About Us
Michael Cogdill reported and anchored news on television for more than 32 years, covering unforgettable tragedies and telling long-form stories of immense hope. He became a writer and a sought-after inspirational speaker along the way. By way of great mentors and hard work, he became one of the most honored television storytellers in America.
His 32 Emmy Awards grew from work as a live anchor, long-form reporter, and newsroom leader, who worked from the White House to the humblest homes of the poor. Covering the likes of 9-11, the Emanuel Nine Charleston church massacre, the Susan Smith child murders, Michael drew from his working-class roots. These taught him the inherent dignity and value of all human lives. His forbears taught him compassion and gratitude.
His interview and coverage credits include presidents and vice presidents of the United States. The names vary like the human race itself: Barack Obama, Abbie Hoffman, The Reverend Billy Graham, the Doobie Brothers, Charlie Daniels, James Brown, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Strom Thurmond, Fritz Hollings, Mitt Romney, Henry Kissinger and many more. His coverage credits include Presidents Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton.
But Michael knows non-celebrities harbor some of our great value, and or greatest stories.
Michael’s latest children’s book, Where Did Joe Go? debuts in 2024. His first novel, She Rain, set in the Western North Carolina mountains, re-launched digitally in 2023, and is being developed as a major motion picture. He’s working now on a new Southern novel, The Sinners of Honeysuckle Road.
Michael is a cum laude graduate of the University of North Carolina at Asheville, a school he celebrates for its devotion to the liberal arts. He holds a postgraduate certificate in the study of rhetoric and oratory from Harvard University Extension School.
Michael believes we each have a calling to live mindful of the undervalued around the world. To live a life of uplifting the underestimated. Michael devotes himself to this as a writer, broadcaster, speaker, in all public and private life.
Michael married the love of his life, Danette Everhart, Family Nurse Practitioner, June 10, 2023. Together they uphold the values of upholding the dignity of all persons and building a legacy to drive some darkness out of the world. Their love story is rare and beautiful, as is Danette.
George Oleg Pocheptsov VII
George was born in Philadelphia to Ukranian parents in 1992. When he was only eleven months old, his father was diagnosed with brain cancer, and died in 1995 at the age of 40. As a toddler, his mother gave her “Georgie” some crayons and paper to keep him busy. When he was 17 months old, he drew an interpretation of an antique car he saw across the street so extraordinary, that first work of art launched George Pocheptsov into international acclaim as a child prodigy.
Across his young life, his work has drawn comparisons to Picasso and Chagall. His commissions include paintings for Colin Powell, Hillary Clinton, Celine Dion, Alain Ducasse, Michael Jordan and other famous collectors. George has travelled the world and so has his work, featured in museums and galleries in England, France, Korea, South Africa, the Netherlands, Russia, Japan and his family’s homeland of Ukraine. His transcendent talents have brought appearances on the Oprah Winfrey Show, Good Morning America, the John Walsh Show, the Today Show, Ripley’s Believe it or Not, Later Today and Nickelodeon.
He met Michael as they worked together on an Emmy-winning story of his artistic gifts when “Georgie” was nine years old. They set off a lasting friendship.
Today George is a graduate of Harvard University (2014) with a concentration in statistics. He’s a philanthropist whose art-focused charitable foundation has raised more than $9 million, serving the interest children’s health and wellbeing, cancer research and more. George was commissioned in 2004 to create an official U.S. postage stamp for brain tumor awareness.