UNA Alumnus and Podcasting Pioneer Jim Blasingame Makes Unique Digital Catalog Available to All Thanks to Gift to the Sanders College of Business and Technology and Collier Library
Sep. 23, 2026
Michelle R. Eubanks , UNA, at meubanks@una.edu, 256.765.4392
FLORENCE, AL – Jim Blasingame ’72 has made his significant and vital body of work available to all comers after his gift to the Sanders College of Business and Technology and Collier Library.
From 1997 until 2021, on the nationally syndicated weekday radio program he created, “The Small Business Advocate® Show,” Blasingame interviewed and archived thousands of the world’s top experts on doing business in the Digital Age, entrepreneurship, Main Street and family-owned businesses, and the impact of government policy. This impressive digital catalog can now be accessed by UNA students as well as others on the UNA website at https://smallbusinessadvocate.una.edu.
“The campus community is, indeed, grateful for this wealth of information and resources from Jim’s impressive and long-standing body of work,” said UNA President Dr. Ken Kitts. “It will be a benefit to anyone who encounters it and who is seeking a reliable and important source for understanding small business in the global marketplace.”
Blasingame is a graduate of the Sanders College more than 50 years before its naming. He said he is excited about how the content, captured and curated over more than two decades, can continue to inform and provide helpful research.
“I think people may be surprised at how much of my content continues to be evergreen,” he said. “It makes me very proud to think that, after I’m gone, something I did along the way could help the next generation. Even if what they learned from me is how not to do something.”
The complete gift includes Blasingame’s unique digital library of approximately 60,000 files which represents almost 24 years of work focused on helping small businesses have the maximum opportunity to succeed in a global, digital marketplace. As an award-winning author and syndicated columnist, his donation also includes approximately 1,800 articles and 200 videos, plus five manuscripts.
From that first broadcast in 1997 until the last one in 2021, Blasingame conducted more than 1,000 live interviews each year, which were converted to more than 2,600 segments annually, producing a career body of work of approximately 60,000 short segments (6-8 minutes). Along the way, he encouraged and mentored a number of individuals new to podcasting, many of whom are still creating content today.
As an innovator, Blasingame helped shape the evolution of podcasting by pioneering on-demand business audio content, building one of the earliest extensive entrepreneurial interview archive libraries and demonstrating the power of niche-focused digital conversations years before podcasting became a mainstream medium.
As a result of his foresight and innovation, and since his first internet simulcast pre-dated the term “podcast” by six years, Blasingame is often considered a pioneer of that genre of mass communication. Plus, he received numerous awards from national organizations recognizing him for his leadership and contribution.
Blasingame said his contributions to UNA students and faculty could be in four areas: “The obvious subject matter of my large and unique body of work; second, my career as a podcast innovator; third, what I learned about producing a long-running, live, two-hour weekday program; and fourth, how to get the most out of really smart and really important people in an interview and make them want to come back.”
Those “really smart people” came to be known as “Jim Blasingame’s Brain Trust” and count among them some of the biggest names in the industry, including Steve Forbes.
Forbes, chairman of the Forbes Media and editor-in-chief of Forbes magazine, noted in a letter to President Kitts: “It is right that Jim’s important work of aggregating and delivering the knowledge of thousands of expert voices in support of small businesses is being preserved and will live on for the benefit of future generations. I’m proud of Jim and UNA for making this happen.”
Kevin Haslam, Vice President of Advancement and Executive Director of the UNA Foundation, has worked closely with Blasingame as part of the process and the curation of his legacy.
“It has been an honor to work with Jim on this project,” Haslam said. “His body of work is impressive and will be a critical part of student success, particularly those who are in the Sanders College. We are so grateful that he chose his alma mater to house and archive this collection.”
It’s noteworthy that Blasingame created and produced his landmark body of work from his offices and studio which were barely six blocks from UNA.
Blasingame was named UNA Alumni of the Year in 2006 and continues to live in Florence with his wife and business partner, Davonna Hickman Blasingame ’83.
About The University of North Alabama
The University of North Alabama is an accredited, comprehensive regional state university offering undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral degree programs through the colleges of Arts, Sciences, and Engineering; the Sanders College of Business and Technology; the Spencer College of Education and Human Sciences; and the Anderson College of Nursing and Health Professions. Occupying a 130-acre campus in a residential section of Florence, Alabama, UNA is located within a four-city area that also includes Muscle Shoals, Sheffield, and Tuscumbia. UNA Athletics, a renowned collegiate athletics program with seven (7) Division II National Championships, is now a proud member of NCAA Division I and United Athletic conference. The University of North Alabama is an equal opportunity institution and does not discriminate in the admission policy on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, disability, age, or national origin. For more: www.una.edu and www.una.edu/unaworks/.