I won a first place regional Society of Professional Journalists award for this story as a student. It was a wonderful moment and I'll always be grateful to KBIA for entering it into the competition.
I got the idea for this feature after sitting through a meeting where farmers in Cole Camp were discussing a possible wind farm. The organizers were trying to get farmers to invest, but told them not to discuss pricing or even the name of the company with anyone. This was the first radio feature I did where I felt like I uncovered a problem that no one was talking about.
I produced this feature at St. Louis Public Radio during my internship there. I like how this grew out of what was a simple story about an odd invention - an alarm that detects graffiti.
I'll never forget this story. All I had to go on was that I liked this art I saw at a local coffee shop and that it was so different from anything I had seen in Columbia. I thought it would be a simple profile piece, but there was so much more to this man's art than I imagined. I remember my broadcast professor asked me, "How did you get him to open up like that?" I couldn't remember. For all I know, I just listened - and it seems like that's what he needed.