Glory Days: The memories and the music live on in the shadow of the Blue Ridge
SANDY RIDGE (Winston-Salem Journal) - History is a funny thing. Some things can happen and become part of our known history; some things can happen, seem significant at the time, and yet be simply forgotten. For a while, events are alive in the memories of people who experienced them. Whether they become a part of lasting, shared history that is retold and recorded may at times seem little more than a whim of fate.
A poster spotted in the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville, Tenn., pointed me toward a bit of history that’s still a living memory here in the little town of Sandy Ridge in the northeastern corner of Stokes County. In September 2002, touring the museum with a group from the National Conference of Editorial Writers, I unexpectedly found myself staring at a black, white and red poster announcing a performance “in person” of the Flatt and Scruggs Show, “Direct from Grand Ole Opry,” on “Fri. Mar. 7” at “Sandy Ridge High School, Sandy Ridge, N.C.”
Now, even I, no music expert, knew that Flatt and Scruggs were big time. They’d taken their old-fashioned bluegrass music to mainstream fame, playing the theme song for the 1960s TV show The Beverly Hillbillies. Their recording of “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” had been on the soundtrack of the movie Bonnie and Clyde in 1967. I owned a vintage copy of their album Flat and Scruggs at Carnegie Hall!
And Sandy Ridge seemed, to put it politely, small time. High on the ridge that gave its name to a plantation and later to the community, the little town has a good view of the Blue Ridge and of Pilot Mountain. It has a post office, a handful of businesses, a fire department, a school, a garbage-collection site and some friendly people. It’s bordered by tobacco fields and, as you head toward Virginia, apple orchards. No river runs through it; the railroad didn’t run this way; there’s no four-lane, not even a stoplight. Sandy Ridge is small time in the best sense; it’s quiet, and peaceful and country.
A poster spotted in the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville, Tenn., pointed me toward a bit of history that’s still a living memory here in the little town of Sandy Ridge in the northeastern corner of Stokes County. In September 2002, touring the museum with a group from the National Conference of Editorial Writers, I unexpectedly found myself staring at a black, white and red poster announcing a performance “in person” of the Flatt and Scruggs Show, “Direct from Grand Ole Opry,” on “Fri. Mar. 7” at “Sandy Ridge High School, Sandy Ridge, N.C.”
Now, even I, no music expert, knew that Flatt and Scruggs were big time. They’d taken their old-fashioned bluegrass music to mainstream fame, playing the theme song for the 1960s TV show The Beverly Hillbillies. Their recording of “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” had been on the soundtrack of the movie Bonnie and Clyde in 1967. I owned a vintage copy of their album Flat and Scruggs at Carnegie Hall!
And Sandy Ridge seemed, to put it politely, small time. High on the ridge that gave its name to a plantation and later to the community, the little town has a good view of the Blue Ridge and of Pilot Mountain. It has a post office, a handful of businesses, a fire department, a school, a garbage-collection site and some friendly people. It’s bordered by tobacco fields and, as you head toward Virginia, apple orchards. No river runs through it; the railroad didn’t run this way; there’s no four-lane, not even a stoplight. Sandy Ridge is small time in the best sense; it’s quiet, and peaceful and country.
posted by BP News Bureau | 8:36 PM
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