According to Bob Dixson, a sense of “ownership” saved Greensburg when a massive tornado leveled 95% of the town, killing eleven people. Imagine emerging from the rubble in the middle of the Kansas plains with one question… where do we go from here?

After the storm, the community came together under a big FEMA tent to cry, hug each other, and envision the future. They decided to forgo the government’s cookie-cutter plan for rebuilding. Instead, they created a blueprint to establish Greensburg as America’s “greenest” town, powered by renewable energy with smart infrastructure for water conservation, and the most LEED-certified buildings per capita in the US. They started with the community art space, because as Bob said, they had lost everything, and a little beauty goes a long way.

Bob Dixson never planned to be the mayor of Greensburg. He was enjoying his recent retirement from the postal service when the tornado tore the roof off his lifelong family home. But as he and his wife huddled in the basement, they thought only of their neighbors and how they could help the community survive. That sense of service is what made Bob the mayor of a small Midwest town facing the near impossible task of recreating itself.

Join us for a powerful story of resilience, small town values, good ol’ Midwest pragmatism, and above all, hope.

Find episode transcript and links for Bob Dixson and Greensburg at HopeIsMyMiddleName.com

If you liked this episode, listen next to Doug Naselroad: Building Instruments to Recover from Floods and Addiction in Appalachia, Hope Is My Middle Name season 2, episode 8.

Hosted and executive produced by Kate Tucker, Hope Is My Middle Name is a podcast by Consensus Digital Media in collaboration with Reasonable Volume.

If you like the show, please follow us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and leave us a 5-star rating and review. It makes a big difference in helping us reach more people with more HOPE.

Thanks for listening!

Ken Falke loves jumping out of airplanes. As a 21-year veteran bomb disposal specialist in the U.S. Navy, he’s a high risk, high pressure kind of guy. But when a jump went bad at age 27, he found himself out of commission and staring down a discharge. At that moment, Ken faced a decision he says all trauma survivors must make – he chose to be a victor, not a victim.

What seemed like the end, held in it the seed of a transformative mission Ken would launch with his wife in 2010 to help veterans, first responders and their families trade PTSD for Posttraumatic Growth. Through Boulder Crest Foundation’s Warrior PATHH program, survivors learn to reframe their trauma and become experts in their own healing. Boulder Crest programs are free for the over 100,000 people they’ve served, they use zero meds, and Warrior PATHH is 5-7 times more effective than traditional approaches to PTSD.

Hear why Ken Falke is determined to transform mental healthcare across America, and how his experience in military special ops makes him the perfect man for the job.

Find episode transcript, links for Ken Falke and Boulder Crest at HopeIsMyMiddleName.com

Listen next to Jon Turner: Veteran on a Life-Giving Mission, Hope Is My Middle Name season 1, episode 2.

Hosted and executive produced by Kate Tucker, Hope Is My Middle Name is a podcast by Consensus Digital Media in collaboration with Reasonable Volume.

If you like the show, please follow us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and leave us a 5-star rating and review. It makes a big difference in helping us reach more people with more HOPE.

Thanks for listening!

Sometimes it just takes a moment to change someone’s life. That’s what Maria Rush understands as a nurse advocating for mothers and babies in Cleveland, Ohio. Maria has a superhero-sized calling, born from a near-death experience during childbirth at the age of fifteen. She’s dedicated her life to saving mothers and their babies just like the nurse who took a moment to see what Maria truly needed on that delivery room table, and to speak life-giving, literally life-saving words.

America has one of the highest mortality rates for mothers and babies among developed nations. The infant mortality rate more than doubles for Black babies, and Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy related cause than White women. These statistics are on the mind of Maria Rush every morning as she goes to work for the Nurse-Family Partnership, a nation-wide program that helps first-time moms have healthy pregnancies and healthy babies, become knowledgeable and nurturing parents, achieve education and employment goals and provide their children with the best possible start in life.

Join us for a powerful conversation on motherhood, breaking generational cycles, and the importance of community in caring for our children and families.

Find episode transcript, links and more about Maria Rush at HopeIsMyMiddleName.com

Listen next to An American Dream to End Hunger with Ron Pringle on Hope Is My Middle Name season 2, episode 2.

Hosted and executive produced by Kate Tucker, Hope Is My Middle Name is a podcast by Consensus Digital Media in collaboration with Reasonable Volume.

If you like the show, please follow us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and leave us a 5-star rating and review. It makes a big difference in helping us reach more people with more HOPE.

Thank you, thank you for listening!