Some old timers from Salmon, Idaho will remember the Salmon Air Taxi. When I was a kid, the business was owned and operated by Carol Jarvis. 

As a teenager, I worked at Salmon Air Taxi, which at that time had just been bought by a guy named Richard Disney. 

Listen-in as Jeff Hicks talks about his life as a high school kid working for Salmon Air Taxi. 

The old timers will remember the glory days of Yellow Jacket, Idaho. Those were the good ole days when folks spent a great deal of time in search of Idaho's famous precious metals - gold and silver. 

Victor Hicks was famous in Central Idaho as a teamster winning pulling contests all around with his huge draft horses. The lure of the mining operations took him and his family and horses to Yellow Jacket. 

Listen-in as Harry Hicks tells the story from his own eyes living in Yellow Jacket. 

(Narrated by Jeff Hicks)

There's an old Idaho legend about the Breakneck Trail - the ancient trail used by Idaho's Native American tribes centuries ago - where few people have ridden that trail and lived to tell the story. 

Harry Hicks rode the Breakneck Trail as a 12-year-old partner in his dad's packing business. Listen-in as Harry tells his tale. 

(Narrative by Jeff Hicks)

Mike Hicks, a Deputy Sheriff in Idaho's Ada County in the 1960s, tells more stories of his glory days of police work. 

Mike Hicks was a Deputy Sheriff in Idaho's Ada County in the 1960s. Those were some wild days of police work. 

Listen-in and get a feel for how law enforcement operated in those days.  

Here in the U.S., post-pandemic fatigue, political distrust, and institutional missteps have led to serious conversations about defunding, restructuring, or outright eliminating key health organizations like the CDC, the NIH, and even our global health partnerships through the WHO. But here’s the problem: you don’t tear down a clinic before the hospital’s been built—and you certainly don’t pull the plug on global aid while communities across the world still rely on that lifeline.

From rural Alabama to remote Uganda, the ripple effects of U.S. health decisions are already being felt.

In today’s episode, we’ll unpack the real-world consequences of these policy shifts, highlight the sharp funding cuts impacting HIV, TB, and maternal health programs worldwide, and offer a few hard questions worth asking before we hit the proverbial kill switch on systems that—though imperfect—have saved millions of lives.

Because healthcare isn’t just politics. It’s personal. It’s global. And it’s about more than slogans.

So stick with me—because today on The Hicks Files, we’re pulling back the curtain on what happens when the safety net starts to fray… and what we can do to fix it before it’s gone.