Photos by Jane Colclasure
Kenneth “Muskie” Harris finds a lot of things to love about life; not least among them is the telling of a good story. Fortunately, his has been a life that has yielded more fascinating tales, interesting characters and had-to-be-there experiences than one man should be allowed.
Among Harris’ favorites, the retelling of which yields both laughter and wisdom, came during his playing days on the University of Arkansas Razorbacks football team in Fayetteville and involved one of his life’s most significant mentors, Frank Broyles, the Hogs’ late head coach.
“We’re all in that meeting, and he said, ‘Men, you are ICs, and if you don’t become RGs,’ and he pointed to the door,” Harris said. “We’re sitting there looking around, you know, what the hell does this mean? Well, he stepped out, and Coach Lon Farrell stepped up and said, ‘I know all y’all are standing there, trying to figure out what the hell he just said. He said you’re independent contractors, and if you don’t become revenue generators, your ass is out of here.’”
After letting loose his trademark laugh — almost no conversation with Harris fails to include at least one — Harris leaned into the enduring moral of that statement. Life demands results, and a life well lived demands results of the kind that go beyond one’s own self-interest. Harris has never forgotten that message or another important learned lesson of his life’ journey — the realization that while everyone physically comes into the world the same way, moments of birth can occur several times during a person’s life, even — and often — at someone’s very lowest.
With that measurement, Harris has lived a very full life, indeed, of cheering crowds, business success, a fall from grace into addiction, subsequent recovery and renewal, and his latest and most sustained chapter, helping others overcome and achieve.
“If you have never been locked up in your life, and you get locked up for 120 days, you can see how a person can lose their mind,” he said. “Me and the Lord had a total understanding of my spiritual growth while sitting locked up in that room. Every morning at 2:30, I’d wake up and just reflect on what I’ve been through, and I’m going, ‘Oh, my God, you were right here with me the whole time. My faith wasn’t as strong as it should have been.’ Once I did that, I was solid.”
Harris’ origin story deviates sharply from other Black youths with whom he grew up or lined up against on the football field. While many of them lacked a strong male role model, Harris grew up under the strict discipline and expectations of his mother, Juanita, and, especially, his father, Thessalonia.
“I come from a handicapped man. My dad had one arm and no education, never went to school in his life,” Harris said. “He lost his arm in a sawmill saw before any of us kids were born. After that, he was a janitor for Independent Linen Service down there on Woodrow. He had to learn how to compensate and use the other arm to manipulate things. He did that and worked there for 29 years.
“I never had a coach who came close to my dad. My dad was very intimidating, and let me tell you this — I grew up in the whip-ass era, so being raised like that, when all the football coaches yelled and screamed, I said, ‘I’m used to getting hit.’”
Harris was exposed to the hospitality industry — and the pervasive alcohol use that comes with it — early in life while working at his family’s nightclub. There, he met musical greats Albert King, Rufus Thomas, Little Milton, Denise LaSalle, Betty Wright and Al Bell. It was a world away from his junior high school, where most of his classmates did not know about his double life.
His parents ran their household with strict discipline, so much so that Harris now uses the letters of the word “discipline” to describe them: determined, intelligent, sanity, courage, inspirational, patient, love, independent, natural and enthusiastic.
“Growing up in the Harris house started with common sense toward everything,” he said. “You better make the right decision. Consequences could be an ass whipping.”
He and his siblings attended two churches, he said, adding that his mother “did not play around about going to church.”
“Only something like measles or chicken pox kept you out of church,” he said.
As the middle child, Harris was trusted with certain responsibilities at home and, by age 12, was expected to contribute to the household, but that did not mean he did not make the occasional mistake.
“I got caught trying to smoke my dad’s pipe. That whipping has lasted a lifetime for me. I don’t smoke today — my dad stamped it out of me,” Harris said. “I was, like, the chosen child to be trusted to go pay bills, go to the stores downtown for mother’s perfume at Blass or M.M. Cohn.”
Although opportunities were short or out of reach for the Little Rock native, he eventually became the first young African American man from Central High School to attend UA on an athletic scholarship.
“My friends were talking about going to college. I didn’t know how I could go to college, so I started lying about I was going,” he said. “I did not know the open door for me to go to college was my athletic talent. You can always reach your dreams if you live with patience.”
As a defensive back, Harris was lethal, possessing the speed to run down nearly any pass and strength enough to blow receivers out of their cleats. While not the first to break the football color barrier at Arkansas, done a few years earlier by the late Darrell Brown, nor the first Black athlete to play on the varsity squad, that honor going to Jon Richardson, Harris still played at a time when racial diversity in the athletic department was relatively uncommon.
“If you know about Little Rock Central, you know you carry a big title behind your name,” he said. “Jon Richardson prepared me. He said, ‘Muskie, I’m from Horace Mann, and my history stops there. You’re from Little Rock Central. You represent the whole community.’”
Nevertheless, Harris said he never experienced any problems during his time on the Hill.
Photo courtesy of Arkansas Athletics.
“We didn’t have any racial issues on the team. We all were Razorbacks,” he said. “It was like we just didn’t see color.”
Harris’ decorated football career rode shotgun with another goal he had for his life, that of earning his degree. He said while it took a period of 15 years, he always knew he would walk the graduation stage as a promise kept to his parents.
“When you come from a man that can’t read and write, and my mother was educated, it’s pencil, pens all in this house, books. Education was very important,” he said. “At the University of Arkansas, the only way a football team is on the wall is you win a championship. For most, to know they passed this way is to leave your name on the [alumni] sidewalk. Otherwise, no one ever knew that you went through the University of Arkansas.
“That haunted me, man, trying to finish that. My job was very demanding, and I just couldn’t fit it in until, one day, I said if I had to go to University of Texas to get this degree, I’m going to get it. That’s my special pride, to be on the walk. I promised my mom I’d do it, and I did.”
Harris played for the Hogs in the early 1970s. (Photos courtesy of Arkansas Athletics)
After his playing days, Harris found success in real estate and even took a run at governor but came up short in the general election. Life was good until it wasn’t; the combination of a soured business deal costing him $50,000 and his father’s battle with dementia led him to a fateful decision in the mid-1990s.
“I got depressed. The great Muskie Harris got depressed,” he said. “I was angry over losing that commission, and my dad was going through dementia, so I just told the world, ‘[Expletive] it,’ and went home and took care of Dad and just kind of left the world alone.
“My friends came by and said, ‘Hey man, come on out of the house,’ and they exposed me to [drugs]. Like anyone will tell you, you get exposed to crack, the thing about it — it’s so good. It’s just too good. Anything that good can’t be good for you in your life. I’m talking about it was like a rocket. I’m not lying, I kept going, going, going, going.”
Hooked, Harris’ life devolved into behaviors that led only one direction and did so with a speed even the fleet-footed former athlete could not outrun.
The defensive back was swift, but he could not outrun the addiction that later upended his life. (Photo courtesy of Arkansas Athletics)
“Man, it don’t know time,” he said. “I mean I just started lying, stealing, manipulating and cheating, lying, stealing, manipulating and cheating. Those four behaviors are what addiction’s all about, and they never leave you, even when you’ve got sobriety. You’ve got to keep those behaviors under control at all times because they’re in it.”
Three decades later, Harris has made the best of that dark chapter of his life. As owner, director and court liaison at Muskie Harris Rehabilitation Services, he is a lifeline for men dealing with substance abuse as he works with the judicial system, specializing in cases in which defendants can benefit from drug rehabilitation.
“As court liaison, my schedule changes daily depending on what court I am required to attend or for what other agency or program,” he said. “In the beginning, 1997 to 2015, I traveled the entire state, working through the prosecutor districts — all 28. I am the only court liaison that traveled that far from Little Rock.”
Any given week, he could be in Paragould on Monday, West Memphis on Tuesday, Pine Bluff on Wednesday, Russellville on Thursday and Camden on Friday. He connects with judges, prosecutors, private attorneys and public defenders to ensure defendants in cases with alternative sentencing orders have access to his program.
On any given day, Harris could be anywhere in Arkansas, helping others overcome addiction. Photos by Jane Colclasure
“My favorite part of any day is winning the client’s case through rehab, the joy-thrill to see the individual get another chance, family bonding, unity,” he said. “Skills for the job are being real 24/7 inside yourself. Dedication to the business is required. I have had this entire judicial system helping me.”
It is a rewarding career, if not the easiest. Harris said Arkansas needs more beds at treatment facilities, as well as more money allocated for court-ordered rehabilitation.
“The system gives district and circuit judges power with no money,” he said. “I believe every judge needs a half-million budget for district courts and $2 million for circuit courts to use for alternative sentencing.”
Helping others takes its own kind of toll. Harris said it can be difficult to maintain sanity in such a personal business, adding that when he has his trust broken, he needs time to heal. However, his proudest moments are when former clients call to tell him they have a child after getting back on their feet through his services. Harris said he is now “Uncle Muskie” to 26 children.
“If you choose to work in the social service field, you need to have your own life in order,” he said. “You cannot be effective if you are not real with the time you put in the field.”
Looking back over his life, Muskie sees a bittersweet story, one in which he is still trying to infuse enough light and positivity in others to bring his own books into balance. Time and experience have given him many ways to do so — cajoling here, motivating there and doling out some Thessalonia-grade reality checks to those who need to hear it, all in the name of turning independent contractors into revenue generators of their own worth and happiness.
“I tell all my clients, ‘Read my card. Does it say adolescent?’” he said. “They go ‘No,’ and I say, ‘That’s right.’ People gave me my life right back in my hand. Then it was up to me. That’s what I do for my clients; I put their life right back in their hands, and they’re either going to accomplish it, or they can fake it to make it. I’ve got obituaries for those that were five and six years clean who went back out there and tried it one more time. You can’t do that. That’s death.
“I just try to continue being me — I mean, just natural, straight me. They all see that I’m not BS-ing with them. If you want to get your life together, I’ll fight to the end with you. We used to have a sign in the locker room that said ‘one play, one day.’ Sometimes people try to make amends too fast, and they lose focus and get confused because they want acceptance like nothing ever happened. Well, you can’t change your past, so like I tell them, don’t ever let that leave out of your head — one play, one day.”
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