Category: Past Speakers

Our Program Today: Public Television for the Gulf Coast: Bob Culkeen – WSRE-TV
Since December 2016, Bob Culkeen has served as General Manager of WSRE which provides public television for the Gulf Coast, and as Executive Director for the WSRE-TV Foundation. The station is a recognized leader in education and an outstanding creator or local content and community engagement.
Bob has worked in many positions throughout the public media and educational fields since 1979 and was previously involved with WJCT, the PBS television station in Jacksonville. He was also an adjunct faculty member at Florida State College, also in Jacksonville.
He received his education In Massachusetts, earning his M.Ed from Westfield State University, a BS from Fitchburg State University and his AS from Grahm Junior College in Boston.

Randy Kennedy is program director and host of Sports Drive on Mobile’s WNSP Sports Radio 105.5 FM, the country’s first all-sports FM station.
Kennedy has been a leading voice in the Gulf Coast since becoming sports editor at the Mobile Press-Register in 2002. He was three times named state sports columnist of the year. His responsibilities eventually including supervision of all editorial content proved by the Mobile office of AL.com.
He left newspapers and the web site to work full-time in radio in February 2015.
Kennedy grew up in Birmingham and graduated with a degree in Communications from the University of Montevallo.

An investigative reporter for AL.com, Ben Raines has covered environmental issues and natural wonders in Alabama for nearly two decades. He wrote and produced the documentary America’s Amazon, which has been distributed to public schools across Alabama and is airing on PBS stations around the country. His underwater film work has appeared in documentaries on the Discovery Channel and National Geographic TV, and now in The Underwater Forest, which he wrote, filmed, and directed. Ben is a graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts with a degree in filmmaking, and is a U.S. Coast Guard-licensed captain, giving tours of the Mobile-Tensaw Delta. He and his wife and son live in Fairhope, Ala.

Today’s Speaker, July 27, 2017: Thaddeus A. Beeker, M.D.
Dr. Thaddeus Beeker is a graduate of Wake Forest University and East Carolina University School of Medicine in Greenville, N.C. He fulfilled a fellowship in hematology and oncology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and has practiced medicine in Mobile for nearly 30 years.
In March of 2007 he joined Southern Cancer Center where he specializes in the fields of hematology and oncology and he has received numerous prestigious awards for his work in those fields.
He and his wife Kelly live in the Oakleigh Garden District where they have been excellent stewards of one of the most beautiful homes on Government Street. They have two adult sons, Curry and T.J.

Stephen McNair, Ph.D. is the owner and senior consultant of McNair Historic Preservation, Inc., a national full-service historic preservation consulting firm. The firm specializes in historic tax credit projects (commercial and residential), National Register nominations (individual and districts), design, materials, compliance, and government relations. Prior to establishing the company in 2015, Stephen has served in various government and non-profit roles furthering the cause of historic preservation in New Orleans, Scotland, and Alabama. Dr. McNair received his Bachelor of Arts from the University of Alabama, a Master’s in Historic Preservation Architecture from Tulane University, and a Ph.D. in Architectural History from the University of Edinburgh.