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Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation
Agricultural News and Information
An Ambassador for Agriculture
Veteran Mississippi entertainer and wildlife conservation advocate Paul
Ott recently received the Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation Ag Ambassador
Award for 2012. The Ag Ambassador Award recognizes individuals who have
gone beyond their normal range of activities in promoting Mississippi
agriculture, and it isn’t given every year – only when Farm
Bureau feels that it has been earned. The award was presented to Ott during
Farm Bureau’s annual membership meeting in December.
No one deserves the honor more.
The 78-year-old singer, songwriter and storyteller has spent his life
travelling the state, the nation and the world, promoting wildlife conservation
and giving others a glimpse of the lifestyle and values that have sustained
farmers and rural Southerners for centuries – important bedrock
values like God, family and country.
And he is not done yet.
That his popular radio/television show, “Listen to the Eagle,”
celebrates its 20th anniversary in 2013 is a testament to his enduring
popularity. Paul Ott’s show, named for a song he penned in 1976
in honor of America’s bicentennial, focuses on wildlife and conservation
issues and on agriculture and other topics.
Ott got his start in entertainment through the Mississippi Game and Fish
Commission (now the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and
Parks) in the 1970s as their public relations manager. He began promoting
their educational programs using songs he wrote and sang himself, songs
like “Take a Boy Hunting” and “Plant a Tree.”
He says he wanted to appeal to kids, and he knew that kids loved music.
Ott used videos and sounds with his music – images of kids running
with dogs and the sound of a hound dog baying – because he knew
this would also capture people’s attention. He says he was the first
musician to use videos with music. He got the idea to include sounds with
his songs from the late country entertainer Jerry Clower of “Knock
‘Em Out John” fame.
Paul Ott’s songs became so popular that other Southern states came
calling. Eventually, the National Wildlife Federation in Washington, D.C.,
asked him to take the ads to all 50 states.
Ott has presented his program, “Listen to the Eagle,” to all
50 state governors’ conventions, to over a million school children
and to six state legislative sessions. He has sung for two U.S. presidents
upon their request. He presented Mississippi’s own Oprah Winfrey
her Angel award. Ott has made appearances in Guam, Puerto Rico and the
Virgin Islands, and he appeared at the First World Wilderness Conference
in Johannesburg, South Africa, with an interpreter.
Someone asked the interpreter what language Ott was speaking.
Ott told them he was speaking South Mississippi.
“I had a great manager, Fred Foster (a songwriter, record producer
and founder of Monument Records), who liked what I was doing and wanted
to make me a star,” he said. “He also represented many big-name
country music stars. I appeared on the Grand Ole Opry, the “Porter
Wagner Show with Dolly Parton” and all of the major national talk
shows like the “Today Show.” But I didn’t want to be
a star. I was happy doing what I was doing. I was a Mississippi boy, and
my roots run deep in this Mississippi soil.”
Paul Ott’s father’s family worked in agriculture in Hollandale.
When his father, Paul Holland, died when he was just a baby, his mother
moved the family back to her home in Pike County, where Ott would help
his grandfather on a small farm that had cows, chickens, hogs and cotton.
“My grandbabies, of which I have 13, still think groceries grow
in the grocery store,” he said. “I’ve been trying to
teach them, by having a small farm and putting a few things out there
on my farm, where their food really comes from. But I don’t know
if it has caught on for them yet.
“We have some great farm families in our state, and I truly believe
that farmers make the world go round,” he said. “If it wasn’t
for farmers, we couldn’t keep our country going. We must never get
to the point where we depend on other countries for our food.”
Ott appreciates Farm Bureau’s work on behalf of farmers and all
Mississippians. He was instrumental in helping Farm Bureau with the eminent
domain campaign.
“Paul Ott did more than any other person in the state, especially
in South Mississippi, to educate people about eminent domain reform and
help us get signatures on our petitions. He worked tirelessly,”
said Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation President Randy Knight.
“That was very personal to me since I own land and know what it
is worth,” Ott said. “I don’t want someone taking my
farm for less than its value for private development purposes. I just
didn’t think it was right.
“It was a great thing to work with Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation,
who took the lead on this issue,” he said. “Through our show,
we reached a lot of people every week, but a lot of other people worked
hard on this, too.”
Paul Ott says he has received a few awards around the country for his
work through the years, but he doesn’t think anything means more
to him than the Ag Ambassador Award.
“I am deeply humbled,” he said. “I’m just so thankful
that the things we promoted in agriculture have made a little bit of an
impact. I’m especially happy to have worked alongside Farm Bureau.
It’s a great organization.
“Farm Bureau is just like my family.”
“Listen to the Eagle,” Paul Ott’s live call-in
radio show, can be heard on ESPN, 105 FM, every Monday night, from 6 p.m.
to 8 p.m., and on 15 stations across the state. The program also airs
on television every Sunday morning on these Mississippi stations: WABG
in Greenville; WJTV in Jackson; WTOK in Meridian; WHLT in Hattiesburg;
WLOX on the Coast; and WCVI in Columbus, as well as stations in Louisiana,
Alabama, Tennessee and Arkansas.
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