Coming to Northeast Wisconsin live from the Civic Media Studios and featuring TV and radio broadcast veteran John Minow along with the City of Green Bay's longest-serving mayor Jim Schmidt.
This is Minow and the Mayor.
And here are your hosts, John Minow and Jim Schmidt.
Friday to you it is a beautiful Friday morning it is okay right I'm gonna say since October this is the first time Todd
has put out 50 no oh yeah I think you're right or was there one last week to begin the day to begin the day I don't know all right there you go
this is that
Thank you, Todd.
He's got it up here.
It is 50 degrees today.
50 in Green Bay, 48 Appleton, 50 in Oshkosh.
What the hell's wrong with you, Appleton?
Seriously?
48.
Why don't you pick it up a little bit?
Get
in the game.
Come on.
Come on.
Yeah, you walk outside.
It's
great.
50 for
our else.
Appleton, 48.
Oh, sex with an Appleton today.
Wow.
I'm sorry.
We love Appleton.
Just throwing it out there.
Good stuff, Appleton.
Claudia was showers and possible storms.
Thank
you
last night.
I heard the thunder Wow, that was like right in the middle of the night Yeah, but it's a nice morning.
I was like no wind out there right now just mild, right?
You know what I mean?
Mm-hmm.
That was great.
Let's get out there people get on walk I would have four and a half miles this morning already don't What drove around you don't know that but you did you see today?
No, no exercise day
Oh, okay.
So
I will get to that.
Yes.
Yeah.
But I'm just saying that is correct.
Animal
Cracker, they overrated.
I know they're not.
They're the most boring things.
Those are
awesome.
Oh my God.
And that little box is a little string.
I like the box.
I like the string.
I
like that part.
But
the
actual crackers.
There's something that no doubt the packaging is...
That's
the whole thing.
More expensive than the
ingredients.
You had to put peanut butter or butter or something on animal crack.
Nobody liked it.
Once your taste buds evolve, nobody likes eating an animal cracker.
It's like, have a host.
Thanks, Johnny.
You know what I mean?
It's not quite that bad, is
it?
I'm pretty
close.
Oh, when they went to the wheat holes,
it has
the same nutritional and taste value as a host.
There's a little, no, there's a little sugar to it.
There's a sweetness to
it.
No, it's not cereal.
Well, you bet there is.
Anyway, yes, um, but today it's a good day.
You're right.
And get out there today.
This is start your exercise program today.
I don't need to start.
I've already been on it.
Oh, you
weigh in it.
Wait.
Yeah,
it's right
to 18.4 up to 18.4.
I got my thing on again, Tom.
Yeah, Tom, Todd, Todd, Todd got Vicki here.
LFG, we made it to Friday.
I go, hello, Michael Friedman in Madison says, yee-haw, see you at the hoe down tonight.
That's gonna
be fun.
Nicholas Bay is watching.
I can't be there, just for the other people.
I know.
I know a lot of people about tickets hoping to see me, and I can't.
Yeah, it's not the great band we're gonna have.
I got two
things, I got two things that are, I got a three and a half hour oral dental surgery coming up on Monday, so I can't eat anything good for now.
Okay, to aggravate it and I there's no way I could stand on those cement floors.
There's tables
and chairs I know but you know what I mean?
Yeah, I couldn't do it I'd have to sit I'd be that old guy that has to sit Michael I'm gonna be
Michael
I wore my Oh
my god, we gotta see this people you gotta see this I gotta get a picture right now.
Okay.
I'm disputing what he says He says they're rattlesnake.
I don't think so.
I think they're Python.
All I know is they're old, but they're cool
Yeah, this is the only time this will ever happen.
Yeah, this is the only time ever to say those are cool something you're wearing and we say is cool Jim is wearing Well, he says the rattlesnake skin boots for the heat.
Hold on.
I don't think they are I think they're python So anyway, that's this is gonna be fun and I and we had I had this great You're listening come we Dave knows every type of boot that there is all right
Take a look at the picture, tell us what Jim is wearing.
And I've got a pair of Eel at home.
I was gonna wear
those.
Eel are cool
too.
Yeah, those are.
Jim actually looks really cool this morning.
He's got some jeans on and the cowboy boots.
I
don't know who he
is.
I don't either.
I don't know who I'm sitting next to.
Jim, I gotta tell you, I like this Jim a little bit better.
Who is it?
I got a black
shirt on.
I got a black
shirt.
He's badass.
That's right, today.
It's like sitting
next to
Garth Brooks
in there, isn't it?
And I'm looking absolutely.
So I went to the, I told you, last year I went to the...
Hey, Matthew McConaughey, I'm Texas.
You did a hospice auction and I bought a
pre-court football
and a black cowboy hat.
The cowboy
hat is MIA.
So I've been looking
all over.
Somebody stole that.
I
know.
Somebody legitimately in this studio.
Well, here's the thing.
First of all, Mino, you've worked in radio a long time.
You never leave anything at your radio station.
Because it's not usually the staff.
It's cleaner.
Absolutely.
No question.
And it was
on the coat.
It was on that.
Coat rack so very easy to walk
out.
Oh, right out here.
Right there.
Well, my German hat
was missing
too.
I had that German hat.
You're right.
The other very easy to pick that up and walk out.
If anybody takes my bayonets, I'm going after them.
Anyway,
that's yeah, so I got to find one today, I think.
All right, I'm going to put the picture of Jim's boots up on a stream now.
This is a whole new gym.
I'm a little intimidated look at this that is them I see Those are
rat
snake those are python, correct?
Anyway,
what I got a
reason I'm saying there's better like twice as much more I expect spends wise those things are these
and I
30 years old a picture there.
I
know that I used to wear cobwebs in Arizona or covered with
just I think
I'm
no
they don't wear out
No, they don't.
But I think, I think expense-wise it was, I think it was eel, ostrich, rattlesnake.
No, eel, ostrich, python, rattlesnake.
People can weigh in, but I think ostrich is the most expensive.
They were back then.
I think eel was.
Okay.
There's a lot of
ostriches out
there in the world.
This has me pumped up.
I'm gonna start wearing my
boots.
You got
some cowboy boots?
Yeah, just some plain old boots I bought down in Texas.
Animal skin?
Comfortable.
No, no, just plain old boots.
But Todd said, are those comfortable?
I'm like, like after five minutes.
Once you got them on, yeah.
I work cowboy boots for probably five years.
We get a text.
Okay, here we go.
I gotta pull the Come on It's
good
Friday
people Think about that He wants we got this text in from Terry said he wants to know if this is what Jim looks like this morning Hang on I got a
I gotta move it over for you guys.
Terry.
Terry, you're kinda pretty creative at
this time.
Wow.
I don't have a mustache.
Okay, funny, funny, funny.
Alright, let's move on.
Let's move on.
I mean, not that far off.
I
bet your legs are that hairy.
Too bad.
It makes Terry.
Oh my goodness.
Oh, okay, Terry.
What the hell's wrong with you, Terry?
It's
great.
I mean, come on, Terry.
Yeah.
I'm sorry.
This is a great Friday already Cowboy day says I never got into exotic boots It's more about the maker as to what good boot is mine Okay, his are all I'll hide
because some people are real serious about what they wear with their cowboy I mean, that's like a status.
Yeah symbol
Michael Freedman says they look like armadillo boots.
Hmm They might be armadillo.
That's the other one.
I was thinking of
I couldn't, I knew there was one other one.
They might be Armadillo.
But they're
not Diamondback Rattlesnake.
And you, remember, do we ever resolve if it was David Whitehurst's store that I bought him at?
Yeah, I,
yeah.
And
you said he had a store but you
got here late before?
No, I
didn't know that though.
I, David, David Whitehurst got cut the first year I, he got cut in training camp the first year I was, so I never really knew David Whitehurst.
Okay.
This is the store I bought him at that doesn't help anything.
I don't think he owned a store, did he?
Don't know I don't know
in
the mall that you tore down, right?
Yes That was the only store that made any money
just a frame of reference one
year frame
of reference
three years We used to give out gift certificates for a packer players to Palos remember Palos leather store Yes, I do and you know I was so I was so broke.
You know what's people understand this about TV?
I was doing six and ten TV anchor
I was doing the Lindickey show, Packer post game show.
I was doing all that stuff.
Okay.
And I was so poor.
I was making so little money that if a player didn't show up, I would use the gift certificate.
And that's what I use for Christmas present for my family.
Is that ridiculous?
Something else you don't know about radio.
Exactly.
So you get paid so terribly.
Broadcasting.
Broadcasting.
We used to get.
Honest to goodness.
We would, you know, we'd get like burger sandwiches at hearties or something like that to give away.
And sometimes the boss would even say, Hey, thanks for all your work.
And that was your little bonus was the free stuff, the station.
When at my
first job, I qualified for food stamps.
I was working full time for about 60 or 70 hours a week.
And I qualified for food stamps.
Did you know, though, that the perception wasn't that at all?
Yo, everybody
thought,
Oh, you knew that.
I was wondering how I was wondering how you perceived.
Yeah.
Well, okay.
Well, so, all right.
Because I think people looked at you guys as, you know, not movie stars, but close to it.
Well, you'd think that with the status of the job
or whatever, you know, but
I was making $21,000 a year as a sports director.
And you had kids?
And had two kids.
21,000
dollars a year.
And everybody
thought I had it made.
I was making, you know, whatever, $21,000 a year.
That's how terrible the pay is in broadcast or used to be.
in broadcasting.
Yeah.
Is it better now?
I think if you're an anchor, maybe there's a little bit more money, but if you're a reporter, it's not.
No,
you're busting butt.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, I was anchoring six and 10 and twin falls that whole $9,600 a year.
Oh, yeah.
$9,600 a year, a year as an anchor.
It's a sports director.
I could have gotten right back into the mines and made.
Oh, yeah.
18, 19,000.
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah So
I'm
not I'm gonna try so what was me because I chose that job
right all I'm
saying is people would be when you see somebody on TV or at least by any of things they small or anything Oh, man, they're wow there Trust me.
They are using food stamps type things unbelievable They're doing that in hopes of right at no question
No question.
So I do have a couple of pair of tickets to give away for tonight's honky-tonk hoedown.
Outstanding.
Boots, brims and bourbon.
Hey, folks, just for the musical aspect of it, you've got to show up for this.
We had them on our show, what?
They're
awesome.
Grand?
Yeah.
Grand Union.
Grand Union.
Grand Union.
Six piece.
The girl's voice is spectacular.
So that's tonight at Epic.
Food's all included.
Well, the tickets are free, so I guess you don't really
care about that.
So we're giving those away today, Todd?
Yes, we are.
Two pairs?
We've got three pairs to give away.
Three pairs of tickets.
Awesome.
So if you'd like to go tonight, what we're going to do is we're going to have you text in.
Text in right now.
We'll give you a chance to win.
We'll put them at the door for you tonight.
Yeah, I'll
bring them there.
OK, let me ask you
something.
I got to set up.
OK,
so Spencer's painting.
Are
you
actually going to bring that there tonight?
Yeah, I parked out here.
So yes, I'm going to take it there.
Okay, can we do one thing?
I'm on setup committee.
Let's do this.
Let's get an opening bid for a listener.
Uh, no, I put a minimum bid on there already.
500?
Yup, I did.
Okay.
I did.
So it's on, I got that.
You really like what we put for the talking about Spencer.
I got a picture of him tainting it with the cleats.
So if everybody wants to bid $500, that's the opening bid for that.
That's an unbelievable three by
four.
Mind the merry back of us.
You may ask yourself, what is that beautiful house?
So before we get back to the show, I just want to let you know, I'll give you all the details clearly and concisely.
Tonight is the show doors opening up at five o'clock at the Epic Event Center, Honky Tonk, Hoedown Boots, Brims and Bourbon.
That is Grand Union and you can go see them tonight.
This event helps the new community shelter and it's going to be great music all night long.
If you'd like to get a pair of tickets right now, text in, download the Civic Media app, choose the station WGBW or WISS, click on the
talk button say hey I want to go tonight we'll put a pair of tickets for you at the door at the epic center tonight again doors open up at five o'clock
and I think we should play every bumper music something with honky-tuck I will do my best that's a good that's a good idea great song what you know what my all-time like at my if you had to listen to one song right before you die okay you got one song you ever think about that what would you listen to I don't think about mine be sympathy for the devil please to meet you won't you guess mine
Do to do do to do what's troubling you is the nature of my game
Yeah, you're really gonna be kids listen to that.
No,
that'd be my last one.
I'm listening Oh, but a hockey tonk woman by the Rolling Stones would be great to play today, Todd All right,
I'll pull
that out and then you're gonna say what I'm ravishing Ruby Tom T. Hall ravishing Ruby.
She was a truck stop child Born in the back.
No, you don't know something ravishing Ruby Tom T.
Hall
Okay, okay.
Well anyway, yeah, happy Friday to its beautiful day out there 50 degrees in Green Bay negligible wind negligible Alton 48 Oshkosh is 50 forecast cloudy with showers possible storms coming up today Did it rain last night when all the thunder was happening a little bit of rain?
Yeah, that was crazy thunder.
Yeah, um high in the mid 60s.
Nope 50s mid 60s.
All right mid 60s.
That's what I report said really
that's
awesome
wow i thought that was like mid 60s today yeah that's unbelievable yeah and yeah okay you know i'm gonna i'm gonna announce something i'm gonna announce a medical problem i got
really yeah okay well let's just get a series find some maybe we'll use the uh music to
Which medical problem you wanna hear about?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical
thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that
a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical
thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Is that a medical thing?
Really?
I remember that.
That was a great show, St.
Elsewhere.
It got a little weird.
It got weird down the stretch.
Yeah.
Especially the ending.
Do you remember the ending, Todd?
Yes.
That the whole thing was the kid looking in a snow globe and he made it all up.
Yeah.
I hate those kind of endings.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But it was an amazing Thursday night lineup because it would be Hill Street Blues, St.
Elsewhere and Cheers.
Oh, yeah, that
was one of the greatest lineups.
I think in TV history.
Don't you?
Yeah, that that's a good lineup.
Yes.
I mean, I watched all three long
time classic shows saying elsewhere.
History blues.
And here's what's interesting about that.
All three of those theme songs, those three blues, saying elsewhere and cheers.
All were on the top charts on the radio stations.
Wow.
Really?
Yeah.
That's
cool.
Yeah.
I did not know that.
Yeah.
That's, hey, those are the days of radio where like a TV shows soundtrack could be a number one hit.
Yeah.
And then you'd play the Carpenters and then maybe a little bit later on you'd play ACVC.
Isn't
that crazy?
Yeah.
And there's all AM.
Hey, welcome back.
AM 1592 here at WGBW.
Have a little sane elsewhere.
Coming at ya.
Thursday night.
Did you see that last night?
Great episode.
How about that young Denzel Washington?
I think that kid has a future.
I
mean, that
was a
great era.
And William Daniels
was in that, right?
And he was the voice of Kit, the car.
You're right.
Yeah.
And Knight Rider?
Knight Rider.
And later on, he was
on Boy
Meets World.
Yep.
David Morse was in that.
David Morse became a big time actor.
Who else?
There's somebody else that made it big.
But, I mean, Denzel Washington made, oh, I know who.
Ed Begley Jr.
was in that.
Howie Mandel.
Howie Mandel.
That's who it was, yeah.
Who else was in this show?
I mean, it was an incredible collection of young actors at the time, who all made it big.
But Hill Street Blues was a great show, though, too.
Remember that?
Oh, man.
Not like you, but yeah, I do yeah
great show.
So anyway, uh
welcome it is Friday It is good Friday, which Jim and I were talking when you're back in the old Catholic faith was the worst day of the year and I mean in a bad way I don't mean I'm just saying it's like this really had to you were all in or you weren't
it was the strictest day of the year strictest day of the year and we both grew up in pretty strict families and Just I think a lot of people listening remember that but that
From 12 to three, you couldn't talk and then you're in mass a lot.
Yeah.
Oh, that's, it was starvation day and, but we remember it.
So I guess it did do some good, but man, that was a long day serving.
And like you said, standing and kneeling.
Kneeling for like hours.
You
got to
protect the crypt or whatever.
It's like, you know what?
Somebody wants to come in.
Go ahead.
I'm just going to sit here for a while.
Yeah.
I agree.
So again, today's animal cracker day.
Nobody likes them.
Exercise day, something like, you know what, every day is exercise
day.
You know they honor us today?
Yeah.
No, the next one, they honor us.
Oh, amateur radio day.
Wow.
I didn't even see, Todd,
that's not really us.
I know.
Those are the
guys.
Are there still
ham radio operators?
They have an event here in Green Bay every year.
Seriously?
They do over on the east side and I go to that and they set up their little radios and yeah, that's it.
It's a small club, but it's a club.
Is that what our guys in Finland do Todd
to hear?
No, those those are just long-distance listeners on AM radio.
No Little different.
Yeah.
No, these guys have a club.
It's still active small but active club.
Okay.
Can I just ask this?
I don't mean to like burst the day every day
Couldn't you just pick up a cell phone and call the person in, like, Tahiti or something?
Tahiti?
You can't ask them that stuff.
They
like
that.
Here's the thing that's really interesting, though.
In, like, really bad crisis situations when there's no cell phone
coverage and stuff
like that, these are
the men and
women who actually keep that communication
line going.
I agree.
Yeah, I know.
I agree with that.
I just didn't know if technology has kind of made them... Obsolete.
Obsolete?
Yeah.
Kind of like albums
are obsolete, but
you
still like them, right?
Yeah.
You can always tell they'd have the big antenna in their garage.
Remember?
Or driving down the road and they had that big antenna kind of swooping over their car.
Duke Wright.
That's right.
Duke was big into that.
He was huge.
It was actually pretty fascinating talking about the different places they would,
somebody
from Fiji all of a sudden would, yeah.
But you're right.
Ham radio operators have, it's been a big thing.
Marbles day, you still love, remember going to school with your sack of marbles?
Wasn't that
big?
The coolest looking.
Yeah.
Steel yeah, yeah, yeah
Yeah, you know you're always jealous of the kids whose dad had certain jobs in the mines because they'd have the ball bearings that they replaced ball bearings and the ball bearings then were the steelies that
you would
use so they would come to school with the you know, oh Hockey talk woman mad, huh?
Love this
song Start tapping those boots there.
Jay.
I'm
I
got the
boots.
Man fist.
It's the right music.
The old Rolling
Stones are amazing.
They're replaying that at your hoedown tonight.
We're gonna send a great, great, great line up for you.
For WGBW and WISS News, I'm Lisa Hale.
The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers, the Milwaukee Brewer's affiliate, will be sold to diamond baseball holdings.
As part of the transaction, DBH is also purchasing the neuroscience group field at Fox City Stadium.
That's been the team's home ballpark since it opened in 1995.
The existing office staff will continue to operate with the club.
The sale will be complete as soon as closing conditions and consent from the league is obtained.
Oshkosh police are looking for the owner of a deceased dog found in a dumpster this week.
Police say the medium sized black female dog was found in a metal dog kennel and was severely emaciated.
They believe the dog was between three and four years old.
OPD said in a press release, quote, animal cruelty and neglect will not be tolerated in our community.
These acts are both inhumane and unacceptable, end quote.
Anyone with information about the dog or its owner is asked to call the Oshkosh PD or Winnebago County Crime Stoppers.
A Michigan High School PE teacher and coach is facing charges of sexually assaulting students and taking inappropriate photos of them.
36 year old Ryan Schrader has not yet been formally charged but was in Manitowoc County Court Thursday for a bond hearing where a $150,000 cash bail was set.
He faces charges of second-degree sexual assault of a child, repeated sexual assault of the same child, sexual assault of a child by school staff, 10 counts of possession of child pornography, and charges of child enticement for conduct happening between 2023 and 2025.
Schrader will make his initial court appearance Monday.
Take Mino and the Mayor with you anywhere.
Download the Civic Media app today from the Apple Store or Google Play Store and text the studio directly, all from the Civic Media app.
Download it today.
Now, once again, here's Mino and the Mayor, John Mino and Jim Schmidt.
Hey, welcome back, Mino and the Mayor here.
Good looking Friday morning.
We made it till Friday.
It is good Friday.
We had Easter weekend.
We got a little thing called the NFL Draft coming to town.
What a...
big, big time it is to be in Northeast Wisconsin.
And we've got somebody right now that is the voice in the face of helping people in Northeast Wisconsin.
And her name is Vanessa Moran.
Good morning, young lady.
Good
morning.
Good morning.
You are so kind that you flatter me way too much.
I will tell you, you know, there's a lot of big things coming up.
Yeah, the draft, but we also have a big event to raise awareness for autism.
So that's what I'm here to talk about today.
So I can't wait to share a little bit about about this event with you.
super near and dear to my heart.
My students founded it 14 years ago and we're still running strong.
I just want to say I was going to get to the thing.
Today is Animal Cracker Day, which are so overrated, correct?
No.
They're great.
Vanessa?
Vanessa, they're great.
No.
Yeah.
Thanks a lot, Vanessa.
Good to have
you here.
Have a nice day.
Vanessa today is exercise day you always say you and I are gonna like walk exercise wise
we never Vanessa does it every day I
you know what I do my daughter and I do a plank challenge every day which is Jim and I do plank
challenges every day we
walk
the every day did you see Jim's cowboy boots Vanessa did you see his cowboy boots
we have an event tonight Todd
put it up on his screen
we have an event tonight Vanessa so I
Hold on hold on so I
he's wearing ostrich skin cowboy boots.
No, I
just meant to
you they're in your in your messenger
in
essence, so you can
see
they're
not
rattlesnake.
I don't know what they are.
Anyway, so yes, but what I was getting at today is autism acceptance day.
Yes.
Two miles for autism.
Yes.
Yes.
You know
what?
I actually didn't know that.
I'm so thankful that you shared that
with me.
Well, that's, we're professionals, Vanessa.
Hey,
hey, show prop.
Hey, show prop.
Today is amateur radio day and we're professionals.
That's right.
So
why?
So go ahead.
Glad we could help you out on your project, Vanessa.
All right, tell us about it.
There's so many things I want to say about that last comment,
but I'm
just going to keep them to myself.
Do that.
We don't have a lot of time.
Go right ahead.
No, you guys are truly the pros.
I'm so thankful for this time.
So no, it really, so I really didn't know that.
So thank you for sharing it with me.
Second of all, thank you for giving me this time because it is Easter weekend.
And because of that, we didn't realize that when we planned the date of the event, we had to take into consideration a lot of other things, including another walk called the N.E.W.
Donate Life Walk, which started the year after us in the Howard Summit Coast School District and also the state autism awareness conference, which led us to this weekend, not really realizing it's Easter.
So we typically have anywhere between 500 and 1,000 people attend.
And this year, our numbers are down, and we understand that it's Easter.
But.
If anyone is looking for something great and just super fun to do, super fast to do, tomorrow morning, we just wanted to help spread the word.
And it's tomorrow at Meadowbrook Elementary School, which is in the Howard Swamico School District.
It's the school I used to teach at.
And so up in the corner, my O-Classroom is there.
And 14 years ago, my students had the courage to rally around one of my other students named Miles.
The event is named after one of my former students who is now
just doing some amazing work.
He's an adult.
He's taller than me, which is wild.
His mom and dad have been just a huge part of this and done all the work behind this right alongside of me.
And we just would love to get as many people there as possible.
9 a.m.
Show up at Meadowbrook Elementary School.
uh... it's just a two-mile have to name two miles brought to them two-mile run walk right in the beautiful howard comico area and uh... that's it if anyone comes even if they haven't uh... just registered day of event or walk up we still order them a t-shirt post event which is really kind of unheard of it but whatever we have you get uh... when they run out they run out no we take all your registration information
and we still will order a second, a second shirt so you can be a part of it.
And why we do that is because we know that those t-shirts help, you know, when people see those, it helps raise awareness.
Absolutely.
Is Miles going to be there?
Absolutely.
And
actually
the event started right around his birthday.
It was actually held on his birthday the very first year.
And we always have cake and cupcakes and all kinds of food.
We have a lot of great sponsors that just make this a great event and little door prizes and giveaways at the end.
And really, we're gearing up for next year already because it'll be our 15th year and we want to do a big celebration for it.
So super easy to just walk up Middlebrook Elementary School.
If you get there on 8.45 tomorrow morning, registration is only $15 per participant.
And
where does this go for this?
You know, I gotta say something.
Okay, you're, I mean, you've been a teacher, school board.
I mean, a lot of different things, a lot of different hats, but there's a certain something with you.
I mean, you obviously don't make any money with autism.
You don't make any money on feeding your starting children.
Every time he stays in
the Howard-Somaco School District, it goes back to supporting students with autism, training for paraprofessionals and teachers so they can better support students with autism.
Every penny stays in the district.
Where does your passion come from?
I mean the feeding the starting children the autism You don't make a dime off of any of these things.
I mean, it's you probably spent a couple thousand dollars a year Just in the different things doing things think where does that passion come from because we deal with a lot of people that work for nonprofits Which is phenomenal and they raise tremendous amounts money, but that's their job you do this on the side of Honestly
just
Just a heart to serve.
That's it.
I mean there is this my my nephew is it also has autism So when I was a teacher It was just something that I felt like you know from a professional standpoint and a personal standpoint I could relate to the family is the students, you know, obviously I you know I don't know it firsthand but witnessing it and watching people struggle with acceptance
watching people struggle just from an academic standpoint watch it would just it broke my heart and it just i was so thankful and i will always be thankful that i had the opportunity to to have miles in my classroom i've been thankful to have every student i've had in my classroom but there's something special that these students with exceptionalities teach you
um... and just knowing and understanding and seeing how much value they add and just how special and unique they are in so many ways not just you know it's a fairly a disability that just you know define them that's not what defines miles that that's never what defined any of my students with any type of exceptionalities
They're just your heart is just with them.
And so because of that, you'll do anything for them.
That's the same thing with my serving children, right?
And when you realize and understand, even from a distance from around the world, the peril that these children are facing, your heart just goes out.
And if there's something we can do, why not step in and do it?
And I've been lucky enough just to have those opportunities.
It's not, I've just been lucky to be able to be a part of the things I have been.
I
just want to reset the decimal and this would be the.
to the number two.
Go ahead and do this Vanessa.
So I don't, I don't mess it up to miles.
The number four.
So go ahead.
The number two miles felt like his name.
M Y L E F.
for autism.
The number four is the name of the event.
Yes.
It's happening tomorrow, Saturday, April 19th, Meadowbrook Elementary School in the Howard-Somaco School District.
Be there around 8.45.
We'll start everything off at 9 a.m.
Come join us for a two-mile run walk.
Help us raise awareness.
Help us encourage acceptance.
And the best part about it all for only $15, that's the registration cost, you get an event t-shirt.
It is not too late.
People that pre-registered, fantastic.
We're so glad we already have you down and know you're gonna be there.
People that just show up tomorrow, and I hope they come in droves after listening to this, you'll still get a shirt after the event.
We still want you to have that as a token of appreciation, but also a way to help, obviously, foster awareness.
The weather's good tomorrow.
There's no rain tomorrow morning.
It's going to be
great.
Tomorrow no rain 50 degrees.
Right.
So, you know, and it's a great way to start your weekend.
A healthy way, a nice walk.
Very friendly people.
And, you know, they can make a donation while they're there as well.
But the awareness and autism, we've had people on here.
That's something that we need to get comfortable with.
And I think
that was really
nice what you said about you.
learn as much from them as they do from all the good that you're doing as well.
I mean, it's just something that this awareness is so important when it comes to autism.
So yeah, thanks for all you're doing.
And you do a lot like Johnny said, but I think tomorrow's a very important day.
I hurt Johnny.
I'm going to be using that from now on.
I like that.
It's kind of hot, isn't it?
Let's
be
honest.
Let's
be honest.
Listen, you have fun in your cowboy boots tonight.
Where are you going?
Tell me about it.
At Epic, there's a fundraiser for the new community shelter where I work.
It's a hold on.
We've got a great band coming on that has been on our show here.
They're outstanding.
They really are.
They're amazing.
And you're
both going to be in cowboy boots.
John's going to be in church.
I'm sitting this one out this Friday.
Shut up,
Todd.
Actually, he has a toothache.
Wow.
Anyway,
hey, Vanessa, I want to talk a little bit more about some of the other things that you do in our community because you are a true leader.
And I'm not I'm not blowing smoke at you.
But I mean, aside from all the other things you do with your family and raising your kids and all this stuff, actually, Jim was talking about you the other day about marathon.
No, no, no.
The Suzuki thing.
The Suzuki.
No, I
didn't
know that was such
a
big
thing in the state of Wisconsin.
Oh It's not a huge thing.
You don't hear about it a ton But it's just a really great training method for beginning violin students
But it's like a serious thing like if you want to be serious about that you is what I guess what I should say, right?
Yeah.
Oh, absolutely.
But we, there's like, there's a, the Abert Suzuki Center actually started in Wisconsin and Stevens Point.
So every single year I take the kids out to Stevens Point.
I live in a dorm, this is how much I love my children.
I live in a dorm room with no air conditioning, shared toilets, maybe, you know, 50 square feet.
And we actually live on campus.
We ride bikes, we sling our violins over our backpacks and you just play music, all these different beautiful, beautiful, beautiful children.
all over the country, all over the nation come, the nation, the world come truly, and spend a week just making music.
And I know with respect to Stephen's point, it's just, if you said, where in the United States do you have the most serious Suzuki, but Stephen's point, I mean, if somebody said, I
want to go
and play hockey in college.
It's a great musical school.
I
don't know if people realize Stephen's point is very well known
for that.
Vanessa, what a concert they put on at the end of that week, huh?
Oh, they do.
It's over at the Century Theatre, which is just off campus.
And yeah, to see, I'm always blown away when I see a three-year-old play a Bach double.
Right.
Me too.
I can't even
believe how fast they are.
I used to play a Bach double
back in there.
I was six before I could do that.
Yeah, John's like, I love soccer.
Yeah.
But I had that same experience my first year.
But then we upgraded to the air conditioner, and then two rooms, and then we ended up...
You
stay there?
Oh, yeah.
Oh, wow.
And she's part of it.
Part of it, though, is live in that world, right?
With the bicycles and go on to the different teachers and, you know, with your kid, because they parents sit in.
I'm so
glad you did that.
That's such a neat thing.
I had no idea
about that.
Yeah.
Years and years and years.
So, yeah.
But that's fun.
And then Belts Ice
Cream.
I'm going to try to come to your event tomorrow.
Oh, I'd love
that.
Just to show my support.
I'm not yeah, you know cuz I can't run right now because of my Achilles tendon thing, but if somebody wants to push me or do whatever little
scooter
We're doing this for you, Jim.
We're doing this for you.
Lisa.
Right on.
Right on pitch.
Lisa.
You ever got any honky-tonks in Louisiana, Lisa?
There's nothing but all the town.
That's
where he started.
Just
asking.
How are you, young lady?
I'm a young lady.
Boy, thank you.
What is going on in downtown Oshkosh at your beautiful studios down there?
Looks like a storm is coming through.
Yeah, it is getting.
It's almost getting darker than later.
Yeah, it got.
It considerably darker here at first.
It was an orangey yellowy glow.
Yeah.
And now it's considerably darker.
So I think we're getting a storm storm coming through.
What's going on with
you?
Well, you tell us what's going on with New Wisco weekend.
Oh, I'm so glad we're going right into that.
Yeah.
New
Wisco weekend this
way.
We do it.
We don't we don't screw around.
Yeah,
you do all the time.
So New Wisco weekend this weekend.
We're focusing on Earth Day.
Easter and the NFL Draft.
So, you know, we've kind of got a wide variety of stuff, but a lot of conversation on
activities that are happening around the NFL Draft connected to Earth Day.
There's some stuff happening over at Bay Beach.
There's some stuff happening at the Fox River Trail with the Fox Wolf Watershed Alliance.
So we're talking about that.
We've also got, of course, a feature on the NFL Draft from Conrad Krieger.
And let's see, we've got stories on the shipbuilding industry here in Wisconsin, spring wildfires and
Yeah,
what about the Earth Day?
What about the cleanup?
What about the cleanup?
I just mentioned it.
I know the Earth Day.
Do you have cleanups in Oshkosh Green Bay, Appleton?
Well, the Earth Day cleanups I'm talking about are happening on the Fox River Trail
up in
the Green Bay area.
We did that last year.
Remember that?
Yeah.
Well, this isn't the big
Fox Wolf watershed Alliance cleanup.
This is what they're calling the preseason cleanup that is in connection to the draft NFL green, which is the NFL's environmental arm is going to be helping out with that.
You know, Lisa, I'm not just pulling someone.
You guys cover such a wide range of topics.
It's amazing.
Well, I mean,
There's lots of stuff happening in Newisco and it's not just, you know, politics and stuff.
There's, there's great news happening and great things happening in our area.
And it's, it's really fun to talk about.
You know, Jim and I were talking about, we're both two old guys who haven't like done enough in Wisconsin.
And you know what I mean?
We traveled to Arizona, go to Mexico, go to wherever, but we're talking about some areas of Wisconsin are so cool that we don't quite appreciate.
Oh.
Wisconsin's got so much that's unappreciated and really needs to be highlighted.
And that's part of what I try to do with New Wisco Weekend.
We've got a great team that talks about the wonderful things here in our state.
What would be your favorite place, Lisa?
If you can't head to my, I know you love Oshkosh.
It's a great area to work.
But if you had to go to like some other area and not even make a living, like you won the lottery, which part of Wisconsin would you live in?
That is such a good question.
And if I won the lottery and had my druthers and could live anywhere in this state, there is a small town in, or a small city, I should say, in Fond du Lac County that I would probably gravitate to because I absolutely love that city.
But then again, I'm also very fond of the Fox Valley and the Fox cities.
So I don't know I love this area so much.
It would have to be in this area.
Okay, but
Trust me, if I had a million dollars and could live anywhere, it would be here in Wisconsin.
Right.
I like that area like around man.
I don't like Madison itself.
I don't like hate driving around it and every whole Madison thing.
But some of those small towns outside of Madison with like 30, 40 miles with the rolling hillsides.
I like that area.
But you want to be have access to the games.
Badger games,
you know, it'll be great.
I know I would have to be but not deal with the other parts
But if you want to live like way up in in northern, Michigan, but there's nothing in northern, Wisconsin
Where that's where we're talking yesterday about how far would you have a cabin exactly?
You don't want it more than an hour and a half away and
that lady that's three hours away It's like right that's pretty far
and that's where I am for the up.
It's like it's just a little too far Todd.
What would yours be
for getting away and going someplace on the
lottery Yeah, and you could just have a studio in your house.
Yep build a studio, but the the air
you would live in, what would it be?
Ooh, I haven't really thought about that, to
be honest with you.
Well, if you're on the lottery, but what if you could just save enough money to do it?
Or whatever, yeah.
We talked about- The odds of me winning the lottery are better than me saving up
enough money.
That's true.
And this is what my life needs to be.
Yeah, I would say- That's what I'm making up.
Southwestern Wisconsin, maybe.
You know, the Driftless area, I like that a lot.
Exactly,
yeah.
Yeah, a little more terrain.
Yeah, a little bit more terrain.
It's very nature, but there's, you know, some great towns and cities out there as well.
So New Mexico weekend is this weekend, 8 a.m.
on Saturday, 11 o'clock on Sunday.
And then also on Sunday, some other local programming is Lean Local with Jim Schmidt.
And we kind of focus on the
draft as well.
We've got everything from transit to the stadium view, parks director, and because people trying to talk to just
There's so much going on.
And I don't think there's one good source where it's all happening.
We have Aaron Popkey.
I know you talked to him, but it's like there's a lot going on.
And I think people need to write down, this is what I think we're going to do.
And obviously Thursday is the day to be at the draft because that's if you're into the draft, that's the most exciting day.
If you just want to see the draft go Saturday
because there's a
lot more elbow room there.
But you look at the stadium view has no parking there.
They just took all four and a half acres.
It's
three stages, 13 bands.
It's incredible what they're doing.
And there's just a lot of cool things going on, especially downtown.
And I know Appleton has a lot of things going on.
There's shuttling people in.
They have a mile of music.
It's a scaled down version.
But there's just a lot of cool things going on.
I just hope people take advantage of this.
I mean, we set it up for tourism as well.
But I mean, we live here.
Why not take advantage of it?
And that
is
what time?
My show's on at one o'clock Sundays.
There you go.
WGBW.
It's gonna be fun.
So tune in all day Sunday.
The whole day
why
not
Lisa what we only got 20 seconds when you worked in Louisiana how many the guys you worked with war cowboy boots I
think Lisa walk or
cowboy boots
I did I had cowboy boots
Lisa
hail
new whiskey weekend.
You're awesome.
Your show is awesome
Coming to Northeast Wisconsin live from the Civic Media Studios and featuring TV and radio broadcast veteran John Minow along with the City of Green Bay's longest-serving mayor Jim Schmidt.
This is Minow and the Mayor.
And here are your hosts.
John
Minow and Jim Smith.
Hey, thank you very much.
Welcome back, Minow and the Mayor here, hour number two, 97.9 FM WGPW, 98.3, 96.5 FM WISS and the Civic Media app worldwide, 50 degrees in downtown Green Bay, 50 degrees in Appleton, 51 in downtown Oshkosh.
It is Friday, April 18th, which of course is Good Friday, Animal Cracker Day, Exercise Day, Mark Hewson, Amateur Radio Day, Marbles Day, Piñata Day,
Autism acceptance day, which is very cool with Vanessa Moran's walk run walk.
They've got going on tomorrow morning at at Meadowbrook Elementary.
It's Mark Houston would actually text to this one.
Hey, guys, do you realize it's Courtney Kardashian's birthday today?
Mark, I don't know why you wanted to.
Why did we have to bring that one up, Mark?
I have no clue that it is.
OK, but Mark, just text that one.
Wait,
wait a minute.
You don't know who Courtney Kardashian is.
I
think
she knows about me I'm
gonna
put mark to the test here,
okay?
I've everything you see in regards to today.
Yep, okay read all those What's the one thing that Jim?
Has a very close allegiance to what what what of everything you read what today is would Jim's world be rocked?
Oh, I know
I know you know what?
Marbles nope
It can I say can I give a hint?
Yeah, it's a birthday, right?
Yeah.
Yeah,
wait
No, oh, yeah, oh, yeah, okay, I Eric Roberts Julia Roberts brother.
Oh, okay.
It's
Jim's good friend.
They're in
a movie together
Adam movie and is at my house for dinner Anyway, it's interesting.
It's more important.
We talk about
You guys talked about ham radios.
Yes, I lived in Allaway
One of my neighbors, I'm almost guaranteed this gentleman has now passed away many, many years ago, but he was like one of the lead ham radios.
Cause I used to ask,
what's that antenna that's
like a hundred feet
in
the air.
And yeah.
And then one of my other neighbors said, oh, he's on ham radio.
And I'm like, what do you mean?
They said that little, it looked like a little shed in the back.
They said that's right.
And they said,
If something goes dead in this town, that's who you want to know.
Someday you'll appreciate me.
That's the one guy that gets broadcast worldwide.
He's going
worldwide.
He knows the Kardashians.
But he and Eric Roberts, Jim and
Eric
Roberts, were good
friends.
Jim played a convict.
What do you think of
his
boots?
What
do you think of his boots?
They're fancy
We
got so much to talk introduce your very special guest here, buddy.
Yeah, no I've got one of my former athletes from Pestigo, Wisconsin I was an athletic trainer and I have Mitchell VanVoren great family friend.
He's got I would say he's probably
the most sophisticated out of all of his brothers.
Best look at, no, hey guys, I'm not giving you a bad time, but the family is great.
Mitchell VanVoren was one of my athletes up north and went to Marquette, ran track four years, did very well as a hurdler, came back and he's at St.
Norbert's and he played football and he's got a
big weekend.
Giving the NFL a shot?
Yep, this next week could be a big weekend for him.
Yo, it's amazing that he was so good at hurl, because he doesn't look like...
You know what I mean?
He doesn't look like an athlete.
John, I think he could go over four hurdles
before he
could even think about one.
He could use you, me, and Jim as hurdles.
He could light up a watch so he'd jump right over all of us.
I probably should have sent these guys tapes of you and the NCAA.
Oh, I've
seen
them.
Oh, I've watched.
Not necessary.
What you introduced him is your former athlete.
Yes, true statement, but he is not a former athlete.
He is a current athlete.
He's a current athlete.
I hope.
So you have a chance of being drafted.
Yeah, uh, hopefully that's a dream, you know, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, that's great.
And you must be a little bit anxious.
Yeah.
I mean, it's a lot of uncertainty.
So, you know, just waiting around these last couple of weeks have been, have been tough, but, you know, it's, it's a lot of fun, it's a cool experience.
Do we need to send gifts or cards to anybody?
Or how does this work?
I'm just kidding.
You just wait, right?
Yeah.
That's it.
They have the tapes.
They have, they know who you are and.
What's
that could be like a draft
day?
Obviously it's not gonna be day one.
I mean,
you know, whatever, but just in general, where it's like your whole life, you've been an athlete and you grew up in Pestigo and all these, and now there's a chance that Roger Goodell could call your name.
Yeah, it's definitely a surreal, you know, I was talking to my family about it and like, I mean, I think they're a little more anticipating that than I am, you know, I'm trying to just, you know, take it all in, but yeah, they're definitely living up to the height.
You know, it's one of those things though too so many and Jim and I talked about this when I was a sportscaster and like in Arizona and all that you'd sit with these kids I'm sorry, you know me, but he's young guys, you know during draft and you just every and every time that phone rings like No mom.
Nope.
Are you worried about that?
No, buddy's calling and stuff like and you're thinking all anticipation is gonna be that cuz you're told everybody don't call me for two days
Yeah, definitely.
I think, uh, yeah, my parents will definitely be, you know, very camera ready.
So, uh, if something like that happens, they'll
probably,
yeah, some bloopers.
But you give them like a red line or a special line, or did you just give them your cell phone that your brother has and your
friend?
They usually ask for two phone numbers, like your number and then like a backup just in case that one's busy.
Okay.
Because there have been cases this is no lie Although this was more years ago where they would like somebody would I forgot which team it was had the wrong number They
were
literally calling the guys I was drafted and the guy the scouter whomever had written down the wrong had one digit wrong
and John I've heard this from the medical side Wow, they call these people sometimes to make sure because it's happened before Geez, we just draft a guy who just had major back surgery
or pick a basketball that
day and like
yeah,
yeah, so it's
You want to make sure they're probably one alive, too,
that they're healthy still.
And nowadays, I think with social media, you can't get away.
But years ago, you could kind of go into hiding and get away with it.
Well, Joe Thomas.
I just said the NFL network just did a big story on him.
He's the only guy that said basically bleep you to the NFL on draft day.
They're like, well, we need you at the headquarters.
Well, I'm going fishing with my dad in Sheboygan.
Well, well, no, no, you can't do that.
He's like, no, we're going fishing.
And he did.
Yeah.
I think he would on Lake Michigan.
Yes.
And it was kind of like, when I get to, I'll check my message
to get back.
That's right.
That is great.
Mark, you, I've been on here a lot, a lot of the sports with high schools and, but you got your.
Stepping in big time on this NFL draft and we had we've had the boys and girls club on here.
We've had the lady with the roots to Yeah,
root it in
rooted in they were on here.
Just great organization Yeah, and you are offering your like parking lot is fundraisers for them.
Yeah, you know, I mean, it's awesome I mean the reason why we're coming to the event is NFL draft, you know, these young men that are gonna get they're gonna get drafted It's an opportunity for us to give back.
So yeah, we've got from the rooted in we've got
the YMCA coming, they're gonna be, you know, throwing footballs around, you know, obstacle courses.
So bring your kids out because we're gonna have that going on all three days, Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
Another thing that we've talked about, we're gonna have some Packer players coming.
So we have Jerry Kramer, Dave Robertson and Nick Bardet, each one each day that they do autographs in our parking lot.
So yeah, just a lot of, you know, it's not just us.
I think the whole community is coming together.
Putting things together.
It's gonna be a fun event from heck.
There's events going on Monday night Tuesday, you know
ground
zero Yeah, we're we're ground zero, which means Unfortunately, we were closing down next week.
We're moving our docks and our therapists out of the building It's just it's too much to do in that building this week.
It really got busy with traffic around that area So we're gonna move everyone out to our other locations and
It's a little bit of an inconvenience for a week, but I think it's the best decision, both for our staff and patients.
And I think people know where you are, but it's the Bellin Tidal Town Sports Medicine and Orthopedic Clinic, right?
That was, I think most people know where you are, but you're at 1970 South Ridge.
We're right
behind Lodge-Colar.
So there'll be signs, though.
The biggest thing is parking.
You know where to park.
You can park on the streets.
If it's legal, you can park in people's yards.
And
that was...
I guess it was.
And some of us are still available.
I say I drove John Rachel today.
It's $100 a day parking.
Honestly, I think that's a great deal for the draft.
Nowhere else in the world would you have an NFL Draft where you can park within walking distance of where Roger Gadell is going to help the things for $100 a day.
Correct.
And I
think the other
thing is.
I know a cheaper place.
I think the other thing that we
should emphasize is the NFL Draft is a free event.
There's a lot of people still thinking, well, what's it going to cost me to bring my family
down to pay to get
in?
Zero dollars the biggest thing download that one app Yeah, but yeah,
and then
I think it's so cool though to see you know possibly a local person like Mitchell, right?
You know, you know someone stand up there and announce that name with what a dream come true You know this wasn't planned You know it's just coincidence that he his career is done from the collegiate side and going to hopefully the professional side
and that he's within an hour from his hometown.
Mitchell, let's reintroduce this.
Go ahead, you introduce him and tell this whole story.
It's a wonderful story.
Yeah, Mitchell VanVoren, athlete from Peshtico, Wisconsin, has an opportunity to be drafted this next week.
And it could happen.
Incredible track career.
Go ahead and talk about that, Mitchell.
Yeah, go ahead.
Yeah, I mean, I went to Marquette University for four years.
I have multiple top
ten.
Could get into a good
school.
Mark,
that's pretty good.
I want Arizona State.
Oh, okay.
Much more partying.
I'm a little more fun than I did.
I'm just throwing that out there.
But go ahead.
It's rate 97% percent.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So I was at, uh, market for four years is a little shift from Milwaukee, from Paschio, but it was a lot of fun.
Uh, yeah.
I had some top 10 marks, had a school record.
And then, you know, with COVID, they gave us some extra eligibility.
So came back closer to home and say, no, but I wanted to keep playing football.
So that's what I did.
Talk about your events.
Yeah, mainly I did the four and a hurdles at Marquette, you know a little combined hurtling and the 400 says it's a little tough event
so hard
Yeah, but
it
was a lot of fun.
I mean no
tell him how fast I was the I was a freshman in high school I had to run the 440 that is the worst thing it's no matter what experience I've ever had in my lifetime trying to run the old 440 mark You might be old enough to know the 440 that's the world about it.
Didn't have to run like hold your breath for 60 seconds type thing
Plus jump over stuff.
Yeah, I mean the last hundred meters are gonna suck no matter what but you know As part of the fun of it, you know, it depends on what you got inside of you
tell
them how fast you run around Yeah, my best was a 51.3 and I smacked one the hurdle so it could have been a little faster Wow, come on
It matters you pistol bulldogs and how are you staying in shape?
Yeah, yeah, doing a lot of working out last three months.
I was up at Advantage in Marquette, Michigan training.
So that's huge.
I mean, I'm proud of my UP roots, but they've got a training facility up there.
Yeah, because it used to be an Olympic training center up there in Marquette and they they've got other young guys like yourself who have a
aspirations of playing professional athletes they train there and it's pretty it's amazing isn't it
yes pretty sweet I mean there's not a lot of do up there in the winter besides like skiing and stuff but we never did that but you know you just focus on training for football and it's it's a pretty cool experience
so did you know when you were a little kid you wanted to play football NFL or did you go back and forth some of these guys basketball they go in it's like I don't know what I want to do I so
programmed early now
yeah especially for basketball some of these guys look I could do anything
yeah
I mean growing up I always wanted every sport I was in that sport I wanted to play in college and then you know I took the D1 track scholarship but then when I got there I was like I miss playing football so that's kind of what I had in the back of my head since then.
Good.
M and O conference.
Yeah.
We got to set a quick break.
This is awesome.
Mitchell VanVoren, Mark Houston, Belton Sports Medicine back right after
this.
Hey, welcome back to the American very special weekly second balance sports minutes with Mark Houston and a very special guest Mitchell VanVoren and it's an amazing story, you know small skull Pesh to go and Tremendous athlete, you know big fish in the small pond and then you decide to go to the big pond and you're still a big fish in the big pond in the NCAA Division one at Marquette and you've done some amazing things and now you get obviously there's no pro
track and field type career, but you want to give football a shot again.
Give us a little bit of a background after, obviously, Plant St.
Norbert, but you went four years to Marquette without playing, and when you put the pads on again and decided, I want to try to give my shot to the NFL, what's that process been like?
Yes, definitely a learning curve going back into it, especially jumping from high school to college after taking four years off, but...
I had a guy ran Randy Johnson.
He helped me out a lot.
So the summer before I went to St.
Norbert, you know, we threw and worked together every week.
So it wasn't too bad.
Explain who that is.
Yeah, he went to NMU for a couple of years playing quarterback and then transferred to Illinois.
And I met him through Scotty Smith.
That synergy gave me his contact and then he was still in the area at the time.
But yeah, he he helped me a lot.
So what do you think you have to do to really?
I mean, like when you've had workouts, private workouts, correct?
Yeah, where scouts come to town and they work out.
What are those like?
Yeah, it's a lot of fun.
I mean, it's basically like your typical, like, pro day, you know, you do your 40 yard dash, the shuttle, and
then, you know,
47 flat.
I was 46.
Okay.
A little faster
than a car.
Huh?
In a car.
Shut up.
Maybe he doesn't know.
Yeah, I did a fully laser, a Zibac laser 40 at a 467, but I don't know that's technically official since there wasn't scouts there.
What's your, what's your height and weight?
Because they, because everybody, you know, the biggest lie.
in the world are high school and college football programs as far as what somebody at their height
is.
Okay.
I love that when the announcers comment on it.
They shouldn't do that, but they do a
lot.
I
know.
Well, he says he's 5'11".
It's like, give the guy a break.
Okay, he's 5'8".
Let him go.
What are your official heights and
weights?
Well, every time I went to the doctors, they told me I was 6'5", but the NFL has me at 6'4", and 5'8".
That's
what you said crazy.
Yeah, a couple inches there.
But what do you weigh?
245.
It's
a perfect tight
end size.
I mean, quintessential tight end size.
How much did you gain weight between track to football season?
I put on like 20 pounds.
I've done that.
Yeah.
No, that we can do.
I think I did that in standard track season.
We finally found some similarities with this guy.
What's your body fat?
It's 20%.
I
don't that's not even how
now
that I don't I don't think what I saw him two years ago when when you were coming when you're running track.
Yeah, I would say like Very fit and I'm not saying he's not fit now.
Yeah, but yeah, I saw him right after he came back from the NCAA's I was like cool
So to get into to get drafted do hire like a marketing company or to promote
you were sent tapes or is it used to that on your own?
Yeah, I
have an agent who helps a lot, but then there's also a guy named Emory Hunt for CBS Sports and like, I mean, we don't pay him anything, but he definitely pushes my name out there a lot, which is definitely helpful.
Okay.
You know, it's kind of cool though, is the NFL has gotten more into this type of thing, more of let's find an athlete and fine tune him to play the sport versus somebody who's not a great athlete and trying to get him.
I mean, there, you get the height, you got the weight, you got the speed, you got those things and they'll take that and work with it.
Don't you agree?
I mean, they will give you the chance.
Yeah, I think, I mean, I think that's definitely the, the intrigue with me.
I know I only played two years of college, college football.
So there's a lot of question marks, but at the same time, like, I think I'm very like, developmental and coachable.
So they can kind of mold me into the
player that they want to be.
There was a kid at North, I don't mean, but there's a kid at Northern Michigan.
Yeah, Jake Witt.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I
worked out and we have the same agent.
He's drafted by the Colts, right?
Yep.
But he was a basketball player and then decided but he got hurt or something gave it up then right?
Yeah, I think he played like two or three years for the Colts, but then he's back in he's back in the UP now
Okay, he'll never leave the UP again.
Yeah, trust
me on this.
You're
one
of the few John
This trust me on this if somebody leaves the UP and moves back to the UP They will never leave the UP for the rest of your life true or false.
Yes.
That's true
Hey, tell me let's just talk next minute these
Personality I was on a national radio show on time when that guy and I think it was played for Baltimore or something and killed people Ray Caruth No,
Ray Lewis.
Yeah.
No, no, no,
no, Ray Lewis did
no, I don't know Anyway, and then the Packers really way heavy on the personality on the test and the psychological profile is this a good guy is gonna be good in the locker room.
Have you gone through that or is that killed anybody?
Well, I'm
not on Russia
That wasn't my question.
My question is, how do they know you're a good guy?
Like, have you sat down with someone?
Did a shrink sit down with you and send something in that, look, this guy's solid.
He comes from a good family.
Yeah.
Oh, that's a lot of the questions they ask us is our background and information and stuff like that.
But also, I was at the CGS All Star game down in Texas in January and like, we had a couple of tests like that with some personality tests that some teams requested.
So.
They definitely dive into that kind of
stuff.
You just take that test once and it goes out to all the teams or do you have to take it for each team?
Yeah, no, I think they send it to every team that requests it.
All right.
Now, what are like heading into this weekend?
Again, a kid growing up in Peshtigo, Wisconsin, where the highlight was going up to Monomony, I would imagine, right?
Yeah, or going to Mickey Luz.
Yeah, Mickey Luz.
But what are some of the things where you have to say to yourself, you know, all that hard work of whatever happens after this happens, okay?
You got to feel good.
You know what I'm saying, to at least be in this position.
Can you describe that?
Yeah, I'm definitely grateful.
I mean, a couple years ago, I always thought this was the path I was going to be on, but taking it here, looking back at that, this is where I wanted to be.
So it's kind of a cool experience.
That's awesome.
Good for you.
So
where are you going to be?
I'm going to begin to peer.
I got a house with a couple of my high school friends.
So I'll probably just be there.
My parents wanted me to go back up the patch to go, but I was like, I'm not going to do that.
You can hang out with us.
Yeah.
You know, we should know it'd be a good thing to do.
Have the networks at the fire museum.
Yeah.
I love the Paschical Fire Museum in the little church or
whatever.
Oh, man, I love that place.
That's let me ask you one other thing.
Mitchell VanVoren, who's hoping to be drafted St.
Norbert College, unbelievable athlete, you know, worldwide.
I just got asked.
So Olympic wise, did you put that on the back burner?
going to market as a freshman, I always thought, but I'm kind of a heavy guy, compared to that.
I mean, the Olympic standard, like for the, to make trials in the USA for the foreign hurdles was 50 flat.
So I think if I didn't hit that last hurdle in that one race, I probably would have been close to that, which may have like changed my, my road a little bit.
Cause I was talking to Madison in Miami about running track after market.
And I thought about doing that, but I was like, at the end of the day, I want to go play football.
So I took that route instead.
Would you rather be in the, on the United States, the Olympic team or the.
Carolina Panthers NFL roster.
Definitely the NFL route.
I think, I mean, that's the dream I had growing up.
So that's what I want to do.
Good for you, man.
Big football family, but, you know, and sports has brought us all together.
But I will tell you that, I mean, just a genuine individual, the family is very genuine.
I mean, I've known his parents, I've known his brothers, a great family and best of luck this next week.
Thank
you.
And all those stuff that's going
on with the draft, definitely get up to the bell and parking lot
at
10 of town.
Great food trucks
food trucks vendors and the money goes to
charity, which is very
cool.
It stays right here locally Yeah, good great organization.
So all right, we'll see out there
Mitchell.
We're gonna be so excited just following your your whole career path.
What's gonna happen here?
Yeah,
just get into a camp.
Yeah, and just kick You know what I'm saying?
No friends.
No
friends.
Everybody's an enemy.
Just go a bleep.
Yes, sir.
All right.
All right
Great
having you here.
Mark Houston, you're the
best.
We'll see you this week.
Back after.
For WGBW and WISS News, I'm Lisa Hale.
If you're driving to the NFL Draft in Green Bay next week, the Wisconsin Department of Transportation says check 511wi.gov for traffic conditions and plan for extra travel time.
Hundreds of thousands of fans are expected to travel to Lambeau Field in Green Bay April 24th through the 26th.
Wisdott warns that construction is starting up for many highway projects and motorists are reminded to slow down and avoid distractions, especially in those work zones.
Significant road construction projects that may impact travel late next week in our area include construction on I-41 between Appleton and Green Bay and on I-41 between Military Road and Fond du Lac in Highway 26 in Oshkosh.
A man riding on a tractor was killed and its driver was injured after a pickup
truck rear ended the tractor and will pack a county this week.
The accident happened Wednesday night just after 8 30 on State Highway 22 in the town of Little Wolf.
Officials say the tractor was rear ended by a pickup causing the driver and passenger of the tractor to be ejected.
The passenger was then struck by another vehicle.
The passenger died at the scene and the driver was taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
The crash is being investigated by the Wapaka Sheriff's Department.
The collaborative beer created to commemorate the NFL Draft 2025 coming to Green Bay next week is available and on tap at breweries throughout the Greater Green Bay area.
Nine breweries came together to develop the brew that's described as hoppy, hazy, and slightly fruity with plenty of flavor.
Only 45 barrels of the special beer were brewed.
That works out to over 11,000 pints.
Canned pints will only be available at the Draft City Music Fest downtown Wednesday
and Saturday.
I'm Lisa Hale for WGBW and W-I-S-S News.
For news anytime visit
civicmedia.us.
to you.
Mino and the Mayor's top craft pick, drafting Northeast Wisconsin's finest one sip at a time.
Now back to Mino and the Mayor.
Here's John Mino and Jim Schmidt.
Hey, thank you very much.
Very special.
Thanks to Mark Hewson, Bellensports of Madison.
They've got such amazing things going on over there over the next week.
But Mark Hewson, bringing in Mitchell VanVoren for Bellensports of Madison.
Great, unbelievable track athlete at Pesco High School, the University of Marquette.
And
Then st.
Norbert playing tight end and he has a chance to be drafted this weekend in the NFL draft 65 to 45 runs a 4-6.
He's got all the essentials So best of luck to you Mitchell.
We're gonna be following you brother.
Yeah, talk about some other crazy athletes walking in the room right here We got Sam Eli and TJ bowls hybrid wrestling entertainment and Jim.
It was great.
We had about a month ago
We had a great time introducing some of the folks out there.
Great crowd, great people.
An awesome venue.
An awesome venue.
The only negative is, if we ever do that again, you got to adjust something because Jim couldn't walk across the map without
falling over.
Did you see that?
Yes, yes.
And you're a wrestler, Eli.
We didn't like practice walking on that mat.
And so then I went through the rope.
I heard
these people laughing.
What did I say that was so funny?
I didn't know him behind me was for you.
He was like a drunk guy walking across
the street.
And John, you know, to have my back starts jumping up and down, which we made it all the worse for me.
I'm trying to talk.
And anyway, I'll have it better next year.
I introduced one of the wrestlers and John did the other one.
And I was just really impressed with the crowd.
So we had a lot of fun.
Oh, yeah,
it was legitimately standing room only and even then it was just hard.
It was hard to find anywhere to stand.
It was a great turnout, amazing turnout, which real fast.
I just want to announce that I got some news early this morning.
Big news online pre online sell online sales for tonight's show is sold out as well.
Oh, wow.
Second show in a row now that we have actually sold out.
Wow.
So the only way to get tickets now is walking up at the show.
And folks,
I'm not blowing smoke.
I was talking with you guys before the before we came on.
like that night where there people have to come there and experience it's an experience like I said you could be from us and Todd
that close to the wrestlers doing amazing athletic things off the top of the turnbuckles double flips do whatever this is really this is professional level i know it doesn't have the glitz and glamour of you know whatever whatever whatever man and everything but you guys put on a hell of a show and Eli you're one of those people yes sir we're not lying we don't have anything to do with tonight show or anything like that
But you guys are truly impressive to watch, right, Jim?
Oh, yeah, you guys are great athletes.
And it's fun
to watch great athletes.
What do you think of the place?
Have you
wrestled there before?
Absolutely.
You know, I've been with hybrid for, I want to say, almost a year.
I think since almost since the beginning.
You're one of our originals, one of, you know, almost since the beginning.
So, you know, I've been there regularly and.
you know, to TJ's credit, the environment, professionality backstage, like you said, amazing place to be.
And like you said, for the fans, I'm one of the guys that's coming over the rope to you and I might land in your lap.
So, you know, it's, it's a crazy atmosphere and TJ's kind of built that and he's given me a platform to be a part of that.
What people don't realize as far as athleticism part.
Okay, everybody can, we could do a quick little thing here, like, you know, hold your punch with a really punch from the face, whatever, but you can't fake the flips and the
Body shots, you guys inflict on each other.
That's right.
You can't fake that.
Oh, yeah.
You were in the ring.
You feel how stiff that ring is.
Yes.
So tell me about that experience.
How do you adapt yourself to be able to do something like that?
Honestly, you just have to commit to it.
You've got to commit your body.
You've got to be in the gym.
You've got to do the work.
Like Jim was saying, with the footwork in the ring, you've got to be sound.
You've got to get your reps in.
And you've got to put time into it.
That's really what it is.
Like any other skill, you have to put the time in and you have to respect it.
And if you don't do it, that's where the injury
factor could come in, correct?
Oh, I don't even want to see you in the ring.
If you're not committed, if you're not fully trained, if you think it's a game, then I'm not even interested.
I want people that are going to be professional.
are invested in everyone's safety first and foremost, including the fans, because some people get reckless outside the ring too.
But tell you what, once you cross that threshold and you respect that, that's when you start becoming a pro.
And that's when I really want to want to start having that conversation with you.
Very
cool.
Yeah, and Sam, I just want to say now if this comes from TJ or your upbringing, but you guys are nice people.
You know, I just sometimes you go backstage and there's divas and we've spent a lot of time backstage with people and
I had these flashbacks of John Stossel, you're too young, but you got punched in the ear.
Oh, I remember that, you bet.
Those big dudes.
But it was just a nice group of people, and I don't know if you
pre-streamed them.
Didn't something happen to Geraldo with the wrestler?
Wasn't that on a show where somebody took a chair and lost to his nose or something?
I think
I remember hearing about that.
Anyway, it's a great atmosphere, it's a safe, fun atmosphere.
So
being in the wrestling world for as long as I have, you do get to know people.
Don't get me wrong.
There are those people in
the
wrestling world.
There are those
people in radio.
But there
are people in this studio.
But being a promoter, that's part of my responsibility, helping booking, doing the promoting and all that stuff.
Because it's a team effort.
It's me, Ethan, and a guy named Josh.
And we are proud of what we've been able to build here.
Part of our responsibility is making sure we bring people into that locker room that not only have the skill set, you know But also have that professional mentality and really we're all here for the same thing.
We're all here because we love it We're all here to make wrestle.
We're all here to put smiles on people's faces and just making a good environment backstage, you know, we could feel that
With
us being civilians or whatever you want to call it, we could feel that type of bonding backstage with everybody.
And there's a word that TJ left out there that I think is very important for this particular conversation, and that's culture.
TJ and the boys backstage have cultivated an amazing culture so that when other people come in when they're new, maybe they haven't been there one of the originals like me, but they come in there and immediately they feel that just like you guys did.
That's the goal.
Do they walk in and they know, okay, here's what the expectations are.
This is Jim on here's a professional wrestler.
We just got this text in.
We just got this text in wondering if we could get Jim on the ticket tonight.
Okay.
Everybody talks about you wanting to be in wrestling.
I have
an event tonight.
I'm going to this event tonight.
And we'll talk about that.
We'll give tickets away to ours.
Or I would be at yours.
I did enjoy that.
I mean, you're gonna wear those boots and you're not gonna come over?
Come
on.
Give yourselves a plug.
What's going on today?
So tonight at Badger State Brewing Company at the Barrow House, it is Barrow House Blitz presented by Hybrid Wrestling Entertainment.
There we have seven or eight great matches planned for you tonight.
One of which being Sam Ely here to my right.
Facing off against Sierra, who is a Midwest staple, one of the best ever, honestly, one of the best female talents, one of the best talents in general.
Main event is Shaq Jordan versus Joey, Jet Avalon.
Tickets are at the door, only $15.
Front row is sold out.
Online is sold out.
And they get there early.
We were there,
and we got to like, like, it's
like, those front row people, they are there like an
hour before.
They're hanging out, they're hanging out.
Doors open at 6.30, all the information can be found online.
Beautiful.
It's a... It's a
badger.
There's a bar, there's popcorn, right?
They
got all the fixings.
Hey,
who brought in the sushi backstage?
That
was incredible.
So kind of with the whole culture thing, right?
You really grow a community.
One of my good friends at work knows that I do this, and she just wants to support any way she can.
She made, I think it was a hand-made 150 homemade egg rolls for
the wrestlers
backstage.
That was
amazing.
That was
her?
Yep, yeah.
Oh my
God, I didn't know that.
Was that great?
So at Badger State, you know, it's great.
There's a lot of parking there, free surface parking.
It's gonna be 150 bucks on Wednesday.
That's a good idea.
That's
very strategic.
Put a boot on and nobody will touch it.
Or wear those orange stickers.
They
already got them.
How did you get into this?
How did you become a pro wrestler?
From being a fan, you know, a lot of guys come in, they see what they love on TV and they think, man, I can...
I can really do this.
I want to give this a shot, you know.
Everybody thinks anybody can
do it, but when you
get in that ring, what was that like?
You know, I, I, I tried to go into it thinking, or this is probably bigger than I think, right?
There's a lot of things behind the scenes that I'm not privy to.
So I tried to keep that cognizant, but even with that, when I got in the ring, wobbly legs, just like Jim, you know, it definitely wasn't just you.
I was like, oh wow, okay, this is different.
And
You just have to keep staying consistent and keep wanting it because that it throws you.
But it's not that you're like, okay, somebody wants to be, then go to a driving range every day.
You can go shoot baskets.
But your sport, you're so dependent on the other people.
Yes, you have to trust.
That's the number one thing.
Your number one job is to keep that other person safe, right?
Make sure they're okay.
On top of that, you can't be a strong performer.
You can't do your job without their help.
So you inherently need each other in order to excel.
in something that is really an individual sport for the most part, right?
Right.
So, but you have to have that trust and it creates that brotherhood that you see in the locker room because everyone has to develop that and you have to earn it with each other.
You earn that trust and that's everyone you see it.
You're putting your life and your livelihood in another person's hands.
Hey, with
those
flips you guys do off the top of the turnbuckles.
Is that still, is that an old man turn the turnbuckles?
No, no.
Is that what they're called?
I actually wanted to use that as my radio name.
Turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle,
turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle,
turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle,
turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle,
turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle,
turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle, turnbuckle,
You
guys revived it.
It's something that my main focus was was we've had professional wrestling in this area since 98 Unfortunately, a lot of people didn't even know that and so Being at so many promotions.
I've gone.
I will say this.
Yeah, you guys have a great venue now
because I remember some of those it'd be at like the VFW or the American Legion, you know, it just didn't have that you guys have a cool
or out when you walk into that room.
We
cannot thank Badger
State enough for all they
do for us.
Honestly, that is the best place in Green Bay for us to have this, honestly,
I
think, with respect to any other venues who want to bring us in.
Badger State is an amazing place, and they themselves are so good for the community as well.
They do so many things for the community, so many great events.
It's such a great place.
Yeah, we love them.
I mean, they check
a lot of boxes, and they got a little bit of a...
Everybody goes there, but they have a little bit of a younger demographic there, too There's a lot of charitable things there and yeah, we're very excited about what they're gonna be doing for the draft as well I mean they've got I
hate to bring it up one negative against bad
but go ahead and bring it up.
That's right.
Go ahead.
Yeah, Jim and I went there for a charity event
We didn't have any money
Everybody else was drinking the
beer that they're in.
We had to drink water because we didn't have.
We didn't
have six dollars cash
between us.
Oh
no.
The guy didn't cut us a deal.
Nope.
Six bucks are like.
So I want you to tear into somebody tonight.
You guys stick
around.
We're talking with Sam Ely and TJ Bulls hybrid wrestling entertainment back after this.
Hey, welcome back.
Come on to the mayor here.
Sam Eli and TJ Bowles, hybrid wrestling entertainment.
Barrel House Blitz coming your way tonight in, is that a Schwab under Green Bay?
Green Bay?
That's Green Bay.
Green Bay.
Okay.
Yep,
Badger State.
Yep, Badger State.
Tonight, the door's open at 6.30.
Show starts at 7.30.
General admission is $15 because online is sold out.
Front row is sold out.
I want to say one thing.
Cuz I used to be a big pro wrestler fan back in the day like all of us.
You're the old version And I hated when it got real skanky with Vince McMahon type things with the women it's
like It was the 90s everything was edgy everything This was just the culture at the time I'm happy that we've gotten away from that you guys are nothing like that in fact with women wrestlers like I don't even
They're just wrestlers, you know, like we actually, they're
athletes.
That's the number one thing
I need to get, or whatever it took away from me.
You people are serious athletes.
Yeah, our area does have, or like our company, I should say, has actually a lot of inner gender matches.
You know why?
Because the women can hit just as hard as the dudes.
They kick ass, that's who you would.
Yeah, like they are just as strong, just as competitive, just as good, honestly better than a...
good amount of men I know like it's just it's wrestlers.
I remember we had
somebody in here one day and I actually tied this morning.
We're just off.
I have so much respect for female law enforcement people, female veterans, female, but and I was telling somebody, man, these, you know, these young women, you know, and he's like.
Buddy, do you know how tough they are?
I'm like wait make sure they'll go to boot camp Whatever's in the morning.
They will lift they will do whatever you don't want to mess
with
these ladies Don't think of them as you used to think of your sisters back
in the
70s.
Oh, yeah
They're a different level and it's the same thing with you folks, right?
Oh, absolutely on tonight.
I'm facing Sierra.
Yep, and she is picture perfect exactly what you're talking is that one
Jim and I met
No,
no, okay, okay, but
that's gonna
hurt a little bit more when you lose to a woman or no Is it just this is it all equal?
You know what?
This is actually my first You know what if I
play ground if I lose
tonight it'll be to a
competitor
Sam is wrestling tonight.
She is, she's been on TV.
She is one of the best in the Midwest.
She's been, so every year, pro wrestling goes straight.
It puts out a top 500, 500 wrestlers in the country, which honestly, there's probably about 1500, 2000, right?
She makes like the top 400, top 300 every time.
And she's, you're
wrestling her tonight?
Oh yeah.
Oh wow.
She's genuinely considered one of the best in the country period.
Where's she from?
She's from Milwaukee.
Wow, that's cool.
It'd be fun to get her on next time or something.
Yeah.
Yeah.
No
disrespect, Eli.
Eli, what type of sports did you play, like growing up or high school or whatever?
You know, I did the high school football, basketball.
OK.
And then after that, you know, when I transitioned out of out of high school into adult life, I got more into wrestling after that.
And you weren't a high school
wrestler,
though.
No, you know, it ran at the same time as basketball.
So it's good.
Where'd you go to high school?
I went to a couple of different high schools.
I moved around a lot.
I lived in the city, went to Ohio for a bit, and then I moved out back to Illinois for a bit.
And when I say the city, I mean Chicago.
The city.
I always forget that we're not in town right now.
Eli, is that who you are?
We gotta
have a spree.
That's Sierra.
Yes, that is Sierra.
She looks mean.
You know what she can be mean she's got a streak to her, but you know what she is a tough competitor She's a great woman.
She's a great friend honestly, you know, but behind the scenes.
She's she's amazing
Honestly
to if you bring up the fact all your girl wrestler whatever right and if like you're wrestling her and you bring her that up bring that up to her
She's going to hit you harder.
Oh, yeah.
Right.
Right.
She's going
to lay it in.
I told you I was just joking
about
that.
All right.
You said you wanted to bring her in, so.
Yeah.
Get her.
Worked
up.
Oh, yeah.
He was and I show you what he said about you.
Oh, yeah.
I'm right when I see her.
I'm like, hey.
Sierra, Sierra.
I had, I had he lay
on my shoulder.
He said
he'd
live
or lose to a girl.
Just for that, I'll let you in on a little after party secret with Sierra there.
She's one of my best friends.
I love Sierra.
She's a great person.
So I'm always hanging out at the after parties with her and stuff.
One of the things she loves to do when she starts drinking in after-party, she just wants to find a guy to fight.
She wants to beat up a man for no reason.
That's how I met her.
She came up to me.
I didn't know her yet.
First thing out of her mouth is, what?
You want to fight?
Oh my God.
And I wheel around.
I'm like, what the heck?
And I see it's her.
And I came to my senses.
I was like, hell
yeah, I want
to fight.
And that's how we met.
But not
you.
I mean,
me and her, we went nose to nose just about after that.
Where
are you in the lineup tonight?
Oh,
where are we?
You are you are opening?
Yeah, we're getting the crowd.
Yes.
Oh man.
He's big in the EDM stuff like he gets
the crowd going Sam Eli TJ bulls hybrid wrestling entertainment barrel house Blitz at Badger State Brewing in Green Bay right of course by the legacy and that that whole cool district
beautiful beautiful
area Legends area great having you guys on we sure enjoy this relationship.
We've had with you
all I'm so thankful for your
You guys support your guys is everything you guys do for us.
It's so nice.
Yeah, let's keep it rock.
Hey, this is my first
radio bit.
Thank you guys.
If
you
lose
tonight, we'll still talk about you.
You just
Those are the brakes, aren't
they?
He liked great having you on buddy have a great show tonight TJ congratulations.
What a great success
Do me a favor though.
Keep the thrill in line.
Nobody can do that, man.
Nobody can do
that.
He called the thrill for a reason.
What are we gonna
do with him?
I don't know.
Get him in the ring.
Get him in the ring.
He's better in the ring, not with Sierra, but I'm pretty sure he'd be afraid of that.
He and I will wrestle someday.
Quick break, back after
this.
Stay.
Coming to Northeast Wisconsin live from the Civic Media Studios and featuring TV and radio broadcast veteran John Minow along with the City of Green Bay's longest-serving mayor Jim Schmidt.
This is Minow and the Mayor.
And here are your hosts, John Minow and Jim Schmidt.
Hey,
thank you very much.
Welcome back.
Hour number three of Minow and the Mayor here on a good-looking Friday morning, 97.9 FMW, GBW, 98.3, 96.5 FMW, ISS in Appleton and Oshkosh, and of course, the Civic Media app, along with the 1100 AM and 1590 AM.
48.
Thank you, Todd.
We've only been doing this for two years, and I've always had to look.
Norm, I usually look when I'm gonna have the signs up here with our frequencies, where it's like, couldn't quite.
What's the
frequency, Kenneth?
None of your business.
Dennis, I'm playing
that
next.
48 degrees in Green Bay, 52 in Appleton, 51 in Oshkosh, cloudy showers, possible storms this afternoon, high in the mid-60s.
We will take the mid-60s.
Oh, yeah.
Oh,
man.
All day.
Vanessa Moran was
here two miles for autism.
Meadowbrook Elementary School tomorrow morning.
They're doing their walk and run.
Lisa Hale, new WISCO weekend.
They've got some unbelievable stories coming up.
Mark Hughes and Mitchell VanVoren from Belvin Sports Medicine.
Man, Mitchell's hoping to have his name called this weekend as a tight end of the National Football League.
Sam Ely and TJ Boles, hybrid wrestling entertainment.
And Todd, before we bring up these distinguished gentlemen and Dennis.
Tell us what we're giving away.
Oh, we got some tickets for tonight's epic center event.
Jim, you want to give us some details on that?
Sure.
Grand
Union's playing.
They've been on... Grand Union is awesome.
Hey, Dennis.
Great friends.
Yeah.
Unbelievable friends, yes.
They are, and they're good.
They are
great.
They're bringing their whole orchestra out there, their whole band tonight.
They're here with two
that ladies got a great voice.
Oh, incredible,
yeah.
Incredible.
They're coming with their whole crew.
It's not the epic center tonight.
It's a charity fundraiser for the new community shelter, but 50 bucks.
And it's...
Tons of food.
Phenomenal food.
It is.
It is.
It's a great food.
I mean, phenomenal.
And it's, you know, there's seating, there's tables you can sit at and listen to this great music, and there's silent auction, and door prizes.
And it's just a great event.
And I'm sure a lot of you have been to the Epic Center.
But we're giving away tickets, two tickets to
whom?
Paradise.
Well, let's do that tonight.
We will give them away.
You can text in right now if you'd like to go to the Epic Center tonight for the big show.
We'd love to send them.
Great event,
people.
No BS.
This is a great event.
Download the Civic Media app right now.
Choose your station, WGPW or WISS.
Lower right hand corner.
There's a text button.
Use that.
Say, hey, I want to go to the epic tonight.
And we will set you up with a pair of tickets that will be at Will Call.
And I actually got a text from the top, um, Bishop.
in the state.
He said, even though it's Good Friday, you can eat meat.
They got a special just for infestation.
From the top of character.
I mean, I don't know if you guys, I'm in the, I'm in the Ultra Boy Hall of Fame.
Yeah.
It
was a phenomenal ball.
You said a lot there, John.
Yeah.
I'm lying so much right now.
It's mine on Good
Friday.
It's unbelievable.
Everything coming out of my mouth is a lie.
Except.
What a great event you guys where we got Dennis Peters here from the glam band of course every Friday We love having him here and you know the number one thing you know people can brag about Dennis being the great singer vocalist of the year He's up for the top award again in the state of Wisconsin the note.
I don't think of Dennis that way I think of Dennis as being a tremendous.
Oh look at that
Jim.
Here's a 20 for you.
Thanks.
Thanks buddy Thanks friend
the thing I'm most proud about and most I don't just
Respectful with him tremendous military career.
Oh, yeah
spent
many many years Raising his right hand saying he'd put his life in the line for our country and that's what I love having him We're talking about your great free fall thing good, but Dennis is like the most fervent Advocate for supporting veterans and veteran causes that you'll ever
meet.
I'm in.
Yeah, cool.
I'm great to see you guys.
Thank you.
I love that shirt man.
That's pretty impressive
Is he the shirt?
It's a cool shirt.
Yeah.
I don't have a cool shirt.
Why don't I have a cool one like that?
I think it's the best sweatshirt in the business.
Well, I'll tell you
what, these guys do an event, and I've been involved with it.
What was the first year?
2015?
2015 was the first event in Almereau.
So let's talk a little bit with us, because I've always wanted to do it for whatever reason.
I swear to God, for 10 years now, something has come up on that day where I can't jump out of an airplane.
Here
we go.
Yeah.
With
you
guys.
Here we go.
But
whatever.
Hey, Jim.
Howard.
Jim, actually, wow.
Maybe it's life.
insurance Jim
Jim who was a pothead somewhat I'm sorry so when he was at St.
Norbert he actually put a sign up on his door if you want to get high Saturday contact
true it's true that is true we needed 20 people to
skydive in Omro because it was much cheaper.
It was like $80 instead of like $150.
So I call that the
group rate.
Right.
It was the group rate.
So I said, if you want to get high, call room 319, which is where I live.
And people called and they're like, what's this all about, man?
And I'm like, hey, then they came up and I got the people we needed.
We all went out there on a Saturday and the training was like.
like an hour.
It just wasn't very in depth at all.
And then we went up, you know, it's 3,000 feet.
It wasn't
no high, but
it was static line.
Yeah, it was great.
That was a lot of fun.
And then back to his dormer, they got even higher.
Just learned the toggles.
And anyway, that was a real thrill.
And the truth that that's the first time I ever flew.
I jumped out.
Yeah.
That was cool.
I've
taken, I've taken plenty of people.
I
bet you
never, never been in an airplane.
Right.
and then they jump out.
I want you guys to introduce yourselves and tell everybody what you guys do.
I want you to put it in your own words.
All right.
My name is Andy Van Handel.
I've been involved with the Freedom Freefall event since 2015.
When a good friend, John Mayno, was part of it.
Here's a whole history.
We could literally talk for hours about the history of the event.
Basically paired up with
My friend Vinnie here with the Hula group stands for helping out American heroes.
Just an incredible
group.
Tremendous
organization.
They
are an absolute machine in what they do for veterans in this state.
We got the event going where we pay for veterans to go on a tandem skydive.
To date, I think we put up over 200 veterans in the 10 years we've
been doing.
And again, I was telling these guys a story for when on the air.
The first year I was there in 2015, I did an interview with a guy.
The last time he had jumped off an airplane was on D-Day in the Invasion Dennis.
Unbelievable.
Yes.
Yeah, the first year I took nine veterans from six different wars in one day.
I went out to the DZ that day thinking it's just going to be miserable.
It's going to be hot.
And it was, it was August.
It was so hot.
It was mind boggling.
It was miserable.
But I went home with tears of my eyes and not because of the work we did physically, but I call Will Culkin, who was the founder of Hula Wisconsin.
And I said, brother, we're doing this every year.
I don't care what we have to do because it takes money.
It's guy diving is very expensive sport.
Uh, but we've literally
has changed lives doing it.
Just last year, I took a Marine Corps veteran and in the airplane, he was outright scared.
And there was a whole thing before the event.
His truck broke down, hooked him up with another veteran who I actually went to high school with and they carpooled down there.
I took David out of the airplane.
And when we landed, the other instructor in the plane says to me, man, I'm surprised you got him out because he was that scared.
Wow.
better part of this whole story is the next day, David messages me and said, that was more adrenaline than the battle of Fallujah.
Yeah.
And then I get chills just talking about that.
It's like, wow.
I mean, this is something with when these guys jump out of that airplane, they hit the girl and they're going, holy man, like,
okay.
Well, let's back up then.
Let's talk about a very, you know,
Poignant thing where this all began with we won't even say her name But a very good friend of ours where this whole thing came about and the prevention of sue I mean the main reason for this is to help bring awareness to suicide prevention.
Yeah with veterans So go ahead guys.
I shouldn't say just better But also not just veterans but their spouses their girlfriends their boys there.
Okay, so go ahead.
So we
back in 2014 or so, I was jumping at the drop zone in Pulaski, which we have our June 14th event this year.
And we have a July 12th event in Madison this year at seven Hillscott.
I was, but I was jumping up there and I had met charity.
I'm not a big believer in fate really, but I met her.
She told me her story is incredible story.
In the meantime, the drops on at the time had closed.
The owner closed the stores, couldn't afford to keep it open or whatever anymore.
And we had just kept in touch and she hooked up with the, the who a group and you know, her story was at, at her fiance, it was a veteran PTSD suicide.
She had this whole thing.
She's going to try skydive and kind of memorialize them.
Yada, yada, yada.
She found out skydive was her therapy.
And I could understand that as a skydiver, I go back to 2001 when the whole world shut down after nine 11, all general aviation, rightfully so.
But I remember going out to the drop zone, being very angry at a lot of things.
Cause I couldn't jump.
Skydive was my drug, my form of therapy, you know?
Yeah.
Right there.
And it was, uh, that was the first year, the, the first freedom free fall event.
And, uh, I remember charity was in the airplane with me and, and Ollie, who was our World War two fighter and she got some, some video of us jumping out and, and I tell you, it was life changing for me.
The, the, the first freedom free fall event.
I remember being in the airplane in Oli.
There was a Korean war veteran we took later on that day.
I'm showing these guys pictures from that day.
Look at those smiles, man.
Yeah.
Hard to beat those.
Was I thinner then?
Yes or no?
A little
bit.
Perfect.
A little bit.
Thank God.
I see a free soul in that picture.
But that's, yes.
And that's the World War II veteran would jump that day.
It is just so.
I was nervous in the plane.
My thought was don't break the veteran, you
know,
cause I
mean, 95 with him.
Yeah.
95 years old.
He wasn't super mobile, but you know, so there's a lot of extra care.
You know, I, at the time, I think I probably had two or 3000 skydives.
I've currently have 3,800 now.
You've
jumped 3,800 times.
Um, yeah.
I mean, that sounds like a lot.
If they go to a bigger drop zone and I'm a small fish in a big pond, you know, but around here, I'm a
big fish and a small pond.
So, but yeah, I know Vinny wants to talk more about who and the incredible
again.
Let's get right to the heart of why we do this or you guys do this.
Go ahead,
Vinny.
All right.
I'm Vinny.
I've been part of veterans organizations for Chris Vincent, better Chris Vincent, better part of 20 years.
I just, I didn't serve myself, but I have the ultimate respect for all my, all my friends and family that did serve.
Thank you, brother, for coming.
Thank you for letting me.
And it's just, I tried to give back whatever way I can.
And I was fortunate to become a board member of Huah, Wisconsin.
And I took on, Will asked me if I would kind of take over the free fall project.
I said, absolutely.
And my first year- And we're talking about Will Coken, who comes on our show on a regular basis, basically, with Fourth, who just a tremendous job.
Right.
And my first free fall event, I tell you what, it was...
You go into it with the unknowns, but I tell Chelsea and will now that the only way you guys will take it away from me is if I die So this is such a great program.
I've had fortunate enough to have so many so many awesome vets A lot of them came from dark places and they we do what we do with them and
It's like night and day.
It's like a light turns back on in their eyes.
We're going to send a
quick break.
When we come back, we're going to talk a little bit about that.
Again, we're going to get to the roots of this and how this is formed to help prevent suicide with veterans.
Andy Van Handel, Chris Vincent, and Freedom Freefall event coming up.
Veterans Salute Olsen Legal Group out of Oshkosh and New Berlin.
Back right after
this.
In America too, she's a good girl.
She's
crazy about Elvis.
Love Scorsese and her boyfriend too.
Her home is broke in the
heart.
I'm free.
I'm free falling.
Great song, Todd.
We're with two very special gentlemen, Andy Van Handel and Chris Vincent, Vinnie Huah, Freedom Free Fall Event.
Veteran Salute Olson Legal Group, who is a veteran of Purple Heart Recipient from pretty much right around Baghdad.
Uh, great, great people down there.
Olsen legal group in Oshkosh and Berlin and we're talking about the free fall event and Jim, I give you credit.
I give you credit.
You did something that I could never do.
You jumped out of an airplane.
Congratulations.
Um, for doing that, but we've got it.
We've got a great event.
It's 10.
This should be the 10 year anniversary.
Love.
This is the 11th.
Wow.
And, um,
Where it all began it began and I don't want to say a dark place, but let's just be honest It began but Dennis read this text.
We just got here from Ted from Green Bay
Ted says I went to last year's event in Pulaski as a spectator The smiles on the faces of the veterans after they jumped was an incredible sight airborne Ted from Green Bay.
Thanks to that.
That is very true If
I could just make a comment about that is a smidget
a smidgen of the feedback we get.
I mean, it's
crazy.
I mean, the goal of this year is to jump 20 veterans in Pulaski and 20 in Madison again.
You know, it's a lot of work on the back end on mine and Vinny's part.
You're doing the follow up, make sure we get people there and
let's go to that dark place.
Yeah.
So, I
mean, this part's all fun, but
there's a real dark place.
This
all began.
The whole reason, the whole mission of the event is to prevent veteran suicide and show these guys and gals life again.
Last year in Pulaski, we took two moms who lost their sons to suicide.
And I
did not
know there was not a dry eye in the whole place, man.
Like it was.
And I always submit an article to parachutist magazine after the event.
So much to the point that Laura at parachutist magazine looks forward to my article every year.
And I sent her literally a seven page word document this year, knowing it wasn't going to all get published because I wanted to get feedback from our moms that we took and.
And Laura at Perish's emails me back and she's like, well, this is awesome, but I have to cut it down for space.
I said, understood, but I had to get these stories out there.
It's important to literally life changing, you know, and it's, if some of these guys are right on the brink and, you know, back in November, I got to call it.
Hopefully no one gets it.
My sister took her own life.
And there were zero signs, man, like none.
My sister was not a veteran, but she's just going to show you the people that are, are awesome at who a week later was who was annual, uh, Rock March, their big fundraiser.
I called Tammy up who was the president of who, and I said, I don't know if I'm going to be there or making plans.
She asked me why I told her.
She's like, we got you.
And, and the support group, I mean, some of these guys, like, like this fella that just
Texted in this color.
He was 82nd Airborne Ted was here.
Yeah, just come out and check out the event and the bond with veterans is so close to how skydivers are that's why this works so well Because there's such a bond.
Okay to be in the military.
I mean Dennis can talk about this You got a step out of a comfort zone.
Yeah, I care helping
you or whatever, but it's a whole War I've got some of the toughest veterans I've ever talked to my lifetime and they say the same thing those first couple of nights they basically
Cried in their
bumps.
It's like my god.
What have I gotten into?
Is that true Dennis?
Not for this guy.
No Although the guy above me pissed his pants
But what you guys do with those you take them out of a comfort zone to a different place and that is therapeutic, correct?
Correct.
Absolutely.
A lot of times you'll see it They'll walk in and they're they're just kind of blank.
They're nervous And then they they're sitting around they'll talk with the other veterans and
They get the norm a little bit.
And then you start putting the harness on them.
Then they know this is happening.
And then I drove her all of them.
I says, you know, there's only one way out of that plane and it ain't by you landing with it.
Right.
I mean, when the, when the doors open, it's Wendy.
No sounds a whole lot like gold.
So he just keep going.
You know, but John, you saw that first year of the event, we saw.
Afghanistan and Iraq veterans bonding with the World War two.
It was phenomenal.
Yeah.
It was just so cool to see like, and I remember bud, our Korean war veteran, I would, I would get these guys rigged up.
I'd walk them past their spectator friends on purpose so they could cheer them on and
perp walk them.
You know, so somebody, uh, as bud is like, bud, you excited for this?
And he stops that as chest.
Well, yeah, you don't get excited for this.
You got
for brains, you know,
we're going to text her.
Great job, Andy.
You are so amazing, Jennifer.
I think that's Jennifer from last year that we took.
Yeah.
She's, I think she's a captain in the, in the military and in the army.
And I'll tell you, man, it's, it's a life changing event.
And when we started this fan, I think I had 16 years in the sport.
I've got one of my 26 season now and
When we started the event it literally gave me a whole purpose to the point where when I went down to Seven Hills skydivers in Madison My friends got tired of me talking about it.
Now.
We've actually created within our club We've created a committee for freedom free fall because it gets talked about every month, you know, and
so You there's still some openings, but the people just want to support you because you said this
is
not an inexpensive
I mean, I think that was 40 years ago.
I did this and it was expensive.
So I mean to put this on if people want to donate if they want to send you some money
or
tell us
about how we can you cannot go to the who a Wisconsin's website page.
There's a donation tab on there.
You can just do a general donation or you can just designated for freedom free fall if you like.
Um, any help is always appreciative.
Cause like it is, it's an expensive sport.
And you know what, people can come out that day and help support.
Oh yeah.
I think that's really important.
The more the marry, I mean, you could get the more people to support these guys while they're doing their jumps.
I mean, the better it is.
It's just a great, great day.
You won't be disappointed.
It's right
here in Pulaski.
It's so easy to find, right?
And the date on that is again, June 14th, the Pulaski.
It's a, it's a Saturday before Father's Day.
And then we're having a July 12th event in, in Madison.
And that's actually what they call world skydiving days.
So the veterans that jumped that day become part of a skydiving world record.
And just kind of a cool little promo for these guys too, you know, and, you know, another quick story.
Last year, the first veteran that we took it in Madison, it
was cloudy.
So they had to land with the plane.
We pointed up.
There's a hole they immediately took off.
But one of the first veterans that jumped was my cousin.
And his brother was there.
He's like, and they lost her dad a couple, couple years prior, who was also a veteran.
And then my cousin, Scott, looks like, boy, dad would be really proud of Shane right now.
Like Shane was deathly afraid of heights.
Dad was a carpenter and laughed at him his whole life.
So dad's proud.
So
You guys are phenomenal,
Andy Van Handel, Chris Vincent, Hua, and Freedom Free Fall Event, Veteran Salute Olsen Legal Group coming your way from Oshkosh and Berlin and coming up on June 14th in Pulaski.
Everybody knows where the little airport is
in Pulaski.
Can't miss
that.
Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful work that you gentlemen do.
Thank you.
Thanks guys for having us.
Whatever we're going to
do to promote anything you guys do, we're here with you.
Come out and see us June 14th in July 20th.
Well, the teams get ready to choose their top draft pick.
You can help Mino and the Mayor choose their top craft pick.
Northeast Wisconsin is home to amazing breweries, wineries, cideries, and distilleries.
And we need your help picking the best.
We've drafted 10 of our favorites, but which local craft beverage creator will go to number one?
That's up to you.
Mino and the Mayor's top craft pick.
Drafting Northeast Wisconsin's finest one sip at a time.
Now back to Mino and the Mayor.
Here's John Mino and Jim Schmidt.
Hey, thank you very much.
Welcome
back.
Hey, can I just mention you broke your microphone.
Can you
help John with his microphone?
While we're waiting for that to get fixed, I will just say this.
Don't forget that today at five o'clock is the final time for you to vote for Mino and the Mayor's top craft pick.
And if you haven't done that already, what you want to do is you want to go to our website, www.gbw.fm or wiss.fm.
Right at the top, you'll see a big banner that says Top Craft Pick.
Thank you, Amanda.
the things we have to do for you guys.
You want to do that today before five o'clock, and then next week, Wednesday on this show, we will announce the winner of the Top Crafters, right?
And we'll also announce the winner that voted that's going to walk away with $250 in gift cards from all of the participating sponsors.
And the dentist just mentioned the winner.
He's going to do a live concert for free at their place.
Really?
I
didn't realize that.
Oh, wow.
The things that make me do around here.
It's going to be the day
after he jumps out of the plane with our buddy, Shabua.
In fact, he'll do a concert on the way down.
Oh, perfect.
I
could have a nine-way tie.
Those are all great, right?
And to see it, to taste it is great.
I'm big on packaging and it's just really cool the effort they put into that.
And so many are family owned, which I love that too.
So yeah, that's gonna be fun.
It's incredible.
The quality of product these people and the quality of people that are doing these things.
And the cool
thing that we've learned from them and just dealing with like the guy in Fond du Lac, wonderful young man.
It's like, well, the water is from our backyard in the hills where the limestone filters the water.
And then we grow the corn right out the window.
And that goes in.
So I mean, it's so organic.
It's incredible.
to it and it's just, yeah,
it's fun.
It's fun.
That's
going to be very cool.
And our goal is to get to every one of them because some of them, besides making a great product, they have like festivals, but like like music, you know, in the summer, summer hours and tours.
So I want to, and it's all right here,
right?
Right here.
It's an hour drive.
Appleton, Green Bay.
And so that's all right in our district.
And the other thing we have to do is, you know, is become more conscious with the environment.
It's good to buy local.
Amen.
So, I mean, Jameson's good and some of this other stuff, but Greg Goose, but it's also right here that is grown here.
So, or made here, I should say.
Absolutely.
Anyway, what is time for our mind on the mayor live music series with Dennis Peters from the glam band.
First of all, we got to talk about your gigs coming up.
I hope you're resting this weekend.
No,
man, do you have really?
No, we're playing at Tanner's on Saturday in Kimberly.
Fantastic venue.
I love Tanner's.
Can't wait to play.
I'm ripped.
I'm so excited about it.
I love stopping there after doing high school football games.
I can't believe stopping at Tanner's for a
little sandwich.
It's right there.
The food is so good.
They have an ool outside too.
It's one of the few places around that has an actual pool.
You know, when the summer season kicks in.
It's a fantastic place to be.
And then tell us about this two-week next coming week.
Well, we will be playing.
Let me say that again.
We will be playing at Stadium View Thursday and Friday.
And we can't wait for that.
And do you know that they have
13 bands playing, I mean, you're two of them,
but we had, Melissa, who's their director of marketing?
Maddie, it's Maddie,
Maddie's
on here, she was on her show.
They are really going all in on this draft and I just hope, I hope a lot of people show up and we're expecting 250,000 people.
I'd like to see 250,000, 300,000 people here because there's some great events.
Badger State's doing a lot of things, obviously Anduzzi's is too, but I saw your name on that list a couple
times.
Just like Mark Houston was saying, it's free.
Right.
It's free, you know, so cool.
You have no, no,
check it out.
I don't know how many gigs you guys do a year.
All of
them.
Yeah.
Hundreds.
But it's cool.
It's like, you're going to have an audience that's never seen you before.
every time.
Yeah, especially when we play like this.
I mean, you have people from
Houston, Dallas,
Los
Angeles, wherever seeing you guys.
I think that's kind of cool.
It is really cool.
And it's something we don't take for granted.
That's for sure.
Good for you.
Well, introduce our talent right
here.
Sit
next to us, brother.
Well, I don't know how he wants to be called today, so we didn't have a chance to speak.
Pre-game here, if you will.
So I'll let him introduce himself and how he'd like to be addressed.
And I don't mean any disrespect in that.
Oh, absolutely.
Go right ahead.
Because he's an artiste.
And I don't want to mess with that.
No, I
understand your confusion.
My name is Brandon.
I go by strategic.
There you go.
That's my stage name, yes.
So yeah, good to be with you guys this morning.
Great to have you here,
man.
I've got to ask about the name, strategic.
That's like.
Almost
sounds like
a wrestling name.
It's my rapper name.
And it's both of the Matrix, I don't know.
Yeah, so I was in a band in college and we just kind of broke up, graduated and all that stuff and just went solo and tried to figure out, you know, what...
What kind of name I wanted and what kind of path I wanted to go on and so strategic means like a thought-out purpose.
You guys are all over the place.
I'm strategic.
To hell with you.
Yeah, exactly.
He's bad.
He's nationwide.
I'm still doing this.
How long have you
been on your
own?
It's been just just over 15 years now.
Wow.
I mean, that's been a while.
Well, that's good for you.
I've known this cat for a while.
He doesn't age.
It's amazing.
I don't know what what is it the water?
Is it the rain barrels?
You know, it's not the water I don't really drink a lot.
What are you doing
real life unless I'm playing shows
when you're not strategic.
Oh Always strategic always, you know, I do a lot of stuff.
I do art.
I do some teaching Oh, wow and doing some substitute teaching and stuff like that.
Well, that's cool.
And where are you from?
We're born and raised the whole thing gives all the
bad born and Appleton went to school Milwaukee came back to Appleton been playing
All around the state
we talked about this all the time and and obviously the glam band is you know, so well-known but there are so many talented people in Northeast Wisconsin We're blown away sometimes.
Hey,
yeah,
you got to be pleased with what the community has been doing to elevate that
Oh, yeah, absolutely.
It's maybe especially in Appleton.
We have my own music I know
as you get one coming up this week.
Yeah, you're performing this week Don't they have a mini mile of music coming up.
I
love it if you guys on
they have something going on.
Yes
But I'm not part of
it.
Okay.
They just want to give a taste of they want to get people back, right?
That's why we're all doing events is to get people to come back, right?
And not you want to showcase what you have but anyway, Appleton does a great job from Myla Music, P.A.C.
Just you guys, Lawrence, of course, turns out some great product.
Yeah,
that's great to see.
Yeah.
All right.
It's your specialty.
Yeah.
As far as
music.
Yeah, growing up, what did you want to do?
What kind of music did you listen to?
All those things.
I mean, I had a pretty eclectic taste and I still do it.
I like a lot of rock stuff.
I mean, I kind of found my way to, you know, not, not a lot of the radio stuff and tried to find different.
We're putting you on the spot right
now.
What he's saying is I just said, let's hear some of that music.
He
prefers talk radio and thank you for that.
I don't think that's what he was saying
to be
honest with you.
I heard something like that interpretation.
I heard strategic interpretation, if you will.
All right.
Let's hear some brother.
All right.
I'm gonna do for you guys a Song from my most recent album that came out last year called possibilities and this is a song called with my beating
heart
Make it through this, I just don't know how Chances to prove myself every single day Not afraid to fail and learn from my mistakes
I said and did I still have so much left that I can give
Dennis from the Glam Band Music Series.
Hey,
I heard
you have got something new coming out.
Yeah, so... Something unique.
Always, always.
Life of a musician.
Well, something for our future.
So tell us about that.
Yeah, so that project came out last year and since then I've been... Which is?
Yeah, I've been recording and working on a kids album.
Yeah, I've heard
about
that.
Yeah, actually it's a second volume.
I already released another volume back in...
22.
So it's been out a while and yeah, it's been a
lot of fun.
And what's the message there?
Is it about their, you teach them anatomy?
No, I'm just kidding.
So yeah, I mean, I just, just kind of in line with a lot of what I do, you know, just trying to, you know, be more of a positive voice.
Nice.
And you mentioned you're teaching.
Your teacher.
Uplifting.
Yeah,
I work with kids quite a bit, so.
It was just kind of a natural thing that happened during COVID.
My kids and I playing around and just writing these silly songs.
That's
awesome.
It's
like other people might want to hear these.
I think that's really cool.
Dennis?
Oh, indeed.
Yeah.
So what, you know, here's another example, ladies and gentlemen of an artist around here that I really think should be on a higher level and, you know, and nothing, you know, about this area.
I'm just saying he should be nationwide, nationwide, you know, worldwide.
His music should be out there on that level.
I mean, how do you sing and play so cleanly on a Friday morning?
That's what I want to know.
That's a good word.
Clean.
It's
pure, yeah.
Your voice is just, it's absolutely show ready at 8.30 in the morning.
Why do you do that?
He hasn't gone to bed yet.
Oh, all that coffee I drank.
Is that it?
Doesn't work for me, man.
Not
usually, but.
Tell us about the kids aspect.
I think that's, what type of message are you trying to send in your music to
kids?
Well, I think it's a couple things.
I think, you know, especially in this area, I think family is a big thing.
And so just kind of playing into that a little bit with all the great things that we have going on in this Northeast Wisconsin area.
And just kind of realizing that a lot of the people that we know and friends have a lot of kids and just kind of seeing the culture of music and just trying to be...
Something out there that
but music is a great and Dennis.
I mean you guys do this to me We can talk about you know, okay, we're crazy 80s rock, but there's there's something that connection that you can make through music that you can't
do
in speaking in a hall.
Do you understand?
Yeah, absolutely.
You can create dreams, you know for me for me music is opened up my Insides to the possibilities of something outside of myself, you know something to aspire to something to get out of
You know something holding me back, you know we come back.
Yeah
place of one of your kids songs
Yeah,
okay good.
I
wish I want
to hear that I just think that's great and I want to get you know how people can get your music We'll talk about that, but yeah, that's I think that's awesome.
Good stuff.
Awesome.
Love it.
Thanks strategic in the house Dennis Peter's in the glam band in the house.
How you doing?
It's our favorite part of the week.
It's a Friday back after this
Friday morning with Dennis Peters from the glam band was giving all over the area this next week or so.
That's a rumors get started.
I know, but we're with strategic
right now.
A wonderful local artist.
And I love this.
I mean, we've talked about artists, you know, whatever.
We've never had one that is passionate about doing songs for kids.
And I think this is so you have kids yourself.
I do.
And your teacher.
Yeah.
So this is something near and dear.
Tell us about.
doing something like this, writing songs, and producing them for
children.
Well, the nice thing is they're shorter.
The
kids
or the songs and the
kids.
Shorter attention spans too.
Well
said.
That'll work for
us.
Yeah, I know.
It's been a different process, different in recording, in promoting it.
So it's been a huge learning curve.
So yeah, it's a whole different ball game, but it's fun.
A lot of fun.
A friend of the show Billy Grisak also has been doing some kids songs for a long, long time.
He's got still dealing with some health issues, wanting to say hi to Billy and whatnot.
Mr. Billy.
I love Billy.
So he just wanted to say that we're looking out for him and thinking of him.
The motivation to write kids songs, we're talking about that a little bit.
How do you get your music out there?
Do you do do do schools programs or how do you move your music to get into the ears of young people?
Yeah, I've done a lot of different things.
I've done some festivals and I've done.
farmers markets and a lot of different things like that.
I've been in a few schools and libraries and that's something that I want to push a little bit more with this next release.
Trying to get out there into the community.
I love doing community events so that's yeah, that'd be huge.
I think that's a good market for you simply because it's basically untapped and you can make a living during the day doing such a thing and schools pay for that stuff.
I'm just saying that out loud because... Yeah.
You know, I think that's a fantastic way for a guy like yourself to get your music out there, get paid decently, I mean, really decently for that as well.
Well, it was like to ask musicians
if there was one thing that influenced you.
A relative of your parents
took that spark and they encouraged it.
A teacher or maybe somebody that you saw on TV or listened to.
I'm always curious as to what made you give your life to this.
In general or is there a person is there one thing like your seventh grade music teacher?
No, I
can't pinpoint one specific really instance or thing or person but
When did you pick up your first instrument like when you really get into
I got my first guitar for my 16th birthday my
One
of my friends got
a guitar
and then
I
was like, Oh, well, I want a guitar.
So that was kind of
part of that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like
that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Nice.
I
love it.
How do we get ahold of your music?
Yeah, so Spotify, Amazon, Apple, anywhere you stream music, or Bandcamp is a great one.
I'm sure you know about that.
Where do we find you socially?
Socially is strategic rock.
Usually, if you just look that up, anywhere you'll find me.
Fantastic.
Let's hear some strategic rockin' it out with children's music on your new album.
It's great stuff.
Thanks for being
here.
Yeah, thank
you.
This is
called Shoda.
Show to limit your
screens.
I walked in, saw him sitting on the couch I said, how many have you watched?
They said, I don't know, maybe four or five And I said, I think that is just about enough Next came crying, yelling soda stuff Now it's clear to me you've reached your shoulder
So I said limit your screams, limit your screams Spend time with your family Life is better when we can see your face Turn off the shows, turn off the games Sometimes you just need a little break Find another way to use your brain
Well, it hadn't even been two hours This whole plan went totally sour They are asking me what they can do And I said almost anything that you please Except for staring at a screen That's the way it goes When you've reached your showed up
So I said limit your screams, limit your screams Spend time with your family Life is better when we can see your face Turn off the shows, turn off the games Sometimes you just need a little break Find another way to use your brain
Limit your screens, limit your screams Spend time with your family Life is better when we can see your face Turn off the shows, turn off the games Sometimes you just need a little break Find another way to use your brain All these screens are making us insane Maybe you should go
That is awesome.
I'm in the
rain today.
All standing.
I don't know who's going to vote higher on that.
The kids are the parents.
That's fantastic.
That's a great song.
You got to write it for both.
That is perfect.
Thank you guys so much.
Have a great weekend everybody.
Coming to Northeast Wisconsin live from the Civic Media Studios and featuring TV and radio broadcast veteran John Minow along with the City of Green Bay's longest-serving mayor Jim Schmidt.
This is Minow and the Mayor.
And here are your hosts, John Minow and Jim Schmidt.
Hey,
thank you very much.
Welcome back.
Hour number three of Minow and the Mayor here on a good-looking Friday morning, 97.9 FMW, GBW, 98.3, 96.5 FMW, ISS in Appleton and Oshkosh, and of course, the Civic Media app, along with the 1100 AM and 1590 AM.
48.
Thank you, Todd.
We've only been doing this for two years, and I've always had to look.
Norm, I usually look when I'm gonna have the signs up here with our frequencies, where it's like, couldn't quite.
What's the
frequency, Kenneth?
None of your business.
Dennis, I'm playing
that
next.
48 degrees in Green Bay, 52 in Appleton, 51 in Oshkosh, cloudy showers, possible storms this afternoon, high in the mid-60s.
We will take the mid-60s.
Oh, yeah.
Oh,
man.
All day.
Vanessa Moran was
here two miles for autism.
Meadowbrook Elementary School tomorrow morning.
They're doing their walk and run.
Lisa Hale, new WISCO weekend.
They've got some unbelievable stories coming up.
Mark Hughes and Mitchell VanVoren from Belvin Sports Medicine.
Man, Mitchell's hoping to have his name called this weekend as a tight end of the National Football League.
Sam Ely and TJ Boles, hybrid wrestling entertainment.
And Todd, before we bring up these distinguished gentlemen and Dennis.
Tell us what we're giving away.
Oh, we got some tickets for tonight's epic center event.
Jim, you want to give us some details on that?
Sure.
Grand
Union's playing.
They've been on... Grand Union is awesome.
Hey, Dennis.
Great friends.
Yeah.
Unbelievable friends, yes.
They are, and they're good.
They are
great.
They're bringing their whole orchestra out there, their whole band tonight.
They're here with two
that ladies got a great voice.
Oh, incredible,
yeah.
Incredible.
They're coming with their whole crew.
It's not the epic center tonight.
It's a charity fundraiser for the new community shelter, but 50 bucks.
And it's...
Tons of food.
Phenomenal food.
It is.
It is.
It's a great food.
I mean, phenomenal.
And it's, you know, there's seating, there's tables you can sit at and listen to this great music, and there's silent auction, and door prizes.
And it's just a great event.
And I'm sure a lot of you have been to the Epic Center.
But we're giving away tickets, two tickets to
whom?
Paradise.
Well, let's do that tonight.
We will give them away.
You can text in right now if you'd like to go to the Epic Center tonight for the big show.
We'd love to send them.
Great event,
people.
No BS.
This is a great event.
Download the Civic Media app right now.
Choose your station, WGPW or WISS.
Lower right hand corner.
There's a text button.
Use that.
Say, hey, I want to go to the epic tonight.
And we will set you up with a pair of tickets that will be at Will Call.
And I actually got a text from the top, um, Bishop.
in the state.
He said, even though it's Good Friday, you can eat meat.
They got a special just for infestation.
From the top of character.
I mean, I don't know if you guys, I'm in the, I'm in the Ultra Boy Hall of Fame.
Yeah.
It
was a phenomenal ball.
You said a lot there, John.
Yeah.
I'm lying so much right now.
It's mine on Good
Friday.
It's unbelievable.
Everything coming out of my mouth is a lie.
Except.
What a great event you guys where we got Dennis Peters here from the glam band of course every Friday We love having him here and you know the number one thing you know people can brag about Dennis being the great singer vocalist of the year He's up for the top award again in the state of Wisconsin the note.
I don't think of Dennis that way I think of Dennis as being a tremendous.
Oh look at that
Jim.
Here's a 20 for you.
Thanks.
Thanks buddy Thanks friend
the thing I'm most proud about and most I don't just
Respectful with him tremendous military career.
Oh, yeah
spent
many many years Raising his right hand saying he'd put his life in the line for our country and that's what I love having him We're talking about your great free fall thing good, but Dennis is like the most fervent Advocate for supporting veterans and veteran causes that you'll ever
meet.
I'm in.
Yeah, cool.
I'm great to see you guys.
Thank you.
I love that shirt man.
That's pretty impressive
Is he the shirt?
It's a cool shirt.
Yeah.
I don't have a cool shirt.
Why don't I have a cool one like that?
I think it's the best sweatshirt in the business.
Well, I'll tell you
what, these guys do an event, and I've been involved with it.
What was the first year?
2015?
2015 was the first event in Almereau.
So let's talk a little bit with us, because I've always wanted to do it for whatever reason.
I swear to God, for 10 years now, something has come up on that day where I can't jump out of an airplane.
Here
we go.
Yeah.
With
you
guys.
Here we go.
But
whatever.
Hey, Jim.
Howard.
Jim, actually, wow.
Maybe it's life.
insurance Jim
Jim who was a pothead somewhat I'm sorry so when he was at St.
Norbert he actually put a sign up on his door if you want to get high Saturday contact
true it's true that is true we needed 20 people to
skydive in Omro because it was much cheaper.
It was like $80 instead of like $150.
So I call that the
group rate.
Right.
It was the group rate.
So I said, if you want to get high, call room 319, which is where I live.
And people called and they're like, what's this all about, man?
And I'm like, hey, then they came up and I got the people we needed.
We all went out there on a Saturday and the training was like.
like an hour.
It just wasn't very in depth at all.
And then we went up, you know, it's 3,000 feet.
It wasn't
no high, but
it was static line.
Yeah, it was great.
That was a lot of fun.
And then back to his dormer, they got even higher.
Just learned the toggles.
And anyway, that was a real thrill.
And the truth that that's the first time I ever flew.
I jumped out.
Yeah.
That was cool.
I've
taken, I've taken plenty of people.
I
bet you
never, never been in an airplane.
Right.
and then they jump out.
I want you guys to introduce yourselves and tell everybody what you guys do.
I want you to put it in your own words.
All right.
My name is Andy Van Handel.
I've been involved with the Freedom Freefall event since 2015.
When a good friend, John Mayno, was part of it.
Here's a whole history.
We could literally talk for hours about the history of the event.
Basically paired up with
My friend Vinnie here with the Hula group stands for helping out American heroes.
Just an incredible
group.
Tremendous
organization.
They
are an absolute machine in what they do for veterans in this state.
We got the event going where we pay for veterans to go on a tandem skydive.
To date, I think we put up over 200 veterans in the 10 years we've
been doing.
And again, I was telling these guys a story for when on the air.
The first year I was there in 2015, I did an interview with a guy.
The last time he had jumped off an airplane was on D-Day in the Invasion Dennis.
Unbelievable.
Yes.
Yeah, the first year I took nine veterans from six different wars in one day.
I went out to the DZ that day thinking it's just going to be miserable.
It's going to be hot.
And it was, it was August.
It was so hot.
It was mind boggling.
It was miserable.
But I went home with tears of my eyes and not because of the work we did physically, but I call Will Culkin, who was the founder of Hula Wisconsin.
And I said, brother, we're doing this every year.
I don't care what we have to do because it takes money.
It's guy diving is very expensive sport.
Uh, but we've literally
has changed lives doing it.
Just last year, I took a Marine Corps veteran and in the airplane, he was outright scared.
And there was a whole thing before the event.
His truck broke down, hooked him up with another veteran who I actually went to high school with and they carpooled down there.
I took David out of the airplane.
And when we landed, the other instructor in the plane says to me, man, I'm surprised you got him out because he was that scared.
Wow.
better part of this whole story is the next day, David messages me and said, that was more adrenaline than the battle of Fallujah.
Yeah.
And then I get chills just talking about that.
It's like, wow.
I mean, this is something with when these guys jump out of that airplane, they hit the girl and they're going, holy man, like,
okay.
Well, let's back up then.
Let's talk about a very, you know,
Poignant thing where this all began with we won't even say her name But a very good friend of ours where this whole thing came about and the prevention of sue I mean the main reason for this is to help bring awareness to suicide prevention.
Yeah with veterans So go ahead guys.
I shouldn't say just better But also not just veterans but their spouses their girlfriends their boys there.
Okay, so go ahead.
So we
back in 2014 or so, I was jumping at the drop zone in Pulaski, which we have our June 14th event this year.
And we have a July 12th event in Madison this year at seven Hillscott.
I was, but I was jumping up there and I had met charity.
I'm not a big believer in fate really, but I met her.
She told me her story is incredible story.
In the meantime, the drops on at the time had closed.
The owner closed the stores, couldn't afford to keep it open or whatever anymore.
And we had just kept in touch and she hooked up with the, the who a group and you know, her story was at, at her fiance, it was a veteran PTSD suicide.
She had this whole thing.
She's going to try skydive and kind of memorialize them.
Yada, yada, yada.
She found out skydive was her therapy.
And I could understand that as a skydiver, I go back to 2001 when the whole world shut down after nine 11, all general aviation, rightfully so.
But I remember going out to the drop zone, being very angry at a lot of things.
Cause I couldn't jump.
Skydive was my drug, my form of therapy, you know?
Yeah.
Right there.
And it was, uh, that was the first year, the, the first freedom free fall event.
And, uh, I remember charity was in the airplane with me and, and Ollie, who was our World War two fighter and she got some, some video of us jumping out and, and I tell you, it was life changing for me.
The, the, the first freedom free fall event.
I remember being in the airplane in Oli.
There was a Korean war veteran we took later on that day.
I'm showing these guys pictures from that day.
Look at those smiles, man.
Yeah.
Hard to beat those.
Was I thinner then?
Yes or no?
A little
bit.
Perfect.
A little bit.
Thank God.
I see a free soul in that picture.
But that's, yes.
And that's the World War II veteran would jump that day.
It is just so.
I was nervous in the plane.
My thought was don't break the veteran, you
know,
cause I
mean, 95 with him.
Yeah.
95 years old.
He wasn't super mobile, but you know, so there's a lot of extra care.
You know, I, at the time, I think I probably had two or 3000 skydives.
I've currently have 3,800 now.
You've
jumped 3,800 times.
Um, yeah.
I mean, that sounds like a lot.
If they go to a bigger drop zone and I'm a small fish in a big pond, you know, but around here, I'm a
big fish and a small pond.
So, but yeah, I know Vinny wants to talk more about who and the incredible
again.
Let's get right to the heart of why we do this or you guys do this.
Go ahead,
Vinny.
All right.
I'm Vinny.
I've been part of veterans organizations for Chris Vincent, better Chris Vincent, better part of 20 years.
I just, I didn't serve myself, but I have the ultimate respect for all my, all my friends and family that did serve.
Thank you, brother, for coming.
Thank you for letting me.
And it's just, I tried to give back whatever way I can.
And I was fortunate to become a board member of Huah, Wisconsin.
And I took on, Will asked me if I would kind of take over the free fall project.
I said, absolutely.
And my first year- And we're talking about Will Coken, who comes on our show on a regular basis, basically, with Fourth, who just a tremendous job.
Right.
And my first free fall event, I tell you what, it was...
You go into it with the unknowns, but I tell Chelsea and will now that the only way you guys will take it away from me is if I die So this is such a great program.
I've had fortunate enough to have so many so many awesome vets A lot of them came from dark places and they we do what we do with them and
It's like night and day.
It's like a light turns back on in their eyes.
We're going to send a
quick break.
When we come back, we're going to talk a little bit about that.
Again, we're going to get to the roots of this and how this is formed to help prevent suicide with veterans.
Andy Van Handel, Chris Vincent, and Freedom Freefall event coming up.
Veterans Salute Olsen Legal Group out of Oshkosh and New Berlin.
Back right after
this.
In America too, she's a good girl.
She's
crazy about Elvis.
Love Scorsese and her boyfriend too.
Her home is broke in the
heart.
I'm free.
I'm free falling.
Great song, Todd.
We're with two very special gentlemen, Andy Van Handel and Chris Vincent, Vinnie Huah, Freedom Free Fall Event.
Veteran Salute Olson Legal Group, who is a veteran of Purple Heart Recipient from pretty much right around Baghdad.
Uh, great, great people down there.
Olsen legal group in Oshkosh and Berlin and we're talking about the free fall event and Jim, I give you credit.
I give you credit.
You did something that I could never do.
You jumped out of an airplane.
Congratulations.
Um, for doing that, but we've got it.
We've got a great event.
It's 10.
This should be the 10 year anniversary.
Love.
This is the 11th.
Wow.
And, um,
Where it all began it began and I don't want to say a dark place, but let's just be honest It began but Dennis read this text.
We just got here from Ted from Green Bay
Ted says I went to last year's event in Pulaski as a spectator The smiles on the faces of the veterans after they jumped was an incredible sight airborne Ted from Green Bay.
Thanks to that.
That is very true If
I could just make a comment about that is a smidget
a smidgen of the feedback we get.
I mean, it's
crazy.
I mean, the goal of this year is to jump 20 veterans in Pulaski and 20 in Madison again.
You know, it's a lot of work on the back end on mine and Vinny's part.
You're doing the follow up, make sure we get people there and
let's go to that dark place.
Yeah.
So, I
mean, this part's all fun, but
there's a real dark place.
This
all began.
The whole reason, the whole mission of the event is to prevent veteran suicide and show these guys and gals life again.
Last year in Pulaski, we took two moms who lost their sons to suicide.
And I
did not
know there was not a dry eye in the whole place, man.
Like it was.
And I always submit an article to parachutist magazine after the event.
So much to the point that Laura at parachutist magazine looks forward to my article every year.
And I sent her literally a seven page word document this year, knowing it wasn't going to all get published because I wanted to get feedback from our moms that we took and.
And Laura at Perish's emails me back and she's like, well, this is awesome, but I have to cut it down for space.
I said, understood, but I had to get these stories out there.
It's important to literally life changing, you know, and it's, if some of these guys are right on the brink and, you know, back in November, I got to call it.
Hopefully no one gets it.
My sister took her own life.
And there were zero signs, man, like none.
My sister was not a veteran, but she's just going to show you the people that are, are awesome at who a week later was who was annual, uh, Rock March, their big fundraiser.
I called Tammy up who was the president of who, and I said, I don't know if I'm going to be there or making plans.
She asked me why I told her.
She's like, we got you.
And, and the support group, I mean, some of these guys, like, like this fella that just
Texted in this color.
He was 82nd Airborne Ted was here.
Yeah, just come out and check out the event and the bond with veterans is so close to how skydivers are that's why this works so well Because there's such a bond.
Okay to be in the military.
I mean Dennis can talk about this You got a step out of a comfort zone.
Yeah, I care helping
you or whatever, but it's a whole War I've got some of the toughest veterans I've ever talked to my lifetime and they say the same thing those first couple of nights they basically
Cried in their
bumps.
It's like my god.
What have I gotten into?
Is that true Dennis?
Not for this guy.
No Although the guy above me pissed his pants
But what you guys do with those you take them out of a comfort zone to a different place and that is therapeutic, correct?
Correct.
Absolutely.
A lot of times you'll see it They'll walk in and they're they're just kind of blank.
They're nervous And then they they're sitting around they'll talk with the other veterans and
They get the norm a little bit.
And then you start putting the harness on them.
Then they know this is happening.
And then I drove her all of them.
I says, you know, there's only one way out of that plane and it ain't by you landing with it.
Right.
I mean, when the, when the doors open, it's Wendy.
No sounds a whole lot like gold.
So he just keep going.
You know, but John, you saw that first year of the event, we saw.
Afghanistan and Iraq veterans bonding with the World War two.
It was phenomenal.
Yeah.
It was just so cool to see like, and I remember bud, our Korean war veteran, I would, I would get these guys rigged up.
I'd walk them past their spectator friends on purpose so they could cheer them on and
perp walk them.
You know, so somebody, uh, as bud is like, bud, you excited for this?
And he stops that as chest.
Well, yeah, you don't get excited for this.
You got
for brains, you know,
we're going to text her.
Great job, Andy.
You are so amazing, Jennifer.
I think that's Jennifer from last year that we took.
Yeah.
She's, I think she's a captain in the, in the military and in the army.
And I'll tell you, man, it's, it's a life changing event.
And when we started this fan, I think I had 16 years in the sport.
I've got one of my 26 season now and
When we started the event it literally gave me a whole purpose to the point where when I went down to Seven Hills skydivers in Madison My friends got tired of me talking about it.
Now.
We've actually created within our club We've created a committee for freedom free fall because it gets talked about every month, you know, and
so You there's still some openings, but the people just want to support you because you said this
is
not an inexpensive
I mean, I think that was 40 years ago.
I did this and it was expensive.
So I mean to put this on if people want to donate if they want to send you some money
or
tell us
about how we can you cannot go to the who a Wisconsin's website page.
There's a donation tab on there.
You can just do a general donation or you can just designated for freedom free fall if you like.
Um, any help is always appreciative.
Cause like it is, it's an expensive sport.
And you know what, people can come out that day and help support.
Oh yeah.
I think that's really important.
The more the marry, I mean, you could get the more people to support these guys while they're doing their jumps.
I mean, the better it is.
It's just a great, great day.
You won't be disappointed.
It's right
here in Pulaski.
It's so easy to find, right?
And the date on that is again, June 14th, the Pulaski.
It's a, it's a Saturday before Father's Day.
And then we're having a July 12th event in, in Madison.
And that's actually what they call world skydiving days.
So the veterans that jumped that day become part of a skydiving world record.
And just kind of a cool little promo for these guys too, you know, and, you know, another quick story.
Last year, the first veteran that we took it in Madison, it
was cloudy.
So they had to land with the plane.
We pointed up.
There's a hole they immediately took off.
But one of the first veterans that jumped was my cousin.
And his brother was there.
He's like, and they lost her dad a couple, couple years prior, who was also a veteran.
And then my cousin, Scott, looks like, boy, dad would be really proud of Shane right now.
Like Shane was deathly afraid of heights.
Dad was a carpenter and laughed at him his whole life.
So dad's proud.
So
You guys are phenomenal,
Andy Van Handel, Chris Vincent, Hua, and Freedom Free Fall Event, Veteran Salute Olsen Legal Group coming your way from Oshkosh and Berlin and coming up on June 14th in Pulaski.
Everybody knows where the little airport is
in Pulaski.
Can't miss
that.
Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful work that you gentlemen do.
Thank you.
Thanks guys for having us.
Whatever we're going to
do to promote anything you guys do, we're here with you.
Come out and see us June 14th in July 20th.
Well, the teams get ready to choose their top draft pick.
You can help Mino and the Mayor choose their top craft pick.
Northeast Wisconsin is home to amazing breweries, wineries, cideries, and distilleries.
And we need your help picking the best.
We've drafted 10 of our favorites, but which local craft beverage creator will go to number one?
That's up to you.
Mino and the Mayor's top craft pick.
Drafting Northeast Wisconsin's finest one sip at a time.
Now back to Mino and the Mayor.
Here's John Mino and Jim Schmidt.
Hey, thank you very much.
Welcome
back.
Hey, can I just mention you broke your microphone.
Can you
help John with his microphone?
While we're waiting for that to get fixed, I will just say this.
Don't forget that today at five o'clock is the final time for you to vote for Mino and the Mayor's top craft pick.
And if you haven't done that already, what you want to do is you want to go to our website, www.gbw.fm or wiss.fm.
Right at the top, you'll see a big banner that says Top Craft Pick.
Thank you, Amanda.
the things we have to do for you guys.
You want to do that today before five o'clock, and then next week, Wednesday on this show, we will announce the winner of the Top Crafters, right?
And we'll also announce the winner that voted that's going to walk away with $250 in gift cards from all of the participating sponsors.
And the dentist just mentioned the winner.
He's going to do a live concert for free at their place.
Really?
I
didn't realize that.
Oh, wow.
The things that make me do around here.
It's going to be the day
after he jumps out of the plane with our buddy, Shabua.
In fact, he'll do a concert on the way down.
Oh, perfect.
I
could have a nine-way tie.
Those are all great, right?
And to see it, to taste it is great.
I'm big on packaging and it's just really cool the effort they put into that.
And so many are family owned, which I love that too.
So yeah, that's gonna be fun.
It's incredible.
The quality of product these people and the quality of people that are doing these things.
And the cool
thing that we've learned from them and just dealing with like the guy in Fond du Lac, wonderful young man.
It's like, well, the water is from our backyard in the hills where the limestone filters the water.
And then we grow the corn right out the window.
And that goes in.
So I mean, it's so organic.
It's incredible.
to it and it's just, yeah,
it's fun.
It's fun.
That's
going to be very cool.
And our goal is to get to every one of them because some of them, besides making a great product, they have like festivals, but like like music, you know, in the summer, summer hours and tours.
So I want to, and it's all right here,
right?
Right here.
It's an hour drive.
Appleton, Green Bay.
And so that's all right in our district.
And the other thing we have to do is, you know, is become more conscious with the environment.
It's good to buy local.
Amen.
So, I mean, Jameson's good and some of this other stuff, but Greg Goose, but it's also right here that is grown here.
So, or made here, I should say.
Absolutely.
Anyway, what is time for our mind on the mayor live music series with Dennis Peters from the glam band.
First of all, we got to talk about your gigs coming up.
I hope you're resting this weekend.
No,
man, do you have really?
No, we're playing at Tanner's on Saturday in Kimberly.
Fantastic venue.
I love Tanner's.
Can't wait to play.
I'm ripped.
I'm so excited about it.
I love stopping there after doing high school football games.
I can't believe stopping at Tanner's for a
little sandwich.
It's right there.
The food is so good.
They have an ool outside too.
It's one of the few places around that has an actual pool.
You know, when the summer season kicks in.
It's a fantastic place to be.
And then tell us about this two-week next coming week.
Well, we will be playing.
Let me say that again.
We will be playing at Stadium View Thursday and Friday.
And we can't wait for that.
And do you know that they have
13 bands playing, I mean, you're two of them,
but we had, Melissa, who's their director of marketing?
Maddie, it's Maddie,
Maddie's
on here, she was on her show.
They are really going all in on this draft and I just hope, I hope a lot of people show up and we're expecting 250,000 people.
I'd like to see 250,000, 300,000 people here because there's some great events.
Badger State's doing a lot of things, obviously Anduzzi's is too, but I saw your name on that list a couple
times.
Just like Mark Houston was saying, it's free.
Right.
It's free, you know, so cool.
You have no, no,
check it out.
I don't know how many gigs you guys do a year.
All of
them.
Yeah.
Hundreds.
But it's cool.
It's like, you're going to have an audience that's never seen you before.
every time.
Yeah, especially when we play like this.
I mean, you have people from
Houston, Dallas,
Los
Angeles, wherever seeing you guys.
I think that's kind of cool.
It is really cool.
And it's something we don't take for granted.
That's for sure.
Good for you.
Well, introduce our talent right
here.
Sit
next to us, brother.
Well, I don't know how he wants to be called today, so we didn't have a chance to speak.
Pre-game here, if you will.
So I'll let him introduce himself and how he'd like to be addressed.
And I don't mean any disrespect in that.
Oh, absolutely.
Go right ahead.
Because he's an artiste.
And I don't want to mess with that.
No, I
understand your confusion.
My name is Brandon.
I go by strategic.
There you go.
That's my stage name, yes.
So yeah, good to be with you guys this morning.
Great to have you here,
man.
I've got to ask about the name, strategic.
That's like.
Almost
sounds like
a wrestling name.
It's my rapper name.
And it's both of the Matrix, I don't know.
Yeah, so I was in a band in college and we just kind of broke up, graduated and all that stuff and just went solo and tried to figure out, you know, what...
What kind of name I wanted and what kind of path I wanted to go on and so strategic means like a thought-out purpose.
You guys are all over the place.
I'm strategic.
To hell with you.
Yeah, exactly.
He's bad.
He's nationwide.
I'm still doing this.
How long have you
been on your
own?
It's been just just over 15 years now.
Wow.
I mean, that's been a while.
Well, that's good for you.
I've known this cat for a while.
He doesn't age.
It's amazing.
I don't know what what is it the water?
Is it the rain barrels?
You know, it's not the water I don't really drink a lot.
What are you doing
real life unless I'm playing shows
when you're not strategic.
Oh Always strategic always, you know, I do a lot of stuff.
I do art.
I do some teaching Oh, wow and doing some substitute teaching and stuff like that.
Well, that's cool.
And where are you from?
We're born and raised the whole thing gives all the
bad born and Appleton went to school Milwaukee came back to Appleton been playing
All around the state
we talked about this all the time and and obviously the glam band is you know, so well-known but there are so many talented people in Northeast Wisconsin We're blown away sometimes.
Hey,
yeah,
you got to be pleased with what the community has been doing to elevate that
Oh, yeah, absolutely.
It's maybe especially in Appleton.
We have my own music I know
as you get one coming up this week.
Yeah, you're performing this week Don't they have a mini mile of music coming up.
I
love it if you guys on
they have something going on.
Yes
But I'm not part of
it.
Okay.
They just want to give a taste of they want to get people back, right?
That's why we're all doing events is to get people to come back, right?
And not you want to showcase what you have but anyway, Appleton does a great job from Myla Music, P.A.C.
Just you guys, Lawrence, of course, turns out some great product.
Yeah,
that's great to see.
Yeah.
All right.
It's your specialty.
Yeah.
As far as
music.
Yeah, growing up, what did you want to do?
What kind of music did you listen to?
All those things.
I mean, I had a pretty eclectic taste and I still do it.
I like a lot of rock stuff.
I mean, I kind of found my way to, you know, not, not a lot of the radio stuff and tried to find different.
We're putting you on the spot right
now.
What he's saying is I just said, let's hear some of that music.
He
prefers talk radio and thank you for that.
I don't think that's what he was saying
to be
honest with you.
I heard something like that interpretation.
I heard strategic interpretation, if you will.
All right.
Let's hear some brother.
All right.
I'm gonna do for you guys a Song from my most recent album that came out last year called possibilities and this is a song called with my beating
heart
Make it through this, I just don't know how Chances to prove myself every single day Not afraid to fail and learn from my mistakes
I said and did I still have so much left that I can give
Dennis from the Glam Band Music Series.
Hey,
I heard
you have got something new coming out.
Yeah, so... Something unique.
Always, always.
Life of a musician.
Well, something for our future.
So tell us about that.
Yeah, so that project came out last year and since then I've been... Which is?
Yeah, I've been recording and working on a kids album.
Yeah, I've heard
about
that.
Yeah, actually it's a second volume.
I already released another volume back in...
22.
So it's been out a while and yeah, it's been a
lot of fun.
And what's the message there?
Is it about their, you teach them anatomy?
No, I'm just kidding.
So yeah, I mean, I just, just kind of in line with a lot of what I do, you know, just trying to, you know, be more of a positive voice.
Nice.
And you mentioned you're teaching.
Your teacher.
Uplifting.
Yeah,
I work with kids quite a bit, so.
It was just kind of a natural thing that happened during COVID.
My kids and I playing around and just writing these silly songs.
That's
awesome.
It's
like other people might want to hear these.
I think that's really cool.
Dennis?
Oh, indeed.
Yeah.
So what, you know, here's another example, ladies and gentlemen of an artist around here that I really think should be on a higher level and, you know, and nothing, you know, about this area.
I'm just saying he should be nationwide, nationwide, you know, worldwide.
His music should be out there on that level.
I mean, how do you sing and play so cleanly on a Friday morning?
That's what I want to know.
That's a good word.
Clean.
It's
pure, yeah.
Your voice is just, it's absolutely show ready at 8.30 in the morning.
Why do you do that?
He hasn't gone to bed yet.
Oh, all that coffee I drank.
Is that it?
Doesn't work for me, man.
Not
usually, but.
Tell us about the kids aspect.
I think that's, what type of message are you trying to send in your music to
kids?
Well, I think it's a couple things.
I think, you know, especially in this area, I think family is a big thing.
And so just kind of playing into that a little bit with all the great things that we have going on in this Northeast Wisconsin area.
And just kind of realizing that a lot of the people that we know and friends have a lot of kids and just kind of seeing the culture of music and just trying to be...
Something out there that
but music is a great and Dennis.
I mean you guys do this to me We can talk about you know, okay, we're crazy 80s rock, but there's there's something that connection that you can make through music that you can't
do
in speaking in a hall.
Do you understand?
Yeah, absolutely.
You can create dreams, you know for me for me music is opened up my Insides to the possibilities of something outside of myself, you know something to aspire to something to get out of
You know something holding me back, you know we come back.
Yeah
place of one of your kids songs
Yeah,
okay good.
I
wish I want
to hear that I just think that's great and I want to get you know how people can get your music We'll talk about that, but yeah, that's I think that's awesome.
Good stuff.
Awesome.
Love it.
Thanks strategic in the house Dennis Peter's in the glam band in the house.
How you doing?
It's our favorite part of the week.
It's a Friday back after this
Friday morning with Dennis Peters from the glam band was giving all over the area this next week or so.
That's a rumors get started.
I know, but we're with strategic
right now.
A wonderful local artist.
And I love this.
I mean, we've talked about artists, you know, whatever.
We've never had one that is passionate about doing songs for kids.
And I think this is so you have kids yourself.
I do.
And your teacher.
Yeah.
So this is something near and dear.
Tell us about.
doing something like this, writing songs, and producing them for
children.
Well, the nice thing is they're shorter.
The
kids
or the songs and the
kids.
Shorter attention spans too.
Well
said.
That'll work for
us.
Yeah, I know.
It's been a different process, different in recording, in promoting it.
So it's been a huge learning curve.
So yeah, it's a whole different ball game, but it's fun.
A lot of fun.
A friend of the show Billy Grisak also has been doing some kids songs for a long, long time.
He's got still dealing with some health issues, wanting to say hi to Billy and whatnot.
Mr. Billy.
I love Billy.
So he just wanted to say that we're looking out for him and thinking of him.
The motivation to write kids songs, we're talking about that a little bit.
How do you get your music out there?
Do you do do do schools programs or how do you move your music to get into the ears of young people?
Yeah, I've done a lot of different things.
I've done some festivals and I've done.
farmers markets and a lot of different things like that.
I've been in a few schools and libraries and that's something that I want to push a little bit more with this next release.
Trying to get out there into the community.
I love doing community events so that's yeah, that'd be huge.
I think that's a good market for you simply because it's basically untapped and you can make a living during the day doing such a thing and schools pay for that stuff.
I'm just saying that out loud because... Yeah.
You know, I think that's a fantastic way for a guy like yourself to get your music out there, get paid decently, I mean, really decently for that as well.
Well, it was like to ask musicians
if there was one thing that influenced you.
A relative of your parents
took that spark and they encouraged it.
A teacher or maybe somebody that you saw on TV or listened to.
I'm always curious as to what made you give your life to this.
In general or is there a person is there one thing like your seventh grade music teacher?
No, I
can't pinpoint one specific really instance or thing or person but
When did you pick up your first instrument like when you really get into
I got my first guitar for my 16th birthday my
One
of my friends got
a guitar
and then
I
was like, Oh, well, I want a guitar.
So that was kind of
part of that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like
that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Girls like that.
Nice.
I
love it.
How do we get ahold of your music?
Yeah, so Spotify, Amazon, Apple, anywhere you stream music, or Bandcamp is a great one.
I'm sure you know about that.
Where do we find you socially?
Socially is strategic rock.
Usually, if you just look that up, anywhere you'll find me.
Fantastic.
Let's hear some strategic rockin' it out with children's music on your new album.
It's great stuff.
Thanks for being
here.
Yeah, thank
you.
This is
called Shoda.
Show to limit your
screens.
I walked in, saw him sitting on the couch I said, how many have you watched?
They said, I don't know, maybe four or five And I said, I think that is just about enough Next came crying, yelling soda stuff Now it's clear to me you've reached your shoulder
So I said limit your screams, limit your screams Spend time with your family Life is better when we can see your face Turn off the shows, turn off the games Sometimes you just need a little break Find another way to use your brain
Well, it hadn't even been two hours This whole plan went totally sour They are asking me what they can do And I said almost anything that you please Except for staring at a screen That's the way it goes When you've reached your showed up
So I said limit your screams, limit your screams Spend time with your family Life is better when we can see your face Turn off the shows, turn off the games Sometimes you just need a little break Find another way to use your brain
Limit your screens, limit your screams Spend time with your family Life is better when we can see your face Turn off the shows, turn off the games Sometimes you just need a little break Find another way to use your brain All these screens are making us insane Maybe you should go
That is awesome.
I'm in the
rain today.
All standing.
I don't know who's going to vote higher on that.
The kids are the parents.
That's fantastic.
That's a great song.
You got to write it for both.
That is perfect.
Thank you guys so much.
Have a great weekend everybody.
