Second Act Stories

Sheldon Myeroff is a true entrepreneur. He launched Direct Recruiters, Inc . at the age of 31. And over the next 37 years, he successfully grew the business into major executive recruiting company. In 2011, he began an exit plan from Direct Recruiters – turning over the management of the company to a group of partners. And that's when he installed a rather elaborate woodshop in his basement. And o...

For more than 30 years, Amy worked as a writer, both on staff and on a freelance basis, for a wide range of top magazines. But when her father passed away in 2009, his funeral had a profound impact on her. And in relatively short order, Amy enrolled in mortuary school to become a licensed funeral director. Ten years later, Amy owns and manages Fitting Tribute Funeral Services in Brooklyn, New York...

What most of us know about hypnotism comes straight from Hollywood and involves swinging pocket watches and devious characters reciting the words "you are getting sleepy." But Lisa Ludovici operates very differently. She is a certified medical support hypnotist and is almost always brought in by a doctor. Frequently, they turn to Lisa when every other path to healing has failed. Jackie Kotler is a...

Robin and Carl Mennie opened River Street Sweets-Savannah's Candy Kitchen in Asbury Park, NJ on July 2, 2020. It's an amazing shop filled with freshly-made pralines, rice krispie treats, loggerheads, chocolate covered pretzels and more – basically any sweet item you could ever want. This franchise business is a leap for both of them. Robin worked for 20+ years as a nurse practitioner with a specia...

Fraidy Reiss' story is among the most inspiring tales we've ever profiled on the Second Act Stories podcast. Part of the Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn, New York, Fraidy was married at the age of 19. It was an arranged marriage to a man she barely knew. He demonstrated a violent streak within a week of the wedding punching his fist through a wall and threatened to kill her. Over the next tw...

Bruce Feiler is the author of seven New York Times bestsellers (including Walking The Bible, The Secrets of Happy Families and Abraham), the presenter of two prime-time series on PBS and the inspiration for the NBC drama series "Council of Dads." He's also presented two TED Talks viewed by more than two million people. It's an honor to have him on Second Act Stories. We sat down in the backyard of...

Kiku Mehta was born in 1937 and grew up in the Gujarat Province on India. He was trained as a lawyer there but emigrated to the United States in 1964. When he arrived here in the US, he set aside his work as a lawyer and went to work as a social worker for Children's Services Inc. in Philadelphia. It paid the bills and helped him and his wife Kira put their three daughters through college. He stay...

We first read about Terry Kutz in a terrific article in The Wall Street Journal . Terry had a long career as a financial planner in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. But as a hobby he had become involved in revolutionary war reenactments with a group called the Northwest Territory Alliance (NWTA). And one day an organizer asked him if he'd be willing to play the role of Benjamin Franklin at an event they were...

Chris Welles was a 46-year-old executive recruiter in Boston, Massachusetts. He was happy in his job and he had no plans for a change. But in 2008 he took a summer vacation with his wife, four kids and two other families to Kenya. And the trip completely changed his life. Today he manages "American Rhino," a growing clothing brand with a retail and online presence. The company sells shirts, pants,...

We depart from our traditional format with this episode to offer a glimpse inside the world of contact tracing. This is the fastest growing job in America, with the need for an estimated 200,000 contact tracers to track infections and protect the U.S. population against the advance of the COVID-19 virus. For those in our audience who may now be unemployed or simply looking for a new challenge, we...

Patricia Heaton starred in two wildly successful television series: Everybody Loves Raymond and The Middle . But it was the not-so-successful series Carol's Second Act  that led Patricia (or Patty she likes to be called) to author a new book called " Your Second Act ." It shares her own story and her new work serving as an Ambassador for the non-profit organization World Vision. The book also deta...

Susan Goldfein is 79 years old, in great shape and splits her time between Florida and Connecticut. For most of her professional career, she served as a speech pathologist in a range of different settings. She worked with elementary school students, provided home care for stroke patients and she taught at the university level. Her last position was with the Alzheimers Association in New York City....

Kevin Garrison worked the overnight shift for Amtrak helping to keep the trains running in an out of New York City. And in 2016, he was looking for a charitable Christmas project. An online post about a blessing bag – a plastic bag filled with everyday hygiene and food products caught his eye. It proved to be the start of the Blessing Bag Brigade – a non-profit that has delivered 65,000 blessing b...

If you've ever dreamed of writing the Great American Novel, this episode is for you. For most of his professional career, Marty Herman was a business turnaround specialist. He would come into troubled companies, figure out what was wrong and implement a solution. And then he'd move on to the next company. But he always had a love of writing – he even sold a couple of short stories in his life. So...

Over the course of the past two years, we've interviewed quite a few lawyers. Mark Salvacion was a corporate lawyer who found a more fulfilling life as a Methodist minister. Richard Turner was a trial attorney who found a path to becoming a very successful nature photographer. Michael Lowe left the law to start a Washington, DC gin distillery with his son-in-law. And Amy Yontef-McGrath was a forme...

Barbara Brooks and Guadalupe Hirt are two, talented women based in Denver, Colorado. Both have entrepreneurial backgrounds but had the same plan as they approached their 50s: Get a stable, corporate job...Enjoy solid health benefits....And put away some retirement funds. But like many older workers they hit a brick wall called ageism. After dozens of resume submissions and almost no interviews, th...

Mary Robinson was just 14 when she lost her father. Throughout high school, college and her 20s, that grief stayed bottled up inside her. A therapist helped her get her life together by helping her share her story. She landed a corporate job with Prudential Financial working in their information technology department and eventually running the company's volunteer programs. But after fourteen years...

Expert estimates predict the U.S. unemployment rate could rise from anywhere from 10% - 32% in 2020. Whatever the final number, that represents millions of individuals who will be unexpectedly looking for work. As Americans struggle to find new positions, it may be the right time to ask " Is It Time For My Second Act? " For perspective on this challenge as the world wrestles with the COVID-19 Cris...

Since his junior year in high school, Chris Donovan has been sketching women's shoes. It's been his quiet obsession for the past 30+ years. At the age of 50, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. And he knew it was time to leave his safe job at the phone company to pursue his lifelong dream. "I need to follow this. I need to find out why I have this passion for shoes." Based on the recommendation...

The majority of Peace Corps volunteers are idealistic, recent college graduates looking to make a difference in the world. But David Jarmul and his wife Champa are different. They joined the Peace Corps together in May 2016. Both were 63 years old. David had been serving as the Associate Vice President of News and Communications for Duke University for 14 years. Champa was employed as a sonographe...

Kathy and Gary Friedle and their two boys lived in New York City. Both had high-powered jobs – Kathy as an architect and Gary as an asset manager in a financial management firm. They worked long hours and increasingly felt they were on a treadmill that kept moving faster and faster. They dreamed of one day retiring and opening up a bed and breakfast. But rather than waiting until their sixties the...

Steve Javie worked as an NBA referee for 25 years. He officiated nearly 1,500 games including 20 NBA finals. He was widely regarded as one of the best referees in the league. But in his 24th year in the league, his knee started to give out. He returned for one final season – his 25 th year -- but  that was it. Steve is a religious man and after his basketball career, he asked God to help guide him...

Paul Giannone (known to all as "Paulie Gee") grew up in Brooklyn, NY but moved to New Jersey as an adult. For most of his professional career he worked with AT&T and their subsidiaries as an information technology staffer and eventually a consultant. And candidly he never liked the work – he never felt he was very good at it either. But he needed to support his family so he stuck it out. While he...

Zammy Migdal arrived in the United States from Israel in his early 20s. He studied hospitality in college and built a career in Miami's hotel industry. And at a fairly young age he launched an art-deco, boutique hotel in South Beach called the Indian Creek Hotel. He operated it with great success for nearly two decades. But the September 11th attack had a devastating impact on Miami's hotel indust...

As we start the new year, we're pleased to share the episode named by Second Act Stories listeners as the "Best of 2019." Most of America already knows Kyle Merker. The Ancestry.com commercial  where he "trades in his lederhosen for a kilt" has aired 22,000 times on broadcast television. Kyle filmed the Ancestry commercial at the age of 53. And the experience sparked an old passion that encouraged...