(Paul) Welcome in to another edition of The Extra Mile podcast presented by the Mississippi Department of Transportation. I’m MDOT Digital Manager Paul Katool and I’m joined as always by my co-host Will Craft. He handles government and constituent affairs here at the agency. The last time you heard us we had a great conversation with former MDOT Commissioner Dick Hall. So, if you haven’t listened to that please go back and check it out.

We also teased a great slate of guests. We have a really fun interview for you today. We have Mississippi Today Editor-at-Large Marshall Ramsey. I’ll go ahead and say a few things about him but if you’re listening to state government podcast you probably know who he is. He is of course Mississippi Today Editor-at-Large, nationally recognized cartoonist and author of several books. His cartoons have appeared in The Clarion-Ledger where he worked for 22 years. He’s appeared in USA Today, CNN, Fox News, The Today Show, The New York Times, Time magazine, News Week magazine and three hundred newspapers around the United States. Lots of stuff. Marshall, we really appreciate you coming and joining us today.

(Marshall Ramsey) I’m incredibly nervous having to follow in Dick Hall’s footsteps.

(Paul) It was a good time talking to him and we really appreciate you being here.

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. Thanks.

(Paul) Tell us a little bit about yourself, kind of your background education and why did you decide to be an editorial cartoonist?

(Marshall Ramsey) It’s really weird. Mom figured out when I was two that I could draw. And how she figured it out was basically that’s how she kept me quite in church. Like “Here’s some paper.” Now they actually do church bulletins for kids but back in the day of course they just invented paper. And so that was her way of keeping me quiet. Suddenly she discovered I was actually pretty good at it.
And then when I was eight, I told my Dad, “I’m gonna be an editorial cartoonist” which was the weirdest thing an eight-year-old could tell their father. I’m sure he was hoping I’d be a pitcher for a baseball team or quarterback. But to his credit he patted me on the head and said, “You’re gonna be the best one ever.” And so, from that point on I just knew what I wanted to do. And was very blessed to end up in Mississippi in 1996. And it’s just been to the throttle ever since. I guess I’ll use driving terms.

(Paul) I like it.

(Will) Very much so. What was your education kind of background getting into college or whatever and just dive right into

(Marshall Ramsey) You’re assuming I’m educated.

(Will) Absolutely.

(Marshall Ramsey) Ok. No. I drew cartoons in high school. The very first one got me sent to the principal’s office. Like I said the “hook” was set at that point. And I went up to the University of Tennessee up in Knoxville. And I thought I was gonna go into advertising, but I started drawing cartoons on the behest of my RA my freshman year on the school newspaper and started doing it five days a week. And at that point there was nothing else. And of course, naturally my first job out of college wasn’t at The New York Times or The LA Times. It was actually as a high school janitor. So, I like to tell people that’s where I got most of my training for politicians was cleaning after high school students. I felt like there was some synergy there. Wait. Your funding just got cut for me saying that. I apologize.

(Will) No problem. We’ll work on that next session.

(Marshall Ramsey) Ok. Let’s go.

(Will) What’s kind of your process for coming up with your ideas for cartoons and how you go about the messaging behind it?

(Marshall Ramsey) I have a crack staff of comedy writers in this building and across the street at the Capitol that literally just give me ideas plenty every day. You know, I mean seriously when I came here, I was a cartoonist because it was my job, right? Then I started having kids. I’m not a native Mississippian but my three boys are. And I want this to be the best state for them so that they can have the opportunity to stay here. You know and so that kind of drives how I view, and I do primarily particularly for the stuff for Mississippi today it’s primarily it's Mississippi centric which is very rare. Most cartoonists don’t do local cartoons.

But my process I literally will read the news. I see what’s going on. If there’s something that moves me, that outrages me, if it tickles my funny bone or whatever I just start sketching. I start sketching ideas. My editor now is Adam Ganucheau. For years it was David Hampton you know at The Clarion Ledger. But then I present several ideas maybe three or four or five to my editor. And they’ll pick which one they want, and I draw it up and we post it. It used to be going on newspaper and now it goes on whatever goes on the Internet. So, my process is that. And you know, I’m not the best artist. I’m probably not the best idea guy. What I am good at no matter what rain, shine, nine eleven, you name it, I can come up with a cartoon idea.

And I look back over 25 years of doing this and the fact that literally the day I had cancer surgery a cartoon showed up the next day. You know, it’s just that’s what I’m good at. And I think living here makes it easy.

(Paul) No doubt. And that’s one of the most impressive things to me is every day you have something. So, you must have creative block sometime. How do you overcome those?

(Marshall Ramsey) Everybody has creative block. I mean if you’re a 10th grader right now listening to this, and you have a paper due there’s nothing more frightening than a white piece of paper. If you’re having to do a press release for you know MDOT there’s nothing more frightening than that blank screen. And you know my advice for anybody on writer’s block is that you just work through it. You literally, I may produce 10 terrible ideas, but I’ve produced ideas. And I’ll get a good one eventually.
So, I think the only thing that ever gives me truly writers block is just fatigue and being tired. And I was joking earlier about caffeine but yeah, I mean there is something to be said. My caffeine of choice is unsweet tea you So, I’m not quite to No Doze at this point. But you know there are times when you kind of need a little bit of a boost. But yeah, fatigue’s probably the worst thing for writer’s block that there is. But like I said you know when you live in a target enriched environment to quote “Top Gun” the movie. One of the few movies that I can quote the whole thing through.

It’s not hard finding a topic. It’s just I can’t do a cartoon about something I don’t care about. And so that’s probably the other thing too. It has to be something that I actually care about. But yeah, that’s how you get past the writer’s block is just do the work.

(Paul) That makes total sense.

(Will) How about like when you’re you know there’s a part of your cartooning that is very much so journalistic, right? You’re presenting information from a standpoint kind of the newspaper if you will. How do you make that kind of balance between this is fact-based reporting and this is just a fun cartoon?

(Marshall Ramsey) You know I can tell you it’s about humor. You can watch every stand-up comedian there is out there. You can watch every late-night host and everything else. If you’re trying to base humor based on something that’s not true, it’s gonna fall flat. Because at the end of the day that’s what makes something funny is the innate truth to it.

Now, the question for me is as a journalist as you say and one girl that I dated in college said that I was a journalist like a barnacle to a ship. What’s that supposed to mean, you know? But of course, naturally I’m not married to her, so it all worked out well in the end thank goodness. But my point on this is there are journalistic principles obviously you know liable and things like that that I pay attention to. But at the end of the day if the joke doesn’t work and it doesn’t necessarily mean I have to do a joke per say per day, but you know the humor works.
I mean seriously you look back the last 25 years because Governor Fordice was the way he was, or Governor Barbour was the way he was or Mike Moore or Tate Reeves or whatever because that truth of whoever they are is what makes for a good caricature and a good you know cartoon idea.

(Will) Yeah. No lack of characters here to characterize.

(Marshall Ramsey) We have a deep bench.

(Paul) Absolutely.

(Marshall Ramsey) Very deep bench.

(Paul) So, we will this is MDOT podcast of course we will take it back to MDOT a little bit. What’s it been like covering the MDOT over the years? Any memories from MDOT?

(Marshall Ramsey) Well um Brad’s boring. He really is. You’re gonna have to come up with somebody more exciting than him. I mean darnit he knows his job and he knows how to get things through the legislature. You don’t want that. You want turmoil and catastrophe and chaos.

Now you know now Butch obviously Brown was “Bless him” was a lot of fun. And he made my job easy. But I mean you think at the end of the day one of the things about MDOT and what you do of course it’s incredibly important for the state. And you know when you walk in and see Billy McCoy up there, I genuinely reflect because I drive so much around the state of Mississippi being Editor-at-Large. If it wasn’t for the four-lane highway program, you know I may not even be here because I swear, I think the roads have saved my life several times. Thank God for rumble strips.

I mean obviously what you do here at MDOT is so incredibly important to the day to day lives of everybody. So, yeah when I’m doing issues on that whether it is the pyramids getting built faster than you know what’s going on in Richland right now or you know anything else it’s going to resonate with people because people care about it because it’s their day-to-day life. So, what y’all do obviously MDOT whether it’s roads or all the other transportation issues you’re dealing with this is a huge, huge function of state government so it’s incredibly important.

(Will) That makes sense.

(Paul) So, you mentioned Highway 49. So, we have this cartoon here. If you’re listening…

(Marshall Ramsey) It looks really good on radio.

(Paul) But uh yeah. On YouTube though how the MDOT executive director should have been chosen. First one who gets Highway 49 done gets the job done. So, it this summer it’s going to be done. So, do we get another Highway 49 cartoon?

(Marshall Ramsey) Don’t brag on a dog till it’s dead.

(Paul) There we go.

(Will) Fair enough.

(Marshall Ramsey) Now okay. Wait. Pete is on the line. Uh, sorry. That’s I don’t know if I’m allowed to use that one. But no no. It’s exciting and I will say this. This is Marshall Ramsey’s opinion. And Marshall Ramsey’s opinion alone it’s not Mississippi Today’s opinion. The biggest wasted opportunity that should have happened maybe in the 60s is they should have built a limited access highway from Jackson to the Gulf Coast.

And it’s not I mean you know MDOT’s made a lot of safety improvements increasing on forty-nine. I drive forty-nine a lot okay down to the coast. I’m about to do it in a couple weeks. The you know obviously putting shoulders. Hey, that’s nice you know. And of course, the traffic lights I joke that in the time we started this podcast, there’s six new traffic lights on 49.

(Will) I agree. That’s correct.

(Marshall Ramsey) But like I said if they could have built an interstate back in the day because if you notice when you’re driving down 49 most of the cars and this is very unscientific, and I know y’ all have the data but they’re from out of state. So, you’ve got a lot of out of state traffic on there which you gotta befuddle and bedazzle and make everybody crazy unless in the wonderful towns between here and in Gulfport that are trying to pull you know trying to turn left. It’s like “help.” So, I mean there’s that issue. I mean y’ all are doing as good a job as you can on keeping it a safe road but that’s my two cents on that. I don’t know what the question was because that’s right where I go. But I’ve wanted to rant about that for years. And now that I finally got the MDOT’s attention.

(Will) We’ve got this book here.

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. That book that one’s really old.

(Will) That’s right.

(Marshall Ramsey) That one’s super old.

(Will) This one’s off the Brad White collection here is where you got it from. We’ve got a little tatter and tear going on, but the value is still in there. They still got all the ads; I mean all the great cartoons. Any kind of favorites over the years maybe?

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. I do. It’s kind of like kids you know you sometimes like some more than the others depending on the day. I’m sorry guys if you’re hearing this but the work that I did during 9/11 was very meaningful because that was a very difficult time for this country and there was so much horrible things that were going on but so much good, right?

(Will) Sure.

(Marshall Ramsey) Same thing with Katrina. You know and we’re coming out of the pandemic right now and our track record as a society is at best mixed for the last two years. But, boy, after Katrina in Mississippi, folks if you’re listening to this, I hope you’re proud of yourself because you know, I was down both as a journalist and as a volunteer for my church. And there would be people from all around the country that would be working to help us out. And they would say, “This is the most amazing place I’ve ever been. I’ve never seen the kind of be able to pick yourself up when you got knocked down resilience that you have here in Mississippi.

And I wrote a book called “Chainsaws and Casseroles” because I’ve got a theory that you know when you get hit by the tornado which we do here in Mississippi. It’s kind of our superpowers getting hit by tornadoes. It sounds like a freight train.

(Paul) It’s very true.

(Marshall Ramsey) It does sound like a freight train which I didn’t know until I moved here. But I will say that there will be there will be the church van out in your front yard full of people with chainsaws and casseroles because they’re gonna cut the tree out of your house and they’re going to feed you. And that’s and it’s because we have some need here, but we do have that superpower. And so, the cartoons that I did after Katrina which were that was the second time, I was a Pulitzer finalist which is a fancy way of saying you didn’t win. But it was still you know I’m in the room so that was kind of cool. But I gotta say that that worked to see something that I did cut out and put on a side of a FEMA trailer. You know that was a very wonderful experience.

And I’ve had a few since you know like the Barbara Bush cartoon, I did a couple two or three years ago. I got huge national aclaim. And you next thing I was speaking at the Bush library and I’m sitting on a stage with Jenna Bush Hager which was the most and I’m on CNN and Fox and Friends which I should have gotten a Nobel Peace Prize for that one pull that off. So, it was you know I mean it has been I can’t think of anyplace else I could have lived other than here that’s allowed me to create the body of work that’s been able to allow me to have the modest level of success that I’ve had. You know I can mean I can say which one’s my favorite cartoon. It’s all because of where we live. And I’m not saying well Mississippi’s funniest place I’ve ever been. I’m just saying that its such a rich that’s why we have so many great authors. That’s why some great musicians and authors because the soil truly is fertile for creativity.

(Will) Working for Senator Cochran one of my favorites is the one that after he had passed. He was already trying to send a little bit of heaven back.

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah.

(Will) That’s I’ve got it hanging up in my office. I thought that was definitely one of my favorites by far.

(Marshall Ramsey) Well, its really weird because I mean there’s some people you draw a zillion times. I mean you know like Trent Lott I could draw in my sleep. And I think Trent’s kind of happy about that. No. He’s like “What? I don’t understand the hair. I don’t understand why you drew the hair.” He said that to me the other day when I saw him. But Thad was so under the radar just you know he and Sonny Montgomery. They were just busy you know making sure everything was named after him in the state.

And then when Katrina happened of course he had to become Mr. Tough Guy. I remember drawing him for the first time. I was like “Oh my God, I got to figure out how to draw Thad.” And then of course the McDaniel race which that was like “Oh wow! Okay this is a games on. I’ve got to draw Senator Cochran.” But I do miss him. And like I said he was very good for the state.

(Will) Absolutely.

(Paul) Yeah. No doubt. And so, this is a podcast. You do a little bit of radio yourself. Do you want to plug that?

(Marshall Ramsey) Yes. You can’t tell by my voice.

(Paul) No. Totally no.

(Marshall Ramsey) I have completely blown my voice out. I don’t know how. It’s not karaoke, I promise. I would not do that. No. I do a radio show for Mississippi Public Broadcasting. I do that on Mondays. It’s called “Now You’re Talking.” So, I’m actually on the opposite side of the microphone. This is kind of weird. And then did a tv show for them also called “Conversations” which I guess will come back in some form.

But I also do an interview series called “Mississippi Stories” from Mississippi Today which its usually a 45 minute to an hour where I have a conversation with somebody whether they’re famous or not as long as they have a good story. And like y’all it makes it easier when you have good stories to tell. And we have great stories here and great people to tell those stories. I like to think its kind of my way of paying penance for all the smart aleck stuff I don’t do with the cartoons. But I enjoy it and I really enjoy interviewing people and talking to them and finding out what makes them tick.

(Paul) Well, that’s good stuff. And you know, you’ve been doing that a lot longer than we have so can you impart any wisdom? Give us any good interview tips?

(Marshall Ramsey) No. I tell you what and this was I worked for another radio station that I shall not name. And they’re good people. Gave me a good opportunity. I have nothing but nice things to say about them. They have one of the hosts that had 12 questions and he would interrupt them to ask him the 12 questions. And I was totally different because I’m always like I’m always like fascinated with what somebody has to say.

There’s an author named Carl Melanis for instance, and I don’t when I interview people, I don’t write down questions. Now I do do a script for the radio just because my producer wanted me to do one. But I do the homework and the research and find out about the person. And you know a conversation. So, I ‘ve got thirty minutes, right? I’m talking it’s like between the ferns. So, you’re sitting there literally talking to him. I can’t be a smart aleck.

So, Carl Melanis is an author who’s written probably the best book on Vietnam ever. And he’s got a new book out in which I number one read the book. If you’ve got an author in read the book. Okay. That’s rule that’s tip No. 1. And No. 2 listen to what your guest is saying because you never know where the conversation’s gonna go. So, Carl you know he literally was a road scholar and felt guilty because he was also a marine that he was not in Vietnam. So, he when while in England he went to a naval station in Africa, walked in the door and he said, “ I want to go to Vietnam right now.”

So, as a marine next thing you know six weeks later, he’s in Vietnam. Charges several machine guns and a machine and a machine gun nest, takes them out, receives the Navy cross which is one step below the medal of honor. So, here’s a guy that’s a road scholar and of course a Navy cross recipient. So, I mean incredible hero and just a scholar.

He suffered from incredible PTSD, and I remember just catching that little flare of that in an interview he did. So, I said, “Look I said, I just read a book on post-traumatic stress disorder a little bit. And I remember reading about how you were in an altercation with a car.” And it changed the total direction of the interview. I hadn’t prepared for it necessarily, but it was just gold. And his friend who had flown them down said that that was the best interview I’ve ever heard Carl say before.

And it was just because I had done the researching on that and wasn’t so determined to get through my ten questions you know. And so sometimes I mean obviously, you know, you’ve got your questions today and you’re going to want me to go in a certain direction so, you got to have that framework. But just listening and being able to hear what people have to say because everybody’s got a story. And so, it’s kind of fun to bring it out of them.

(Will) That’s really good advice. We’ve talked about this before, so this is definitely my first foray into any kind of podcast or radio or anything. But I’ve most definitely caught myself you know asking a question and then I start thinking about alright what’s the next topic we’re going into you know? I realized like wait a minute what were you know what were you answering?

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. Yeah. I mean just think about it. I live my life like that all the time. I’m like oh please don’t let me trip over this curb. You know, I’m sitting there doing that and I can’t remember anything because I’m not listening because I’m so worried about falling over.

(Will) That’s very good advice for sure. And do the homework, right?

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. Do the homework. Do the work. You know, it’s just I mean there’s a great book by Steven Pressfield who wrote “The Legend of Bagger Vance.” And he wrote a couple books one about Spartacus I believe but anyway he wrote a book called “The War of Art”. Not “The Art of War”, “The War of Art” and it’s about creativity. And literally he outlines you know what I’ve talked about writer’s block. He agrees with me on that. But just basically at the end of the day if you’re a writer write. If you’re doing a podcast, do a podcast you know.

I had a really nice guy come in today when I was talking down at an event, I did for Mississippi Today. And he’s talking about “Well, I’m thinking about doing this and I’m thinking about doing that.” Do it. Just do it. And I guess maybe that’s why I’m so prolific in all the different stuff I do. It’s just at the end of the day it’s like I just got to sit down and do the work.

(Will) That’s awesome. That’s very all very good advice.

(Paul) No doubt.

(Will) You alluded this earlier talking about the time that you spent traveling the state and how wonderful the ‘87 program was and getting the four-lanes out there. You know how important is that I mean for economy, business, education? I mean we’ve got to keep the system efficient and ready to go you know so we can get these products to and from, get the people to and from. I mean that’s just a resounding thing, right? Any thoughts?

(Marshall Ramsey) I could almost give the Dick Hall price of asphalt speech. You know I’ve heard it so many times. But that said and like I said I cannot stress how important I mean Bloody ‘98 everybody that remembers before they four-laned Alabama, I know they’re trying but they need to get on the stick, go ahead and finish that out so it’s four-laned all the way to Mobile.

(Will) That’s right.

(Marshall Ramsey) But that you know used to be a horrific road. You know people going between Hattiesburg and Mobile and they would die. You know how many chicken trucks or log trucks have you been behind on 25 going to Starkville.

(Will) Amen.

(Marshall Ramsey) You know and then you don’t have that problem anymore. And so, if I need to get to Oxford, I can do it in just between two and a half hours and that’s driving just barely above the legal speed which I’m just for that’s, don’t don’t tell anybody I just said that. Okay. I’m a grandmother. I’m very careful how I drive because I drive a lot. I don’t want to end up being a greasy spot in the road.

But yeah, it totally changed obviously if you’re in a development you know you can say well you can put your plant here because we’ve got roads, we’ve got rail, we’ve got all the things that you need. I mean that’s obviously why we have a Nissan plant and Continental plant and so forth because we have the infrastructure that’s here to do it. But that said, it helps the average man because it literally saves lives every single day.

And I’m glad obviously that we have the big pot of money that came in to be able to do some of the maintenance and to be able to keep it up because when you build a four-lane that’s a lot of upkeep. Oh yeah. Did I mention expansive soil? Yeah. That’s the devil. And you know I mean people give Richland a lot of credit, I mean a lot of grief. And obviously 55 south in Jackson and so forth. Until you live here and have your house jacked up by a guy named Bubba two or three times which I have. Not in my current house thankfully. But you know, you just don’t understand how destructive it and how difficult it is to build roads around here because you have to dig down really deep and bring in a lot of dirt and do it so that you are not having to repave every three minutes.
(Paul) That is that is the truth for sure. You know, we’ve covered a lot of ground today, but we do have the most important question that must be asked. And it’s Will’s question so he’s gonna…

(Marshall Ramsey) So why do you talk too much? Is that what you’re saying?

(Paul) No. Yeah exactly.

(Marshall Ramsey) I’m just caffeinated to be honest with you.

(Will) Me too. I told him I polished off a fence post Red Bull before we came in here, so I was like all hyped up first dude, man.

(Marshall Ramsey) I do not know CPR so you’re playing with the devil with that.

(Will) So, all right. As we’ve talked about you spent a lot of time traveling right around the state. Is there any place can be you know here at home or somewhere maybe out you know away from population center so to speak? Any place you’re going through you just to stop in and get a bite to eat?

(Marshall Ramsey) Oh. Bite to eat. That’s tough. You know, I did a book with Robert St. John who’s a chef and author. And he literally took me to Letha’s. He would stop at gas stations. And I mean gas station chicken folks and potato wedges, logs, potato logs are fantastic. I don’t know. I mean it’s like a sailor having a girl in every port. I have a great place to eat in every town I’m in. I mean Oxford my gosh. There’s like name like six or seven places I love to go eat. Starkville same thing so I mean it’s hard to just nail down one. But that said, I pretty much know where every good place to eat is along the way.

(Will) Maybe one that you get to go to the least or that you, but you really enjoy.

(Marshall Ramsey) So, you’re really gonna press me on one answer.

(Paul) He needs an answer.

(Marshall Ramsey) He needs a sponsor.

(Will) That’s right. We got to see our game plan is all these recommendations next year when we host, we’re going to do them from the location so we can also get a taste of the food and you know see what’s going on.

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. No. I’m trying to think about that. Oh yeah. Doe’s obviously in the Delta. Fantastic some good eats on there. And Gibbes down in Learned. That was some fantastic eats there. And of course, here in Jackson, I’ve got several friends that have restaurants and I love to eat at. You know it’s so funny because my wife and I we’re like okay let’s eat at the same place we’ve eaten at nineteen times in a row. It’s like well maybe we need to we’ve been married a long time maybe we need to try some different food.

(Will) Hey. If it’s good, you know.

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. I mean you know; I mean we my son who just graduated from Ole Miss congratulations to him. He just rocked it.

(Paul) Congrats. Yeah.

(Marshall Ramsey) No. He did great. But he likes to eat at Volta all the time which is you know an old gas station in Oxford, and they have really good gyros. So, you know that kind of stuff. So, I mean we we’ve got our favorites.

(Will) I frequented The Chester chicken on Highway 13 to Mendenhall for many a year when I still lived back home.

(Marshall Ramsey) I know exactly so you’re from Mendenhall?

(Will) God’s country.

(Marshall Ramsey) Yeah. My very good friend has a book shop in downtown Mendenhall junk shop named Joe White.

(Will) Yep.

(Marshall Ramsey) And Joe edited both my short story books and basically was the first person to see my cartoon ideas for about twenty years.

(Will) Awesome. So, you love the Simpson County influence.

(Marshall Ramsey) Oh yeah. Gotta love Simpson County. Good folks in both McGee and Mendenhall.

(Will) That’s awesome. Yeah. It’s awesome.

(Paul) For sure. For sure. So, Marshall, we really appreciate you coming and talking today. Super interesting perspective on MODT, cartoons, state government as a whole. We know you’re a busy man. And as evidenced by your Twitter account we see you posting at @MarshallRamsey there. So, thank you very much.

(Marshall Ramsey) You’re welcome. This was fun. It really was. I hope this was fun for y’all because I enjoyed it.

(Will) Very much appreciate the tips too because just keep the mental program going up there. That’s right.

(Paul) For sure. For sure. So, we’ll go ahead and wrap things up right now. We want to thank our listeners out there for tuning into The Extra Mile podcast. We also want to thank our producer Katey Hornsby and our editor Drew Hall. Remember you can watch and listen to each episode by visiting GoMDOT.com/TheExtraMile. And be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter. That handle is @MississippiDOT. And as always remember to drive smart out there on Mississippi highways.