Episode #311 - Lee Brackman (General Lee)
Mighty Blue On The Appalachian Trail: The Ultimate Mid-Life Crisis
Steve Adams
4.8 • 599 Ratings
🗓️ 24 February 2022
⏱️ 61 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
I have a wonderful reunion this week, with Lee Brackman, General Lee, from my Class of 2019. Lee and I ran into each other in Virginia and hiked around each other for a few days. Despite that brief time, we felt like firm friends, our nearly 50 year age difference notwithstanding. It was great to catch up.
Lee is a pretty remarkable young man, having packed an awful lot of stuff into his 24 years, including both his long hikes, mission work in a Cholera Hospital, and Cancer Research at Vanderbilt.
More recently, Lee hiked the CDT and started a new company, with a friend from Vanderbilt, producing clean water with electrolytes. Check it out at Purlyte.com. If you want to learn more, or even reconnect with him after your own hiking adventure, Lee is happy to share his email address. You can reach him at lcb21977@uga.edu
We catch up with two of our Class of 2022 members. Joanne Birditt tells me that she is bringing forward her thru-hike a few weeks, while Sarah Sunshine Landis is going in the opposite direction, putting hers back a couple of weeks. None of this will matter when the two of them get out on the trail; it's always going to be there!
Finally today, stick around and listen to the Ballad of Mighty Blue, written for me by Andy Alexander. I close out the show with it today, and am grateful indeed that our show has meant so much to people that they want to support in this way. I'm humbled.
If you like what we're doing on the Hiking Radio Network, and want to see our shows continue, please consider supporting us with either a one-off or monthly donation. You'll find the donate button on each Hiking Radio Network page at https://www.hikingradionetwork.com
If you prefer NOT to use PayPal, you can now support us via check by mailing it to Mighty Blue Publishing, PO Box 6161, Sun City Center, FL 35751. Any support is gratefully received.
If you'd like to take advantage of my book offer (all three of my printed hiking books–with a personal message and signed by me–for $31, including postage to the United States) send a check payable to Mighty Blue Publishing at the address just above.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You are listening to the Hiking Radio Network, where we talk the walk with shows're listening to Mighty Blue on the Appalachian Trail, |
| 0:38.4 | the ultimate midlife crisis, and I am Mighty Blue or Steve Adams. |
| 0:42.2 | I hiked the AT in 2014, and clearly having failed to learn how tough it was, |
| 0:47.1 | I went again in 2019, and today we've got one of my friends from the 2019 hike. |
| 0:52.3 | This is Lee Brackman or General Lee, and I know that there will be quite a few of you out |
| 0:57.2 | there who will remember this terrific young man. |
| 0:59.7 | He was, and still is, such a positive guy, having packed quite a life already into his 24 |
| 1:04.8 | years. |
| 1:06.0 | I knew I wanted Lee on the show quite a while ago, but, well, he doesn't really do social |
| 1:09.9 | media, so it wasn't easy to find him. Then, just a couple of weeks ago, but, well, he doesn't really do social media, so it wasn't |
| 1:11.1 | easy to find him. Then, just a couple of weeks ago, he reached out to me through the contact |
| 1:15.7 | page on our website, HikingRadioNetwork.com, and we struck up a conversation, and here he is |
| 1:20.7 | today. It was great to catch up with this charismatic guy, and I'm sure you're going to enjoy |
| 1:25.0 | hearing his exploits. And after General Lee, we have two of the |
| 1:28.9 | women in our class of 2022. Jain Birdett or Foxbait and Sarah Sunshine Landis will be telling us how |
| 1:36.6 | their plans have both changed. Joanne will be on after General Lee while Sarah, fresh home from |
| 1:41.6 | South Korea, were full of your own. And please stick around |
| 1:44.9 | until the end. I've had an awesome gift this week that I want to share with you. I'll tell you |
| 1:50.7 | about it between our two class of 2022 chats. So let's hear from my buddy Lee Brackman or General |
| 1:57.5 | Lee. We've got another one of my 80-through hiker class of 2019 this week, and, as it turns out, he went on to hike the CDT. This is Lee Brackman, memorably known on the trail as General Lee. Hey, General Lee, how the heck are you? It's good to see you, Mighty Blue. It's been a while, my friends. It's certainly, yes. It's quite amazing, isn't it? It's become such an integral part of your life, even though we were only there for six months, but it's something about it, isn't it? It has. I was sitting at work the other day thinking about people that I met along the way, and you popped into my mind and, you know, |
| 2:34.9 | click Google search and I found your email and reached out to you and here we are. |
| 2:39.4 | Very cool. |
... |
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