What it will take to get me to return to Reidsville

Ten years ago this summer I packed up my car with the bare essentials and my dog Tammy and I left our hometown of Reidsville, North Carolina.  I didn’t know where we were going.  We were headed toward literally only God knew where.

We spent the better part of an entire year crossing America, looking for a new place to call home.  When we got to California I decided that we had gone as far from our old home as we could, so I spent a few months looking for work there.  That didn’t happen.

I didn’t want to go back to Reidsville a failure, but that’s pretty much what happened.  And I was there for a couple of months while I tried to figure out what my next course of action should be. That didn’t go so well.  Concerned friends came up with a plan: to let Tammy and me stay with them in South Carolina for awhile, long enough to figure some things out.  They were going to give me time to straighten myself.

That turned into a year and a half long stay in the Greenville, South Carolina area.  And it was time that I truly did use to heal and grow from.  I wouldn’t be the person I am today, of stronger mind, had it not been for those friends coming together to give me the assistance.

In November of 2018 I relocated to the Spartanburg area to be close to a job that I had taken.  A few months after that I changed jobs and became a mental health professional: by far the most rewarding career that I have ever had during the course of my life so far.  There wasn’t a day that went by that I wasn’t helping people.  And then the economy turned rotten and I had to leave that.  Since then I’ve had a string of jobs that haven’t had anything of that kind of stability or sense of personal fulfillment.

It’s been growing for awhile now: the encouragement from many friends to return to Reidsville, North Carolina.  To “come home,” to a place that God had told me to take up stakes and leave.  Now, that really would have made me feel like a glorious failure.  I was supposed to have left for good, shaking the dust from my boots and apart from a few rare occasions, to never return.

Circumstances lately have led my friends in North Carolina to tell me even more that “it’s time to come back, we need you here.”

I’ve thought long and hard about it.  And I’ve come to a conclusion: there IS something that would bring me back to Reidsville, North Carolina.  This time to stay.

I still maintain a great interest in what happens in Reidsville and the rest of Rockingham County.  The politics there is something I keep abreast of.  I stay informed about new businesses that come to the area.  I’m glad that it seems that Reidsville is making a terrific comeback, after decades of economic downturn going back over thirty years (the day it was announce that American Tobacco was being sold was truly a dark day for the city).

Where am I going with all of this?

Okay, here it is: what it will take to entice me to come back to Reidsville…

Television station WGSR would have to get new owners and they would have to make me its general manager.

I cannot begin to convey how many people have been telling me about how WGSR, the television station located on Gilmer Street in downtown Reidsville, is an embarrassment.  But then, they don’t really have to tell me anything.  I saw what was coming to WGSR a long time ago and knew it was headed toward a bad end.

WGSR used to be a very good company.  For its size and broadcasting footprint, it served the market well.  I was there as an employee twenty years ago and was truly amazed about the operation.  It had a healthy variety of locally produced programs, along with some syndicated content.  It was a thriving television station.  It seemed bigger than it was in actuality.  I was impressed.

But those days are long gone.  There is no locally-made programming anymore.  In fact, very few people seem to be going into the Gilmer Street location at all.  It’s being primarily used as a transmitter site, getting its feed from sister station WMDV located across the state line in Virginia.  For all intents and purposes Reidsville has no television station to call its own anymore.

What happened to WGSR?  How did such a thriving company come to such an inglorious fate?

It happened because of Charles Roark: the general manager of the entire operation.

WGSR came to be bought by Azile Roark, who also owned WMDV in Martinsville, Virginia.  Azile Roark put her son Charles in charge of both stations.  Sort of giving the Reidsville/Danville/Martinsville area a “super station” with coverage of a tidy little bit of real estate across the region.

And for awhile, it was good.  The two stations were under the same corporate umbrella but they retained their own respective identities.  WGSR served Reidsville, Eden and the rest of Rockingham County while WMDV was focused on Martinsville and Danville.  They each had their own unique personality.

But Charles Roark didn't know how to be responsible with a television station.  He was fixated on generating controversy.  He was, and still is, about riling people up to make a big deal out of it so that he could broadcast it.  Something that was best symbolized by what was for quite a long time the two stations’ biggest client: the “Church of Christ” cult headed by a very evil man named Johnny Robertson.  It could be said that Robertson was the real owner of WGSR and WMDV.  When he told Charles Roark to jump, Roark asked “how high?”.  It was a pretty slick system: Robertson was being funded by “the mysterious East Texans”, who provided Lord only knows how much money.  Robertson paid Roark for something around four or five hours of live broadcast time on the two stations each week.  Robertson and his cronies would go on their shows, which were invariably used to attack other churches and Christians because they weren’t “good enough” and “not real Christians”.  It was a surefire controversy generator and that’s something that Roark specialized in.

It went on like this for years.  Meanwhile legitimate local shows began ending production.  Fewer and fewer people wanted to be affiliated with a station that was on such a decline.  The station began filling the time up with reruns of the news and call-in shows.

The decline was dramatic enough already.  And then a year ago Johnny Robertson died by suicide.  The money train ended for WGSR/WMDV.  The two stations no longer had reliable income.

I’ve heard a lot of stories over the past several months about what is being done to keep both stations on the air.  It’s not my place to share the details of that.  But I honestly have to shake my head in sad disbelief.  The situation is on the air for all to witness however.  There is NO local news coverage for Reidsville.  WGSR is only mirroring the feed from WMDV, without dedicated programming of its own.  The few exceptions are for things like the Reidsville Christmas parade.

Speaking of THAT, Charles Roark almost single-handedly destroyed this past year’s parade.  Maybe he was possessed by the dark powers and “the Devil made him do it” but for whatever reason he jumped into the midst of a routine by one of the area's dance studios and threw the entire performance into chaos.  But then, this is a man who has made himself out to be the focus of the station’s broadcasts.  It doesn’t strike him that most people DON’T want to see him shirtless at a water park, or being on vacation in Key West, or many other places.  The man is a full-tilt narcissist and that’s something that a television station can’t be fixated upon.

So let me summarize: WGSR is a television station in name only.  It’s Reidsville location is not producing content.  The programming that it is sending out is from the sister station in Martinsville, across the state line.  That programming, well… it’s not good, if we are to be honest.

Meanwhile Reidsville is coming to turn things around as a community.  New businesses are coming to the area.  The shopping mall is being dramatically renovated.  People are moving northward from Greensboro.  Industries are looking at expanding to Rockingham County.  The place is starting to make a very significant comeback away from the stagnancy it’s been in for more than three full decades…

But the television station, to be very frank, sucks.  It does not reflect at all the community that’s coming to be bustling around it.  In fact, WGSR has become a black eye on the face of Reidsville.  “Star News” is a bad joke.  One that stopped being funny a long time ago.

The town, all of Rockingham County actually, deserves better than that.

So, this is what it will take to bring me back to Reidsville to stay for good.  WGSR has to find new owners.  RESPONSIBLE owners.  It has to come under the control of people who sincerely care about making a great impression and are committed to honesty and integrity.  They have to be people who appreciate the Reidsville community and want to serve it to the very best of their ability.  And then they have to hire me to be its general manager.

I don’t particularly care about what happens with WMDV.  The focus has to be on Reidsville, Eden, and the rest of Rockingham County.  That means locally produced programming, local advertisers, local news coverage (including sports).  Local talk shows.  Fill the rest of the airtime with syndicated content that is reliable and trustworthy.  When I was at WGSR we had a few religious shows and classics like The Lone Ranger on weekday afternoons.  As well as a syndicated “horror host” show on Saturdays.  Those seemed to have their viewers and there is no reason why they couldn’t again.

The station is there.  It’s not being used to its fullest potential but the studios and equipment and transmitter are sitting on Gilmer Street, waiting.  There is talent to be found in the area that can provide the heart and soul of programs.  The number of businesses looking to get the word out is growing by the month.

And people are hungry. They want and NEED a broadcast outlet that serves them and reflects their community.

I know these things, better than most.  Even though I’ve been an expatriate of Reidsville for a decade, I’ve stayed very informed.  And what has happened to the town’s only television station is an absolute travesty.

There it is.  If new people come in and take over WGSR, rebrand it, move it as far away from the current operation as it needs to be, and bring me aboard to be its general manager, then I will gladly come back to Reidsville.

Those are my terms.

 

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Earl Burton, the world's greatest weatherman, has passed away

Okay, maybe I'm more than a little biased.  But as long as I am on God's green earth I will never believe that there was ever a meteorologist who was as accurate and honest and entertaining as Earl Burton.

Earl Burton was born in Reidsville, North Carolina in 1940.  Two things happened in his young life that wound up spinning him into someone legendary: his love of broadcasting, and the volumes of weather records that he began keeping as a teenager.  Eventually he came to be an announcer on WREV AM-1220 out of Reidsville.

His flair for radio and his vast knowledge of local meteorology collided one fateful afternoon when Earl was about to relay a forecast from the National Weather Service to his listeners.  He was set to read the report calling for rain when he stopped, paused for a moment, and told the audience "Folks, I think that's wrong!  I think we are going to see snow!"

It indeed snowed.  Earl Burton was right on the money and the professional meteorologists were wrong.

From that point on, Earl was the person to get the weather forecast from if you were in the Reidsville/Eden/greater Rockingham County area.  And he had a style all his own when he was giving his prognostication.  With that velvety voice perfect for radio, what would take most weather people three or four minutes to share with the audience, Earl would turn that into a seemingly half-hour long masters thesis on atmosphere, humidity, pressure systems and how they were going to meet over the area.  And I would say that he was 95% accurate most of the time.  Earl had a way of explaining it all, making something as complicated as weather into something that everyone could grasp and appreciate.

I can't talk about Earl Burton without mentioning how beloved he was by the school children.

So many winter days there were when there were rumors of snow coming in.  I think every kid in the county would be tuned into 1220 AM and what Earl had to say.  It would sometimes take him ten to fifteen minutes to get to the point but if the situation aligned well enough we would hear Earl say the magic words: "this is just the right conditions... for snow!"  When he said that, you could pretty much forget about going to school the next day.  It simply wasn't going to happen.  Earl Burton had said it, we believed it, and fifteen hours later we saw it with our own eyes.

Earl Burton was among the finest personalities in the field of radio.  And later on he complemented that with also being the weatherman for Reidsville's WAEU Channel 14 television station.  His forecasts on TV were a tad more in keeping with that medium's scheduling but they were no less effective, and for many people it was their very first time putting a face to the voice.

What makes small towns so special are their larger-than-usual percentages of personalities.  The people who give a place their true character.  Reidsville is fortunate (maybe) to have had many such people over the years.  Few of them had as much virtue and qualities as Earl Burton.  And to this day, whenever I see a weather forecast calling for snow in an area I happen to be in, I find myself wondering "What would Earl say?"

Earl Burton passed away on February 25th, 2026.  He leaves behind a grateful town and generations of school children who hung on his every word on so many winter afternoons.

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Pennrose Mall will live again! Worst shopping center in North Carolina is getting an extreme makeover (Plus: Reidsville is getting a new bookstore!)

I first heard about this about a week ago and it didn't seem possible.  There were photos though that proved it was true: Pennrose Mall, what might be the worst shopping establishment in the southeastern United States - it's definitely the worst in the state of North Carolina - is getting some much-needed cosmetic attention.

Here is a pic of what Pennrose Mall has looked like for the past few decades:

The blog Sky City: Retail History has many other photos of Pennrose.  Those are from circa 2011 though.  I paid a brief visit inside the mall in 2017 and it was MUCH worse by that point.

Pennrose Mall used to be a happenin' place.  It had many good retailers, some big-name anchors but also quite a few small businesses that brought real local charm to the downtown area.  But the last time it was anything like that was perhaps thirty years ago.  I think the town's economic downturn when American Tobacco Company was sold in 1994 was one hammer that hit Pennrose.  And then Walmart came in 2005 and that wrought a lot of devastation to the business scene in Reidsville.

Like I noted above, I went into Pennrose Mall in 2017.  There were only three stores that were still there: Belk, Rose's, and Strader's Shoe Store.  There was only one other "business" there: a fly by night Internet sweepstakes place that looked like it had gone completely under the radar of local law enforcement.  Strader's closed this past spring, leaving only Belk and Rose's to dominate an empty shell of a shopping center.  There was extensive water damage from leaky ceilings.  Trash throughout the complex.  Weeds growing throughout the empty parking lot.  I'm sure vagrants have been hanging around.  No doubt some drug deals have happened there too.

Put succinctly, Pennrose Mall has been the blight of Reidsville, North Carolina.  But its owner never cared about fixing up the place.  The interests owning Pennrose, apparently up in New York State, found the mall to be more profitable if it was just sitting there derelict.

Well folks, apparently things are finally going to be looking up for Pennrose Mall.

On the podcast today at Mike Moore Media, the plans for Pennrose Mall were finally revealed.  Here's what was posted on the podcast's Facebook page earlier...

Pennrose Mall in Reidsville has been bought by local developer Tom Holderby, a Reidsville native.  Renovations have started, a dozen new businesses have already signed leases, including retail, restaurants, trampoline park, coffee shop, and Peanut Shack is returning.  Holderby is also building 168 apartments on the property.  Plans will be announced for the old Hardee’s and China Grill.  Winn-Dixie will be torn down.  Pennrose, one of the first malls in the state was built in 1968.

WOW!!  All of that, and the return of Peanut Shack, too!  New businesses set to fill the empty spaces.  Restaurants coming.  A coffee shop and a trampoline park, which sounds like a lot of fun.

This really could be the thing that revitalizes downtown Reidsville.  Something that it has needed for a full generation now.

I have high hopes for this and I wish Mr. Holderby all the best.

But that's not all!

When I commented on the original post on Facebook, I lamented that Reidsville needs a bookstore.  Pennrose Mall used to have News & Novels, an awesome bookstore that I bought many a volume (and quite a few comic books) from.  News & Novels closed down in 1988.  Richard Moore (who I've written about a few times on this blog) had KC Books and then The Bookstore and that lasted for awhile until it closed in 2008.  There hasn't been a single bookstore in Rockingham County since then.

Well friends, I have been informed by trusted associates that a new bookstore is coming to Reidsville!  Coming spring of 2026 is Ink & Ivy Bookshop and it sounds like it's going to be the perfect lil' addition to the city of Reidsville.  I'm definitely looking forward to visiting Reidsville again soon, just to check Ink & Ivy out.  Hey who knows, maybe we'll have a signing for my book there.

Seriously though, this news warms the cockles of my heart and I'm very glad to hear that my old hometown is getting some good things after too long a time in the wilderness.

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Short Sugar's Barbecue Sauce has hit store shelves!!

For the past ten months the number-one question that has been asked of this blogger has been: "Do you know when the Short Sugar's barbecue sauce is going to be for sale?"

It was back in January that Short Sugar's Barbecue in Reidsville, North Carolina closed after almost eighty years of business.  It was news that shocked a lot of people.  I know.  For weeks it was THE item that spun the most traffic to this blog.  Folks as far away as Ireland, Australia and Brazil were coming to this site.  But that was nothing compared to the reactions that I saw on Facebook, among the people who for most if not all their lives had Short Sugar's in the town they grew up in.  It was an institution, not just of Reidsville but of the entire state of North Carolina.

I could go on all night about that.  It's been talked about by people more eloquent than I.  But a few days after the closing was announced, Short Sugar's owner David Wilson told us that the restaurant's classic barbecue sauce would be going on sale sooner than later.  I know the notion of selling it on Amazon had come up, and that venue might still come about.  That's all I knew about it though.  And at least once or twice a week since then there's been e-mail coming in asking if I had heard anything about Short Sugar's sauce hitting the market.  And all I could do was throw my hands up in the air and tell everyone "beats me."

But let there be rejoicing!  A few hours ago Wilson broke the news on Facebook that Short Sugar's Barbecue Sauce is now on sale!

You can find it at Richard's Meats & Things on Scales Street in Reidsville.  Which is practically straight across the street from where Short Sugar's was located.  Richard's is a great store that has a lot of good stuff, I can't praise their Delicious Seasoning nearly enough.  I have no idea if they ship.  If they don't they had perhaps better start thinking about setting up logistics for that, because I have a feeling that there is going to be a honking huge demand for this sauce.  A great friend back in Reidsville has already offered to send me a few bottles and I am soooooo eager to have that succulent sauce drenching my chopped barbecue before too long.

Okay well, there ya go.  Short Sugar's Barbecue Sauce is now being sold by the bottle.  It's what you all wanted.  When there's a demand for a product, eventually someone will fill it.  It will make the public very happy and it makes the producer rich.  And that's what America's all about, by gum!

So go get your bottle of Short Sugar's!  Or perish in flames.  It's your choice.  But not really.

UPDATE November 17th 2025: I asked the fine staff at Richard's Meats & Things about shipping.  Here is what Hannah told me...

Hi Chris! 

Yes, we have gotten a lot of requests for this. Unfortunately, we don't ship at this time, so it is something I have to look into and figure out how to do! With the holiday season, I am unsure if I will be able to do this before the New Year (though I'd like to). Hopefully in January we can get a system up and running. 

Best, 

Hannah

Thanks Hannah!  Well, if you guys get something figured out I'll not only order a few bottles of Short Sugars's sauce but also some of your seasoning.  I feel like a bad expatriate of Reidsville for not having some handy already.

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"God must have needed a photographer, and He got the very best with Tim."

That was one of the very first thoughts that came to mind this morning.

My heart felt like it broke into a hundred pieces yesterday afternoon, upon hearing of the passing of my very good friend Tim Talley.

Tim was many things to many people.  I suppose the first aspect that comes to the minds of lots of folks is that he was an amazing photographer.  For more than forty years Tim made his mark not just in Reidsville and Rockingham County, but throughout the Piedmont region.  Tim was blessed with an incredible vision and sense of composition.  The man worked with light the way that the finest sculptors work with clay.  Tim came up with seemingly countless ways of staging photos and he would go to whatever lengths it took to pull them off.  He also had a way of bringing out the best of his subjects.  Everyone was beautiful in his eye and he knew how to capture and convey that with his camera.  Tim had ways of pulling off the almost impossible... like when he coaxed my dachshund Tammy into sitting still when we did a photo shoot with him in 2017.  I had told him that if he could do that then he was a better man than me... and lo and behold he did it!

If nothing else then the many thousands of portraits that he made, hanging in family living rooms throughout the region, attests to his talent.

Those who knew him best, though, will remember him for so much else.

Tim was a devoted husband to his wife Donna, and a father to his son Brandon.  He absolutely adored Brandon's wife and their three daughters. When Tim finally retired some years ago, it was always with it borne in mind that he and Donna were going to move to Lancaster County, Pennsylvania so he could be closer to Brandon and his family.

And once Tim got situated in Lancaster County, he very quickly made friends among the people there, especially his Amish neighbors.  I think Tim might have been the one photographer they trusted enough with his getting an occasional picture of them (but not for widespread publication, those were meant for his friends and family).  Not long after relocating there, Tim became the driver of a tour bus, and he became much beloved for his knowledge, his sense of humor, and just the fact that he was a southerner driving visitors around "Amish Country".

Tim's good cheer and friendliness were absolutely contagious.  His smile lit up everything... and every one... who came into his proximity.  I don't think Tim ever met a stranger.  And in that regard, he certainly became a role model for my own place in this world.

Tim had principles.  He stood resolute upon them.  I think it's safe to say that there were some people who didn't agree with those.  But there was too much respect for Tim than to think any less of him for those.  With Tim, you knew where he was positioned.  And that had to be admired by all who knew him or knew of him.

Tim devoted his life to serving God, in whatever capacity that might be.  God gave him a talent and Tim was determined to make the most of it.  He truly was a brother in Christ who cared for all who came into his life, for however long or brief it might have been.

I think that most of all, though, what especially rends my heart right now, is that I have lost a true friend.

I had my photo taken by Tim several times.  I also knew him from the Boy Scouts.  He and I were adult leaders in Reidsville's Troop 797.  In fact, that's where I first laid eyes on him, after seeing his work displayed around the area for years already.  Once, a month or so before I graduated from high school, Tim and me and several other Scouts and Scouters made a long drive to camp in the North Carolina mountains for a weekend and to hike part of the Appalachian Trail.  Tim made sure to bring a camera along to snap photos.  He took to mountain hiking the way a fish takes to water.  The troop also went camping a few times at Tim's place outside of Reidsville.

We were already friends.  When Facebook came along that gave us more opportunity to keep in touch on a regular basis.  Tim often shared some of his latest handiwork, and he was ever eager to demonstrate to his readers how he worked his trade.  I learned a lot about photography from Tim and his informal academy.  I believe a lot of people did, too.

Well, I could say so much, much more.  All that I really know since yesterday afternoon is that the world has lost a tremendously talented man, a family has lost a husband and a father and a grandfather, two communities hundreds of miles apart have lost a respected citizen, and I have lost a wonderful friend.

Until we meet again, Tim.  Thank you for being you. And I thank God that He let you be in our lives, for however brief a season it seemed.

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One of the most amazing people who I have ever known has left us

 

A short while ago I got the word from her daughter that Nell Rose, one of the most enthused and energetic and especially dynamic people who I have ever had the great pleasure of knowing, passed away yesterday.

Nell was the embodiment of model leadership.  She would see things that could have been better and she threw herself into it, no questions asked.  This was especially noted in her myriad of activities involving education.  She spearheaded a number of initiatives when she and her family moved to Charlotte.  And then some years later when they moved back to the Reidsville area, she brought that same vision to bear.  The woman was nigh unstoppable.

I knew Nell from a variety of situations.  The first time we met, it was during our high school swim team's weekly meets.  Her two daughters were on the team and Nell often came to cheer not only her own girls on, but she was behind all of us.  Her beautiful beaming smile never failed to encourage and inspire us ever forward.

Nell was one of the first members of the consolidated school board after all the systems in Rockingham County merged.  And that led to further contact with Nell as I got involved in the county's education affairs.  She and I had many conversations about a variety of subjects, and I always went away feeling that much more wise and enlightened.

And then there was Theatre Guild of Rockingham County.  Nell served on the board of that.  And she came to most of our performances.  It was a special feeling, knowing that she was in the audience as we put on our production.  I think we made sure to put a little extra heart into the act when Nell was in the house.

Wow.  So much I could say about this fine lady.  She was the kind of person who really did make this world a much better place for her being here.  There is, was and ever will be only one Nell Rose.  God broke the mold when He designed her.

Here is Nell's extensive obituary on the Citty Funeral Home site.

Thoughts and prayers going up and out for her loved ones.

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After Johnny Robertson: What happens to WGSR now?

Maybe I'm about to say too much, with this post.  But a few of you have asked me about recent events and my take on them.  And this does pertain to some people who I had blogged about much (though it's been awhile, like fifteen years or so).

I feel obligated, for sake of completion, to weigh in on the matter.  So here it goes...

As reported a few days ago, Johnny Robertson of the Martinsville Church of Christ died a week ago.  The funeral service was held this past weekend.  Robertson was cremated, which may or may not be germane to the conversation.

The manner of Robertson's death has become a topic of considerable discussion in the Martinsville, Virginia and Reidsville, North Carolina area.  I am aware of what the medical examination determined.  By now many people have correctly surmised how Johnny Robertson came to pass away.  Regardless of the history that existed between Robertson and myself, I am greatly troubled and even grieved that his end came in such a way.  "There but for the grace of God..."

Although I no longer live in that vicinity, I do maintain interest in what transpires around my old stompin' grounds.  And so it is that from where I see things, Johnny Robertson's death may have significant ramifications to that region. Especially in regard to WGSR, the television station from which Robertson's "Church of Christ" had three solid hours of broadcasting each week.

Here's what it comes down to: WGSR, the Star News station, is now on the brink of destruction.  It is far removed from the fairly vibrant television station that I first went to work at in 2006.  The WGSR of that time had a lot of variety of programming.  But that's dwindled away, from what I've heard.

For all of this time though, there has been one consistent constant: that the "Church of Christ" (which is nothing at all like the mainstream Church of Christ denomination) was WGSR's biggest-paying client.  Johnny Robertson kept the money coming into the station.  So long as Robertson kept stoking the flames of controversy, the "rich Texans" out west would send money for the broadcasts.  And stoking controversy has always been something right up WGSR general manager Charles Roark's alley.  The man trades and deals in strife.  Johnny Robertson and his confederates of the "Church of Christ" came loaded with footage  of their trespasses against decent Christians with seemingly each new hour of broadcast, and Roark was ever eager to put it on the air.  It was a vicious cycle that kept Robertson and his cronies doing their "work" and consequently kept WGSR in business.

But now, Johnny Robertson is gone.  And with him goes much if not most of the funding that WGSR has relied on for the past twenty years.  There will be no more shows from the Martinsville Church of Christ.  The "Church of Christ" as has been known in that area, represented by the Robertson family, is done with.  It's over.  It took awhile but they are finally extinguished.

Sources in the Martinsville/Reidsville area have told me that WGSR's management has been thrown into chaos.  Roark bet the farm on the Robertson gang, and he has now lost bigly.  But it was only a matter of time before this happened.  And now Roark is facing the very severe consequences of having hitched the WGSR wagon to Johnny Robertson's star to begin with.

I suppose if nothing else, I'm writing this post out of an obligation to chronicle something that doesn't happen very often: the death of a television station.  Because that is what it seems is now happening to WGSR.  Reidsville has had a TV station for more than forty years, and suddenly it is facing the possibility that there will be no local television broadcasting anymore.  How it came to this point, is something well worth analyzing and discussing.  Because what may be about to happen, is something that could have been avoided had smarter and more mature management been in charge.  WGSR is about to become an object lesson in running a media outlet into the ground.

Maybe others will watch what happens with the station, and take from it a measure of wisdom.  The well of controversy has dried up at WGSR.  And that's what it had put its stock in.

It wouldn't surprise me if the station was defunct by the end of the year.  Barring significant reform, its days are certainly numbered.

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GOOD NEWS: Short Sugar's BBQ Sauce is hitting store shelves soon-ish!

This blog has been SLAMMED with visitors since three days ago coming to read about Short Sugar's Bar-B-Q in Reidsville, North Carolina shutting down after more than 75 years in business.  The counter has been ringing up visits from all fifty states, Canada, Ireland, Australia, Germany, even some people in Brazil. There were few corners of the globe that hadn't heard of Short Sugar's, it seems.  Judging by the comments and e-mails that have come in there have been a lot of folks who are regretting that they will now never have an opportunity to eat at a place that once was judged to have the best barbecue in America.  Short Sugar's was the kind of place that they just don't make anymore and it's not just a loss to a small town, but to our culture as a whole.

Well, it's been a very depressing past 72 hours but there is a little bit of light to break through the gloom.  Short Sugar's as a location may be gone, but its signature barbecue sauce will live on!  And it may be coming to your front door before too awful long.

Here's what Short Sugar's owner David Wilson posted on Facebook earlier today:

"We will continue producing the sauce. I think we will start on Amazon and in local stores... I’m going to change our social media presence to focus on the sauce."

I hope David and the rest of the Wilson family are bracing themselves.  Because for years a lot of us have been wanting Short Sugar's sauce to be widely distributed.  Until now bottles of it have only been really available for sale at the restaurant.  It has been highly demanded for a very long time.  Bringing this sauce to the larger marketplace is going to be a veritable goldmine.  It is going to take the world by storm!  There is no sauce like Short Sugar's, is something unique all its own.  It's not something you slather onto meat, it's more like you saturate your pork or chicken or whatever with it.  This is the perfect thing to accentuate chopped barbecue especially.  I've also had a bit of success using it on ribs.  So maybe this will be like the second coming of Short Sugar's.  It has been more than a place to eat, it has been an enduring idea: a spot for the mind as much as for the taste buds.  And now it seems that it will endure.  Not just that but also thrive!  Short Sugar's sauce is poised to take the greater world by surprise and in my mind there is not a product that more deserves a position in the global market.

I shall be keeping my eyes open about this with great interest!

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Dateline: Reidsville, North Carolina: Short Sugar's is no more

Of all the things that the Biden economy has destroyed, in its final days it has taken down one last victim.  And being a proud son of the town of Reidsville, North Carolina, this is the most bitter loss of all.

Short Sugar's Pit Bar-B-Q

1949 ~ 2025

The sad word came down earlier today.  Reidsville's most famous restaurant has shuttered for good.

Short Sugar's had been hobbled, first by COVID closures but mostly because of economic downturn in the past few years not related to the pandemic.  People just couldn't afford to eat out like they used to be able to.

This really does feel like a piece of my heart has been ripped out.  Short Sugar's was the kind of place you just knew would be around forever.  It is at the heart of the identity of the City of Reidsville, North Carolina.  Some of my earliest memories are of eating at Short Sugar's.  At first the hot dogs but as I got older it was that wood-fired barbecue.  Sometimes I would even order and devour two plates, I could get so hungry for it.  I hadn't been back to Reidsville as often as I'd like in recent years but whenever I did, I always stopped at Short Sugar's for lunch and afterward went to Mayberry for a chocolate milkshake.  And that was my "coming home" ritual since leaving Reidsville in 2016.

My sister worked at Short Sugar's for a number of years, too.  There was a real sense of family at the place.  We knew them and they knew us.

I don't know when the next time I'll ever visit Reidsville will be.  The more I hear about the place the more it sounds like a foreign country, now.  The tobacco field near where I grew up is today a vast solar farm.  Some businesses have gone and others have come in.  Thomas Wolfe really was right, "you can't go home again."  And with the departure of Short Sugar's, I'm feeling that harder than ever this afternoon.

Who knows though, maybe someone will swoop in and resurrect the place sometime.  But it would be too different.  The Wilson family has owned and operated it all this time, it won't be the same without them.

I'm going to miss that barbecue sauce.  A vinegar and brown sugar-based concoction unlike any sauce I've ever encountered.  The perfect enhancement for chopped pork.  Now I wish that I had stocked up on it.

Wow.  So much that could be said about a barbecue restaurant and drive-in.  Short Sugar's really was the kind of place that that they don't make any more of in America.  In 1982 it was judged as having the best barbecue in the country.  I don't know if they held that competition again but if they ever did I've no doubt that Short Sugar's would still be a worthy competitor.

And now, it's... gone.

Damn.  I finally feel old now.

Edit 01/17/2024: More than a few have noted something, and I was woefully remiss to mention this.  That Short Sugar's was not only famous throughout the state of North Carolina, but also across America and even known throughout the WORLD!  Short Sugar's hosted quite an international clientele over the decades.  I myself brought friends from Belgium to eat there a few times and they made sure to take bottles of barbecue sauce home with them.  I also have it on very good authority that several bottles made it to Germany in 1993.  For there to be no more Short Sugar's is truly a loss to us all.

Speaking of the larger world, since making this post 21 hours ago yesterday it has been read nearly 5,000 times.  The blog has always had a faithful global audience but yesterday this post especially has found visitors from almost all fifty states and also places like Canada and Ireland.

I have heard from David Wilson, the owner of Short Sugar's, and he is truly overwhelmed by the many tributes that people are making.  David, on behalf of everyone: thank you and your family and staff, for everything.

(Note: the photo is from Roadfood.  I had just grabbed any pic I could find of Short Sugar's without looking at the link.  They're the ones who originated the photo.)

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About the post from three days ago...

Feel like I need to follow up on the the post I made a few days ago about what happened to me when I was an adolescent.

 

It increasingly seems that it was the right thing to do.  I feel an AWFULLY large burden has been lifted off of me.  I carried that particular thing around for almost forty years.  I felt better after talking with the detectives about it three years ago.  I feel better again, now.

 

It has indeed been a boon.  I'm writing for the book again.  From the very beginning, when I first tried writing it in 2014 before Dad passed, I knew this was going to have to be addressed somehow.  That is possible now, when it hadn't been possible before.  I wish I could tell you that this book is going to be entirely focused on my life as a manic depressive: something that in and of itself is replete with drama and occasional comedy.  But it's not and it can't.  A person's life is like a tapestry.  Try to take one thread out and the whole thing unravels.  This particular thread has insinuated its way into my life since I was twelve.  But in the past couple of days I've found that I'm not afraid to confront that anymore.  So, that's good.

 

A number of people have privately messaged me about it.  Some have reiterated that the chances of seeing something done in the way of justice are slim.  I know that.  I knew it going in to talk to the detectives three years ago.  I keep thinking though that if it happened to me, well... could it have happened to others also?  As one of the detectives told me then, a person who does a thing like this can't stop.  He (and it's almost always a he) will try to do more.  Who knows?  Maybe others will step forward.

 

One person left a comment on my blog yesterday, noting that decades after the war that Nazis were still being found and prosecuted.  My situation isn't quite like that though.  There were MANY witnesses still alive in the 70s, 80s and 90s who could recollect individual SS officers and concentration camp guards.  There was very little problem with identifying such people.  With what happened in 1986 it's going to forever be my word against his  But again, who knows?  Since going to them three years ago the authorities may be keen on something I don't have.

 

Anyway, I felt led to come forward and write about this.  It was more than that even though.  God put me in a place where I had no choice, if I was going to continue writing the book.  And I want and need to write this.  It's as part of my recovery story as much as it is a chronicle of that.  I have been obedient to that and now it's done and well... we'll see what transpires next.

 

So that's what's happened since Saturday.

 

Hope you guys are having a great week :-)

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I am a survivor of child rape

It is exactly two hundred miles from the driveway of my home near Spartanburg to the Rockingham County Sheriff’s Department office in Wentworth, North Carolina.  That was the distance I drove one morning three years ago this winter.

I went back to where I grew up.  Because I was finally ready to give a statement to members of law enforcement about my being raped at age twelve.

For well over three decades I had kept the agony and the shame close to me, sharing it only with a few people I absolutely trusted.  As if that would be enough to stop the hurt.  But at last it became too much to bear, this far into my life.

Why didn’t I go to the authorities years earlier?  It’s hard to explain.  Partly, it’s because on a primal level I didn’t want to have to face my abuser again.  Anything sexual creates a bond between two people: something that had I treasured in the marriage that complications from my wounds eventually destroyed.

I guess, I can’t really fully offer up an explanation for why I waited for so long.  You have to go through something like this to understand why.

I went to the sheriff’s office and spoke with two detectives.  I knew going in that it was a long shot.  That after thirty-four years the odds of seeing anything happen in the way of justice were against me.  But I gave my statement, and the two officers gained my confidence.  I don’t know if anything will ever come about from my going in, but they still have it.  I’ve no doubt that they have pursued this with all due passion and diligence.

But it’s been nearly forty years.  People move around.  Many die in that period.  Memories fade.

My own memory is a funny thing.  Some things I don’t remember well at all (a quality that to some extent is rooted in the meds I take to manage bipolar disorder).  Other things, I remember all too well.

May 16, 1986 is a date burned into my mind.  That was the day that the remaining vestiges of childhood innocence were ripped away from me.

I can even tell you the shirt that I wore that day, to Community Baptist School in Reidsville, North Carolina.  A place I had been a student at since kindergarten.

Maybe it was my size.  Maybe it was because I was the “nerdy kid” of the school.  Whatever.  I was regularly bullied, by boys as well as girls.  On this day I got into an altercation with someone.

A male faculty member accused me of doing something that I had not.  Of uttering a forbidden word.

I protested that I had not.  I would have never dared use that word toward anyone.

In later years I would find using it all too easy.  Well, why not?  I sure paid for the right to say it.  But I digress.

The faculty member said I had to be punished.

The two of us were alone.  I was told to drop my pants, exposing my underwear-clad behind.

And then he put his hands all over my genitals.  He did worse than that even.

I was sent home.  Too shocked and confused to fully comprehend what happened to me.  I was still dazed by the accusation that I had used that word to describe my classmate.  Too hurt by being punished for it.

That night the movie Godzilla 1985 came on television.  I desperately tried watching it to make the feelings go away and be forgotten.  It did nothing.

That night I had very bad dreams.

I felt violated.  Dirty.  Ashamed.  And you want to know why?

Twelve is the cusp of something that can feel either very wonderful or very terrible.  A person’s body is changing at that age, beginning to become a full fledged entity.  Sensations are starting to come about, that delight or bewilder or both.

God forgive me.  For one horrible moment when he had his hands on me, my body liked it.

And even then, I knew that that was wrong.  That it violated the natural order of things.

That day altered whatever trajectory my life would have taken, toward something polluted and twisted.

Sixth grade had been a hell year for me at Community Baptist.  So much went wrong.  The one bright spot was those fleeting months that Halley’s Comet came, and the astronomer in me was excited to see it.

After that day in May, even a once-in-a-lifetime visit by the comet didn’t make me feel anything.  I was just too overwhelmed.

I didn’t tell anyone what the man did to me soon after it happened.  It was four years before I told someone.  That person didn’t believe me until many years later when the fractures became too grave to deny that I had been violated when I was young.

Three and a half months later my sister and I were in public school.  A place that we were told at Community Baptist was filled with godless heathens who didn’t pray.  I was at once thankful to be away from Community Baptist and also intimidated.  I was bullied a lot.  I cried a few times.  I felt thrown to the cold cold world and there was nobody to help me.

But I also remember seventh grade as the first time I was attracted to the opposite sex.

And I felt dirty because of it.

I will never forget the first moment I found myself wanting to look at a pretty girl in my class.  She had a beautiful smile and she was wearing a nice outfit and it was driving me CRAZY.

I had to turn my head and look away.  I was too ashamed of my feelings.  Felt too much like I had with him.

It was a shame that persisted well into adulthood.  Counseling has helped.  But by that point it was too late.  Among other things I thought that being married would make things better.  But it didn’t.  Marriage doesn’t solve problems, it only brings what is wrong to the surface.  And that’s what happened and I will forever be damning myself for hurting the most wonderful person God ever put into my life.

But again, I digress.

God, I hate that man.

Yes, let’s talk about God.  Because of all that came about from what happened, my relationship with God was impacted worst of all.

I’ve never doubted that God is there.  There have been many times that I have been accused of being an atheist.  My own mother was one person.  There were some who believed her.  Who believe her still, though she has been dead for eleven years.

No, I have never been an atheist.

But I have had my faith in God destroyed.

It was a man who I had respected and trusted and looked to as a Christian example.  And God let him hurt me.

Wasn’t God angry at that?  Wasn’t God going to mete out justice?

But He didn’t.

God let me be abused and violated and betrayed.  And I felt betrayed by God in turn.

No, I never stopped believing in God.  But I hated Him with every ounce of my being.

I was a senior in high school when it began to dawn on me that God didn’t hurt me.  That it was someone who only claimed to be sent by God.  I started to not hold that against God.

But by that point I thought my hatred toward Him made me irredeemable.  That God wouldn’t want me anymore.  Thankfully He put some people into my life a few years later in college who showed me what REAL love of God is.  That God isn’t the tyrannical legalistic despot Who we were taught at that church-run school that He was.  That wasn’t the real God of Christianity.  And so it was that in my second year at Elon, I was able to finally turn to Christ and commit to following Him.

But that still wasn’t enough to completely salve the wounds.

Well, it was a few confusing years more after that.  My faith teetered at times on the brink of destruction.  And then in early 2000 the first symptoms of manic depression began to manifest: one more element of chaos in my life.

My faith has been tried and tested and pushed to the breaking point by so much that has transpired since then.  I have at times shared my despair with others.  Sometimes very openly.

It has taken time, prayer, counseling, and the love and care of many true and wonderful friends.  But at last my faith has begun to become what it should have always been.  And I am thankful for that.

As for what happened when I was twelve…

I have spent much of my life wanting to destroy that man.  Even now there is the temptation to call him out by name and let the chips fall where they may.

But doing so would add many complications to matters.  It would literally be my word against his.  For now I have to trust the people I went to three years ago.  They have resources that I don’t.  They also bring an objective eye to the issue and that’s something that obviously I lack.

And if justice doesn’t come in this lifetime, I have to trust God that it will come in His time.  It is VERY hard to do that, I won’t deny it.  Just one more test of faith.

Why am I sharing this, now?

I am writing a book about my life, especially what has come about because of a condition that almost certainly has a medical component.  But that is only one aspect that has defined me.  If I’m going to be completely honest and forthcoming about my story, I have to write about EVERYTHING that has so impacted me.  Sexual abuse and PTSD are also elements of my life.  And it’s going to have to be confronted full-bore.

I have come to a place where I cannot further work on my book.  The feelings keep breaking through.  I am haunted by the thoughts of what could have been, had things gone otherwise.  Especially thoughts of my dreams of having a family.  Something that is a fleeting possibility with each passing day, it seems.

Maybe sharing what happened when I was a kid now, will help me expel the demons keeping me from writing.  It’s going to come out in the book anyway, if it ever gets published.  Why not tell it as it is?

If my book does get published?

I don’t know what I’ll do.  Maybe God will let me finally die, with my faith in Him intact.  I don’t see what the point would be in keeping going on.  I will have said everything that needs to be said.  My life will be complete.  There will be no need for a sequel.

Maybe if it is published, the people I’ve hurt most in my time on this earth will have some understanding of where I’ve been coming from and why I have done the things that I did.  Maybe there will be forgiveness and absolution that I can’t get in this life.  That’s something to hope for.  I could die believing that.

But for now, perhaps getting all of this out in the open will let me overcome that obstacle.  I want to write my book.  I need to write it.  It’s what God has put before me to do.

I can promise you, it won’t be all bad.  There are some pretty funny things that have taken place in my life.  I look forward to sharing those, too.

Thank you for reading all of this.  Please keep me in your prayers.  I would very much appreciate it.

 

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Reidsville's $30,000 monument to madness

So my hometown of Reidsville, North Carolina has decided to ultimately remove a nationally-recognized statue with more than a hundred years of history, and let it instead be replaced with a horror straight out of H.P. Lovecraft...

"We'll tear your soul apart!"

Brief recap: almost four years ago the Confederate monument in downtown Reidsville was toppled and smashed by an errant driver.  The statue of the Confederate soldier atop the monument fell and broke into pieces.  The damage wasn't irreversible however, and it was determined that the statue and the monument could be repaired and restored to normal.

Reidsville's Confederate Monument
at it's original location

That's how things should have worked in a sane world.

But former dictator mayor James Festerman would have none of that.  On his own, Festerman decreed that the monument would never go back up.  That, despite a huge outpouring of support from the community for the Confederate statue to be repaired and returned to its rightful place.  Hizzoner Festerman declared that the monument was "controversial", nevermind that it had occupied the location sine 1910 and there had been no opposition to it in all of that time.  Festerman was just pulling that out of his [REDACTED].

So the "leadership" of the City of Reidsville had its way, and though the Confederate monument was eventually repaired it was relocated to a nearby cemetery.  In its place at the roundabout on Scales Street the city installed a wretchedly ugly planter and then for the past two years or so it's been a Christmas tree.

And now in place of the Confederate monument, the City of Reidsville has decided it will erect the eldritch abomination that you see above.  Allegedly a water fountain, the creator of which has titled it "The Bud".

More often than not it's being called "The Thing".  Local writers are describing it as something out of the Alien movie franchise (it definitely has that open-egg look going for it).  Or like a prop from a Clive Barker "Hellraiser" film.  I can't print what one person told me it looked like (it's that obscene).  I should recite incantations around it when it goes up and try to summon Cthulhu with it.

Incidentally, this "work of art" which looks like third-rate H.R. Giger is going to cost at least $30,000.

Generations to come should remember it as "Festerman's Fountain": a monument to the most indolent, apathetic, indifferent and tyrannical city government in Reidsville history (and that's saying something).

Seriously: twenty years from now people will be looking at that eyesore and wondering "what the #&@$ were they thinking?!"

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Rockingham County commissioners UNANIMOUSLY approve restoring the Confederate monument!

The message went out loud and clear last night from citizens and their elected representatives alike: "Mayor Festerman, tear down this tree!"

Confederate Soldiers Monument in downtown
Reidsville, North Carolina prior to the
May 2011 accident

Lots of friends who went to yesterday evening's meeting of the Rockingham County Board of Commissioners conveyed the good news: that by unanimous vote, all five board members passed a resolution calling for the return of the Confederate Soldiers Monument in downtown Reidsville.

And what's more, there was not one person at the near-capacity public hearing in Wentworth who spoke against restoring the monument.

Let that lil' detail sink in, friends and neighbors. During a two-plus hour public meeting that had been announced and advertised well in advance, nobody came to the podium to insist or remotely suggest that the monument remain absent from the town's landscape. That alone indicates the overwhelming belief across the community is that the Confederate Soldiers Monument should go back to its rightful place as a memorial to the men of Rockingham County who, for whatever reason God or conscience led, volunteered to serve and defend what they saw as their homes and their loved ones.

The Confederate Soldiers Monument (seen at right in its proper glory) had stood vigil at the intersection of Scales and Morehead streets in Reidsville since its dedication in 1910. But in May of 2011 the monument was severely damaged and the statue atop it smashed into pieces when a driver fell asleep and crashed into it.

In any other municipality to be found across America, the logical and obvious thing would have been to repair the statue, restore the monument to its previous condition and then let it all stand anew, as if nothing had happened and none the worse for wear. The driver's insurance would have paid for all the work that would have been required.

Except this is Reidsville, North Carolina we're talking about. Oh the people here are fine. But this town's current administration is so drunk on power that it would put Boss Hogg to shame.

So instead of letting things run their proper course, Reidsville's city government removed EVERYTHING pertaining to the monument and WITHOUT consulting the citizenry or even letting it be known that the monument was going to be pulled out at all! There was no due process whatsoever on the part of Reidsville City Council and Reidsville Mayor James Festerman.

Mayor Festerman arbitrarily chose to have the Confederate Soldiers Monument removed wholesale. In its place has been a butt-ugly eyesore that has variably taken the form of a massive planter or the town Christmas tree (the current occupant of the site). I've taken to calling it "Festerman's Folly".

And what has Maximum Mayor James Festerman the First of His Name to say about it? He's gone on record as decreeing that the Confederate statue is "never" going to be returned to its original location.

Huh. If that isn't the mentality of a dictator, then I don't know what would be.

Festerman insists that the monument is a magnet of "controversy". But it had never been before. If there is any now it is only because some people demand to see controversy around the monument. Apparently the fact that it's a (gasp!) monument to soldiers who fought in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War is enough to... something. Rationale on the part of Reidsville government in the matter has been spotty at best.

Confederate history enthusiasts - many dressed in period costume - have protested for the return of the monument at the site for most of the past two years. It should also be borne in mind that these have been people from all walks of life, both white and black. Those peaceful assemblies ended when the Reidsville Police began prohibiting the protestors from the traffic circle. Okay, actually the protestors were limited to six inches of space in which they could stand (for realz, folks).

Anyhoo, for most of this time a group of citizens calling themselves the Historic Preservation Action Committee (HPAC) has been doing some admirable work toward restoring the monument to downtown Reidsville. As HPAC members have noted, the monument is one toward all the Confederate soldiers of Rockingham County, not just the ones from Reidsville. And that's something that shouldn't be done away with at the whim of one person.

Last night the county commissioners weight in. From the Save the Reidsville Confederate Monument page on Facebook...

Big news tonight from Wentworth, North Carolina! The Rockingham County Commissioners unanimously adopt a resolution in favor of putting the monument back up in Reidsville.The County Commissioner's chamber was filled with those in favor of the monument being restored. All those who spoke from the public were in favor. Not a single negative comment from the public! Emotions were high and it was a standing ovation as the commissioners voted all in favor. Although this resolution has no legal binding withing the City of Reidsville, the Reidsville City council has some pressure on it and now has some explaining to do to the public. More to come as it develops.

Commissioner Craig Travis remarked that "We're talking about a City Council that's run amok. If you don't like what they do, vote them out. The cities need to be held accountable." Indeed, it is now coming to light that there have apparently been some seriously under-handed shenanigans on the part of Reidsville officials to not only obscure and obfuscate its citizens in regard to the monument, but also some illegalunethical legal finagling involving the United Daughters of the Confederacy. I'm gonna be listening for more about that particular item especially...

If you wanna read more here are all the posts that have appeared on this blog about the monument since the 2011 accident. And fellow Reidsvillian Rob Jernigan has been all over this matter since Day One: here's his Speaking Up & Out news site, which Rob has said will be hosting video of last night's meeting later today.

If this momentum keeps going, it wouldn't surprise me if Festerman's Folly was ripped out by the end of the year and the Confederate Soldiers Monument put back where it belongs.

I'll be praying that there is enough shred of sanity to make it so.

EDIT 10:39 a.m. EST: D'oh! Rob works fast! Here's the video from last night's meeting that he just posted...

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