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Gracie introduced several of our programs once starting there including the official mentor program which was tied to the chapters. I am not claiming to have invented "mentors" but she acknowledged that she took the best stuff we were doing and incorporated it into NSAI. There's even some old posts on here where it was being discussed as it was happening back then. She had come to me asking about a job but we only work with volunteers, so I suggested she try NSAI.

I was an NSAI member back in the 1980's, and there was no mentor program for us available except at the limited workshops they offered which were hard to get into, especially if you weren't in Nashville. I am sure there were many other benefits to being an NSAI member who lived in Nashville (just as there are still today) but the only person who ever visited us was Ralph Murphy (I got to hang with him on that visit for the day and night which was a trip...) That was circa 1988-1990 probably. He wasn't called a "Mentor" at the time, but he did come there to lecture and offer critiques. In app. 15 years of membership that is the only time we had anything like a visiting "Mentor."

Back when JPF had over 100 active chapters, we had many mentors who toured around to places where there weren't any industry people and help out. We had app. 40 mentors for 111 chapters at the time that Gracie launched the Chapter Adopt a Shop format for mentors attached to chapters at NSAI. We had many long discussions over that and several other things she was credited with in an American Songwriter Article which were directly borrowed from JPF. But I will acknowledge openly that we started chapters long after I had been an NSAI member and I think we both got it from the NAS and LASS back in the 70's run by John Braheny and Len Chandler and that gang as well as Diane Rapaport and those folks who started even earlier in San Francisco. In fact, someone should really do a documentary on all these groups who I think have done a great job at pushing back on the scam artists and bad contracts and also voicing concerns of the little guys in Washington. NSAI now regularly goes to DC (I think you've been part of that). I don't recall as much focus on that Pre-Bart Herbison who was hired because he was a lobbyist. I started going to DC regularly in 1998 and return 2-3 times per year until 2009 when first the awards and then my stroke limited me from going. I still was part of many legislative efforts (many in conjunction with the NSAI though they got most of the photo ops since they often brought successful writers or artists and we focused on grassroots folks who no one else cared to focus on). JPF exists in part because I felt none of the existing orgs. really cared about the little guys, but rather they used the dues money and numbers to help those more at the top of the food chain. And I think that is still the case today. I am sure others would vehemently deny that, but I've seen far enough behind the curtain for long enough to know the truth.

But I digress... NSAI is different than it once was. Some things are better, some things are not. But there are one of very few options offering legit help to writers. I can probably count them all on my fingers, if not one hand, and they certainly make that list.

Brian