May 28, 2026

S E2: MR HANSoN Podcast – “The Tackle Box That Became a Kingdom | The Johnny Morris Story”

S E2: MR HANSoN Podcast – “The Tackle Box That Became a Kingdom | The Johnny Morris Story”
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Johnny Morris: The Tackle Box That Became a Kingdom | MR HANSoN Podcast


SEO META DESCRIPTION

How did a small tackle display in the back of a liquor store become one of the greatest outdoor empires in American history? In this cinematic episode of MR HANSoN Podcast, Jeremy Hanson tells the incredible true story of Johnny Morris — the visionary founder of Bass Pro Shops. From humble beginnings in the Ozarks to building wilderness resorts, conservation movements, and a retail kingdom unlike anything America had ever seen, this immersive audio documentary explores entrepreneurship, grit, branding, family legacy, and the spirit of the outdoors.

There are companies… and then there are kingdoms.

Before giant wilderness resorts, massive aquariums, handcrafted boats, conservation campaigns, and towering outdoor cathedrals known as Bass Pro Shops… there was just a fisherman with a dream.

In this cinematic episode of MR HANSoN Podcast, Jeremy Hanson takes listeners deep into the life and legacy of Johnny Morris — the quiet visionary who transformed a simple fishing tackle operation in the Ozarks into one of the most recognizable outdoor brands in the world.

This is not just a business story.

It is a story about American ambition… about understanding identity before marketing ever had a name for it… and about building an empire around experience, conservation, nostalgia, and the soul of the outdoors.

You’ll hear:

  • The forgotten early days of Bass Pro Shops
  • How Johnny Morris understood outdoorsmen better than corporate America
  • The rise of destination retail
  • Why Bass Pro stores feel more like museums and wilderness lodges than shopping centers
  • The philosophy that built customer loyalty bordering on tribal identity
  • How conservation became part of the company’s DNA
  • The Springfield, Missouri roots that shaped the entire empire
  • The merger that reshaped outdoor retail forever
  • And how a tackle box became a kingdom


Told in the signature cinematic style of MR HANSoN Podcast, this episode blends immersive storytelling, entrepreneurship, American culture, business psychology, and emotional narrative into one unforgettable audio experience.

If you love stories about empire builders, American originals, entrepreneurship, outdoor culture, and visionary leadership… this episode is for you.



  • Johnny Morris
  • Bass Pro Shops
  • Cabela's
  • Springfield
  • Wonders of Wildlife National Museum & Aquarium
  • Tracker Boats


Who is Johnny Morris?

Johnny Morris is the founder of Bass Pro Shops, one of the largest outdoor recreation retailers in the world. He started by selling fishing tackle in Springfield, Missouri and grew the company into a major outdoor lifestyle empire.


How did Bass Pro Shops start?

Bass Pro Shops began in 1972 when Johnny Morris sold fishing tackle from a small space inside his father’s liquor store in Springfield, Missouri.


What is Johnny Morris known for?

Johnny Morris is known for revolutionizing outdoor retail, creating immersive destination stores, promoting wildlife conservation, and building Bass Pro Shops into a global outdoor brand.


Where is Bass Pro Shops headquartered?

Bass Pro Shops is headquartered in Springfield.


What is the Wonders of Wildlife Museum?

Wonders of Wildlife National Museum & Aquarium is a massive conservation-focused museum and aquarium created by Johnny Morris and Bass Pro Shops in Springfield, Missouri.


  • Johnny Morris story
  • Bass Pro Shops founder
  • Bass Pro Shops history
  • Johnny Morris podcast
  • outdoor empire documentary
  • Bass Pro Shops documentary
  • entrepreneurship podcast
  • MR HANSoN Podcast
  • Springfield Missouri business success
  • outdoor retail history
  • American entrepreneur stories
  • Bass Pro Shops origin story
  • Johnny Morris net worth
  • Bass Pro Shops empire
  • conservation entrepreneur
  • cinematic business podcast
  • immersive storytelling podcast
  • outdoor lifestyle brands
  • Tracker Boats history
  • Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s merger


#JohnnyMorris

#BassProShops

#MRHANSoNPodcast

#Entrepreneurship

#BusinessStory

#AmericanDream

#OutdoorLife

#SpringfieldMissouri

#BassFishing

#Cabelas

#TrackerBoats

#Conservation

#StorytellingPodcast

#ImmersiveAudio

#FuzzyLifeEntertainment


Johnny Morris,Bass Pro Shops,Johnny Morris documentary,Bass Pro history,MR HANSoN Podcast,Jeremy Hanson,outdoor empire,business documentary,American entrepreneur,Bass Pro founder,Springfield Missouri,Bass Pro Shops story,immersive storytelling,podcast documentary,cinematic podcast,outdoor retail,Cabelas merger,Tracker Boats,outdoor business success,Wonders of Wildlife


  • Entrepreneurship
  • Documentary
  • Business History
  • Society & Culture
  • Outdoor Lifestyle
  • Storytelling
  • American History
  • Leadership


  • “Who founded Bass Pro Shops?”
  • “How did Johnny Morris become successful?”
  • “What is the story behind Bass Pro Shops?”
  • “Best podcast about Johnny Morris”
  • “Entrepreneurship podcast about Bass Pro Shops”
  • “Who owns Bass Pro Shops?”
  • “Springfield Missouri business legends”
  • “Immersive storytelling podcast about business founders”
  • “Outdoor retail empire story”
  • “Johnny Morris conservation efforts”


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WEBVTT

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Springfield, Missouri, nineteen seventy two. A young man stands behind

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the counter of his father's liquor store. He's twenty four

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years old, tall, sun leathered, and quiet in a certain

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type of way, you know, the way that a man

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that spent a thousand mornings on the water before the

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rest of the world even wakes up. He's not selling liquor.

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He's selling fishing lures. That's right out of a brown

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cardboard box. Okay, one of these guys sitting on a

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wooden shelf in the back of the store. How big

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eight square feet of space? That's it. This shelf creaks

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when you lean in on it. The light in that

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back corner is the kind of yellow you only get

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in the old Midwest commercial buildings, you know, that incandescent,

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dusty and warm. The whole back room smells faintly of

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cedar and printer ink and the inside of a tackle box. Hooks,

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spinner baits and crank baits, jigs line the things. Most

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people walk past without even thinking twice. But the men,

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the men coming through that door, now they notice, They

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stop and they lean in, because most of them are

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passing through Springfield on their way to the table rock

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lake or bull shoals are even stocked it. And they've

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been looking for this gear, this exact gear, for years.

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Real gear, you know, the stuff the pros use, the stuff.

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The catalogs weren't carry the stuff, the hardware stores can't

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get permission to even stock. And here it is sitting

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in a cardboard box in the back of a liquor

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store run by a kid who knows every fish in

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every cove of every lake within two hundred miles. The

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cardboard box, that brown dented, ordinary cardboard box. Well, it's

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going to become the seed of an empire. It's going

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to grow into nearly two hundred destination stores across two countries.

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It's going to grow into the largest boat manufacturer in

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the world. It's going to grow into a wildlife museum

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so massive that presidents fly in for grand openings. It's

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going to grow into a name that outdoor people speak

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with the same reverence other people reserved for Disney. But

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on this day, in this back room, it's just a box,

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and the question echoing inside it is no one's asked

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out loud yet, why can't I find the right gear

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in one place? You're listening to The Mister Hanson podcast

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the story of an ozark's kid who just paid attention

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and built a kingdom out of a cardboard box. Mister

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Hans podcasts. The world before fishing wasn't new in nineteen

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seventy two. Fishing was as old as America. Even older

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men had been chasing bass and walleye and catfish since

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the country had a name. But the gear, well it

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was kind of scattered. A hardware store on this corner

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had hooks but no claw line. A general store across

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town had lined but no decent rods. A specialty catalog

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mailed out of Wisconsin had professional spinner bits, but it

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had a six week wait time if you wanted to

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outfit yourself like a serious angler, like the men started

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to compete on the new bass tournament circuit. Oh, you

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had to drive, you had to wait, you had to hunt.

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There was no destination, no mecca, no place built for

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the fishermen. And that's a little strange. That gap, well,

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it was invisible to most people. Most people looked at

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the outdoor world and saw something already complete. Hunters had

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their stores, fishermen had their tackle ailes. Everything just seemed fine.

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But Johnny Morris saw something different. He saw the same

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thing every fisherman saw. The difference was he just refused

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to accept it. That's the first lesson buried inside this story.

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The biggest opportunities in the world are usually invisible, and

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that's because everyone's already learned to live with the broken thing,

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everyone except the person who can't now the kid on

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the water. To understand what Johnny saw, you have to

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understand where he came from, Netlas Springfield, Missouri. The Ozarks,

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a region of green hills and clear water and limestone

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bluffs and small towns that smell like cut grass and

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cedar smoke. Born in nineteen forty eight, raised on the

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White River, raised on table Rock Lake before table Rock

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Lake was even famous. His father took him fishing before

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he could even read. His mother too. You see, this

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wasn't a hobby in the Morris house. It was a

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religion by the time Johnny was old enough to drive.

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Now he wasn't chasing girls, he wasn't chasing parties. He

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was chasing fish. Now you have to understand the Ozarks

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to understand what that actually means. This isn't fishing the

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way coastal people picture fishing leisurely afternoon on a pond.

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This is dawn and cold mornings on table Rock Lake,

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when the fog is sitting on the water like cotton.

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This is reading the stained shoreline after a storm. This

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is watching a hare and stand still for forty minutes

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and learning how a predator actually waits. This is the

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kind of country where every kid knows the names of

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the three different shad where every old man at the

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bait shop has a theory about barometric crusher and fishing

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where you can drive eight miles in any direction and

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find a fishable cove somewhere. He spent his time studying

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the lakes the way the other kids studied baseball cards.

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Where do the bass hold when it's cold out? Where

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do they push when the water starts to warm? What

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lure works on a cloudy morning? What works at dusk

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when the cicadas start? What works when the water is

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just kind of tinged and stained? What works when it's clear?

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You see, Johnny Morris learn to read water. And that's

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the thing about learning to read water is it teaches

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you things like patience and observation. It teaches you the

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right tool and the right approach Because you learn that

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that can change everything you see. A wrong lure on

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the right structure catches nothing. The right lure on the

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right structure, sure well, it catches your phil for the day,

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and details they matter. Most kids don't learn that lesson

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early Johnny did. It would shape every decision he made

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for the next sixty years. The father who came home.

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You can't tell Johnny's story without telling his fathers. John A.

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Morris born nineteen eleven, raised dirt poor in Willard, Missouri,

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a tiny little speck of a town outside Springfield, lost

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his parents, young, got passed off to a great aunt,

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grew up in the kind of poverty that doesn't show

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up in photographs because nobody could even afford a camera.

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When World War Two came in, well, he just went

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Battle of the Baals, the cold, the trees splintering from

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artillery fire, the German offensive in our Dens December of

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nineteen forty four, the largest land battle the USA Army

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fought in the entire war. Thousands of American boys frozen

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in foxhels in Belgium, toads turning black inside their boots,

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the worst winter Europe had seen in forty years. Men

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came back from that and never spoke about it. Then

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John A. Morris, Well, he was one of them. He

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came home. A lot of men didn't. He came home

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and he built something. In nineteen thirty seven, actually before

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the war, returning to it after, he started a liquor

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store in Springfield, Missouri. He called it Brown Derby. He worked,

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and he stocked shelves, He bounced books, he greeted customers.

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He he did all of it. By the time Johnny

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was old enough to remember anything, his father was already

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a successful murder in the Springfield area. The Brown Derby

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would eventually grow into eighteen locations across the Springfield region.

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Eighteen from a kid raised by a great aunt in Willard, Missouri,

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from a soldier who'd watched friends die in the Belgian snow.

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That's the seed Johnny inherited, not money, not connections. A

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father who came back from war and built something out

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of nothing, A father who understood that work, relentless and patient,

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customer facing work was how a poor kid from Willard,

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Missouri became something more. A father who proved that circumstances

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didn't pick the winners. People do. And Johnny watched Johnny absorbed,

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and when his time came, he wouldn't ask his father

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for permission to use the family money. He'd ask his

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father for permission to use eight square feet. Then the

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tournament that changed everything. Nineteen sixty nine, Johnny is twenty

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one years old. Bass fishing, Oh, it's changing. A man

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named Ray Scott had just started something called the Bass

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Anglers Sportsman Society Bass Bass. He'd organize the first All

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American Bass Tournament a couple years earlier. It was new,

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and it was raw. It was the beginning of competitive

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professional fishing as a real sport. Johnny enters, he fishes,

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He doesn't win, but that's not what matters. What matters

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is who's there. Anglers from California, from Texas and Florida,

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from Alabama, from Tennessee. Men who fish for a living,

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men who know things he's never even heard. Men carrying

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tackle that he's never seen. These guys are using techniques.

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The magazines haven't eve been published yet. For five years

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after that, Johnny Fish is the professional circuit. Now he's

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not the top angler, he's not the marquee name, but

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he's there and he's listening. He's watching what they tie

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on and what they throw, what works, and what doesn't.

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He's standing in tackle shops in Birmingham and Tulsa Lake Charles,

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listening to local guides argue about things like lure colors.

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He's watching the manufacturer reps unload sample caateses at tournament

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headquarters and seeing what sponsors anglers actually grab when no

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one's looking. He's watching Bill Dance and Roland Martin and

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Rick Kloon, the men who would become legends in the sport.

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He's collecting an education that no school at the time

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could give him. Every cast taught him something, Every tournament

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weigh in taught him a little bit more. Every late

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night conversation in a diner with a fellow angler from

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a different state. It filed something away in his memory.

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And somewhere in those five years, somewhere on a tournament

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dock in Alabama or a marina in East Texas, a

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thought comes to him and it starts to form. There

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are tens of thousands of men just like these guides

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in every state in America. Men who love this who

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want this gear, who simply can't find it, Men who

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would drive hours to get if someone would just put

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it under one roof, and that thought sitting unspoken in

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the back of his mind is the seed that becomes

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the cardboard box. The U Haul Springfield Spring of nineteen

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seventy two. Johnny goes to his father and he says,

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I want to sell tackle out of the back of

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the store. His father is a businessman. His father has

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built one of the largest liquor chains in southwest Missouri.

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His father knows what a long shot that this looks like,

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but his father also knows his son, and his father

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co signs a ten thousand dollars loan ten thousand dollars

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in nineteen seventy two money that's roughly seventy five thousand

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dollars in today's money. A kid with no retail experience

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to sell hooks and lures out of a liquor store

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whom Johnny rents a U haul trailer he loads up.

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He drives across the country, state after state, and manufacture

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after manufacture, wholesaler after wholesaler. Days behind the wheel. Truck

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stops at three in the morning in coffee that takes

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like burnt rubber maps spread across dinner tables. He buys

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the best tackle from everywhere that he can find. You know,

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the stuff. The pros use the stuff. The catalogs don't

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have the stuff the hardware store simply can't get. He

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buys it directly from the men who make it. He

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shakes hands, he looks them in the eye. He builds

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relationships that will outlast most marriages. And he fills the

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U haul. He drives back to Springfield, and he unloads

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it into a brown cardboard box sitting on a wooden

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shelf in the back of his father's liquor store. Eight

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square feet. And that's where it starts. Not in a boardroom,

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not with a business plan, not with venture capital, not

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with a marketing study, with a U haul alone, a

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box and a kid who'd spent his whole life learning

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what fishermen actually wanted. I listen carefully because most people

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don't hear this part. The Empire didn't start with the empire.

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It started with the smallest possible version of itself. Eight

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square feet, one box, one shelf, and that's it. The

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first move anglers come. They drive past brown Derby on

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their way to table Rock. They stop in for a

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six pack and notice the box, and they lean in.

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They pick up a spinner bait that they've been trying

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to find for months. They look at Johnny, Hey, where

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did you get this? And Johnny tells them. He talks

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to them. He's not a salesman, but he's a fisherman,

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and he talks as a fisherman. He asks where they're going,

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what they're targeting, and what works the last week but didn't.

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And then he points to them and says that lure,

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that's the one that's going to work because he knows.

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You see, he's been on those lakes, He's caught those fish.

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The customer doesn't feel like a customer. The customer feels

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like a brother. And here's what happens. They go to

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the lake, they use the lure, they catch the fish.

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They drive home from Tulsa little rock in Kansas City

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and Memphis, and they tell their buddies. Their buddies start

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writing Johnny letters. Can you ship me what you sold

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00:18:10.279 --> 00:18:12.720
my friend last week? Can you put me on a

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list somehow? Can you send me a catalog? Well there's

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no catalog, at least not yet, but there will be

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because Johnny, well, he's listening. The insight. Most businesses start

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with a product. Johnny didn't. Johnny started with a gap.

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He sold tackle, but he wasn't really selling tackle. He

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was selling answers. Answers to questions men carried around for

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years and couldn't get answered anywhere else. Why can't I

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find this gear? Why can't I find someone who knows

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what they're talking about? Why can't I get the same

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stuff the pros use? Every other retailer in America was

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thinking what products should I stock? Johnny was thinking what

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problems am I solving? And you see that's a different game,

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00:19:13.400 --> 00:19:18.119
that's a deeper game. Stock a product, you get a sale,

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solve a problem, you get a customer for life. And

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maybe there's a philosophical hinge. The men who build empires

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00:19:28.160 --> 00:19:31.480
are almost never the men who set out to build empires.

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They're the men who set out to fix something, something

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00:19:36.079 --> 00:19:41.039
that bothered them. A bothered man with patience and discipline

248
00:19:41.079 --> 00:19:46.759
becomes dangerous. A bothered man who builds a system around

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00:19:47.000 --> 00:19:53.279
his frustration changes industries. And Johnny, well, he was bothered,

250
00:19:55.119 --> 00:19:58.359
but he was different from every other bothered man in

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America because he didn't just complain, he didn't just dream.

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He didn't sit in a duck blind for ten years

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saying somebody ought to fix this. He fixed it eight

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square feet at a time. The cardboard box was the

255
00:20:15.079 --> 00:20:19.000
first crack of light, and it was well. It was

256
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about to grow. The Catalog nineteen seventy four. The letters

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00:20:26.720 --> 00:20:31.319
keep coming, pouring in. Men in states Johnny's never visited

258
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are asking for gear eight square feet of a shelf

259
00:20:35.319 --> 00:20:40.400
space and can't reach them. A storefront that can't reach them,

260
00:20:40.640 --> 00:20:45.240
but paper can. So Johnny makes a catalog, a real one,

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over one hundred and fifty pages, high quality tackle on

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fair prices, clear photos, honest descriptions, written by someone who

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actually used this stuff. He calls it the Bass pro

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00:21:00.039 --> 00:21:05.400
Jos Catalog. He prints it, he mails it, and something

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00:21:05.480 --> 00:21:09.720
happens that he didn't see coming. The catalog goes off

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00:21:09.799 --> 00:21:16.519
like a bomb. Orders pour in from Texas, in Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Florida,

267
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from states with no Brown Derby, from states where no

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Morris had ever even set foot in. The catalog is

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doing something that the store simply couldn't. It's reaching every

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fisherman in America who'd been quietly suffering through bad gear

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and worse service. It's giving them a single mailing address

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that says, we know what you're trying. To do, and

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we have the tools that you need. The catalog will

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eventually swell into millions of copies per year. It'll spawn

275
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sister catalogs for offshore fishing, and for hunting and for camping.

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It'll become the kind of catalog that arrives in mailboxes

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00:21:58.319 --> 00:22:01.279
and gets passed around the dinner table like a family heirloom.

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Boys sitting there circling lures, fathers checking off rifles, and

279
00:22:06.640 --> 00:22:11.799
sons dreaming about boats. But on the day it first

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hit mailboxes in nineteen seventy four, it did something more

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important than any of that. It proved that the cardboard

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box hadn't been a fluke at all. It proved that

283
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the gap was a real thing, and it proved that

284
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Johnny Morris was right the boat. Johnny is thirty years old,

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the store is busy, and the catalog is exploding. Money's

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rolling in the business is real. But he also notices something.

287
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His customers are buying tackle. But the path from buying

288
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tackle to actually fishing it, well that's still a mess.

289
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You see, to fish like a serious angler, you need

290
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a boat, and buying a boat in nineteen seventy eight,

291
00:23:01.960 --> 00:23:05.079
well then it is brutal You go to one dealer

292
00:23:05.160 --> 00:23:07.279
for the hull, and you go to another to shop

293
00:23:07.319 --> 00:23:10.720
for the motor. You go somewhere else for the trailer.

294
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You fight to find a fish finder, a trolling motor,

295
00:23:14.640 --> 00:23:19.359
a battery of bilge pump. You spend weekends, you spend savings,

296
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and you get gouged, and by the time it's all

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in the water, you've forgotten what you wanted to fish

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in the first place. Johnny looks at this and he

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00:23:30.720 --> 00:23:36.640
sees the cardboard box all over again, same problem, different scale.

300
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So he does what he did with the box. Well,

301
00:23:39.880 --> 00:23:42.880
he goes in and he fixes it. He goes to

302
00:23:43.000 --> 00:23:46.680
a small aluminum boat builder. He works out a hall,

303
00:23:46.799 --> 00:23:50.079
he repairs it. It puts a Mercury motor on it,

304
00:23:50.880 --> 00:23:56.240
a Hummingbird depth finder, a Minkota trolling motor. One package,

305
00:23:56.279 --> 00:23:59.519
one price, and it's ready to fish right out of

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the show room. He calls it the Bass Tracker twenty

307
00:24:06.000 --> 00:24:10.359
nine ninety five two thousand, nine hundred ninety five dollars,

308
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the first nationally advertised complete boat motor trailer package in

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American history. Industry experts says that it's going to fail.

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They say, no one buys a boat that way, and

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they were wrong. Within four years, demand is so heavy

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00:24:29.440 --> 00:24:32.759
he opens his own aluminum boat plant in Lebanon, Missouri.

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Within thirty years, Tracker is the number one selling fishing

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boat in America, and it'll keep that crown for over

315
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four decades. In counting White River Marine Group, the company

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that grows out of Tracker, Well, it eventually becomes the

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00:24:50.880 --> 00:24:55.640
largest boat manufacturer in the world by volume, all of

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it out of the same idea that's started in the

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00:24:58.759 --> 00:25:05.119
back of the liquor store. Stop making customers solve problems

320
00:25:05.160 --> 00:25:12.359
someone else should solve for them. The first real store.

321
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Nineteen eighty one, nine years after the cardboard Box, Johnny

322
00:25:18.519 --> 00:25:23.720
opens his first standalone Bass Pro shop store and Springfield,

323
00:25:24.440 --> 00:25:28.039
down the street from brown Derby. But here's the thing.

324
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He doesn't build a store, not the way every other

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retailer in America builds a store. He'd been to Llbean's

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flagship up in Maine. He'd seen what was possible when

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00:25:40.119 --> 00:25:43.240
retail stopped trying to be retail and started trying to

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be a destination. He took the seed and ran further

329
00:25:48.480 --> 00:25:52.880
than anyone else had ever run. He builds aquariums, real ones,

330
00:25:53.640 --> 00:25:56.640
tens of thousands of gallons, and live bass and live

331
00:25:56.759 --> 00:26:01.559
trout and walleye, live catfish hanging in the corners like submarines.

332
00:26:02.680 --> 00:26:08.200
He builds wildlife mounts and dioramas and waterfalls, a taxidermy

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00:26:08.200 --> 00:26:13.519
display that looks like a museum exhibit. He builds rough

334
00:26:13.519 --> 00:26:18.200
cut log beams overhead and stone fireplaces, wood floors that

335
00:26:18.319 --> 00:26:22.240
creak the way, a hunting cabin creeks. He builds a

336
00:26:22.279 --> 00:26:26.559
store that doesn't really feel like a store. It feels

337
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like a national park where you can buy things. You

338
00:26:31.039 --> 00:26:32.920
walk in and the first thing that hits you is

339
00:26:32.960 --> 00:26:36.000
in a sales rack. It's the smell of cedar and

340
00:26:36.039 --> 00:26:40.839
gun oil and coffee. It's the sound of running water

341
00:26:40.960 --> 00:26:45.480
from an indoor stream. It's a stuffed black bear standing

342
00:26:45.519 --> 00:26:48.559
eight feet tall in the entryway with its claws caught

343
00:26:48.680 --> 00:26:53.839
mid swipe. You see, people don't come to shop, They

344
00:26:53.960 --> 00:26:59.119
come to be there. Families drive in from three states away,

345
00:26:59.160 --> 00:27:01.799
and they walk slowly and they take pictures. They eat

346
00:27:01.920 --> 00:27:05.720
lunch on site. They tell their kids, look at the fish,

347
00:27:05.720 --> 00:27:09.519
look at the bear, look at this. Grown men who

348
00:27:09.519 --> 00:27:13.400
don't take pictures of anything take pictures of the aquarium.

349
00:27:13.680 --> 00:27:17.480
Couples come there and treat it like a date. Tourists

350
00:27:17.480 --> 00:27:20.440
with no interest in fishing put it on their itinerary,

351
00:27:20.519 --> 00:27:23.000
right next to Silver Dollar City and the caverns at

352
00:27:23.039 --> 00:27:29.279
Marble Cave. And while they're walking through the Wonder, they're

353
00:27:29.319 --> 00:27:35.119
buying reels and rods and boots and camel and coolers

354
00:27:35.160 --> 00:27:41.920
and boats. But buying isn't the point. The wonder is

355
00:27:42.000 --> 00:27:47.480
the point. The buying is the byproduct. This is the

356
00:27:47.480 --> 00:27:52.799
moment Fast Pro Shop stops being a retailer. This is

357
00:27:52.839 --> 00:28:01.759
the moment that it becomes a place the obsession. Now,

358
00:28:01.799 --> 00:28:06.359
this is where the story starts to sharpen. Because building

359
00:28:06.440 --> 00:28:11.160
one destination, well, it's not hard. Building twenty is something

360
00:28:11.200 --> 00:28:16.400
else Entirely. Most retailers, once they cracked the formula, well

361
00:28:16.440 --> 00:28:20.960
they water it down. They duplicate, they franchise, They cost cut,

362
00:28:21.839 --> 00:28:25.079
They strip out everything that made the first one magic,

363
00:28:25.960 --> 00:28:30.200
so the next forty kin ship under budget. Johnny refuses.

364
00:28:31.359 --> 00:28:35.960
Every store he opens has to feel real, real wood

365
00:28:36.000 --> 00:28:40.240
and real stone, real water in the aquariums, real animals

366
00:28:40.279 --> 00:28:47.640
on the wall, real fishermen behind the counters, not retail clerks, outfitters,

367
00:28:48.400 --> 00:28:50.799
men and women who actually hunt and fish and can

368
00:28:50.880 --> 00:28:53.759
answer a question about a Texas rigged worm on a

369
00:28:53.799 --> 00:29:00.839
Saturday morning without reaching for a manual, and he won't compromise. See,

370
00:29:00.880 --> 00:29:07.240
Johnny understands that most people don't understand that outdoor people

371
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don't trust faith. They live in a world where authenticity

372
00:29:11.799 --> 00:29:15.640
matters because their life sometimes depend on it. A bad

373
00:29:15.759 --> 00:29:20.319
not it fails, a cheap wine, it breaks, a counterfeit

374
00:29:20.400 --> 00:29:24.759
lure tears off in the first cast. These customers can

375
00:29:24.880 --> 00:29:29.720
smell thorniness from across the parking lot, so Johnny builds

376
00:29:29.720 --> 00:29:32.880
it for them, not for the market, and not for

377
00:29:33.000 --> 00:29:37.960
Wall Street. For them. Every store gets walked through by

378
00:29:38.000 --> 00:29:42.000
him personally before it ever even opens. Every aquarium gets

379
00:29:42.000 --> 00:29:46.440
stocked with native species and not some show species. Every

380
00:29:46.519 --> 00:29:49.119
taxidermy amount has to be done by an artist and

381
00:29:49.160 --> 00:29:53.559
not a factory. Every restaurant inside the store has to

382
00:29:53.599 --> 00:30:00.880
serve real food, not concession stand garbage. Every employee, every

383
00:30:01.279 --> 00:30:05.440
single one of them, more than forty thousand outfitters across

384
00:30:05.480 --> 00:30:08.640
a chain, has to be the kind of person who'd

385
00:30:08.640 --> 00:30:13.680
welcome somebody into their own hunting camp. And by doing that,

386
00:30:13.759 --> 00:30:18.519
by refusing to dilute the experience even one, it would

387
00:30:18.519 --> 00:30:23.839
have been cheaper and faster and easier. Johnny creates something

388
00:30:24.000 --> 00:30:30.240
almost impossible in modern retail, a national chain that still

389
00:30:30.279 --> 00:30:35.720
feels like a local one, a franchise of authenticity that's

390
00:30:35.880 --> 00:30:43.359
not a business move. That's called discipline, the Pyramid and

391
00:30:43.440 --> 00:30:49.640
the Empire. For years, the Empire grows quietly, store after store,

392
00:30:50.079 --> 00:30:54.160
boat plant after boat plant. In nineteen eighty seven, on

393
00:30:54.200 --> 00:30:58.599
the banks of table Rock Lake, Johnny starts building something different,

394
00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:05.160
based resort, forty six hundred acres of wooded hollow with

395
00:31:05.400 --> 00:31:09.920
stone lodges and cabins tucked into the hillsides. He calls

396
00:31:09.960 --> 00:31:16.519
it Big Cedar Lodge. Now it's not a hotel. It's

397
00:31:16.559 --> 00:31:19.759
a homecoming for people who'd forgotten what trees sound like

398
00:31:19.799 --> 00:31:24.319
at night. Eventually it'll host more than a million guests

399
00:31:24.440 --> 00:31:28.319
a year. It'll grow into a constellation of golf courses

400
00:31:28.359 --> 00:31:33.400
designed by Tom Fazo, Arnold Palmer, Gary player Jack Nicholas

401
00:31:33.640 --> 00:31:38.359
Tiger Woods himself. It'll grow into Top of the Rock,

402
00:31:39.039 --> 00:31:42.519
the first par three course included in an official PGA

403
00:31:42.640 --> 00:31:47.480
Tour event. It'll grow into Dogwood Canyon Nature Park, ten

404
00:31:47.559 --> 00:31:51.920
thousand acres of preserved Ozark wilderness, open to the public

405
00:31:53.480 --> 00:31:56.559
by the early two thousands, Bass pro Shops is one

406
00:31:56.599 --> 00:32:01.440
of the most reputable retailers in America. The mails millions.

407
00:32:02.000 --> 00:32:07.359
The Springfield Flagship draws four million visitors a year. Then

408
00:32:07.480 --> 00:32:13.200
comes Memphis twenty fifteen. There's a building on the bank

409
00:32:13.240 --> 00:32:17.759
of the Mississippi River, and it's a pyramid three one

410
00:32:17.839 --> 00:32:22.000
hundred and twenty one feet tall, a field sports arena.

411
00:32:22.799 --> 00:32:25.400
The city had spent decades trying to figure out what

412
00:32:25.519 --> 00:32:29.039
to do with it. Johnny looks at it and he

413
00:32:29.200 --> 00:32:33.039
sees the next chapter. He turns it into a bass

414
00:32:33.079 --> 00:32:37.640
Pro shop, not a normal bass Pro shop, but a

415
00:32:37.680 --> 00:32:42.599
pyramid with the hotel inside at bowling alley, a glass

416
00:32:42.599 --> 00:32:45.440
elevator running up the spine of the structure to a

417
00:32:45.519 --> 00:32:48.160
restaurant at the top with the view of the river,

418
00:32:49.119 --> 00:32:53.079
a swamp on the ground floor with live alligators, cypress

419
00:32:53.119 --> 00:32:57.480
trees rising through the lobby, a shooting range, an archery range.

420
00:32:59.559 --> 00:33:03.680
It becomes one of the most visited tourist attractions in Tennessee,

421
00:33:04.519 --> 00:33:08.759
and it makes a statement, a statement to the entire industry.

422
00:33:09.960 --> 00:33:16.039
This isn't retail anymore, this is something else. That same year,

423
00:33:16.119 --> 00:33:19.599
he forms White River Marine Group, consolidating his hold on

424
00:33:19.640 --> 00:33:25.720
the boat building world. Tracker Nitrol, Triton Ranger, Mako, Suntracker,

425
00:33:25.839 --> 00:33:32.400
Tahoe Ascend by volume, the biggest boat manufacturer on Earth.

426
00:33:33.240 --> 00:33:41.559
The cardboard box we see has grown teeth. The acquisition

427
00:33:42.240 --> 00:33:48.200
twenty seventeen, the deal that shocks the outdoor industry. Four

428
00:33:48.279 --> 00:33:53.680
years vast Pro Shops had a rival, Cabellas, Nebraska based

429
00:33:53.759 --> 00:33:57.359
family built founded in nineteen sixty one by Dick and

430
00:33:57.400 --> 00:34:01.559
Mary Cabella in their kitchen, selling fly fishing lures through

431
00:34:01.559 --> 00:34:08.840
classified ads, different states, different founders, same humble origin story,

432
00:34:08.960 --> 00:34:13.400
two boys, one thousand miles apart, both starting with almost nothing,

433
00:34:13.840 --> 00:34:16.840
both ending up at the top of an entire industry.

434
00:34:18.079 --> 00:34:22.079
Cabella's had grown into a public company, eighty five stores

435
00:34:22.079 --> 00:34:26.079
across the Western United States and Canada, a brand outdoor

436
00:34:26.119 --> 00:34:30.760
people loved fiercely. The two chains had circled each other

437
00:34:30.800 --> 00:34:34.679
for decades. Johnny does something most people don't have the

438
00:34:34.719 --> 00:34:38.119
appetite for it this stage of the life. He buys

439
00:34:38.159 --> 00:34:43.079
it four and a half billion dollars. He doesn't gut it,

440
00:34:43.400 --> 00:34:46.920
he doesn't strip it for parts, he doesn't bury the name.

441
00:34:48.320 --> 00:34:52.159
He keeps the Cabella's brand alive, keeps the stores running,

442
00:34:52.239 --> 00:34:58.239
keeps the heritage intact. Because he understands something that bankers don't.

443
00:34:59.360 --> 00:35:02.519
You don't are a brand like Cabbella's for the real estate.

444
00:35:03.119 --> 00:35:07.639
You acquire it for the trust, and trust dies the

445
00:35:07.639 --> 00:35:11.000
moment that you treat it carelessly. So bass Pro and

446
00:35:11.039 --> 00:35:14.679
Cabbella's now stands side by side under one parent company,

447
00:35:15.519 --> 00:35:19.880
the two giants of American outdoor retail, both founded by

448
00:35:19.920 --> 00:35:24.599
men who started with almost nothing, both refusing to forget

449
00:35:24.960 --> 00:35:29.400
where they came from. The mission. Let me tell you

450
00:35:29.440 --> 00:35:33.760
something you don't know. The storefront is loud, so loud,

451
00:35:34.679 --> 00:35:39.920
the mission underneath almost gets lost. Johnny Morris is a conservationist,

452
00:35:40.880 --> 00:35:46.079
not in the bumper sticker sense, in the Theodore Roosevelt sense.

453
00:35:47.079 --> 00:35:50.840
People in conservation circles call him the modern Teddy Roosevelt.

454
00:35:51.960 --> 00:35:56.039
That's not a compliment people throw around lightly. He's worked

455
00:35:56.039 --> 00:36:00.480
with every Republican in every Democrat administration since nineteen seventy

456
00:36:00.519 --> 00:36:06.119
eight on conservation legislation. He's poured hundreds of millions of

457
00:36:06.159 --> 00:36:11.079
dollars into wildlife habitat. He's funded the National Wild Turkey Federation,

458
00:36:11.719 --> 00:36:16.400
Ducks Unlimited, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, the National Fish

459
00:36:16.480 --> 00:36:21.119
and Wildlife Foundation. In twenty seventeen, The same year he

460
00:36:21.400 --> 00:36:25.079
closed the Cabells deal, he opened the Wonders of Wildlife

461
00:36:25.239 --> 00:36:31.360
National Museum in the aquarium in Springfield, Missouri. Three hundred

462
00:36:31.639 --> 00:36:39.000
fifty thousand square feet, three hundred million dollars, thirty five

463
00:36:39.440 --> 00:36:45.440
thousand live animals, eight hundred species, the largest wildlife attraction

464
00:36:45.719 --> 00:36:51.119
in the world, voted in America's Best aquarium five years running.

465
00:36:52.440 --> 00:36:56.119
The grand opening drew two former presidents, George W. Bush

466
00:36:56.199 --> 00:37:01.440
and Jimmy Carter. Country music stars donated their time. Conservation

467
00:37:01.559 --> 00:37:05.239
leaders from forty different organizations came in to walk the halls.

468
00:37:06.480 --> 00:37:11.000
Teddy Roosevelt's great great grandson, Simon Roosevelt, walked through the

469
00:37:11.039 --> 00:37:15.199
doors that night. He stopped in front of an exhibit

470
00:37:15.239 --> 00:37:17.679
that once stood in the Bronx Zoo back in nineteen

471
00:37:17.719 --> 00:37:21.639
oh eight, a collection of North American big game his

472
00:37:21.679 --> 00:37:26.960
great grandfather himself had used to spark the American conservation movement,

473
00:37:27.840 --> 00:37:33.199
now relocated to Springfield, Missouri, watched over by a Missouri

474
00:37:33.280 --> 00:37:35.920
kid who'd started with eight square feet in the back

475
00:37:35.960 --> 00:37:39.679
of a liquor store. But Johnny's real audience that day

476
00:37:39.840 --> 00:37:44.880
wasn't the president's. It was the children. Because this is

477
00:37:44.880 --> 00:37:47.280
what Johnny says, when you come and ask him why,

478
00:37:48.039 --> 00:37:53.760
he says, hunters and fishermen are America's first and best conservationists.

479
00:37:54.480 --> 00:37:58.760
He says, the next generation has to know that. He says,

480
00:37:58.760 --> 00:38:01.159
if a child grows up in a parking lot, that

481
00:38:01.360 --> 00:38:04.760
child won'ts fight for the woods or the river. So

482
00:38:04.840 --> 00:38:07.599
he built the woods and put it next to a

483
00:38:07.679 --> 00:38:12.760
parking lot, and then he opened the doors. He also

484
00:38:12.800 --> 00:38:16.840
funded the school, The Wonders of the Ozarks Learning Facility,

485
00:38:17.679 --> 00:38:21.599
a full time fifth grade curriculum where deserving kids spend

486
00:38:21.639 --> 00:38:27.559
an entire school year studying conservation and ecology and the outdoors.

487
00:38:28.480 --> 00:38:32.079
Not of the field trip, but as a school. That's

488
00:38:32.119 --> 00:38:36.119
a man playing a longer game than anybody in retail sees.

489
00:38:37.039 --> 00:38:42.360
That's a man playing for the next century. What it

490
00:38:42.559 --> 00:38:47.719
really sells now here's the reframe. Most people think Bass

491
00:38:47.800 --> 00:38:53.079
Pro Shop sells geer tackle boats, camel boots, rifles, reels,

492
00:38:54.320 --> 00:38:58.599
and that's the surface. But that's not the product. The

493
00:38:58.679 --> 00:39:03.159
product is benging. Walk into a Bass Pro Shop on

494
00:39:03.159 --> 00:39:08.320
a Saturday morning. Watch the families. Watched the grandfather pointing

495
00:39:08.360 --> 00:39:10.639
out a large mouth in the aquarium to a five

496
00:39:10.679 --> 00:39:14.639
year old grandson. Watched the father showing his teenager which

497
00:39:14.719 --> 00:39:17.199
kind of broadhead to use in deer camp this fall.

498
00:39:18.519 --> 00:39:21.400
Watch the lady buying her husband his first fly rod

499
00:39:21.480 --> 00:39:26.480
for their thirteenth anniversary. Watched the kid with the tournament

500
00:39:26.480 --> 00:39:29.639
patch on his jacket pricing out his first bait caster.

501
00:39:31.079 --> 00:39:33.760
Watched the old veteran in the camel cap who saved

502
00:39:33.840 --> 00:39:36.159
up for six months to buy a track or boat

503
00:39:36.199 --> 00:39:39.880
package and is standing next to it now, and he's

504
00:39:39.920 --> 00:39:43.920
standing like he's next to his first car. Watch the

505
00:39:44.000 --> 00:39:47.440
dad who lost his own father last year walking through

506
00:39:47.480 --> 00:39:50.880
the wildlife exhibit alone, remembering what it felt like to

507
00:39:50.920 --> 00:39:53.960
be a kid in the woods with him. You see,

508
00:39:54.000 --> 00:39:59.440
these people aren't shopping, they're gathering. They're inside something that

509
00:39:59.559 --> 00:40:03.119
says the way you grew up, the way your family

510
00:40:03.159 --> 00:40:08.559
grew up, the things you love, they still matter. They

511
00:40:08.559 --> 00:40:13.679
have a home, and this is it. That's the empire,

512
00:40:14.559 --> 00:40:18.400
Not the buildings or the boats, not the catalogs, but

513
00:40:18.920 --> 00:40:22.440
the feeling in a culture that's traded most of its

514
00:40:22.519 --> 00:40:27.440
rooted things for screens and stress and noise. Johnny Morris

515
00:40:27.480 --> 00:40:30.199
built a place where you can walk in off a

516
00:40:30.320 --> 00:40:35.719
hot parking lot and remember who you are. That's not

517
00:40:35.920 --> 00:40:43.960
retail that's a return the rest of the story. Step back,

518
00:40:45.000 --> 00:40:49.119
Picture it again. That cardboard box sitting on a wooden

519
00:40:49.119 --> 00:40:53.760
shelf in the back of a liquor store in Springfield, Missouri,

520
00:40:54.599 --> 00:40:59.760
nineteen seventy two eight square feet of space, A young

521
00:40:59.760 --> 00:41:03.000
man and standing behind it talking to a stranger about

522
00:41:03.000 --> 00:41:07.599
a spinner bait. He doesn't know. He doesn't know that

523
00:41:07.760 --> 00:41:10.079
fifty four years later his name will be on a

524
00:41:10.159 --> 00:41:14.159
wildlife museum the side of a city block. He doesn't

525
00:41:14.199 --> 00:41:17.559
know that the boats he'll one day sell will outnumber

526
00:41:18.239 --> 00:41:23.119
every other fishing boat brand in America for forty years running.

527
00:41:24.039 --> 00:41:26.360
He doesn't know that two presidents will fly in for

528
00:41:26.440 --> 00:41:30.400
the opening of one of his projects. He doesn't know

529
00:41:30.480 --> 00:41:33.239
that Tiger Woods will design a golf course on land

530
00:41:33.280 --> 00:41:37.719
that he owns. He doesn't know that he'll be called

531
00:41:37.760 --> 00:41:42.559
the Walt Disney of the outdoors. He's just trying to

532
00:41:42.599 --> 00:41:46.000
solve a problem, the same problem he had as a

533
00:41:46.079 --> 00:41:49.519
kid driving past hardware stores looking for the right lure,

534
00:41:50.760 --> 00:41:54.280
The same problem as customers have walking through the door today.

535
00:41:55.599 --> 00:41:58.920
Where do I get the right gear? Who actually knows

536
00:41:58.920 --> 00:42:04.320
what they're talking about? Where do I belong? That's the box,

537
00:42:04.960 --> 00:42:09.119
that's the kingdom. That's the whole story, compressed into eight

538
00:42:09.159 --> 00:42:11.519
square feet of wood and cardboard in the back of

539
00:42:11.519 --> 00:42:14.559
a building. Most people drove past without even thinking twice.

540
00:42:15.960 --> 00:42:20.719
And that's what's cool about empires. They don't start as empires.

541
00:42:21.360 --> 00:42:25.239
They start as boxes. They start as questions that no

542
00:42:25.280 --> 00:42:31.039
one's answering. They start as small, ordinary, almost forgettable acts

543
00:42:31.039 --> 00:42:36.360
of paying attention. A young man, a wooden shelf, a

544
00:42:36.440 --> 00:42:40.440
brown cardboard box full of hooks and lures, and the

545
00:42:40.599 --> 00:42:44.239
stubborn refusal to accept the world that had to stay

546
00:42:44.239 --> 00:42:47.880
the same that he found it. If you've got a

547
00:42:48.039 --> 00:42:52.440
box on a shelf right now, don't underestimate it, don't

548
00:42:52.639 --> 00:42:56.599
move past it, don't wait for the bigger version of

549
00:42:56.639 --> 00:43:00.960
yourself to start. Start with the box, Start with the

550
00:43:01.079 --> 00:43:04.280
eighth square feet. Start with the question that no one

551
00:43:04.280 --> 00:43:07.119
else is asking. Start with the thing in front of

552
00:43:07.159 --> 00:43:10.719
you that everyone else thinks is too small. No matter what,

553
00:43:12.039 --> 00:43:15.440
because somewhere in the Ozarks a kid did exactly that.

554
00:43:16.360 --> 00:43:19.559
He started with the box. He paid attention to people

555
00:43:19.719 --> 00:43:23.960
most people ignored. He solved the problem nobody else thought

556
00:43:24.039 --> 00:43:27.280
was even a problem. He kept it real when keeping

557
00:43:27.280 --> 00:43:34.199
it real cost and money, and it turned into a kingdom.

558
00:43:34.400 --> 00:43:37.360
My name is mister Hanson, and now you know the

559
00:43:37.400 --> 00:43:42.280
rest of the story. Please go to www dot mister

560
00:43:42.400 --> 00:43:47.159
hansonpodcast dot com for more wonderful podcasts like this and

561
00:43:47.239 --> 00:43:49.840
subscribe where you listen to most.

562
00:44:04.000 --> 00:44:11.280
Longings are Handsome by the feet Storgate, dust.

563
00:44:11.079 --> 00:44:12.920
On my boots.

564
00:44:13.679 --> 00:44:15.679
Had a long word day.

565
00:44:16.960 --> 00:44:23.239
They came by saying, there be changing the plane, talking

566
00:44:23.280 --> 00:44:28.960
about Johnny Morees, some bass pro land.

567
00:44:30.119 --> 00:44:33.760
I just tip my hat sit.

568
00:44:34.039 --> 00:44:42.760
Some will see this Osar Clay, don't bend to Ezy

569
00:44:43.280 --> 00:44:47.360
heard that room role like thunder down the hill, old

570
00:44:47.519 --> 00:44:49.639
man knocking by the split the river.

571
00:44:49.559 --> 00:44:53.199
Still if you want to say here it is playing

572
00:44:53.280 --> 00:44:59.880
some names dried on, some namestay, Johnny Moores, bast fro.

573
00:45:01.280 --> 00:45:04.960
That's a line folks know from the.

574
00:45:05.000 --> 00:45:06.199
River bed.

575
00:45:07.800 --> 00:45:09.519
To the county road.

576
00:45:11.119 --> 00:45:16.400
It's a hard world and the.

577
00:45:17.840 --> 00:45:25.519
Floods shining marts fast fro. I said it slow, I

578
00:45:25.599 --> 00:45:30.800
said it love, misper Handsome took it like a passing storm.

579
00:45:31.000 --> 00:45:38.559
Some roots run and some stand firm. Soft boys and

580
00:45:38.639 --> 00:45:39.719
camel by the.

581
00:45:39.599 --> 00:45:44.679
Bait shop door, talking big plans, wanting something more, dog

582
00:45:44.840 --> 00:45:48.559
eared and mapping a coffee gone cool dreams and the

583
00:45:48.719 --> 00:45:52.679
mud in the story's told. I've been around since the

584
00:45:52.800 --> 00:45:56.960
hounds with puffs, seeing good folks, building, seen bad luck.

585
00:45:57.079 --> 00:46:00.880
When the creek runs high, you learn what last a

586
00:46:00.960 --> 00:46:03.840
shuddered barn and the Sunday past.

587
00:46:03.920 --> 00:46:07.480
If he asked me now, I'll tell you true. A

588
00:46:07.639 --> 00:46:08.719
name can grow.

589
00:46:08.800 --> 00:46:10.519
Like a cedar, dude.

590
00:46:11.719 --> 00:46:13.880
Johnny Marse fast pro.

591
00:46:15.199 --> 00:46:20.360
That's the line folks know from the river band.

592
00:46:21.760 --> 00:46:23.199
To the county ro.

593
00:46:25.079 --> 00:46:27.679
It's a hard world.

594
00:46:30.000 --> 00:46:36.559
In the river flow, Shining Marks, fast cro I said

595
00:46:36.559 --> 00:46:37.159
it's a little.

596
00:46:37.519 --> 00:46:38.760
I said it low.

597
00:46:39.840 --> 00:46:44.000
Mister Hanson told it like a passing storm. Some roots

598
00:46:44.079 --> 00:46:49.639
run deep and some stand firm.

599
00:46:49.840 --> 00:46:53.079
I ain't saying gold, I ain't saying dust.

600
00:46:53.119 --> 00:46:56.760
Just a man keep score by the things he trusts.

601
00:46:56.760 --> 00:47:01.039
One good hand and a stubborn heart can line up.

602
00:47:00.880 --> 00:47:06.519
A town wants the tall tale stork. Johnny Morris, fast fro.

603
00:47:07.880 --> 00:47:12.280
That's the line folks know from the rig of a

604
00:47:12.440 --> 00:47:16.280
bank to the county road.

605
00:47:17.639 --> 00:47:21.199
It's a hard old.

606
00:47:22.800 --> 00:47:29.360
In the rear flows. Johnny Moors, fast broth. I said

607
00:47:29.400 --> 00:47:34.519
it slow, I said it, Lord Misper Hanson told it

608
00:47:34.679 --> 00:47:39.079
like a passing storm. Some roots run deep and some

609
00:47:39.280 --> 00:47:59.840
stand firm.