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He sent an angel to save my life: 86-year-old Ruby Jeter recalls the day she lived to tell her story

ROGERSVILLE — It was 48 years ago this Saturday, not unlike any other September night, when 38-year-old Kingsport mother of five Ruby Jeter prepared to leave work at the Holiday Inn on Lynn Garden Drive, unaware of how her life was about to change. Then it happened. “I could hear them talking, saying ‘Take her to the morgue,’ but I couldn’t say anything.  The blood was just gushing and my mind was coming and going.  That’s what I remember most.” Today, at age 86 and a Rogersville resident for the past 21 years, Jeter vividly recalls the tale she says she is blessed to have lived to tell. “I had just gotten off work.  Me and the lady who rode to work with me were trying to start my car.  And that’s when it happened.” Jeter raised the car hood to adjust a lever on a faulty solenoid switch. “The woman friend of mine was in the car, ready to feed the gas,  but when the motor started the car went into gear.  It jumped the curb and pinned me against ...
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Signing off after 53 years: WMCH icon retires from radio (July 6/7, 2013)

CHURCH HILL — With her Bible in-hand and microphone at eye-level, Bettye Russell signed onto her radio show for the final time last Friday morning at WMCH 1260 AM in Church Hill.      Following a 53-year career in the industry she decided to retire as the station, founded by her father in May 1954, prepares for its 60th year.      “I could’ve hung on for the 60th anniversary, but you know when it’s time,” she said.   “I got my assurance from the Lord, and I’m not a spring chicken anymore,” she added with a laugh.      Bettye was 19 years old when her dad, the late Thales Wallace, started WMCH and it was a family-owned business until 1999 when it was sold.      “After a period, there was a place for me to come back so I did and I’ve been here ever since,” she said.      Hawkins County’s oldest radio station, WMCH first entered the airwaves as an easy listening station lo...
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Earning Her Wings: Mount Carmel teen achieving dream of becoming a pilot (November 3/4, 2012)

MOUNT CARMEL — Sixteen-year-old Rachael Barkley took her first flight at age 12 and she's been hooked ever since.   On October 4, the Mount Carmel teen became the first NJROTC cadet at Volunteer High School to earn her solo wings — and she doesn't plan to stop anytime soon.      “My friends are like, ‘Whoa, Rachael, you can't even drive a car yet, but you're flying a plane,’” she joked.   “That's probably the biggest thing I get teased with. It’s hilarious, but that's the next step.”      Rachael received a solo scholarship, thanks to her parents and the FLIGHT Foundation, and a grant from the Tennessee Aeronautics Commission. Cadet Barkley soloed in only 8.3 hours as the 106th solo student overall in a program recently recognized as one of the nation’s best. Rachael also became the youngest cadet to solo, performing the feat on her 16th birthday.      Her mother, Stacey Barkley, said, “We have a very determined...
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Finding Inspiration: Harris combines favorite pastimes to create art he loves (May 4, 2012)

CHURCH HILL — “I’ve always been kind of a creative person,” Tracy Harris said sitting at a reading table inside Church Hill Public Library.       Listening to him speak about his hobbies with modesty, you would never know his handiwork was on exhibit less than 20 feet away in celebration of National Poetry Month.  Tracy is an amateur poet and photographer, self-trained with an equal passion for both pastimes.     “When I was 14, I started to write poems,”  he said, “but I didn’t start writing in earnest until four years ago.”     Tracy said his work often includes themes of nature, as well as things in life that inspire him.     “Pastoral poems; how you feel when you’re sitting on the front porch, or under the shade of a tree.  Those are the types of things that inspire me,” he said.  “Poetry just comes to me.  It’s very seldom difficult to write.”     Tracy’s goal is to compile a...
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C'est magnifique! Quebec native enjoys time with her art (March 21, 2012)

MOORESBURG — Speaking with a distinct Québécois French accent, Canadian Marie Andree Desjardins explained why she loves to create art and why Hawkins County, Mooresburg in particular, is her muse for at least six months each year.      “I’m a snow bird here,” she said smiling.  “Winter in Quebec is minus 40 degrees at times.  My body aches everywhere when the weather is that temperature.  So, I come down to Mooresburg to stay with a friend in the warmer weather.  I will be going back to Quebec in April.”      A self-taught artist from Châteauguay, Quebec, Marie uses every medium from charcoal to oil paint, but she said her favorite is ink.  She uses it to complete a very complicated, time-consuming style known as pointillism, or pointillé in French.      Pointillism is a technique in which small, distinct dots of pure color are applied in patterns to form an image.  Shadows and light a...
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Finding His Muse: Acclaimed Photographer Discovers New Home at Rogersville Gallery (February 15, 2012)

ROGERSVILLE — Sam Bass said he was a young Navy journalist in the early 1960s with little ambition to pick up a camera, "there were, after all, young Navy photographers to do that," he said, but when he finally did, it changed his view of the world.     More than 40 years later, Bass has established himself in photojournalism and strives to help others see their own surroundings through a different lens.  A few of those views are currently on display at the Local Artist Gallery in Rogersville, but Sam's story is far larger than the confines of an exhibition hall.     "The best photographers strive to be masters of light, shadow, composition, and time," he said.  "We attempt to balance these elements to create the most powerful, thought-provoking images, remembering always we are but stewards of an instance in time.  But we're more than simply stewards, we interpret that instant."     Those photographic interpretati...
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Making Music: Mandolin Players Nationwide Depend On Church Hill Man (October 2011)

CHURCH HILL — The smell of fresh sawdust filled Audey Ratliff’s workshop in Church Hill as he sat among a collection of planing and fretting tools, clamps and other implements of his trade.      Ratliff is a luthier, perhaps better known as a mandolin maker.      Self-taught, he worked thoughtfully on his latest project, a mandolin designed for a musician in Switzerland, as he discussed how he became one of Tennessee’s foremost full-time luthiers.     “My dad Tom’s hobby was playing the dobro,” he said.  “So, I grew up around music and learned to play the guitar when I was about 15 years old.”     With bluegrass in his blood, Audey said he also took an interest in mandolin playing, but as a left-handed musician he had a difficult start.     “If you’ve ever looked at a mandolin, it’s definitely a right-handed instrument,” he said, breaking from work to pull a pouch of cigarette tobac...
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