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  • Letter to Visitors of My Blog Letter to Visitors of My Blog

    As children, we have unbridled aspirations. We dream to be doctors. We dream to be lawyers. We dream to be a Forest Ranger. We dream to be a sports star. We dream because we can. Looking back at our childhood dreams, we remember a time when dreams ha

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  • Everything You  Need to Know About Success Everything You Need to Know About Success

    At the age of twenty-six I passed the bar exam and started my own law firm. The Juris Doctor degree I received from law school was my first and only degree. I didn't graduate from high school or college. I never once attended the best sch

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  • Impoverished Teens Need Jobs Impoverished Teens Need Jobs

    Impoverished teens need jobs. The unemployment rate for teenagers today is a whopping 23%. That is especially bad news for teens from poverty neighborhoods. When it comes to job interviews, the middle class children will have an advanta

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  • How Children in Poverty Can Change Their Life? How Children in Poverty Can Change Their Life?

    The truth about child poverty is that these children have no idea about the social behaviors of the middle class. As they grow older, they want to have a better life—-they want all those things that children in the middle class want.  

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  • What Money Can't Buy What Money Can’t Buy

    Have you ever considered what you have in life that really matters to you?  Chances are what really matters to you is something that money cannot buy. When I was ten years old my father set fire to the only house we ever owned, just to co

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  • Judy Collins: Send in the Clowns Judy Collins: Send in the Clowns

    This is Judy Collins singing "Send in the Clowns." I loved this song the first time I heard it many years ago, and I still love it today. It reminds me of the irony of the war on poverty. The perception that our government helps the poor is far fr

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  • Troubled Teen Escapes Poverty: Achieves Financial Independence Troubled Teen Escapes Poverty: Achieves Financial Independence

    That's me, Doug Wallace,  top center in the above photo. My siblings and I lived with our parents in the Kirkpatrick Homes housing projects in Granite City, IL in 1955. There were six of us children back then. Years later, our mot

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  • Ten Behaviors Guaranteed To Ruin Your Life Ten Behaviors Guaranteed To Ruin Your Life

    Amidst the desolate landscape of missed opportunities and broken hearts there lies the unanswered question: Why Do People Fail in Life? Could you have detected early warning signs and avoided the misery of failure? How far can will you fa

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  • Doug Wallace Live Radio Interview With the Jim Bohannon Show Doug Wallace Live Radio Interview With the Jim Bohannon Show

    This radio interview was with Jim Bohannon (pictured left) of the Jim Bohannon Show, broadcast live over 350 stations nationwide. It involves live interaction with listeners calling into the program. Though I have done dozens of radio in

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  • Hardbound Books are Still Available on Amazon Hardbound Books are Still Available on Amazon

      On October 1, 2009, Doug Wallace's Everything Will Be All Right was released by Greenleaf Publishing Company in Austin, Texas. On December 1, 2009, the book won an Indie Bound Next List notable award for best non-fiction. I was thrilled

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  • Indie Award For Best Non-Fiction: Reader Reviews Indie Award For Best Non-Fiction: Reader Reviews

    Aftr receiving the Indie Next List Notable award for best non-fiction my email inbox started getting crowded from readers, some who knew me from way back when, and some were people who crossed my path during my life journey, and others were 

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  • A Mea Culpa Moment A Mea Culpa Moment

    I would like the tell the story of my own mea culpa moment, which taught me an important lesson--failure to say "I'm sorry," has the potential to seriously alter your own future success. In my memoir, Everything Will Be All Right, I write

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  • How to Escape Poverty: Gratitude How to Escape Poverty: Gratitude

    My brothers and I spent a lot of time during our teen years talking about our dreams and aspirations when we became adults. At an early age I decided that I would become an attorney. My older brother, Bracy, wanted to own a used car lot

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  • More Americans Sinking Into Poverty--Losing Hope More Americans Sinking Into Poverty–Losing Hope

    The most disturbing aspect of this lousy economy is the adversity that is coming at the American people from all directions, especially the poor. The American people can handle one crisis, or perhaps even two or three crises, but add them a

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  • True Life Stories of a Child in Crisis True Life Stories of a Child in Crisis

    Children in poverty are emotionally fragile; their feelings are easily hurt by the most ordinary things. The real life stories of children living in dysfunctional homes where there is a constant crisis: utilities suddenly cut-off for nonpayme

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  • Teens in Poverty Face Life-Changing Choices Teens in Poverty Face Life-Changing Choices

    In the poverty neighborhoods of east Nashville, we lived in a time and a place in which rules were far less important than a healthy self-image. When your sense of self-worth is constantly hammered, demanding respect is the measure by wh

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  • Troubled Teens: How Can We Save Them? Troubled Teens: How Can We Save Them?

    When thinking about the culture of poverty, start with the proposition that poverty is evil– people are not. By way of example, we’re all born equally innocent, a happy baby in search of the good. There is no rule that says a child bor

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  • Life Choices:Free Will or Destiny Life Choices:Free Will or Destiny

    “Do you believe in destiny or free will,” I asked my wife. “Well,” she replied. “If you were meant to be shot, then you will never have to worry about drowning.” "Thought provoking response,"  I amused, but I couldn’t help

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  • How to Overcome the Odds How to Overcome the Odds

    A university in New Jersey is using my memoir this semester as part of their studies in sociology. A couple of days ago I received a very nice letter from the Professor of Sociology at the university in which she made the following comment, ”We e

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  • Standing Up To My Father's Rage Standing Up To My Father’s Rage

    I was barely a teenager when I first learned about reducing fractions to their lowest common denominator. It’s not that I hated math. I was gifted with the ability to do many math equations in my head without the need of a writing pad. But, our

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  • Teachers at Work Teachers at Work

     When I was contacted by the Principal at the Junior High School in Llano, Texas a few months back, I was thrilled that they had chosen to use my book to study the sociology of the culture of poverty. I had no idea of the adventure I was about t

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  • When Entitlements Hurt Children in Poverty When Entitlements Hurt Children in Poverty

    The US Census report for 2010 reports a significant rise in the number of people in poverty in 2009 as compared to 2008. I don’t think this is a surprise to most people. The New York Times reported in September 2011 that more people are living in

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  • Character Counts Character Counts

    Young people generally value the opinions of their elders, and will often ask questions like, What advice do you give to someone who really wants to succeed financially?  I used to ask the same kind of questions to my elders during my younger y

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  • Myths and Inconvenient Truths About Children in Poverty Myths and Inconvenient Truths About Children in Poverty

    There are many unknown factors when it comes to poverty, especially if you come from a background of the middle and upper classes. Though we can't predict the future, we can dispel some myths, and confirm some inconvenient truths, that collective

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  • Sargent Shriver: A Man Who Had Been Given a Great Gift Sargent Shriver: A Man Who Had Been Given a Great Gift

    Sargent Shriver died on January 11, 2011. Lyndon Johnson once referred to Sargent Shriver as "Mr. Poverty," because of his extensive work in creating programs like the Jobs Corps. Today, poverty levels are at an all time high. Our nation could learn

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  • Author Interview: Sociology Students Ask Questions About Growing up Poor Author Interview: Sociology Students Ask Questions About Growing up Poor

    The Project: Students studying sociology at a northeasrtern university were asked to read the memoir, "Everything Will Be All Right", as a class assignment. They were asked to use their sociological imaginations to study the behavioral patterns of

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  • America's Flawed Safety Net America’s Flawed Safety Net

    America is facing a mountainous debt, an anemic economy with a shrinking labor market, and an alarming increase in the poverty rate. How America deals with these problems, how they prioritize them, will present a number of really big game changers

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  • The War on Poverty Can be Won in the Classroom The War on Poverty Can be Won in the Classroom

    I know I have written several articles about the importance of mentors for children born into poverty. But, I'll say it again, without mentors, most children born into poverty are destined to remain stuck in the cycle of poverty. I know many of 

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  • Teachers: The Front Line in the War on Poverty Teachers: The Front Line in the War on Poverty

    One of the many intangibles that holds back poverty victims is the loss of dignity brought on by put-downs and low expectations. Achieving small successes, one milestone at a time, requires a lot of patience. The challenge is to bring h

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  • War! Good God Y'all! War! Good God Y’all!

    My wife's dog recently threw-up several bits and pieces of something rotten he apparently found and ate while roaming around our farm. Before my wife could clean up the mess, the dog had eaten up everything he had regurgitated. It's a disgusting thin

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  • Without Love There Can be no Miracle Without Love There Can be no Miracle

    Many years ago I had an epiphany experience that changed my life forever. It was a miracle. The unspoken foundation of a miracle is the presence of pure love. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are not God-given laws, but if you are lucky

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  • The American Crisis in 2012  The American Crisis in 2012

    The January-February 2011 issue of Harvard Magazine, speaking of America’s stagnant economy and rising debt said the following:""Most Americans have not experienced austerity in a long time, so the decade ahead may come as a shock. Expect continued

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  • Moving Customer Service to Asia is a Dumb Idea Moving Customer Service to Asia is a Dumb Idea

    A recent New York Times article reports that "Americans calling the customer service lines of their airlines, phone companies and banks are now more likely to speak to Mark in Manila than Bharat in Bangalore." Well, this week I spent nearly fo

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  • Is it Arrogance or Outright Disrespect? Is it Arrogance or Outright Disrespect?

    In day-to-day discourse, we inevitably encounter people who are disrespectful in their behavior towards others. I sometimes think this is a character flaw unique to humans. For example, my English Mastiff, Fonzie, gets alongs well with Fuzzy the

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  • The Mayans May Very Well Have Gotten it Right The Mayans May Very Well Have Gotten it Right

    Throughout the history of mankind, the calendar has been the central organizing instrument for society to measure time. That was true thousands of years ago and it is still true today. The calendar is the indisputable instrument for organizing our g

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  • It's Called Free Will For a Reason It’s Called Free Will For a Reason

    There are a lot of classic year-end resolutions made during this time of the year. But there is a big difference between the commitments we make and the actions we take. We say the words with good intentions and try to make sense of them according

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