Herndon residents Brett Simons and Bill McKenna recording their weekly podcast at downtown Herndon. Photo by Ryan Dunn.
Once a week, Herndon resident Bill McKenna prepares his audio equipment for his weekly podcast. The podcast is usually recorded at his home in downtown Herndon, and from there uploaded to the Internet where it can be streamed or downloaded. “I got motivated to podcast because my dad was a great story teller. People would stay in McKenna's Stationery for hours listening to my dad talk about so many different things. He knew how to keep your interest and understood timing and inflection in your voice,” said McKenna.
WHAT STARTED as a hobby on a dining room table in June 2014 has expanded into a multi-platform podcast available on iTunes, TuneIn, Stitcher and iHeartRadio. Since the podcast began it has had a month by month growth of over 17 percent since March 2015.
McKenna grew up in the town of Dunellen, N.J. outside New York City. His parents had a newspaper shop for 19 years in town and he graduated from Dunellen High School. From there, McKenna attended West Virginia Wesleyan College and began to host a radio show with his roommate Chris Blaus. “It was a 10-watt station and I learned I had a gift to ad lib on things,” says McKenna.
After college, McKenna worked at the Department of Motor Vehicles. At the age of 23 he ran for city council at Dunellen. His platform was simple, to improve downtown, upgrade the borough's train station and stabilize the tax base. “I am proud to say as finance chairman, taxes did not go up and I was able to even give a tax cut in 2000, the first in 12 years in Dunellen,” says McKenna.
McKenna’s mom died from cancer in 2012, and his father Joe McKenna died from pneumonia in September 2013. After his parent’s passed, McKenna found he needed an outlet to channel his grief. “The podcast became not only the channeling of the grief but also gave me a way to pay tribute to my dad, who loved the spoken word,” said McKenna.
In 2014, McKenna began to experiment with podcast equipment, creating a podcast series called Not Another Podcast. By Episode 4, McKenna developed his technique and knew Herndon resident Brett Simons would be the podcast’s co-host. Simons was a veteran broadcaster at Shepherd University (WV) and announcer for West Virginia Professional (ATCW) Wrestling.
Simons and McKenna met at Jimmy’s Old Town Tavern in Herndon, and they soon realized they had great rapport. The podcast series is part spontaneity, sports and pop culture, and has had guests including Charles Styles, host of Food Network PrimeTime Show Mystery Diners. The show has a certain rawness (hence the explicit tag on most podcasts) yet does not seek shock jock status.
The show makes reference to area happenings. Previous episodes included a visit to Herndon’s first microbrewery, Aslin Beer Company, as well as a remembrance to Damien Scanlon who worked at O'Sullivans Irish Pub in downtown Herndon. “We decided to do a show on the first anniversary because there was a ceremony we had done and we wanted his friends in Ireland to be a part of it too,” said McKenna. The duo are invested in the podcast series, and have came out with episode 87 not missing a week for a show.
THE DUO developed an annual event called Podcrawl hosted the first Saturday after Labor Day. “We start at the Wieners Circle for ‘NAP Snacks’ (lunch) and then go to The Breeze, O'Sullivan's Irish Pub, and end at Jimmy's Old Town Tavern. We do a segment at each location and we have had over 150 people at each event we have run,” said McKenna.
What began as encouragement from friends became something neither McKenna nor Simons could imagine, but both remain grateful to their supporters as they continue their podcast series. For more information about Not Another Podcast, visit www.notanotherpodcastusa.com.