Jon Dempersmier knew about public radio long before moving to East Tennessee—there were a couple of syndicated shows such as Car Talk that had occasionally grabbed his attention—but it wasn’t until one day when he was driving his toddler son to daycare that he got hooked on WUOT 91.9 FM.
“One morning I was just flipping through the dial and hit Morning Edition, and it was like, wow, this is a totally different thing. They’re actually talking about this like it matters, and like they’re speaking to grown-ups,” he recalls. “…And that was, I guess, my ‘gateway drug’ into public radio, and at a certain point it became the go-to preset on my radio.”
Dempersmier grew up in Indiana but moved to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, from Nevada to work in musical theater and get back to living in a greener landscape with trees. Not long after that move, he switched careers and became a real estate agent. As he drove about the mountains and foothills for work and leisure, he found himself switching back to WUOT more and more, with shows such as Fresh Air exposing him to new ideas and experiences.
“My life has been so enriched by that particular show. You know, travel, music, theater, you name it, because [host Terry Gross] talks to everybody. And I’ve learned so much from that show; it’s brought so much depth into my life as far as things I otherwise wouldn’t have experienced,” he said.
The prime example of this was when Gross had author Bill Bryson on the show promoting his book At Home. During the interview, they discussed a place in Scotland called Skara Brae, a Neolithic settlement discovered in the late 1800s. Dempersmier jumped to get Bryson’s book and dug even deeper to learn more about the unique site. This eventually led to Dempersmier and his wife traveling to Scotland’s Orkney Islands to visit Skara Brae, which turned out to be only one of the highlights of the islands, which he described as an “amazing place.”
“We were on the Brough of Birsay on a beautiful day, and my wife was sitting at the edge of a cliff looking out at the ocean. I looked at her and a thought popped into my head: If I hadn’t turned the radio on that day, we wouldn’t be here right now,” he said. “From the page to the actual experience was a lot of planning and a lot of years in between, but that’s what keeps me listening to that show, because I never know what else it’s going to add to my world.”
That trip wasn’t the only thing inspired by something Dempersmier heard on WUOT. In 2012 he heard a segment on Morning Edition about something called a schwenker grill—a German barbeque traditionally used to cook a marinated pork dish called schwenkbraten over a wood fire. The concept appealed to Dempersmier, whose name is indicative of his three-quarters German ancestry.
“For years I’d wanted to have an Octoberfest party, and looking at the photos on the Morning Edition website led to the idea for ‘Schwenk Fest.’ Our first year we improvised a grill from assorted hardware and dug a firepit in the yard,and had so much fun we decided to do it again… and again …and 2025 will be Schwenk Fest Number 13!” he exclaimed.
Asked to describe the event, Dempersmier said, “There’s a fire in the pit with the schwenker loaded with food swinging over it, kegs of beer, German music playing, my wife and I greeting our guests, wearing our traditional lederhosen and dirndl, and lots of laughter. Dinner is in the garage, which has been decorated to look like an Oktoberfest tent, followed by live music and even more laughter.”
Listening to WUOT for years made its impact and eventually Dempersmier began making contributions to support the station, which somehow snowballed into volunteering with the station and eventually landing on its 91.9 Inc. board. He is an advocate for the station now and it easily slips into conversations with other people, whether it is in mentioning that a pasta recipe came from the Splendid Table or referencing a news story he heard.
Though the news and other shows are a lot of what keeps Dempersmier tuned in, as a former professional musician he’s also in it for some of the unique musical offerings WUOT airs. He was a long-time fan of the Celtic music program, Thistle and Shamrock, which retired in June of 2024, and he’ll always appreciate the evening jazz, daytime classical, and weekend world music programs. As a self-taught musician, his skills span across genres including bluegrass, rock-n-roll, beach music, Motown, R&B, and reggae.
At the end of the day, Dempersmier says that supporting and listening to WUOT makes him feel like a part of a community that positively adds to the lives of those who listen.
“It’s been such a blessing that I discovered WUOT. It’s enriched my life. Now I’m in a position where I can pay it forward a little bit so that the next generation of people who discover public radio will still have that resource there. Because, you know we can’t take that for granted,” he said. “This stuff doesn’t make itself. The content is not self-generating. It takes a lot of work, it takes a lot of knowledge, and it takes money to generate that content. And if you’re consuming the content without helping pay for generating it … at a certain point I realized, okay, this is not a temporary thing, this is something that I’m going to continue to listen to, and I want to make sure that it continues.”