AUDIO: An in-depth discussion with Jonathan Hopkins of the James Hutton Institute

During my time working on this project, I have relied heavily on one piece of academic research more than any other.

The issue of population decline on the Scottish Islands is not something that has received a lot of attention from the academic community or large media outlets.

The research conducted at The James Hutton Institute by Andrew Copus and Jonathan Hopkins is some of the most in-depth and comprehensive coverage that this issue will get.

I had the pleasure of spending some time speaking with Hopkins as we talked about his researcher and what it means for the future of the islands communities.

TRANSCRIPT:

Nick Haseloff 0:00

Yeah, so can you tell me a bit of your background and your work at the institute? Jonathan Hopkins 0:09 Sure. Yeah. I mean, I joined the I joined the Hudson Institute about seven years ago, I guess my backgrounds as a constitutive, geographer, and so previous to kind of physical geography but moving into moving into human geography, social statistics, I do a lot of data analysis related to demographics. Also GIS, spatial data analysis, indicators, well being and possible survey analysis as well. But the main kind of work I've been doing on this particular project is defining areas in Scotland which are sparsely populated, and so we're not looking so when you talk about sparse population that means poor access to people, it doesn't necessarily mean a low population density or country. Have remoteness from big cities or big towns, it kind of is a combination of those things. And so we've identified areas of Scotland which are sparsely populated. And actually, we've kind of just redone this again. So the publicly available reports which you'll have seen, we're going to be producing an updated revised version of that policy. And we've looked at the past population trends and use the kind of small area beta to project populations into the near near future in Excel 2530 years. And so that's been kind of that's been kind of my main, my main involvement in this work. I've also had a small, very small role in root silence revival projects, which was, which was probably no to do with this kind of anecdotal, anecdotal or qualitative evidence which have population change, which isn't reflected in the statistics. And that's kind of a major, a major kind of issue. I mean, the the most detailed population data comes out every 10 years and the census or 11 years because the one that was going to happen next year, it's been delayed a year. And so there isn't really any, any population information other than estimates in between. And so often you can have small areas, small villages, which have experiencing population growth and there's positivity in the community and there's a sense that people moving back which isn't picked up in the kind of statistics that I'm live in mainly involved in. So yeah, it's it's kind of something I've become increasingly aware of this, this need to accept that there is a there is a kind of spin quite negative picture of a future population in the islands. But that's not capturing every detail of what's happening in villages, and certain different parts of the island. Nick Haseloff 3:08 Yeah, so that's that's definitely something that because I initially had started my research with Ruth's findings and the eyelids or Bible project, because that is what got the most, most coverage in the media, ABC, BBC did a story on it, as well as quite a few other publications. But then you come to your research and look at the actual statistics and the data and look outside of that anecdotal area and you see a completely different picture. So that's, that's really what got me interested in the project and covering it in media in a way that necessarily wasn't covered before. So you've already touched on the dichotomy between those two different projects. Is there is there any similar Word of answer you have, can you put your finger on something that would lead to the difference in data? Jonathan Hopkins 4:09 Well, partly it could be it could be to do with scale. I mean, if you if you're in a small, a very small, you know, village in the in the highlands, or the islands somewhere, the population of that might just be five or six, it might just be a couple of houses with two families in it. Now, it might be that, you know, if you have another, if you have another family move in, if you have another house gets built, that's, you know, population growth of that small scale, and that could be pretty substantial and keeping that place going and then kind of maintaining, maintaining that place as a community. But if you look at the kind of if you look at kind of the statistics for data zones, and areas which are much bigger, you will kind of lose that. lose that degree of nuance, and I don't I mean, I guess I guess I'm biased a bit towards the quantity of beta because that's kind of what I've always I've, I've sort of been experienced in using, but But yeah, I mean, you know, there's definite sensitivity about, you know, you don't want to, you've got to accept that there are issues in the island population, you've got this this population aging. You have had the history of population loss and sparsely populated areas compared with more more accessible areas and areas around towns and cities. But yeah, you cannot. You can't ignore sort of kind of anecdotal among when they experience their everyday life. That's completely valid, valid view. And so yeah, it's in terms of deficiency can be a question of scale. It's small scale processes, which people experience but these kind of wider, wider areas. translate, they probably don't as much. So that's that's possibly one reason. Nick Haseloff 6:04 Yeah, one thing I noticed in your data, talking about the small, relatively small scale is you had, you had looked at projections of how much influx of immigration would need to be on the islands in order to reverse the change. And it wasn't much it was, I think, 458 or something like that on yours. And I mean, that's, that's less than what a ferry can handle. I mean, obviously, there needs to be housing and jobs and all that sort of stuff in these small communities. But for the for the numbers that have been projected, the solution to it seems rather small. Do you have anything you can say on that? Jonathan Hopkins 6:47 I mean, I mean, something. I mean, I'm did Andrew did that particular calculation, and we earned it actually, in the most recent one. We haven't. We haven't kind of reproduced that but but yeah, it's it's I mean, the thing that Because across all the time on the islands is the shortage of affordable housing. And then there's this kind of, I mean, you'll be aware of kind of the, you know, the Airbnb and people buy housing as an investment, and there isn't any affordable housing and, and so, yeah, it's it's kind of, it's kind of very, it's kind of very difficult to kind of report to get a movement of people back to the islands without without addressing burnout. And I'm, I'm not best placed to advise on the best way to do the mean, in some areas or meanings. I mean, as a country, we haven't built you know, the UK hasn't built affordable enough affordable housing for the last 40 odd years. So that's why they Nick Haseloff 7:48 It's definitely not being focused on these Island communities either. The affordable housing. Jonathan Hopkins 7:53 Exactly, exactly, exactly. But But yeah, I mean to to attract people to the islands. I mean, you know, you It's difficult. I guess it's difficult to to have that population movement without addressing the housing issue just because you hear it so often. I mean, you hear you hear this this issue of portable housing and available housing. And a lot of people, I think you might have seen the surveys that cheney have done on and on. And I forget exactly what it's called. I think it's about young people. I think, young people wanting to return and there's there is a desire of people to return to the islands to live there. But yeah, in order for that to happen, you need to get housing and you also need, you know, things like broadband and things like access to, you know, access to the sort of jobs that people want to do. So there's that there's a number of kind of issues, which are, it's not, it's not just housing, it's having economic, economic conditions where people can go back and solve what they want to do as well. So So yeah, I mean, it's it's it's, yeah, I mean, often when you do you do kind of demographic modeling and you work with economic data, it's easy to assume that, you know, people can they often assume that people didn't move around very easily. Well, in reality, there's there's a lot of values to this kind of this kind of migration, which people don't necessarily consider. Nick Haseloff 9:23 Going back to that modeling. I don't have a big background in human geography. What what type of modeling, have you relied on to make these projections? And how accurate Can we say they are? Has this modeling been used in the past in other communities and has it shown promise? And I'd know that you mentioned that there's another report coming out. Could you speak to that as well? Jonathan Hopkins 9:50 Yeah, I mean, I mean, for the I mean, for the I mean, we've got a couple of reports coming out one, it was kind of a reproduction of the kind of our sort of revived version of the report which I did with Andrew which is used on newer data and slightly slight changes, the other one's a bit more experimental, which, which is perhaps a bit less easy to explain. But the population projections is kind of a method that's been applied to other areas. You look at the current population structure. So you have details of the number of people in sparsely populated areas who are five year age groups, men and women, and then you apply birth rates and birthrate prediction and so you know, how many people are being born, you know, you apply mortality rates. So, you know, which are specific to different age groups and gender groups and different locations. And you also apply migration assumptions and that's that's the tricky bit because migration is the hardest is the thing that there's most uncertainty over birth rates and death rates tend to be fairly slow moving in time, but migrations the so what we did for that was we used recent migration assumptions, which are based on recent migration data. So it's kind of assuming a status quo assumes that each migration will be similar to that in the recent past, I guess. And through this use of, you know, small population data and population structures, you can then apply, you could then get a five year periods out to 2043. I think, the population structures for those years and you can then get, and then you can get kind of the statistics from that. So it's kind of an established, it's kind of an established method. We've obviously applied to quite small areas, using small area data. There's a lot of assumptions in that kind of work. Which I think we've acknowledged. But it's kind of wait, I think we've done a decent job with the data that we've we've got available. You can, you know, I mean, you can never, you can never have too much faith in modeling. Because as you know, as we, as we all know, how does now you can get these completely unforeseen events which can change everything. But yeah, Nick Haseloff 12:23 How close is the new data that you've been working on to what you had modeled in that report? Jonathan Hopkins 12:29 It's pretty, it's pretty similar. I'm just trying off the off the top of my head. They this new report, which is updated projections, it's a slightly different time period. So I think in the first report, Andrew use 2011 data and it went to 2046. Because there's population data in this new report available for 2018. We've done it to a slightly different period. So it's now projected in 2043, I think, and I think we get similar results we get pretty soon Similar trends happen actually something I actually haven't done this is to to compare across the two, but you tend to see, you tend to come in to see similar things. So the regions where some of the kind of violent weakens in the West tend to have the most negative population changes. And I think Shetland Islands spot popular parts of the Shetland Islands, I'm not sure they have the most positive to populating trends. And again, I mean, I guess something I mean, when we're doing these projections, you're reporting statistics for different regions and obviously within that region, while the population projection for the whole region might be negative, there could be bits, which are positive, there could be smaller parts of it which are positive. And if you look at the reports, which national records of Scotland to produce looking at the working age population, something that But to some of the comes out of them is the whole of Scotland is going to have a slight decline in the working age population by sort of 2043. I think. So, you know, demographic issues aren't just affecting sparsely populated areas, they're affecting all parts of Scotland to some to some degree, I guess. Nick Haseloff 14:19 I don't know if you know, off the top of your head, what percentage of the area of these islands is considered sparsely populated? Jonathan Hopkins 14:27 Well, that's, that's a tricky. One. Isn't that Oh, I've got them. I've got map, which I don't know if I can. I don't have I don't have available. But for instance, if you take if you take, say the islands, which is sparsely populated, isn't the kind of you know, there's a mainland of Army and you've got luik, the main town and you've got the mainland area, that bit of it is actually not sparsely populated. The popular bit important is kind of Outlying Islands and the kinds of edges of mainland Island I think So because there's something that we've picked up on is there's kind of a contrast between the kind of Central towns and Island areas, so stone away. And Kirkwall. These kinds of areas, you know, tend to be kind of key kind of hub towns for the islands. And so it's a kind of maintain population economic activity in a different context, the more remote parts of the island, so that's why we think it's useful to have it's useful to have that back kind of split. Nick Haseloff 15:35 So you feel that these Kirkwall, Stornoway, those sort of hub towns, you don't feel that they will see the same amount of decline as the spark sparsely populated areas. You don't feel that it's reflected. Jonathan Hopkins 15:49 I touched on serasa I'd have to double check on the kind of results for that, but they've, they've got kind of advantages which the more remote parts of galleries don't have, you've got this agglomeration. of service such as an economic activity and people and that kind of support population, that kind of agglomeration you just don't have in the mall kind of areas. So the theory would suggest that, yes, the remote areas are going to have that threatened more by that kind of the population, which is a horrible word. I really don't like the term the population. It's a bit of a, you know, it's just not a nice, not a nice to, but that but yeah, maintain population, although it's going to be it's going to be harder, just because you don't you don't have access to that kindof agglomeration. Nick Haseloff 16:37 Are you aware at all of the Isle of Rome and the Eco homes that they're building there? Jonathan Hopkins 16:44 I'm not No, I mean, I'm aware of Rome, but I mean, it's, I mean, it's, I know that there's groups in the islands who are kind of kind of doing similar thing. Please tell me more about that sounds sounds very interesting. Nick Haseloff 16:57 Yeah. So I think their population hovers between 30 and 40. And they're in the process. They're hoping to finish next month that they're building for eco homes. So they're all powered off the grid. No, no traditional sewage, that sort of stuff. But they're, they're hosting applications for people to move there. So they're hoping to almost double their population, hopefully. Jonathan Hopkins 17:24 So that's right now that's the recipe that's really, really interesting remembering. Yeah, I mean, how big is how big is Rome? I can't remember. It's. Nick Haseloff 17:33 Yeah, it's very small, though. Jonathan Hopkins 17:35 Yeah, but I mean, I guess I guess the polling population these remote islands. Yeah, I mean, I mean, what what do you know what the kind of, you know, are they are they are there jobs that people are going to be doing on the island or Nick Haseloff 17:49 the main thing is, there's there's aren't a ton of jobs there. Most of it has to do with tourism, and obviously, most of its seasonal. So it's going to be interesting to see what their criteria is we're getting people on the islands. I think they're hoping for most people to have remote jobs that they can work from. Jonathan Hopkins 18:06 Yeah, man. I mean, that's really interesting, because it's kind of, you know, you know, I mean, time we've all become more used to home working than than ever before. It's kind of Yeah, mate, enabling people to kind of participate in economic activity sort of wherever, wherever that happens, I guess. Yeah, that's very important for places like that. But now that I've not I've not heard about, but I think there's a few similar communities, but it's not something that I'm very, I mean, I'm very much sort of quantitative data, yeah, data person. And an all the time you can kind of you kind of learn the value of what you might pass as anecdotal evidence, as you know, it's, you learn about the values of people's experience and all of the colleagues or with a more called seven. So I'm involved in, I'm involved in are involved in this kind of interviews, focus groups and shops and things like that good. Yeah. And often you can have these two sets of data which, you know, present very, very different, different pictures of both, but both can be validated that so it's something that I suddenly I know about. Nick Haseloff 19:19 Alright, thank you so much. Hope you have a great rest of your day. Jonathan Hopkins 19:21 You too. Nice sweet too. Thank you. Bye. Cheers. Bye Transcribed by https://otter.ai

VIDEO: An introduction to the topic

TRANSCRIPT: Looking at a map of Scotland, the northernmost country in the United Kingdom, it’s easiest to pick out the large population centers like Glasgow and Edinburgh, but there is still a large swath of the Scottish population that lives north of this line, often called the Highland Boundary, it separates the area known as the Scottish Highlands from the rest of the country. Mostly known best for things like kilts and clans and haggis and outlander, there’s a lot more going on in the highlands of Scotland than what you hear about in the cuurent zeitgeist. One quintessential part of highland culture and heritage that isn’t necessarily well-known outside of Scotland is island life. Away from the population centers of the south, Scotland is home to over 900 islands. Ranging in size from the smallest island Eilean Donan, to the largest island, the Isle of Lewis and Harris.  94 of the Scottish islands are currently inhabited and some, such as Lewis and Harris and Orkney, are home to thousands of residents. But over the past decades, these islands have struggled to keep their population afloat. New studies estimate that the sparsely populated areas of the islands could diminish by up to 25% by 2046. And even the more populated towns like Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis and Kirkwall on Orkney are expected to join this downward trend. Many experts attribute this population decline to a number of factors: including a disparate birth and death rate, economic influences and higher education and job opportunities on the mainland. This is a story with a lot of tiny moving parts and there are some big plans in the works to fix these issues. Over the next several weeks, this site will host a journalistic series which will dive into the issue of population decline on Scottish islands and will look at anecdotal evidence of resurgence. We’ll look at specific islands as case studies for this phenomenon and study the data so that we can formulate a clearer picture. We’ll also look at the steps the Scottish government is taking in the forms of the islands act and the national islands plan. You’ll read and hear interviews from experts on the subject as well as locals who have spent their entire lives on the islands. All of this in an effort to bring light to this complicated issue.

Podcast - A conversation with Javier and L.A. from Black Star Line Brewing in Hendersonville, NC

By Nick Haseloff

After interviewing L.A. McCrae earlier this Fall, before their brewery Black Star Line Brewing officially opened, they received some hateful messages on their website. This podcast is a discussion with L.A. and their new COO Javier Naranjo about the brewery and its future.

Transcript:

Nick: So I’m here with Javier Naranjo and L.A. McCrae of Black Star Line Brewing. And we’re here to talk about their opening and stuff that’s been going on with the brewing industry in the Hendersonville and Asheville area and culture and community. How have things been going since you’ve opened?

Javier: You want to take that?

L.A.: I’m going to let you take that.

Javier: It’s been going Well. Despite some speed bumps here and there, I think it’s been going pretty well. The people here are great. They’ve been super responsive to us. I think we’re really honing in on some good beers here. I think despite all of the challenges with the start up, long hours and what not, some days we’re just like ‘oh man can the day just be done.’ We’re having fun all the while. It’s been a lot of fun. Not so fun sometimes. Overall it’s been great. 

Nick: What about you L.A.? Has it lived up to your expectations? Because when I last talked to you, you were right before it and you were freaking out a little bit.

L.A.: Yeah I think I’m unsure as to what I thought this was gonna be. So any expectations that I thought I had have clearly all just been dashed away. I think I want to echo what Javi said. It’s a lot of work but it’s a labor of love. So as I look over at our fermenters right now, those are our babies right now. Some people have fur babies, we have beer babies. So each birthing, from the conception of the beer baby to the idea, to the process of helping it get into its incubators, also known as fermentation vessels, and getting the finished product out, it’s deeply satisfying to go from an idea to tasting. And it’s literally the taste of satisfaction. What's been the most heartwarming and the face of those challenges is the out warming the outpouring of support from our community hands down Kendra Penland from the Asheville Brewers Alliance Derek Allen the folks from Hillman, Triskelion, of course Joe and Lisa over at Sanctuary these folks have welcomed us who were more or less strangers into the family with big warm openness hugs Smiles mentoring guiding and we are just grateful beyond words for their witness to what the craft brewing industry really is so big shout out to the homies that hold black star line down.

Nick: That’s awesome. And you’ve been proud of the product you guys are producing and have you had a good reception from the community, the people coming in trying the beers?

Javier: Most definitely. Yeah right now we have an IPA upstairs. I’m excited about that because we had no intention of making a super hoppy IPA ever. Sweet beer movement, right? That’s one of the themes here for us is to have like malty beers. But we’ve been looking for an IPA and we’re like ‘okay, okay, we’ll do it.” And Kay, who designed this IPA, she hit it out of the park.  

L.A.: Absolutely.

Javier: Out of the park. Yeah so I think we’re doing some good stuff upstairs and down here. 

Nick: So you were telling me that six weeks ago, you didn’t even know how to brew beer.

Javier: Right, right. So…

Nick: What is it like learning on the job, especially with L.A. in charge?

L.A.: Well I don’t know about L.A. being in charge. I would say that’s not necessarily true.

Javier: It’s a back and forth dialogue. And sometimes that dialogue is yelling and then whispers, and then no dialogue. But learning how to brew on this tiny guy, I am on this guy all the time. And when I say ‘this guy’ I’m on the boiler, I’m on the mash. All day long. So it’s been… the learning curve is high, but you know I’ve just been kinda ramping it up. And I have a degree in chemistry. Doing this isn’t just laborious, it’s very engaging for my mental so… yeah it’s been good. 

L.A.: I think it’s pretty cool, Javi and I know each other through a mutual friend so we had never met before and I said ‘sure come down’ he said ‘let’s talk on the phone’ and I said ‘well, give us a couple weeks and we should be able to pay you.’ And I think Javi is still waiting for dollars and cents. It’s been weeks at this point. But literally he drove down here in one night. He got here tired, eager. He had a… it wasn’t a panini…

Javier: It was a whole calzone

L.A.: It was a whole calzone. I was so hungry. And so he had it. We were eatin’ it. And I was like ‘okay cool, you need to help us with the mash out.’ So we started mashing out. And from literally the time he arrived, ten toes down in Hendersonville, has been brewing. So I really appreciate that it feels… we say this often, that we’re parents of the brewery, we’re parents of the beer. Collaborate on recipe design, Javi really carries them out. So what you’re tasting right now has literally been fermented by Javi’s hands. It’s really awesome to have a true partner in this. And to be going through the stages of this, with someone who is equally devoted, committed, and who’s parenting the child that is Black Star Line.

Nick: That’s awesome. That’s awesome. So when we talked last, it was right before Black Star Line opened, like I said. And you were talking about creating community empowerment through this brewery. What steps have you taken now that you’ve opened? And what successes have you had? 

L.A.: That’s a great question.

Javier: So our staff, is a pretty nice cast of characters. So big shoutout to everyone here. Upstairs, down here all the time. In terms of community, we’ve held some kinds of events, kind of…. So for example Our Table, Our Table is an event that we had right before thanksgiving. We wanted to kind of have some healing space and some place for family and love in the wake of some of the violence that happened these past couple months. Whether it be Vegas, or was it Texas? Texas. And so.. Just having that intentional event to get people through the door and to feel warm and to feel that there’s some sanity in the world and there’s some unity. 

L.A.: That’s pretty good.

Javier: And we hope to continue events like that. Hopefully not in response to such horrific things, but just, you know, just to bring people in again and you know it’s just a big community hug if anything else. You know what I mean?

L.A.: I’ll add to that. Last week we had an opportunity to meet with folks from nuestro centro, and thinking about ways we can partner and collaborate with indigenous communities and the types of things that we can really hold space for. I think that’s really critically imperative to us fulfilling our social mission. So we keep our eye on that every day and it really informs all of our decision-making. 

Nick: Okay, okay. So social media has kind of blown up with you guys in the past couple weeks about some things that were said through emails I think. Or through your website. If you could, fill in people that are listening to this that haven’t heard about it. Tell us your side of the story. What happened? 

Javier: Yeah so it was through our business website. On the business website there is a text box, a field right there where patrons can kind of put in feedback, suggestions for the bar, suggestions for beer and what was once a tool for, you know, constructive feedback, had become a vehicle for spewing hate and for threats. I don’t have the message right in front of me but the essence of it was: the identity of some of the people that work here are not welcome, and essentially they should die. Which was really jarring. The first day that messages like that started coming in, the first one was like as simple as: ‘we comin’.’ And we’re  like ‘okay this is some kid.’ And then by the end of the second or third day, the last message we got was pretty threatening. Kind of scary actually. And we had a decision to make. We either stay quiet or we say like ‘This exists.’ And so L.A. and I and a few others got together to kind of process ‘Do we put this out there?’ And ultimately we decided that there needed to be a spotlight on it. And the community really did show up. 

Nick: I heard there was a gathering or a protest? 

Javier: Not a protest. I think what happened once we exposed it was like… So let me say something first. That message, the messages we got through the website, We know that it is nowhere near representative or indicative of the people who live here. It’s an unfortunate, you know, just small population of people who think like that. And we know that. The community knows that. And the support that came out afterwards, was just like ‘Yeah. That doesn’t stand for us and…’ Basically...  Can we swear on this show?
Nick: Go for it.

Javier: ‘Fuck that shit.’ You know the people here were like ‘Fuck that shit.’ Yeah, so the response was incredible. There were the obvious people we see every day but people came out of the woodwork. People came from far and wide to say ‘Fuck this shit.’ 

L.A.: I think probably one of the most awesome things was the high school students...

Javier: The high school students. Oh my god.

L.A.: ...who wrote us letters. 

Nick: Are these from local area high schools?

Javier: Yeah. I’m not sure if we’re allowed to say from where. But they were so touching. There was event going on downstairs and I came downstairs to grab something and I saw the envelope open and saw the handwritten letters and I just sat down. I totally forgot what I was doing upstairs. And just wept dude. I just wept. I was so touched. I’m getting kind of choked up just thinking about it. These letters are just so cool. These are young people who, with such emotional intelligence. It’s good to see that next generation or the generation that we have now is just, that they’re there. They’re taking the steps to connect with people they don’t even know. 

Nick: I think as bad as the things that were said on your website were, they really helped to show people that you guys really do have support and to bring the conversation up. 

Javier: Yeah so unfortunately it had to come through that avenue, but yes, yes. 

Nick: So have you received anything recently? Or has it continued on? You guys have been pretty alright with not seeing that sort of hate towards you? That’s very good. 

L.A.: So to respond: No. We have not seen anything and we’re really encouraged by the community and the folks who were showing up to have on-the-ground support. I know a lot of the local business owners are coming in to check and see how we are. And the police department, the Hendersonville Police Department, has gone above and beyond making sure that we’re protected, being on patrol, the chief of police has come in a couple of times. So we really feel like the community has taken a strong stance that this type of bias, bigotry, racism, hatred will not be tolerated in our community. And Javi and I are residents of Hendersonville.

Nick: That’s really awesome. I’m really glad that you guys have been seeing that support. So what’s the future of Black Star Line? What are you guys gonna do in the next coming months, coming years? What do you guys have planned in the woodworks?

Javier: So coming years are like the dream, right? And then the nearby stuff is more like, we’re just putting our head town and getting to work. As far as where we want to go, we just want to make sure that this kind of space is available not just to the folks out here. We want to make sure that as we grow, wherever we go, if we choose to go somewhere else, that we can do this better and better each time. 

L.A.: Yeah I think the anecdote about that last year, when I was really deliberating on the name for the brewery. And settled on Black Star Line Brewing Company. I was talking to a woman at the Juneteenth Festival over in Asheville and she just began to weep because she understood what that means for folks of the African Diaspora. Folks that are aware of the UNIA, the Universal Negro Improvement Association. So as I think about our recent trials and tribulations, I happen to be cleaning out Javi’s room which had some of my old notebooks, and today was talking to someone and happened to flip upon notes that I wrote about Marcus Garvey. And when I flipped it over, the very first thing at the top of this page, was ‘Black Star Line.’ Right? So this is not something new for me. And as I’m rereading these notes and always going through a process of re education, further education, I’m reminded that when Black Star Line was created, not far from my home in Maryland, people were angry, people were upset. Marcus Garvey started with essentially no money. Black Star Line was started with zero dollars, was just a dream. They dealt with a lot of distorted views from folks on the outside. Often really trying to narrow down the message of ‘This is what we’re trying to do with Black Star Line.’ Right? And had a heck of a lot of adversity. So thinking about that, thinking about those that just essentially would go on to fully sabotage Black Star Line, the reason that Marcus Garvey got deported from the United States. It’s interesting that we chose this name and that this has been our experience at the beginning and thinking about ‘What are we about almost a full century ago?’ The same types of things happening to Black Star Line. And I think it’s really important for folks to know who are listening that yes we do have an aggressive social mission, and we have some pretty kickass beers. At the core of what we’re doing is making great beer. And we take a lot of pride at making great beer, collaborating with those who are in our brew family locally and even across the northeast seaboard. And that’s what we want to be known for. We want to be known as a whomsoever bar that makes really great beer. Really great sweet beer. 

Nick: Yeah. Are there any interesting brews that are gonna come up in the next couple weeks? Or any interesting collaborations? 

Javier: I wish I could tell you about this one I’m doing. I wish I could tell you. I can’t. There’s a competition this coming weekend. Yeah I have something that touches close to my home, to my heart, so the ingredients in it are reminiscent of my family’s culture. So my dad’s Mexican, and that’s it. That’s all I can give you about that. So look forward to that. But in terms of other beers, I think right now we’re concentrating on honing in our flagships. Which are: 

L.A.: Dat Dere Ginger Beers, Dopely Stout, the Pullman Porter, the Lord Honey Pilsner, the creamsicle.... pale ale, we’ll call it the Creamsicle Pale, Amber’s Ale. My name is Amber. Laura Amber, everyone knows delete that. Delete, delete.

Javier: No it’s too late.

L.A.: It’s too late, it’s too late. Now everybody knows the L.A. and probably one of our most popular, named after James Baldwin, Juicy Jimmy’s Pale Ale. 

Nick: That’s a good lineup. That’s a pretty big lineup.

L.A.: Yeah and the Crusha. Of course the Crusha IPA.

Javier: Yeah big shout out to Kay for that one.

L.A.: Hey Kay!

Nick: Alright, I think that should wrap it up. If there’s anything else you guys want to add, feel free to.

L.A.: Find us on social media, especially Instagram. Send us your favorite selfies. 

Javier: Yeah if you want to see a picture of me and L.A., we’re all over that.

L.A.: Yes, we’re about to take a picture right now with Nick.

Nick: Okay.

L.A.: Alright. Thank you so much.

Nick: Thank you.

Javier: Thank you.