Harper Talks Episode 48 – Izabela Pieniadz

Harper Talks Episode 48 - Izabela Pieniadz

Meet Izabela Pieniadz, 2012 Harper College graduate and a 2025 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient. From discovering her passion for art and history at Harper to leading the Ellwood House Museum in DeKalb, Illinois, Izabela shares how curiosity, saying “yes” to opportunities, and a love of historic preservation shaped her path. Tune in as she discusses her time at Harper College, getting her start at the Art Institute of Chicago, earning two master’s degrees, her impactful work in arts and culture, and her advice for students finding their own way.

Harper Talks: The Alumni Podcast
Show 48: -- Harper Talks -- Izabela Pieniadz

[00:00:00.440] - Brian Shelton
I'm Brian Shelton, and you're listening to Harper Talks, a coproduction of Harper College Alumni Relations and Harper Radio. Today on Harper Talks, I'm excited to speak with Izabela Pieniadz, a 2012 Harper College graduate and soon to be, newly minted, 2025 Distinguished Alumni Award Recipient. After Harper College, Izabela attended Lake Forest College and then received dual master's degrees from the School of the Art Institute in Arts Administration and Historic Preservation. She is currently working as executive director of the Elwood House Museum. She joined me in the WHCM studios on the Harper College campus. Thanks for being here.

[00:00:40.880] - Izabela Pieniadz
Thanks for having me.

[00:00:41.800] - Brian Shelton
How are you doing? How are you doing today?

[00:00:43.490] - Izabela Pieniadz
I am doing pretty good. I'm excited to talk about myself, which is something I'm normally not very excited to talk about, but I'm here to share and maybe overshare.

[00:00:52.520] - Brian Shelton
Well, and that's good. And an old story in the speech communication world is that If you ask somebody to talk about themselves, they'll happily do that, generally speaking. And if you want to have a conversation, just keep asking that person questions rather than trying to you interject.

[00:01:10.840] - Izabela Pieniadz
Talk about yourself.

[00:01:11.440] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, talk about yourself. So we were talking right before you came in here that you are not yet a distinguished alumni, but you will be. What do you think about that?

[00:01:21.700] - Izabela Pieniadz
I don't know. When I got the call, I was like, Oh, my God. I was not expecting it at all, which was really great. And I think the other really neat thing about this is looking through the past alumni, you don't really see a lot of humanities or arts and culture folks. Sure. So to be able to represent that is just awesome.

[00:01:39.660] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, that is always the thing, isn't it? A lot of times when you're looking at that stuff, it's science folk and health care folk, and engineering, and that's great.

[00:01:47.280] - Izabela Pieniadz
Which, yes, go off. I could never.

[00:01:48.880] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, but us, arts and humanities folks never... Well, not never.

[00:01:54.320] - Izabela Pieniadz
We deserve to be represented.

[00:01:55.460] - Brian Shelton
That's right. So I was really excited when Shannon told that you were going to be here, because I do have a connection to the Elwood House Museum, and I don't know if Shannon passed that along to you or not. But when I was in graduate school, we made a documentary on the three barbed wire pioneers. Okay. And so we spent quite a bit of time at the Elwood house. So would you tell people what the Elwood house is? Because I doubt that a lot of people outside of a certain sphere of influence or area know what it is.

[00:02:26.060] - Izabela Pieniadz
We'll know. Yeah, for sure. So first of all, if you haven't been there, you It should go. It is incredible. But the Elwood House Museum is really dedicated to telling the story of the Elwood family, as well as the story of Barbed Wire. I didn't know until I got this job that Barbed Wire was invented in De Kalb, which makes sense because it's called the Barbed City, but the museum itself is 17,000 square feet of preserved, Victorian and Gilded Age era living. So you see a lot of the family's belongings in there. It's a constant project at 17,000 square feet. So we're always working on preservation efforts. And then outside of that, we try to put on exhibits and programs for the community to inspire a love for history, but also get the word out about the fact that we're there.

[00:03:20.120] - Brian Shelton
Also, part of the house, there's another structure that's Mrs. Elwood's curiosity shop or something. Oh my God, yeah.

[00:03:25.530] - Izabela Pieniadz
You know your stuff. I do.

[00:03:26.400] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Tell about it, because I I think it's really interesting. Will you talk about it for a second?

[00:03:31.960] - Izabela Pieniadz
Yeah. So on the grounds, we have seven buildings. One of them is called the Curiosity Shop or the Museum Shop. This is from my tour spiel, so bear with me. But once the Elwoods made their money in barbed wire, they did what everyone else does. You travel the world, you travel everywhere, and you buy souvenirs, you buy little tchotchkes and Mrs. Elwood, Harriet, did so much of that that Isaac said, There's no room left in our house. So he literally built her an entire separate house for her souvenirs. And I always like to call it the original She Shed. Yeah. All the way back to 19, I think '03.

[00:04:10.640] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. I just thought it was so funny that this person essentially had a house for their souvenirs. And how cool is that, though, right? Man shed, she shed the whole thing.

[00:04:20.670] - Izabela Pieniadz
She shed?

[00:04:20.810] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, the whole thing there, right? Which I thought was really cool. But the Elwoods, that whole group there, Joseph Glidden and Isaac Elwood and Jacob Hayes, they donated all the money in the land to make what would become Northern Illinois University. So it's a real legacy there. And I just don't think a lot of people realize that, like you said, barbed wire was invented there and what barbed wire meant to the country when it was done.

[00:04:45.550] - Izabela Pieniadz
Yeah. And I mean, you still see the influence in DeKalb even today with the street names. Like once you start getting really familiar with the local history.

[00:04:53.220] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Cool. So what is your job as the executive director at the museum? What does that mean to be an executive director?

[00:05:00.980] - Izabela Pieniadz
Oh, my God. What isn't it? So as the director, my job job is to lead the overall strategy for the museum so we can be there long term and to obviously bring in funds and donors. We are a museum, and a small museum at that. So that is really what keeps us sustained and going. But the day to day is literally everything. So today, and I'm not kidding you, I colored in flashlights for the ghost tours we were about to have with Sharpie because I didn't like the cool blue LED. In other days, I'll be working on the social media strategy or putting together a newsletter, crawling in the crawl spaces of the mansion. So it literally is a little bit of everything. Yeah.

[00:05:51.000] - Brian Shelton
How many people work at the museum?

[00:05:53.240] - Izabela Pieniadz
So it's me and two other full-time staff, and then I have four other part-timers. Okay.

[00:05:58.890] - Brian Shelton
And then some volunteers

[00:06:00.000] - Izabela Pieniadz
Yeah, lots of volunteers.

[00:06:01.260] - Brian Shelton
Docents and that thing. Yeah. Okay, cool. When is the museum open? If I wanted to come do a tour or something, what does that.?

[00:06:07.280] - Izabela Pieniadz
So we are open Wednesday to Sunday, and we do tours of the mansion itself at 1: 00 and 3: 00 PM. Okay, cool. If you wanted to see me in person, that's when you should go.

[00:06:17.280] - Brian Shelton
Is it kid friendly?

[00:06:19.000] - Izabela Pieniadz
If your kid likes history, yes. Okay.

[00:06:23.400] - Brian Shelton
My kid likes history. Okay, good, good, good, good. I mean, I've been there, but you know. Yeah. So before you started that job there, I thought it was really interesting that your work that you did at the Art Institute. Can you talk about that a little bit?

[00:06:39.240] - Izabela Pieniadz
So where I started at the Art Institute was working the front desk, just selling memberships, answering questions, and things like that. And then I moved into managing and creating member events, which was really my first foray into a big girl job. So So I got to work with all the curatorial departments there and figure out the strategy for how we wanted to approach things. And during the pandemic, the museum ended up restructuring, and the member... I was a department of one, by the way. So the member events department went away, and a new team was formed called engagement programs and productions. And what I was doing by myself, I now had three other people to help me, and we were doing it for members and public audiences, which was really great.

[00:07:34.060] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. Did you like that?

[00:07:35.560] - Izabela Pieniadz
I loved it. It was a good variety. So I got to work with curatorial teams. I got to work with artists, which was really awesome. And I got to figure out what I really enjoy and don't enjoy as I figured out what I wanted to do.

[00:07:52.820] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. What's it... Maybe a weird question, but what's it like being in that space for such extended periods of time? Because I'm a member of the Art Institute and try to go as often as possible, that sort of thing, and I'm always a little bit overwhelmed when I'm there. Do you get less overwhelmed if you're able to see it every day, or are there still things that you're trying to see there, that sort of thing?

[00:08:14.520] - Izabela Pieniadz
Yeah, That's not a weird question. I think that's a valid question. Yes, I think it becomes a little day to day and monotonous. Not that everything is incredible, but it's walking through here. You see the same things every day in the same spaces, so you start to tune it out. And when you're working at a museum like this, you're not working in the galleries. You're in a basement with no windows.

[00:08:43.340] - Brian Shelton
(laughs) So you don't get to see it every day, unless you go out for a lunch walk or something.

[00:08:48.400] - Izabela Pieniadz
No. But I would always at least try to see all of the new exhibits at least once, and they called me back multiple times. Yeah.

[00:08:58.480] - Brian Shelton
Now, I will say, you mentioned the pandemic, going to the Art Institute during the pandemic was the absolute best as a member, because members were able to go in, and it was almost completely empty, and it was so peaceful and so relaxing. And I hate to say these words out loud, but I miss the pandemic.

[00:09:15.280] - Izabela Pieniadz
That's fair. You're also welcome, because I was the one that made that happen. Did you?

[00:09:19.940] - Brian Shelton
Oh, excellent. Oh, thank you so much. I appreciate that. So that's awesome. So I want to bring you back to Harper College. What brought you here? Did you grow up in the area?

[00:09:30.000] - Izabela Pieniadz
Yes and no. So I was born in Poland and lived there until 2000, when my dad brought us all over on family green cards. And then we hopped around the area before we settled in Elk Grove. So I think I lived in Elk Grove from 2004 until 2010. Okay. So graduated from Elk Grove High School, nice and local. And by the time I was graduating, I still didn't know what I wanted to do, which I think is valid. I'm 18.

[00:10:02.850] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, for sure.

[00:10:04.340] - Izabela Pieniadz
So Harper at the time, and maybe they still do, they offered a full ride scholarship if you had certain grades or some program. And I qualified for that.

[00:10:16.000] - Brian Shelton
Good for you.

[00:10:16.860] - Izabela Pieniadz
So to me, it just made sense to come here and figure out what I wanted out of life.

[00:10:24.120] - Brian Shelton
Right.

[00:10:24.920] - Izabela Pieniadz
Or the next two years.

[00:10:26.460] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. I talk to people about this all the time. What's one of the great benefits of having a good community college in your region is that if you haven't quite figured out what you really... If you haven't got the plan nailed down, going to community college is a really great step because it's very affordable. Most of them are really good. Harper is really good, obviously. And there's so many opportunities at them that if you take advantage of that, not only can you save yourself a lot of money, but you could really figure out what it is that you want to do during that time. Because I meet students all the time who went to some university their first year or something like that, and they wasted 40 grand of their parents money, and then they've come back here. So yeah, I'm glad to hear you say that. While you were here, what did you find? What worked for you here?

[00:11:11.190] - Izabela Pieniadz
What worked for me? Well, I can tell you that I tried to learn Japanese, and it did not work for me. So I did not last long in that class. But what I really enjoyed were my art and design classes here. I thought they were incredible, and I walked away with so many valuable things. I actually so I graduated 2012. That's 13-ish years ago now. I still have a lot of the projects we did in those classes in updated sketchbooks and things like that. So that was such a big impact. The other thing that I I think, set me on my path in working in nonprofits and the Humanities is that I was a student worker at the Educational Foundation. So that was my first behind the scenes look of what it takes to run a place that supports others.

[00:12:00.340] - Brian Shelton
It's so interesting that you say that, too, because it's interesting how people come to careers, right? Maybe you would not have gone down that direction. I mean, do people really know what a foundation is? Do people really know what development is? Do they know what that... And if you're not exposed to it in some way like that, how would you know to go look for it?

[00:12:19.400] - Izabela Pieniadz
To look for it. That's a good thing you could do.

[00:12:21.380] - Brian Shelton
I didn't know that you could do that. People do this? Yeah. So that's really interesting. And you got that opportunity while you were here? Yeah. Any favorite classes while you were here? Remember anything?

[00:12:30.680] - Izabela Pieniadz
Oh, my gosh. What do I remember?

[00:12:32.620] - Brian Shelton
It's been a while.

[00:12:33.840] - Izabela Pieniadz
It's been a while. The Design One and design two classes, for sure. The other class that I remember is my, I think it was a biology class with Craig Stettner.

[00:12:46.220] - Brian Shelton
Oh, Craig. Yeah.

[00:12:47.740] - Izabela Pieniadz
So again, like such a big impact. And I know he passed away a few years ago, which is unfortunate, but I still think about that class 13 years later.

[00:13:00.000] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I have classes like that myself. Yeah, every once in a while, all these years later, it will pop into my head, and I'm like, Oh, why am I thinking about that? Which is great. That shows the impact of these things. So after Harper, you went to Lake Forest. What did you do there?

[00:13:15.620] - Izabela Pieniadz
So Lake Forest was... I don't know how to say it, but I took a gap year between Harper and Lake Forest.

[00:13:23.360] - Brian Shelton
Oh, nice. What did you do during that gap year?

[00:13:25.900] - Izabela Pieniadz
I worked at a yogurt shop, which for the time, very on trend. They were everywhere.

[00:13:34.280] - Brian Shelton
Were you just really believing in yogurt? Or was it a mission?

[00:13:38.280] - Izabela Pieniadz
I was believing in the money I was earning.

[00:13:39.640] - Brian Shelton
You were believing in the money? Okay. All right. Yeah.

[00:13:42.740] - Izabela Pieniadz
So when I ended up at Lake Forest, and I was starting to think about finishing a bachelor's degree. I was looking for class sizes that were small and where... A nice campus. I I appreciate a nice college campus. It's very pretty there. It's beautiful there. So Lake Forest was top of the list. And then Lake Forest also has, I think, still an agreement with Harper College, where if you're in the Honors College, you get a crazy good discount on Lake Forest.

[00:14:16.980] - Brian Shelton
I didn't know about that. I'll have to look at that.

[00:14:18.620] - Izabela Pieniadz
I hope it's still a thing. So to me, that made sense. And at Lake Forest, I ended up taking a lot more design classes than art classes. I got interested in business a little bit there, so I took some finance and accounting classes, and I was still trying to figure out what to do. And Lake Forest offered an off-campus study program. It's called In the Loop. So for a semester, you live in the loop, and you have to have an internship. So my first ever internship I ever had was at the Art Institute.

[00:14:53.760] - Brian Shelton
Oh, wow. That's awesome.

[00:14:55.020] - Izabela Pieniadz
So again, it's this little thing that puts you on the path that you're on.

[00:15:00.660] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. See, I'm a big believer in internships myself, and we try to encourage students to find a meaningful internship. I run one of the media programs on campus, and it's like you need a meaningful internship so that you can meet people. I mean, it is for better or worse. Your career after college is so much about who you met while you were going to college, right?

[00:15:22.480] - Izabela Pieniadz
Absolutely.

[00:15:22.680] - Brian Shelton
And if you didn't meet anybody while you were going to college, it makes things really tough when you go on the outside. And I meet students often who, they did their classes, they did whatever job they had, and then they graduated, and then they're sitting out at the end and saying, I don't know how to get a job in my field. I don't know anyone. And it's like, well, yeah, that's where the internship comes in. So that was really cool that you had one of the Art Institutes.

[00:15:42.920] - Izabela Pieniadz
Yeah, it worked out perfectly. I ended up doing a member travel internship, so I got to plan some member travel trips. And the person that I was reporting into was an alumni of Lake Forest. So again, that network and those connections that you build are the things that last a lifetime.

[00:16:03.240] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. Now, after Lake Forest, it's the Art Institute for...

[00:16:08.340] - Izabela Pieniadz
Seven years. Yeah.

[00:16:09.700] - Brian Shelton
Dual master's degrees?

[00:16:11.220] - Izabela Pieniadz
Dual master's.

[00:16:11.880] - Brian Shelton
What's wrong with you?

[00:16:13.220] - Izabela Pieniadz
So here's the thing. I love being a student.

[00:16:17.740] - Brian Shelton
Okay.

[00:16:18.260] - Izabela Pieniadz
I'm just not a very good student.

[00:16:20.260] - Brian Shelton
Okay.

[00:16:21.980] - Izabela Pieniadz
But I didn't get them at the same time. I think I would have lost my mind if I had to do dual masters, but I did get them while I was working full-time. So the Arts Admin Degree seemed like the next natural step.

[00:16:35.790] - Brian Shelton
Sure.

[00:16:36.380] - Izabela Pieniadz
I was... I'm trying to think when I started it. I was still working the membership desk at the time, and thinking being like, I need something to help me move along in my career. That master's made the most sense, and the Arts Admin program has so many staff from SAIAC take it. So So that's what I enrolled in. I got in, and then it wasn't until close to the end of that program, where for one of my electives, I took a survey, Historic Preservation class, and it clicked for me there. I was like, this is what I want to do. Yeah. So immediately, when I finished that Arts Admin, I reenrolled in Historic Preservation.

[00:17:25.380] - Brian Shelton
Yeah.

[00:17:26.180] - Izabela Pieniadz
And took more classes.

[00:17:27.980] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, I know. When When I was in graduate school, I took a class in documentary production, and that was the click for me, because I had been in radio for a long time, and not in the video production side of stuff, and then went into that, and I was like, wow, this is what I want to tell stories about. But it's hard because there's no money in it.

[00:17:48.570] - Izabela Pieniadz
I mean, yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:50.360] - Brian Shelton
So that's tough. So let's say somebody's listening to this, and they're like, oh, yeah, arts preservation, that's something I'm interested in. Is that a market? This is a hard question, I guess, but is that a market where someone could actually hope to get a job and make a living? Or is that, I don't want to say you got lucky, but you were in the right places at the right time?

[00:18:09.740] - Izabela Pieniadz
So I absolutely got lucky. When I was finishing this degree, the job that I have now just happened to open up. And I was really the unicorn they were looking for. I had the Museum Management background and events background and a preservation background. So a job like that is very too much luck. The thing with the Historic Preservation degree is that the community of professionals here in Chicago is really small. So if you pursue a program like that, chances are you'll meet everyone, you'll have internships with them. So it's much easier to get a job that way.

[00:18:49.160] - Brian Shelton
So again, it's about that network, right?

[00:18:50.620] - Izabela Pieniadz
It's about that network, yeah.

[00:18:51.560] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, very important. But you also had a lot of things in your bucket, right? That met that unicorn list that they had. And so that's important, too. Yeah. That's very interesting. Did you feel like Harper prepared you for all of this? I mean, I know you did your Yogurt Gap year, but do you feel like Harper prepared you for going to Lake Forest and going to the institute?

[00:19:13.940] - Izabela Pieniadz
I think it did. Like I said, I love being a student. I'm not a good student. In high school, I would cut in-school suspensions, all of that. Here, it allowed me to figure out what worked for me, schedule-wise, classes-wise. And that made me a slightly better student. And it allowed me to, I don't know, figure out what I was wanting to do. So Absolutely. Yes, Harper.

[00:19:46.780] - Brian Shelton
Do you find your work exciting?

[00:19:48.560] - Izabela Pieniadz
I do. I love the variety of it.

[00:19:50.990] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. Is that variety is what makes it...

[00:19:53.600] - Izabela Pieniadz
It makes it go, yeah. It's never the same, which I talked about earlier, but It's also an interesting challenge in thinking of new ways to keep the museum sustainable and keep it going. And you get to experiment a little bit, which I think is not something that you get to do in a lot of careers. Yeah.

[00:20:14.000] - Brian Shelton
So I'm not I'm going to talk you out of your job.

[00:20:16.230] - Izabela Pieniadz
Okay.

[00:20:17.060] - Brian Shelton
But if you could have your job at any museum of importance, what would be the dream?

[00:20:25.960] - Izabela Pieniadz
Okay. No, that's a good question. So it actually It wouldn't be a museum. My dream job would be to run a historic motel. My master's thesis in preservation was focused on motels around Lake Michigan, and that put me somewhere in the backwoods of Wisconsin, Historic Motel. That is my dream job. That sounds like fun. And I get to fix it myself. Yeah.

[00:20:56.800] - Brian Shelton
No, that sounds like fun. You like working with your hands, too? Yeah?

[00:21:00.000] - Izabela Pieniadz
A little bit, yeah.

[00:21:00.820] - Brian Shelton
You want to fix it yourself?

[00:21:02.270] - Izabela Pieniadz
I want to fix it myself as much as I can.

[00:21:03.960] - Brian Shelton
Okay. That's interesting.

[00:21:04.800] - Izabela Pieniadz
Maybe not the plumbing.

[00:21:05.480] - Brian Shelton
Maybe not the plumbing (laughs). Okay. So I try to ask everybody who comes in here, I think I have successfully asked everybody who's been here, what advice do you have for current Harper students? What would you tell you today, if you could?

[00:21:19.720] - Izabela Pieniadz
So I was thinking about this on the drive over, and I am so introverted. If I had the opportunity, I would never leave my house. But what I force myself to do is say yes to things. Yeah. And I think that is the biggest takeaway. Even if you're dreading it the day of, if you go there, it can change your life, or you can figure out what it is, and you might not hate it. So say yes to things, even if you don't want to.

[00:21:52.400] - Brian Shelton
Say yes to things. That's fantastic advice. I was having this conversation. It's funny that you say. I was having this conversation with my daughter last week. She was nervous about a presentation. And she goes, Dad, you teach communication for a living. You taught speech for a living. What's your advice? And I looked at her and I said, get over it. And she said, Well, that's not very friendly. And I'm like, Well, no. I mean, get over it. Go in the front of the room and do your speech and be done. Everybody is there to listen to you, whether you think they are or not. And you just have to do these things. This is part of growing up and doing it. And so saying yes to things is part of growing up and doing it. Yeah, I absolutely agree to that. Saying no to things.

[00:22:27.760] - Izabela Pieniadz
I mean, you should say no sometimes. Like maybe saying yes isn't the greatest idea in some situations.

[00:22:33.160] - Brian Shelton
But I think you have to be... I'll take to a different direction for you. I think you have to be putting yourself into positions where you have the opportunity to say yes to things. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. And so if you're not at the event, if you're not at what's going on in your community or in your profession or that thing, and showing up to that thing, no one's ever going to ask you to do it, right? Exactly. No one's just going to magically call you and say, Hey, would you like to do this? I thought of you. It doesn't work that way, right?

[00:22:57.600] - Izabela Pieniadz
No, it doesn't. And most recently, I got an Instagram ad, of all places, that they were looking for volunteers to just be little guides in Lake Forest for some historic houses. And I said, sign me up. The day of, I was like, why did I do this? Oh, my God. I could just stay home. It's such a nice day. But I went, had a wonderful time, met the organizers who deal in antiques. So now I have a new connection in a place that I didn't have one previously.

[00:23:30.000] - Brian Shelton
Right, right, right. That's fantastic. Yeah. You've got to make yourself present in order for the opportunity to find you. I think that's a really important lesson that you bring up because I have that with students all the time. I'm like, you should go and work on this project, and they'll, I don't have time. And I'm like, well, when are these opportunities going to present themselves to you again? It's very hard to do.

[00:23:53.440] - Izabela Pieniadz
The other thing, too, I'll say, it's such a It's a hard thing to do, but networking and putting yourself out there with complete strangers, and essentially selling yourself, horrifies me.

[00:24:10.380] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, it horrifies everyone, I think.

[00:24:12.320] - Izabela Pieniadz
I get so sweaty, so nervous, but I continue to do it because I meet people, and I can talk about the Elwood house, or I can talk about myself. And that's how you spread everything. That's how it grows.

[00:24:26.140] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, that's awesome. It's been so much fun talking to you.

[00:24:29.480] - Izabela Pieniadz
Likewise!

[00:24:29.960] - Brian Shelton
I I haven't thought about Barbed Wire in a long time. I don't want you to think that I associate you with barbed wire. That sounds bad. But I haven't thought about that time in my life in a long time until Shannon said that you were going to be on the show, and she sent me your background information And I was like, Oh, my goodness, the Elwood house. That brings back so many memories from that time period. We had a premiere for the film at the Egyptian Theater in town.

[00:24:52.700] - Izabela Pieniadz
Do you still have it?

[00:24:53.760] - Brian Shelton
I don't know. It's probably on VHS or something somewhere. I know someone who probably has a copy. I definitely have that.

[00:25:00.100] - Izabela Pieniadz
I want to see it.

[00:25:01.260] - Brian Shelton
Yeah. I'll tell him he should put it on YouTube. I bet it looks horrible because it was shot-

[00:25:05.280] - Izabela Pieniadz
It's fine.

[00:25:05.800] - Brian Shelton
It was shot in a format back then that was called three-quarter Umatic, which was just an ugly, ugly format. So I can't imagine that it's held up very well.

[00:25:13.200] - Izabela Pieniadz
Well, it's vintage now, right?

[00:25:14.360] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, it's definitely vintage. It's like vinyl and cassette have made a comeback. Maybe VHS will make... Well, VHS actually is making it come back.

[00:25:22.140] - Izabela Pieniadz
Yeah, it's coming back.

[00:25:23.020] - Brian Shelton
Yeah, it's coming back. It's there. Well, thanks so much for being here today. I've totally enjoyed talking to you. Izabela is a Harper College graduate and soon to be Distinguished Alumni. If you're enjoying Harper Talks, please subscribe. And while you're at it, rate and review us so that others might find us. Harper Talks is a coproduction of Harper College Alumni Relations and Harper Radio. Our show is produced by Shannon Hynes. This episode was edited by Koby Pozo. Our online content producer is Blue Bailey. Our theme music was created by Aiden Cashman. I'm Brian Shelton. Thanks for listening.