Storytellers

BN (Brent) Heard writes the “Cranks My Tractor” column for small newspapers and community magazines in the Deep South. Originally from Alabama, he now lives in Virginia’s Historic Triangle amongst Yankees who think they are living in The South. In his spare time, he’s a rocket scientist and math professor, having spent more than 25 years in the NASA world and more than 20 teaching college mathematics courses.  His specialty is probability and statistics – mostly due to his Daddy who taught him with a deck of cards and a pair of dice. Before pursuing rocket science, he was a janitor and lawn engineer at The Anniston Star in Anniston, Alabama where he also played softball with 1996 Pulitzer Prize winning writer, Rick Bragg. He and his family have a 95 pound Standard Poodle named “Doolittle” who enjoys eating the cardboard roll out of toilet paper and a Miniature Poodle named “Maddie” who enjoys doing nothing. He is an “Honorary Citizen” of Vernon, Florida and Arkansas City, Kansas. He comes back to the Durham area often because he was wait-listed by Duke’s Fuqua School of Business in the early 90s; he checks back every now and then to see if he should stop waiting. He dreams of retiring to the North Carolina Mountains.