CO M M E N TA R Y
THERE ARE MANY SPECIAL
things about living in a large
metropolitan area like Tampa
GOING HOME
Bay. We have entertainment of all
kinds, along with beautiful beaches
and lots of glorious sunshine.
However, for those of us who came
here from somewhere else, there is
still no place like home. I do believe
that "home is where the heart
is;" but Thomas Wolfe was on to
something when he declared, “You
Can't Go Home Again.” He must
have meant that time changes
things so much that they don't exist
anymore the same way we left
them. However, I have found that
not to be entirely true, as every time
I return to where I grew up, I can't
wait to come again. My hometown is
deep in the mountains of Southwest
Virginia, a small place called Big
Stone Gap. It's a 13-hour drive from
Tampa or a two-hour flight to Bristol,
Tennessee and another hour and a
half by car from there. I was born in
Appalachia, Virginia, not in a hospital,
but in a home that had been converted
into a kind of hospital. Even then,
Appalachia was considered the "poverty
pocket" of America. It is just a few miles
from where I grew up in Big Stone Gap.
Every Friday night during football
season, I led my high school band down
Main Street as its drum-major. We
marched behind a police car and a fire
truck right through town to the ballpark,
where our Buccaneers would take on
the visiting rivals; and competition for
"bragging rights" in the country can be
fierce.
A shopping center now occupies the
place where my high school once stood;
and WLSD, the little radio station where
I started my career in broadcasting 50
plus years ago, is nothing more than an
empty building with old "program logs"
Best-selling novelist and director
Adriana Trigiani, who also grew up
there, has created a warm-hearted
love story about belonging and the
proud people who live there and
their deep roots in the mountains.
They are hoping that this little
movie will pump some life back
into this troubled part of rural
America where jobs are scarce, if
there are any at all, and people are
judged by what kind of person they
are instead of how much money
they have, or once had.
In the film, Wilson Van, our
family rock band, performs with
Appalachia's own,"If Birds Could
Fly," Michael Trigiani (harmonica)
and New York’s Grammy-winner
Dave Eggar, who plays a cello like a
fiddle. The result was a classic mix
of Country Bluegrass and Van
Halen with Paul, Mark and Patrick
Wilson.
As for Thomas Wolfe, I think you
can go home again if you are willing
to accept its changes. I do, as I am still
humbled by these people who just want
respect. I am willing to suspend the passing
of time, even if it means I can’t relive my
memories.
Personally, I can't wait to return home
with my family, talk to the home-folks and
watch all six grandkids catch crawdads in
the creek, having the time of their lives
rolling down a little hill behind the house
where I grew up.
9
EDITOR’S NOTE: John Wilson ended 50
plus years of radio and television news
broadcasting with his final goodbye on
WTVT Fox 13 on November 26, 2014, the
day before Thanksgiving.
By John Wilson
John Wilson
and trash littering the floors. The nearby
town of Appalachia is a "ghost town;" in
which most of the shops, stores and the
old hotel, where I used to go to "D-J"
dances that were called “sock hops” in
those days, are now closed. A bunch of
railroad tracks are also empty, just a block
off the center of town, but they remind
me of a happier time when the mines
were running twenty-four hours a day
and coal was "King."
My most recent trip back home was to
help support the pending release of a
major motion picture about Big Stone
Gap that stars our son, Patrick Wilson,
Ashley Judd, other Hollywood and New
York notables, most of the hometown
folks who live there, and fourteen
members of the Wilson family. It is set
for release nationwide on October 9th;
and it contains no four-letter words,
steamy sex, car crashes or even gunfire.
152 TAMPA BAY MAGAZINE JULY/AUGUST 2015