Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet, as a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio and Unbust Creative. I'm Bridget Toad
Speaker 1: and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet.
Speaker 1: I am so sad to report that one of my
Speaker 1: all time favorite guests of all time on this podcast,
Speaker 1: miss A Stella Hyrum, passed away from leukemia at the
Speaker 1: age of Mrs Stella's story is incredible. She was born
Speaker 1: in the thirties, grew up during the Dust Bowl, became
Speaker 1: a teacher, and in her seventies spent her entire retirement
Speaker 1: to build a mobile learning lab equipped with computers so
Speaker 1: kids and adults in her community who didn't already have
Speaker 1: access to computers could get online. And she was still
Speaker 1: driving that bus when we talked last year as part
Speaker 1: of my birthday fundraiser for Estella's Brilliant Bus. Now. I
Speaker 1: first heard her story when she was featured in a
Speaker 1: Super Bowl ad during the Super Bowl. She quickly became
Speaker 1: one of my heroes and as our producer and I
Speaker 1: can tell you I've probably never been more nervous to
Speaker 1: speak to a guest, Bridget. I have seen you prepared
Speaker 1: to interview some badass women who are like not to
Speaker 1: be fooled with and H. And I've also seen you
Speaker 1: prepared to go on talk radio programs with like conservative
Speaker 1: assholes who are like hostile to your point of view.
Speaker 1: And I have never seen you be more nervous than
Speaker 1: when you interviewed Miss Estella. Oh. I mean, the woman
Speaker 1: is an icon, She's a legend. And first of all,
Speaker 1: I mean just being a black woman who grew up
Speaker 1: in the South. When you're talking to a black elder,
Speaker 1: there is a whole different level of respect and scrutiny
Speaker 1: that you need to show. Notice how only your part
Speaker 1: of miss Stella as miss O Stella um. And so
Speaker 1: that was one reason why I was just right off
Speaker 1: the bat, very nervous. You know, this is this is
Speaker 1: the older in our community, and so you really have
Speaker 1: to show a certain level of deference and respect. And
Speaker 1: you know, if I was interviewing somebody like Mark Zuckerberg,
Speaker 1: I could do that in my sleep. Interviewing miss O
Speaker 1: Stella was a completely different story. And also just the
Speaker 1: fact that I get very nervous when I'm interviewing somebody
Speaker 1: that I deeply respect, and I so deeply deeply respect
Speaker 1: miss A Stella and her work and her legacy and
Speaker 1: just the incredible life that she lived, and I felt
Speaker 1: such a deep responsibility to do her story justice because
Speaker 1: her story is incredible. You know, this is somebody who
Speaker 1: really lived an important life. So yeah, I was I
Speaker 1: was pretty nervous. What is it about her story that
Speaker 1: you respect so much and that inspires so much in you?
Speaker 1: What a good question. I think one of the things
Speaker 1: that struck me is reading her obituary. Her family talked
Speaker 1: about how a lot of people thought that her making
Speaker 1: the Brilliant Bus was her second act, but it was
Speaker 1: really more like her third or fourth act. And so
Speaker 1: I just really respect that she was someone who never
Speaker 1: felt like she was too old to start something that
Speaker 1: she wanted to do, never felt like she was too
Speaker 1: old to impact her community, never felt like she was
Speaker 1: too old to really like live her legacy, And so
Speaker 1: I just respect her story so much. Yeah, you gotta
Speaker 1: respect and love that third act. Mrs Stella's family says
Speaker 1: they're going to try to keep her Brilliant Bus alive
Speaker 1: to continue connecting residents of all ages to vital technology,
Speaker 1: and you can go to Tangoti dot com slash bus
Speaker 1: to donate. Mrs Stella leaves behind four children, three of
Speaker 1: whom were educators like their mama. Thirteen grandchildren, three great grandchildren,
Speaker 1: and countless others that she touched myself very much included
Speaker 1: Mrs Stella, you are an icon. Let's listen to her story. So,
Speaker 1: in true nerd fashion, I have a birthday on Pie
Speaker 1: Day this weekend on March fourteenth, and to celebrate, I
Speaker 1: wanted to honor one of my heroes, A Stella pih Frome.
Speaker 1: You might have seen her story in a Super Bowl
Speaker 1: commercial in Mrs Stella spent fifty years in public education,
Speaker 1: serving low income kids in a Title one school. Now,
Speaker 1: while teaching, she saw that many of her kids couldn't
Speaker 1: always do their assignments because they didn't have access to
Speaker 1: a computer or reliable internet at home. So she created
Speaker 1: A Stella's a Brilliant Bus to bring the computers to them.
Speaker 1: My name is A Stella and the Uno the creator
Speaker 1: and founder of A Stella's Brilliant Bus. The Stellar's Brilliant
Speaker 1: Bus is a mobile learning center where we provide education
Speaker 1: and technology but underserved community to children and underserved communities,
Speaker 1: and that's what we've been doing since we started. But
Speaker 1: realizing that the children have other siblings and other realities
Speaker 1: and need our service. We have expanded our service to
Speaker 1: include not just children, but adults in unserved communities. That's
Speaker 1: what the bus is all about. Yes to tech center,
Speaker 1: it's the learning center, but we use above to provided
Speaker 1: technology to accomplish the mission that we set out to
Speaker 1: do in the communities. After retiring in her seventies, Mrs
Speaker 1: Stylla spent her life savings on a bus that she
Speaker 1: turned into a mobile learning center to help bridge the
Speaker 1: digital divide and help bring technology to the communities can
Speaker 1: meet it most. Knowing that I was getting older and
Speaker 1: I was pretty much I would say we all over
Speaker 1: seven through one, I knew that if I was going
Speaker 1: to do anything other than work at the school, I
Speaker 1: needed to look at what that option might be. And
Speaker 1: when the hurricane devastated other people in New Orleans and
Speaker 1: other places, it's shopping my ideal about going out into
Speaker 1: communities and doing something that I thought would be worth while.
Speaker 1: I had the idea of creating something to think out
Speaker 1: in the community, but put it on hold because I
Speaker 1: wasn't really sure what I was gonna do. But after that, okay,
Speaker 1: and I thought about this is it. According to Pew,
Speaker 1: a quarter of lower income teams don't have access to
Speaker 1: a home computer, and one quarter of Black youth that
Speaker 1: they often or sometimes can't do their homework assignments because
Speaker 1: they don't have a reliable internet access or a computer.
Speaker 1: Compare that to just white youth. This is sometimes called
Speaker 1: the digital divide and it presents a big barrier to
Speaker 1: kids in all communities being able to succeed. I figured
Speaker 1: if I could create a project that I could take
Speaker 1: I didn't the community because we knew that this was
Speaker 1: age of technology, and I knew from working with Type
Speaker 1: in One schools if there was that did you do divide?
Speaker 1: So I wanted to keep that going because I know
Speaker 1: if about community is a concern that we served the
Speaker 1: children that and the Tide One School was missing at
Speaker 1: home the technology. Mrs Stella was relentless and she also
Speaker 1: dreamed big. Her first thought was to use her old
Speaker 1: minivan and she even told her the idea of trying
Speaker 1: to get her hands out. I sent my truck to
Speaker 1: turn that into a mobile computer lab. So in putting
Speaker 1: my ideas together, the first thing I asked myself how
Speaker 1: can I provide technology through these undeserved communities? And I've
Speaker 1: sto thinking about it a while. I knew that the
Speaker 1: band that I had would not be enough because it
Speaker 1: was just not big enough. The third more than four
Speaker 1: or five children at one time. It's that mini. So
Speaker 1: I decided, after thinking about it, what is it that
Speaker 1: I would be comfortable with? Knowing that I didn't have
Speaker 1: a lot of money? But how can I make it work?
Speaker 1: Because I was of the fail you, it's not an
Speaker 1: option mindset, so I knew what I was going to
Speaker 1: do had to be successful because free of you was
Speaker 1: not an option. So I thought about the man and
Speaker 1: I ruled that out. I thought about her, say my truck,
Speaker 1: and I said, I can't drive that on the back
Speaker 1: went out during my lifetime. But then the bus came up.
Speaker 1: I said that I use a bus. I have a
Speaker 1: lot more space, and of course I can drive a
Speaker 1: bus because I learned to drive a bus through my
Speaker 1: childhood because my dad had no boys and six girls
Speaker 1: and I was the only girl that was brave enough
Speaker 1: learn how to drive the truck and the bus. So
Speaker 1: I figured I could say the money if I got
Speaker 1: if I used a bus, because that was something that
Speaker 1: I could drive when I needed. So I grabbed some
Speaker 1: paper and pilsu games. Startled drawing figure out what I
Speaker 1: wanted to do, and started working on it. And it
Speaker 1: was an idea that I put together on paper, and
Speaker 1: then I was successful in lifting that idea of the
Speaker 1: paper and put it into reality. I didn't know that
Speaker 1: you actually drive the bus yourself. My goodness, you said
Speaker 1: going to drive the bus. And when we first got started,
Speaker 1: I drove the bus and most of those videos that's
Speaker 1: on the website or on YouTube, and they didn't believe
Speaker 1: I could drive the bus either. It all made me
Speaker 1: drive the bus. You'll see me driving. I'm driving the bus,
Speaker 1: but I have someone to help me drive the bus.
Speaker 1: The producers didn't want that. They wanted need to drive
Speaker 1: the bus. That gets to prove that in my age,
Speaker 1: that I could drive that bus. Do you mind me
Speaker 1: asking how old you are? You don't have to say
Speaker 1: if you don't want to, no, I'm eighty four. It
Speaker 1: was Mrs Stella's father who instilled in her the importance
Speaker 1: of helping others and sharing with your community, even if
Speaker 1: you didn't have a lot. My father was a Micrid contractor,
Speaker 1: and we traveled from Florida to New York the nineteen
Speaker 1: years the Harvest produced Thinking beings one but davies and
Speaker 1: things of that sort. And my dad was a very
Speaker 1: kind hearted man who really enjoyed getting and helping people,
Speaker 1: even though he was a poor man. And we would
Speaker 1: travel up, not leaving Florida during the month of May
Speaker 1: mid May, and sometimes come we will come back in October.
Speaker 1: Because if you don't have any skills, then you have
Speaker 1: to do unskilled laboring jobs. And that was what was
Speaker 1: going on with my parents. Need one of them ever
Speaker 1: finished elementary school, so they didn't have skills, but they
Speaker 1: were very smart and hard working people. Growing up poor
Speaker 1: in a government housing project. Mr Stella knew that not
Speaker 1: much was expected of her, but the power of community
Speaker 1: helped her subvert those a lot of expectations. We lived
Speaker 1: in a government project. Uh. And if you have seen
Speaker 1: the documentary Harvests of Shame by Edward our Moral, when
Speaker 1: they predicted that we probably would ever get out of
Speaker 1: that project, you just stuck there for life, and that
Speaker 1: less than thirty percent of us but ever get out
Speaker 1: of there. Uh. And the smaller percentage of us would
Speaker 1: probably not making the college because he would be stuck
Speaker 1: in that rut and that government project. But I'm proud
Speaker 1: to say yeh. Many of us who went to school
Speaker 1: out there, graduating from high school with the college and
Speaker 1: obtain advanced degrees. Now in the project where I lived,
Speaker 1: it was the ideal of it takes a village to
Speaker 1: raise a child. And all of us are poor all
Speaker 1: about most about parents world working for away from the
Speaker 1: in the in the fields. But there was always someone
Speaker 1: home in that project during that day and would look
Speaker 1: out for each other, and we got long we're doing today.
Speaker 1: We could go to that neighbor's house and they'll give
Speaker 1: us some bread and cheese, or bread and mayonnaise. Were
Speaker 1: bread and peanut butter. So it's one of those things
Speaker 1: where really actually helped raise a child, and we learned
Speaker 1: to share whatever we had, but every sources that we had,
Speaker 1: so we just grew up with that mentality. Do you
Speaker 1: feel that that's why you're inspired to give back to
Speaker 1: the kids in your community with the bus to make
Speaker 1: sure that they have the same kind of village that
Speaker 1: helped raise you and your sisters. I'm sure it had
Speaker 1: something to do with and that experience is a thing
Speaker 1: would grants form me into the person who I am today,
Speaker 1: giving and sharing with other people who need us. The
Speaker 1: most Now, summers can worsen the divide between low income
Speaker 1: kids and kids whose families can afford things like summer camp.
Speaker 1: The learning loss that students sometimes experience when they're out
Speaker 1: for summer break is sometimes called the summer slide, and
Speaker 1: a John Hopkins study found that by ninth grade, the
Speaker 1: summer slide makes up for two thirds of the reading
Speaker 1: achievement gap between low income kids and middle income kids.
Speaker 1: Chicking back this, Mrs Stella spent her summers taking kids
Speaker 1: on educational trips in her bus. She self financed them,
Speaker 1: looking for deals on hotels and meals so the trips
Speaker 1: wouldn't cost the families a dime. But then COVID hit
Speaker 1: and now her bus is in park. We would go
Speaker 1: and go into communities. We have worked with churches, smers,
Speaker 1: schools in Gunny organizations and we would just schedule our
Speaker 1: activities and we would go out in the community and
Speaker 1: make things happen. There was no problem when COVID came alone.
Speaker 1: Everybody was afraid of a body, so business was shutting down.
Speaker 1: People were afraid of their children and other family members,
Speaker 1: and of course you know they were dying. So we
Speaker 1: adhere to what the community was doing when they shut
Speaker 1: down business. Since we parked the bus and now we
Speaker 1: have two buses now and we would take these kids
Speaker 1: across country to travel the Freedom Trail and also get
Speaker 1: more exposure to technology, education and technology. And we would
Speaker 1: get on the road for ten or three of days
Speaker 1: with one hundred teenagers going across country to get more
Speaker 1: exposure because many of the kids who living those loops
Speaker 1: and communities, they don't get to go to town, so
Speaker 1: they speak because sometimes their parents can't afford to take them.
Speaker 1: Many of them are working or they just can't afford
Speaker 1: of expense that going along with it. So three years
Speaker 1: in a row, I was very successful in taking the
Speaker 1: kids across the country for ten or twelve days, giving
Speaker 1: them the exposure and not having to charge them one cent.
Speaker 1: And then we we were able to expose them. We
Speaker 1: tecknowledging and address the summer flide. But this past your
Speaker 1: nine we did not because we were right, I'm going
Speaker 1: into involved with COVID. So again we didn't want to
Speaker 1: be responsible or exposing kids to COVID because they're just
Speaker 1: learning a little bit more about it, but they didn't
Speaker 1: know anything about it. They didn't know very much. I
Speaker 1: would say about it, so we just decided we'll just
Speaker 1: stay in close up like the other business until they
Speaker 1: find out more. How people, and I'm talking about adults
Speaker 1: and their children say from the runa virus COVID has
Speaker 1: only shown how important it is for all kids to
Speaker 1: have access to technology. If low income kids didn't have
Speaker 1: computers or reliable internet at home before, how are they
Speaker 1: supposed to keep up with remote learning during COVID. Pew
Speaker 1: actually found that one in five parents with kids at
Speaker 1: home because of COVID say it is very or somewhat
Speaker 1: likely that their kids won't be able to complete schoolwork
Speaker 1: because they don't have access to a computer or internet.
Speaker 1: It's so important to support community leaders like missus Stella,
Speaker 1: who won't let a generation of kids get left behind
Speaker 1: because of their economic circumstances. In miss A Stella's community,
Speaker 1: they looked after little ones like a village, sharing what
Speaker 1: little they had with one another. She's a living legend,
Speaker 1: and her work and legacy is a testament to the
Speaker 1: fact that anyone can make a lasting difference. Miss Stella,
Speaker 1: what a life you have lived? What a what an inspiration?
Speaker 1: What do you want to say if somebody is out
Speaker 1: there and they think gosh. I want to make a difference,
Speaker 1: but I don't know what I can do. What's your
Speaker 1: message to them? Because you've made you're one woman and
Speaker 1: you've made such a big difference on your community. What
Speaker 1: is your message to other people who might be listening,
Speaker 1: who want to do what you're doing and make a
Speaker 1: difference in their communities? Don't let age up here with
Speaker 1: your dreams. One thing and the other thing is if
Speaker 1: you can believe it and willing to work, you can
Speaker 1: achieve it. I so appreciate it. I appreciate you. I
Speaker 1: appreciate all that you do. Ms A Stella. You are
Speaker 1: an icon friend of Oprah Winfrey, the board in my book,
Speaker 1: Oh my good, have a book out there. Let's go
Speaker 1: the legacy of a humble Black woman from fear to
Speaker 1: back to it to a brilliant boss. It's on the
Speaker 1: website too. For my birthday, I hope you'll consider supporting
Speaker 1: miss O Stella's vision for the future by making a
Speaker 1: donation to Estella's Brilliant Bus. If you're able, go to
Speaker 1: tangodi dot com slash bus to donate. That's Tangoti t
Speaker 1: A n g O t I dot com slash bus.
Speaker 1: If you're moved by Mrs Sella's story and want to donate,
Speaker 1: but aren't in a position to do so right now,
Speaker 1: Hit me up at Hello at tangoi dot com and
Speaker 1: we'll donate in your honor. We keep us safe and
Speaker 1: we keep us strong, so let's all keep striving to
Speaker 1: be the change we want for our communities. Just like
Speaker 1: miss O Stella, you are a living legend, such an
Speaker 1: inspiration to to me personally. When I saw your Super
Speaker 1: Bowl ad, I cried before we spoke. Today, I watched
Speaker 1: it again and I had the same feeling. There's just
Speaker 1: something so beautiful about what you've done for your community.
Speaker 1: So I'm so I'm so very grateful for you and
Speaker 1: then doing everything that I could do make it down
Speaker 1: the down here. Got a story about an interesting thing
Speaker 1: in tech, or just want to say hi, You can
Speaker 1: reach us at Hello at tang godi dot com. You
Speaker 1: can also find transcripts for today's episode at tang godi
Speaker 1: dot com. There Are No Girls on the Internet was
Speaker 1: created by me Bridget tod It's a production of iHeart
Speaker 1: Radio and Unboss creative Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer.
Speaker 1: Terry Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato
Speaker 1: is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If
Speaker 1: you want to help us grow, rate and review us
Speaker 1: on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from I heart Radio,
Speaker 1: check out the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever
Speaker 1: you get your podcasts.