The Rice Farmer Who Talked Straight to the President
The chair next to the President of the United States was empty, and Meryl Kennedy was about to sit in it. She wasn't
Connie Worrell-Druliner built a business from scratch, raised five children, survived the moment three professionals told her to quit — and kept going anyway. This is her story. And stories like hers, from women everywhere who built something real.
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"I started with a desk, a phone, a prayer, and a 'me.' I was told it couldn't be done. I was told women didn't get loans. I was told to close my doors. Every single time, I suited up and showed up anyway.
Forty-three years later, when I walked into a room and they asked everyone I'd helped to stand up — most of the room rose."
— Connie Worrell-Druliner
The chair next to the President of the United States was empty, and Meryl Kennedy was about to sit in it. She wasn't
There's a certain kind of desk you've sat at without ever thinking about it. Maybe it was a waiting room. Maybe
The suction cup was the whole thing. A small silicone circle that sticks to the back of your phone and grips onto anything — a mirror,
The first batch happened at a kitchen counter in Minneapolis, in a bowl she probably also used for pancakes. De'Vonna Pittman wasn'
The first truck sat in a lot, and Nyzinga Patterson owned it. Not a share of it. Not a stake in someone else's
She was maybe eight years old, hauling copper pipe across a Michigan job site because her father needed a hand and she was the hand
There's a photo of Penelope Wong from the early days that I keep thinking about. She's inside a food truck, hair
There's a moment that happens to almost everyone who inherits something built by other hands. You walk the floor. You see the machines
The first time Loryn Nalic tasted Bosnian food, she was already in love with the man who cooked it. Edo made her something from home.
Doing Business with a Pink Pen — Connie's full story, from Petticoat Lane to 43 years in business, told the way she always told it: with warmth, faith, humor, and a pink pen.
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"The banker told me he didn't loan to women-owned businesses. I thanked him, stood up, pushed in my chair, and left. Then I drove west toward Mount Bachelor — literally looking for divine intervention — and found it in a parking lot."
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