Swan Dive

Taylor Keen has an astonishing resume: Golden Gloves boxer, Dartmouth undergrad, Harvard MBA and Masters in Public Administration. Business man. Indigenous leader, Strategy consultant and full-time instructor in Corporate Strategy and Entrepreneurship at Creighton University. But at his core, Taylor is a storyteller. And the stories he tells are those of his tribal people. Harvard did a magnificent feature on Taylor last Dec titled, Singing To the Corn, where they wrote: “Corn thrives when sung to and spoken to—something Taylor Keen does in the language of his mother’s Omaha Tribe, where he is known as Bison Mane. Keen is also an active member of the Cherokee Nation, his father’s people, where his tribal name is Blackberry. He grew up between Omaha and the Cherokee reservation in northeastern Oklahoma ..." IN 2014, Taylor founded Sacred Seed whose goal is preserving Native American heritage in history through collecting, growing and spreading the seeds of corn and other traditional Native American foods. This incredible polymath has seen a great deal and gained much wisdom, which he generously shares on Swan Dive.

Watch Sacred Seed video
Recommended books on Indigenous Culture:

• Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
• Custer Died for Your Sins
• God is Red
• Corn Among the Indians of the Upper Missouri
• Braiding Sweetgrass

Have a Swan Dive to share? Text us!

We are always looking for Swan Dive Stories to share so hit us up, send an e mail to Ron: [email protected] or Stu: [email protected]

In the late 1990s Richard Bowsher co-founded the conference company, StreamMedia.com which pioneered the nascent space devoted to the delivery of audio and video over this new thing called the Internet. He sold that thriving company to NYSE publisher Penton Media. In 2007, Richard founded Klipopmekaar and started farming rooibos tea high in the Northern Cederberg mountains of his native South Africa. The only things standing on the farmland when Richard began were an old bus and a ram-shackle camp site. Today, along with being a thriving, productive and happy place, Klipopmekaar is one of the largest organic rooibos farms in the world. In addition to supplying premium tea brands direct, Richard Co-founded BOS Ice Tea in 2009 which is now the world’s leading Rooibos ice tea brand with regional head offices worldwide. Between Klipopmekaar, BOS Ice Tea, and their suppliers, hundreds of jobs have been created in the South African economy and beyond. BOS has significantly increased the world-wide awareness of rooibos tea, its proudly South African roots, its premium qualities, and its spirited African identity. Richard is an avid surfer, loving a father, husband , farmer, artist and dear friend of Swan Dive host, Stuart Sheldon.

Have a Swan Dive to share? Text us!

We are always looking for Swan Dive Stories to share so hit us up, send an e mail to Ron: [email protected] or Stu: [email protected]

In 1960, Rodney Lawrence Hurst, Sr., the 16-yr-old president of his local NAACP Youth Council, led a sit-in at a local segregated lunch counter. All this young black leader desired was basic respect and dignity. In no time, a mob of 200 angry whites showed up with axe handles, spitting and shouting epithets, in what came to be infamously known as "Axe Handle Saturday." Sixty years later, this Southern gentleman is still fighting for fairness and speaking truth to power. “When I interact with whites, I say to them, ‘When you come into my community, I don’t want you coming into my community being as black as me. You don’t understand my problems. You don’t understand the circumstances of living in a black life. You have not walked a mile in my shoes. And, I’m not gonna hold that against you. All I’m asking you to do when you come into my community, when we have conversations ... all I ask you to do is to listen to what I say and be fair. Don’t don’t try to be an expert on me,'” says Hurst, author of three award-winning books on black history--It was never about a hot dog and a Coke®! A personal account of the 1960 sit-in demonstrations in Jacksonville, Florida, and Ax Handle Saturday, Unless WE Tell It...It Never Gets Told! and Never Forget Who You Are: Conversations about Racism and Identity Development, which he co-authored with Dr. Rudy F. Jamison Jr.

Have a Swan Dive to share? Text us!

We are always looking for Swan Dive Stories to share so hit us up, send an e mail to Ron: [email protected] or Stu: [email protected]

Crime rates around the world have declined, but the global prison population is rising. The US is worlds greatest jailor with 5% of the world population and 25% of its prison population. This is clearly not logical, and Dr. Baz Dreisinger's life is dedicated to solving this inhumane problem. Heralded by the New York Times and named a notable book of 2016 by the Washington Post, Dr. Dreisinger's book, Incarceration Nations: A Journey to Justice in Prisons Around the World, offers a radical rethinking of one of America's most devastating exports and national experiments: the modern prison system. Dr. Dreisinger works at the intersection of race, crime, culture and justice. She earned her Ph.D. in English from Columbia University, specializing in American and African-American studies. She is the Founding Academic Director of the John Jay College Prison-to-College Pipeline program, which offers college courses and reentry planning to those in prison, and broadly works to increase access to higher education for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated individuals. She is Executive Director of the Incarceration Nations Network (INN), a global network and think tank that supports, instigates and popularizes innovative prison reform efforts around the world. Dr. Dreisinger won a 2018 Global Fulbright Scholar for her international work promoting education-not-incarceration and restorative justice internationally. As a journalist and critic, Dr. Dreisinger produces on-air segments for NPR and covers Caribbean culture, race-related issues, travel, music and pop culture for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and ForbesLife. Her first book "Near Black: White-to-Black Passing in American Culture" (2008), a cultural history of whites who pass as black, was featured in the New York Times Book Review and on NPR and CNN. We are honored to welcome Dr. Dreisinger as the next guest in our Wide Awakes activation.

Have a Swan Dive to share? Text us!

We are always looking for Swan Dive Stories to share so hit us up, send an e mail to Ron: [email protected] or Stu: [email protected]

A breath-taking 140-ft mural, titled Swan Dive, just appeared in a leafy Deep South neighborhood, in the midst of a pandemic and a national racial awakening, at the beginning of 6 young artist's careers. Inspired by our podcast, this group of art students and friends safely took broke quarantine to bring public art and joy to an appreciative urban neighborhood block. In the process, their lifelong desire to be professional artists when they "grow up" just lit up, and a bunch of paid mural gigs have resulted, all before their 21st birthdays. We welcome these charming truth tellers and invite you to enter Swan Dive, the mural.

Have a Swan Dive to share? Text us!

We are always looking for Swan Dive Stories to share so hit us up, send an e mail to Ron: [email protected] or Stu: [email protected]