BROADCASTS.com

Ann Hand on her jewelry design philosophy ~\n\n"I think I look at myself as a storyteller because most of my jewelry has a message. That's what I want to do for America . . . I want you to wear it and be able to talk about what it represents."\n\nAnn Hand - CEO, Ann Hand, LLC - The Nation's Jeweler - in studio interview with Andy Ockershausen\n\nAndy Ockershausen:\tThis is Andy Ockershausen and this is Our Town. I'm so excited to have a very special friend today to talk to you about Our Town. A lady I've known for many, many years who has\nto me the foremost jeweler of the city of Washington, maybe in the East Coast and certainly better than anybody in New York. Ann Hand is a legend and a major, major player in Our Town and Ann, welcome to Our Town.\nAnn Hand:\tI am thrilled to be here. Truly excited. \nAndy Ockershausen:\tI was trying to explain to you and we're still working on it ourself, what is this podcast thing. It is magic and as I told you, everything you do and say here, as long as it's in the ionosphere is there forever.\nAnn Hand:\tNow you're scaring me. \nAndy Ockershausen:\tWe have a record of everything you've done but your business has been fabulous for our nation's capital.\nMeeting Lloyd Hand at University of Texas Where Their Odyssey Began\nAnn Hand:\tThank you very much. It's been a real pleasure.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tYou're a Texas girl obviously. Grew up in the great state of Texas. \nAnn Hand:\tI grew up in Houston Texas, went to the University of Texas.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tIn Austin.\nAnn Hand:\tIn Austin. Met my wonderful husband the first day. I was 17, married him six months later then it began an odyssey. \nAndy Ockershausen:\tA beauty contest and the cheerleader and everything you did growing up and you made Lloyd Hand. As far as I'm concerned he's known as Ann Hand's husband.\nAnn Hand:\tHe'd better not hear that. No way.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tI tell him in the barber shop. We've been going to the same guy for years and of course I knew him and saw a lot of him and a lot of you with Joe Robert. But that's another subject. Ann, but you went to UT and Austin's had some problems here recently. An explosion or something?\nAnn Hand:\tYes, I've been reading about that. It's so tragic. I don't have any family there now but everything.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tIt was real dangerous for a while.\nAnn Hand:\tPretty, pretty scary.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tBut they found the culprit. You and Lloyd decided to get married and stay in Texas?\nLife in the United States Navy\nAnn Hand:\tWell he went off to the Navy and I went with him to the Navy base out in San Diego.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tVietnam war?\nAnn Hand:\tNo, Korean war.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tKorean war, right.\nAnn Hand:\tWe had a interesting three years in the Navy and then after that he went back.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tWonderful, I didn't know that.\nAnn Hand:\tAnd then went back to University of Texas, finished his law school and got his degree and then he went to work for LBJ when LBJ was a Senate majority leader.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tHe was a congressman before that. \nAnn Hand:\tYep, that's right.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tI know way back, Lloyd's too young. What was he was in the Navy, was he on a ship? Did he ever ship out?\nAnn Hand:\tOh yes he was, the USS Telfair. He was in Japan, Korea.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tSo he had a nice time in the Navy but being away from you. And you waited for him in San Diego.\nAnn Hand:\tWell for a while, then we went to Corpus Christi because he was going to be assigned there. The Navy base.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tMove across part of the country back east.\nAnn Hand:\tWe just kept moving. \nAndy Ockershausen:\tA Navy wife. \nAnn Hand:\tNavy wife.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tSo many of my friends, that's my war too, the Korean war. It's so hard to believe now that that was that long ago. I'm sure it's hard for Lloyd too.\nAnn Hand:\tIt seems like an instant ago.\nAndy Ockershausen:\tIt was a just a big part. But he is a very, very upstanding guy physically.