PEORIA MAGAZINE May 2022

B radford, Ill.—population750, the sign says – would, at first blush, seem like an unusual place for a burgeoning media business. Actually, “I think it’s around 400” people, jokes Rob Sharkey with the characteristic wit and relaxed humor that have earned him and his partner in all things, wife Emily, quite the following on radio, onlinewith a popular podcast, on television including a PBS show, and most recently in print with a regular columnist’s gig. Sharkey – aka “The Shark Farmer” – has a weekday radio show (SiriusXM RuralRadio, Channel 147, 3 p.m. CST), which he and Emily broadcast live from their barn studio just steps from their Bureau County home, 45minutes north of Peoria. Their SharkFarmer Podcast is more than 300 episodes strong, brags 7 million plus downloads, and also enjoys weekend satellite radio play. Meanwhile, they have a regular SharkFarmer TV slot on Omaha- and Nashville-based RFD-TV — the nation’s f irst 24-hour television network focused on agribusiness and rural lifestyles — now entering its fifth season (airing at 8:30 p.m. Tuesdays, 1:30 p.m. Saturdays on DirectTV Channel 345, DISH 231, and AT&T 568). About a year ago, they began filming “A Shot of Ag” for WTVP Channel 47 (1 p.m. Mondays, 8:30 p.m. Thursdays). All in all, the Sharkeys’ weekly reach across all platforms exceeds 4 million in North America, with a decent following in Europe, South America, even Australia and New Zealand. Recently, Rob took up the pen – or resorted to the computer keys, anyway — with an anchor column in the “Seed and Soil” section of Peoria Magazine. His Twitter following surpasses 30,000, and he has become a much-in-demand public speaker, traveling to some 25 states for 43 speeches in 2021. Did we mention that the Sharkeys also run a busy outfitting operation (booked “through 2025, at least”) and merchandising line, farm2,000 acres of corn and soybeans, and have produced four “little sharks” by the names of William, Anita, Eian and Steven, ages

Emily says now – and they have been together ever since, apart from the commuter relationship they had for a short time in college, when Rob first attended Illinois Central College and Emily headed down to Southern Illinois University in Carbondale. They were married just a month after both graduated from SIU. In 1996, the Sharkeys returned to Bradford to work on the farm with his father, before venturing out on their own to raise hogs. “I wanted to be my own guy,” he said, but in 1998 the hog market crashed and “we were broker than broke.” They refused to declare bankruptcy, however. “We clawed our way back but it took a good eight years to pay everybody back.” As they were working up to eight odd jobs to make ends meet in 1999, the Sharkeys ran an ad in the back of a magazine about organizing hunting trips in a 30-mile radius of Bradford – back when Illinois was “the be-all, end-all to hunt deer” – and thus was born their outfitters operation. So successful was it that it “likely saved our farm,” said Rob. DIPPING A TOE INTO MEDIA Things had turned around by 2017 when, on the heels of a Twitter account that had developed a decent following, they decided to give the podcast a try. Look at their on-site studio and modern equipment today and you might think “wow,” but “it didn’t start out that way,” said Rob. Indeed, they’ve come miles and miles from the “$50 Blue Snowball (microphone) that you buy off Amazon,” the pillows they put around it to get the sound just right in one corner of their 120-year-old farmhouse, and their Skype feed. They really didn’t know what they were doing, and at the time there was little to compare it to, but Rob had a gift for gab, a fun-loving irreverence and a certain fearlessness. Emily had the business sense, the organization skills, and a knack for production and promotion. And they got better at it.

12 to 23? Their golden Labrador, Sammy, rounds out the family. Their business motto may be “sharks don’t swim backwards,” but whew! THE BEGINNING For Rob Sharkey the self-described “digital media disruptor,” it all began 47 years ago, when he was born into a family that included five older sisters — “my parents just kept goin’ til they had a boy” — on “the next farm over” from where he finds himself rooted today, a couple miles east of Bradford. He grew up “the stereotypical farm kid,” part of the fifth generation to work the soil his family has been connected to since 1854. He met his future wife at a 4-H func tion when both were 16. “He asked me to dance,” recalled Emily, noting that the conversation may have started be cause she was standing next to the food table, and “if he chickened out” on the way over he had cover in “the pizza behind me.” She was from Princeton – Rob will tell you he married a girl from the big city — and he was from Bradford — “And I married a good ol’ farm boy,”

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