Appalachian fiddler, humorist and actor Randall Franks, “Officer Randy Goode” of “In the Heat of the Night,” was inducted into the Tri-State Gospel Music Hall of Fame Aug. 6, 2022, at Parkway Baptist Church in Fort Oglethorpe, Ga. Franks was included in a class of inductees including Kelly Nelon, the late Rex Nelon, Peg McKamey Bean, […]
77 YEARS OF AMERICAN MUSIC – Appalachian Actor/Entertainer Randall Franks and his Hollywood Hillbilly Jamboree recently celebrated its 77th Anniversary Performance at the Colonnade in Ringgold, Ga. for the North Georgia EMC. The show was started as one of the several stage productions operated by Grand Ole Opry and Western Film star Ramblin’ “Doc” Tommy […]
That may sound like a strange question but after you already have a whole hoard move in on you, what’s a few more? I was filming a movie outside Nashville when I noticed that I had an extreme need to reach down a scratch my leg again and again. I wasn’t even filming outside where […]
I reached down and pulled out a freshwater oyster shell from the branch next to Washington Road and ran up to my grandma who was leaning on a fence post nearby. “Is there a chance I can find a pearl?” She looked at it and said, “You already got one, and she’s your mother.” As […]
As I scanned the banquet hall filled wall to wall with people, I saw many faces that struck a memory of meeting in the past. Through the years with some of them, I had even become what might be described as friends. People with whom I had shared common experiences, told stories and found the […]
I am learning that the field of earnest debate between people is becoming an art that is no longer appreciated nor desired by many. I will never forget the joy as a youth of learning the skills of debate, of working to bring someone who was on the other side of an issue into your […]
I reached over and picked up the can I found along the roadside and looked at it before I tossed it into a nearby trashcan. It carried me back to the carefree days when such a find would result in me kicking the can down the road for a ways. Summer always was filled with […]
Have you ever really wondered where it is you are from? How did your folks come to be in this place or how did you get to where you are? Can you point to some place and say that there is home? I have spent a lot of time of late looking back upon our […]
The importance of one’s family connections is something that I believe we are losing in America. With each generation there are fewer individuals who live close to their extended families, unlike the days when grandma and grandpa lived just in the next room or uncles, aunts and cousins were a short walk down the road. […]
When you think of western films even forty plus years after the passing of the legendary John Wayne, who comes to most people’s minds? Who can ever forget his greater than life presence on the screen no matter what film was rolling through the projector like “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon,” “The Man Who Shot Liberty […]
