Hey Amarillo

A conversation with Michele McAffrey , a local magazine publisher who has partnered with host Jason Boyett to launch Brick & Elm , a new print magazine celebrating Amarillo. With the first issue releasing in May, McAffrey tells Jason how she transitioned from a cosmetics industry career into a publishing career, how she built and guided a previous magazine, and how she and Jason ended up in a posi...

A conversation with Michael Haning, who runs DISCO, Inc . as his day job and, on the side, is one of the founders of Amarillo Acton Academy . His unique resume gives this episode a broad set of topics, as Haning tells host Jason Boyett about bringing an entrepreneurial mindset to the industrial trades and rethinking the ways we prepare kids for their career paths. Also: What was it like to launch...

A conversation with Melanie Eggleston, a massage therapist for 24 Hours in the Canyon Cancer Survivorship Center and a death doula. Melanie arrived in this area more than a decade ago from Chicago. She tells host Jason Boyett about the slow process of finding her place in the Panhandle and how her ongoing work with cancer patients evolved into a new career as an end-of-life doula—a profound and un...

A conversation with Aloni Ndihokubwayo, the young entrepreneur behind the Amarillo-based F8TH Industry clothing company. A recent high school graduate, his family is originally from Burundi and Aloni first arrived in the U.S. with refugee status from Tanzania. With host Jason Boyett, he shares about experiencing culture shock in Texas, why so many refugees are driven to succeed, and how the "melti...

A conversation with Jon Revett , a local artist, tenured professor and director of the art program at WTAMU. Besides being a talented artist whose art has been shown nationally, Revett is an expert on Robert Smithson's Amarillo Ramp, a world-famous work of land art that is practically unknown by locals. With host Jason Boyett, Revett shares about his career path, the unique Amarillo art scene, and...

A conversation with Deetress Peoples, the Canyon resident behind the " Black is Beautiful " book project and a member of WT's Faculty and Staff Diversity and Inclusion Council. With host Jason Boyett, Peoples shares how parenting propelled her into community activism. She shares about her upbringing, driving for Uber in Amarillo, and why uplifting the local community of Black residents in Amarillo...

A conversation with Jami Cowart, voter registration coordinator for the Amarillo League of Women Voters , a nonpartisan political organization. Cowart grew up in Amarillo before moving away as a college student. She spent the next two decades living in and around Nashville before returning to her hometown. With host Jason Boyett, Cowart discusses how Amarillo has changed, why she got into politics...

A conversation with Molly Dyer, an Amarillo resident and the host of the popular " Witchcraft Off the Beaten Path " podcast. Molly grew up in a very conservative faith tradition, but today describes herself as a witch and practitioner of paganism. With host Jason Boyett, she describes arriving in Amarillo a few years ago from the Texas Hill Country after a career in law enforcement. Despite an out...

A conversation with Lonnie Shaw, the owner of SkyWest Assisted Living in Amarillo and Canyon. A long-time entrepreneur, Lonnie has owned and operated multiple businesses, from janitorial services to remodeling and restoration. He bought SkyWest after his father became a resident there. Several years later, he'd be enduring the biggest challenge of his career. With host Jason Boyett, Shaw shares ab...

A conversation with Marcy McKay , a local, award-winning novelist and the author of the recent book, When Life Feels Like a House Fire: Transforming Your COVID-19 Stress . McKay and her family survived a house fire in their Wolflin home several years ago. She draws on that experience to share with host Jason Boyett how anxiety, insomnia, depression and other tensions all relate to trauma. She also...

A conversation with Brian Hudson, a project manager with Xcel Energy. Trained as an aerospace engineer—a literal rocket scientist—Hudson briefly pursued a defense industry career before returning to Amarillo. He recently oversaw the completion of the massive, $900 million Sagamore Wind Project , which provides clean energy to residents of the Texas Panhandle. With host Jason Boyett, Hudson shares...

A conversation with Ana Ramirez, a senior business consultant with the Small Business Development Center at WTAMU. The daughter of immigrants, Ramirez works almost exclusively with the local Hispanic community. She helps small business owners and aspiring entrepreneurs navigate everything from idea generation to market research. She shares with host Jason Boyett how she found her niche in our comm...

A conversation with Dr. James Avery Rush IV, MD, who goes by the nickname "Jave." A psychiatrist, he shares with host Jason Boyett about the impact of COVID on local residents' mental health, plus his work with elderly dementia patients and a vital new facility coming to Amarillo. He also gives insight into the reason he and his family—including his high-achieving younger brothers and his father—h...

A conversation with Robyn Bilson, owner of the creative branding agency Hatched Studio . She found her way into her marketing business by way of the fashion world, after launching and learning to market Semblance boutique (now closed) several years ago. With host Jason Boyett, she shares about introducing some of Austin to Amarillo, the state of women's fashion, and why more and more women-owned b...

A conversation with Clay Stribling, President/CEO of the Amarillo Area Foundation . A Hereford native and former attorney with Brown and Furtunato, Stribling guides this community foundation as it serves the Texas Panhandle, from supporting nonprofits to matching donors with community needs. Clay shares with host Jason Boyett his path into this unique position and why AAF has invested so heavily i...

A conversation with the Rev. E. Courtney Jones of St. Andrew's Episcopal Church . A former science teacher at Boys Ranch High School, Courtney took on a full-time role as, in her words, "some sort of minister" during the pandemic. She and host Jason Boyett discuss Courtney's long, winding path into the ministry from Amarillo to Austin and back to Amarillo, including how she began deconstructing he...

A conversation with Scott Buchanan of Yellow City Street Food (YCSF). Half of the husband-wife team behind this high-profile restaurant, Scott combines an impressive chef's resume with a punk-rock personality and passion for food. In this episode, he shares with host Jason Boyett about his journey through the Amarillo and Austin restaurant worlds, the YCSF origin story, and why Amarillo needs to k...

RERELEASE: A conversation with Patrick Miller , a local educator and the newly elected president of the Amarillo chapter of the NAACP. Also a member of the Amarillo College Board of Regents, Patrick became the youngest person ever elected to the Board in 2015. In this interview, he tells host Jason Boyett why he got into local politics and discusses his work with refugees at Whittier and Travis. T...

RERELEASE: A conversation with Jodi Thomas , a best-selling novelist and member of the Romance Writers of America Hall of Fame. An Amarillo native, Jodi has written more than 50 books, from historical romances to contemporary fiction—and many are set in Texas and the Texas Panhandle. With host Jason Boyett, she shares her writing process, how her career began, and why this area is so significant t...

RERELEASE: A conversation with Dr. Ryan Pennington, founder and director of the Refugee Language Project . A linguist by profession, Pennington moved to Amarillo after several years working in Papua New Guinea. Here he discovered an extraordinary refugee population—and set about trying to remove the barriers that kept these residents from success. He and host Jason Boyett talk about Pennington's c...

RERELEASE: A conversation with Kristin Babbitt, the entrepreneur behind Dotsy's Boutique in Wolflin Square. Women's fashion is big business in Amarillo, and Dotsy's has carved out a large and loyal following despite tons of local competition. With host Jason Boyett, Kristin shares how she started her boutique, her plans for the future, and why social media remains so central to Dotsy's success. Th...

RERELEASE: A conversation with architect Mason Rogers of Playa Design Studio , the firm behind several high-profile construction projects in Amarillo—including the Six Car/Crush building on Polk and the new Ronald McDonald House . With host Jason Boyett, Mason talks about the city's architectural history, whether or not Amarillo has a particular "style," and what he thinks the future holds for dev...

RERELEASE: A conversation with Stevi Larson, special events coordinator at Sharing Hope Ministry . After years of addiction to heroin, Stevi found herself in the state prison system. During her incarceration, she got in touch with Sharing Hope, based in Amarillo. Stevi tells host Jason Boyett about her past mistakes, why she came to Amarillo after her release, and how Patsy's Place helped Stevi es...

Due to the current COVID-19 surge in Amarillo and the increasing difficulty of safe, in-person interviews during this moment, Hey Amarillo is going on a brief hiatus. The next few weeks of episodes will feature re-releases of past interviews from the first year of the podcast. In this 5-minute announcement, host Jason Boyett explains this decision.

A conversation with Scarlett Burke , the star, co-creator, director and executive producer of Make It Up as We Go , a new scripted podcast featuring Dennis Quaid, Billy Bob Thornton and others. Born in Amarillo, Scarlett lived in Canyon before leaving to pursue acting, modeling and songwriting. In this episode, she shares with host Jason Boyett about growing up in Canyon, living in L.A. during the...