Increased interest in “The Overnighters” documentary – part 1 of 3

Flaring of natural gas. A common site in 2012 and 2013, but is rare today. Photo by James Ulvog.

There has been a lot more interest in my posts on “The Overnighters” documentary recently. In particular, my 7/2/15 discussion of Where are they now? Follow up on people you saw in The Overnighters documentary has been getting a lot of page views. It has been running between 100 and 130 views a month for the last six months, with a peak of 217 views in January. Yesterday, 7/16/17, there were 62 views.

While those counts of page views are trivially small for the internet world, that’s a lot of attention to one of my posts, especially one that is two years old.

Did some searches online and cannot find what in particular is driving that growing interest. Did find a few things that I wanted to mention.

“Overnighters” streaming on Netflix in July and

running on lots of PBS stations

Spoiler alert:  several comments here will give away plot elements that produce the drama in the story.

My poking around on the ‘net revealed the documentary is streaming on Netflix in July. It is also being run on a lot of PBS stations.

If you haven’t seen the documentary yet, there are plenty of opportunities to do so this month.

Either before or after watching the show you can read my blog for a lot more background and follow-up. I have discussed “The Overnighters” quite a bit.

As you watch the show, keep a close eye on one of the characters, Keith Graves.

In the director’s cut, Mr. Graves is identified by the director as one of the individuals who “survived” the tumult seen during the story. The idea to keep in mind is that Mr. Graves is currently serving a 33 year federal prison sentence after having been convicted for five counts of human trafficking, one count of drug distribution, and one count of drug possession.

I just checked the Federal Bureau of Prisons inmate locator page. Mr. Graves is still scheduled for release on December 24, 2043. He is still in the Victorville Medium II Federal Correctional Institute.

Disclosures:

Since I will be discussing biases and agendas, there are a few things you should know about me.

I am a Christian. That drives my worldview and affects most things I think and believe. My faith even affects the way I analyze things.

Mr. Moss has made on-the-record comments that he is not a Christian. The difference in world view needs to be identified.

I will repeat my comments from 6/29/15:

  • When our son moved to North Dakota, he slept in the church’s building and parking lot for some time before he found a new job that offered housing. I knew of the Overnighters program a long time before I heard of this movie.
  • Our son joined Concordia Lutheran Church and was a member during the time frame of the movie.
  • From those two comments you can accurately conclude that I know more about The Overnighters program and the church than I will mention on my blog.
  • My wife and I are long time members of a church that is part of the same denomination as Concordia Lutheran Church in Williston.
  • I have been writing about the energy boom in North Dakota for a long time. Glance at any half-dozen sequential or random posts on my blog and you will know I have strong opinions on the shale revolution.

As you can see, I have a dog in this race. Filter my comments as you wish. (Previous comments in italics.)

Since making those disclosures back in 2015, I have worshiped at Concordia Lutheran Church twice.

Next post: Agendas

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