on their double decker busses, like that. Yeah, and she was sat on the, propped up on the back seat of an open top limo waving the crowds. Oh, come on. Yeah. That's so cool. I mean, and in her hometown as well, New York. Yeah. Sweet, sweet, sweet. And she got, she like received a claim from the mayor. She got a letter from the president. She had this short term. mega fame. Okay. But wasn't sustainable. She couldn't, she didn't, she wasn't through a wealthy background. Yeah. And she wasn't getting any money for winning these tournaments. So to be a, to have a career in tennis at the time was virtually impossible. You had to have money behind you to keep, keep playing. And Olympians nowadays, so many of them have to have jobs. Yeah. Yeah. They're lucky if they can get proper sponsorship for training. Yeah. Yeah. It was work hard enough. Um, the best in the world, at the absolute height of her powers, couldn't make a living for it, from it, and they basically retired in 1959, a year after winning the double tournament. Yeah, and then she's retiring from tennis, but by the time the open era came about and they did start to give prize money, she was then in her 40s, so couldn't compete with the youngsters. Of course. And the part of it still being amateur is they weren't allowed endorsement deals. Right. So she couldn't get sponsorship from brands. She couldn't be endorsed in advertising for anything. There was no other opponent. No. Despite breaking the barriers and achieving the success that she had, female athletes, black or otherwise, didn't have anywhere near the same opportunities to capitalize on their success as their male counterparts. You think from a similar era, Muhammad Ali was everywhere. And like, everyone knows about him to this day. Everybody knows his name. Iconic. And like, they were breaking down the same barriers. They were doing the same thing as her. And to like, similar levels of success. They're being rewarded in a different way. But they're rewarded in a different way. They get the media. They get, The coverage, they get this sort of sustained fame that lasts them well beyond their career. So in the years following, she ran outreach and training programs for young athletes. Did she? And she had a mildly successful foray into golf. So she became the first African American player on the women's tour. Is, you know, fighting down another. She just carried on with a different sport. She was like, I'm going to pivot and off I go. Nice. She even had a go at singing. She was so smart. Did she? Yeah. Yeah. And tennis saxophone, I think. So she, she was a pretty. She much challenged them. Skilled lady. Yeah. But as is so often the case, she wasn't, she'd achieved all of this. She'd knocked down these barriers, wasn't necessarily the one to really reap the benefits from it. The benefits and these opportunities that she'd fought for. She was just sort of blazing the trail. At the time, tennis remained highly segregated. They'd have someone come in and win. the most prestigious tournaments, but still like she applied for membership of the All England Club who runs Wimbledon, owns that club, and thought that would be pretty easy considering she's just won it twice in a row. She had five Wimbledon trophies, three doubles, two singles, and she was repeatedly denied. She was never given membership or access to the club. Neither was a Jewish doubles partner. She was refused as well. So it quickly felt like whatever barriers that she felt, she broken down it, but there were being put back up behind her, but they were being put also, what else does she need to do? Like what? Absolutely. She's come from like the most absolute poverty to smash your school through all these adversities. Anyway. A sport that had a lot of wealthy purely because of the, the nature of what it was. Yeah. You know, it was played by these sort of upper, upper middle classes. No, neither. Yeah. It would be another 43 years until another African American woman, Serena Williams would win the US Open. Wow. 43 years. Yeah. I all know Serena, but we dunno. Yeah. It's interesting. Yeah. But even if it. Felt to her that these barriers were sort of going straight back up behind her. She had punched that initial trail through for others to follow. And it proved to be an amazing That's a nice metaphor you've got going on there. Thanks, Cheryl. And proved to the young athletes who were coming up behind her, it's possible, you can do it. The next person, it will be easier. Billie Jean King said, after a fellow called Arthur Ashe, But then the first African American man to win 10 years after Althea did, Billie Jean King said, if it hadn't been for Althea, it wouldn't have been so easy for Arthur, all the ones who followed. Great. Yeah. She's a smart lady, Billie Jean King. Yeah. She's smart cookie. Yeah. Respect. So as always seems to be the case, it's not that one person can break these barriers down and that's that. But it is the repeated thing and every time it gets a bit easier. Um, like succeeding despite a society and the institutions that were set up to ensure her failing, she blazed a trail which others have followed since. Um, over the years she's been inducted into many halls of fame, received medals and recognition for her achievements, and in 2019 a statue of her was unveiled at the home of the US Open Flushing Meadows. And it was only the second statue that they've ever put up in honor of a camp. The sculpture was by an artist called Gulda. He said, Althea reoriented the world and changed our perceptions of what is possible. We're still struggling, but she broke the ground. In her retirement speech, she said, I hope that I have accomplished just one thing, that I have been a credit to tennis and to my country. Oh my god. By all measures, reads the inscription on her Newark statue. Althea Gibson certainly attained that goal. A little bit emotional. Oh my God. Yeah, she did. She did achieve it. I think she, she didn't just achieve it. She went beyond, didn't she? Yeah. So impressed. Well done. Did you enjoy that? I loved it. I loved researching it all. Oh, what a lady. What a lady. And I've learnt loads more about segregation and the southern states and authorities and sharecroppers. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully other people will see it now. The main source for all of this is her book. Is it? Okay, great. Which is called, I Always Wanted to Be Somebody. I love that, so much for doing that, that's amazing.

audio1246976076: 31:28

Remember to like, rate, subscribe, check out our socials. We are doing a shout out if you've got any, suggested subjects for us. Or if you've just got a really cool story to tell about any woman at any time. you know, they don't have to have changed history, quote unquote, just someone who's pretty kick ass. Please share, and then we'll do a listening episode at some point. That'll be really cool.

31:52

Great, well thanks everyone.