Sharing Words of Wisdom

Writer David Clark loves small towns and the values their residents hold dear. In fact, he’s been sharing words of wisdom and stories about hometown America in his syndicated column for the last six years.

Many of his stories recall simpler times, like growing up in Macon, Ga., in a home cradled by fragrant pine trees. As a boy he rode his bicycle down dirt trails with his faithful dog loping close behind. And there, he learned about God, nature and gardening—themes that often appear in his column.

“His style makes readers feel comfortable; like a visit from a close friend,” says Tom Clinton, executive editor of the Madisonville (Ky.) Messenger, one of the first newspapers to publish Clark’s syndicated essays in 1998.

His column began by chance. Longing for the rural setting of his Macon childhood, 12 years ago, Clark, 45, bought an 1893 farm house in Cochran, Ga. (pop. 4,455). From time to time, his “city friends” back in Macon inquired about his country lifestyle. Clark sent them entertaining letters using the expressive language spoken by his new neighbors. Those friends, who knew Clark to be a talented guitarist and vocalist, encouraged him to record the letters.

Before long, Susanna Capelouto of Georgia Public Radio aired Clark’s essays on Georgia Gazette, giving his work a wide audience for the first time.

“What drew me to David’s stories at first was his great regional accent,” Capelouto says. “Then I discovered he was talking about a vanishing part of Georgia—the rural life and landscape. He tells his stories in a Southern tradition that is steeped in spirituality.”

For that, Clark credits his late father, a railroad agent and Sunday school teacher. “Sometimes I talk about prayer in my articles,” he says. “But I’m not a preacher, I’m just a regular guy. If I hit my thumb with a hammer, I cuss. But I see part of my column is to challenge people to look at life in a new way.”

Today, Clark’s columns are syndicated in 15 newspapers in Kentucky, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas and South Carolina, as well as in national and regional magazines. His stories, sometimes accompanied by his guitar, have aired on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered and Mount Washington Observatory’s Weather Notebook, a New Hampshire-based weather report that blends fact and folklore for radio stations nationwide. He’s also produced several music and storytelling CDs, and his first book of memoirs, The Peanut Farmer Stories, was published in 2002.

In February, Clark hit the road to see America’s other small towns as part of a tour he calls The Shaking Hands Tour. “I want to hear what people are thinking,” he says. “I want to report back to readers of my column what my neighbors in America believe.”

As the tour’s title implies, he asks his audience at the end of each show to shake hands and to introduce themselves to one another. “The guiding principal is bringing people together,” he says. “That’s what my work is about, to introduce people to each other and create neighbors.”

The shows, staged at old community theaters, incorporate Clark’s talents as a singer, songwriter, guitarist and storyteller.

“The stories may be about my great-grandpa discovering oil in Texas in the 1800s by digging a well. He found bad water as far as he was concerned, so he moved back to Georgia,” Clark says with a laugh. “Or it may be more serious about my mother having Alzheimer’s.”

So far, he’s traveled to some 50 small towns, including Headland, Ala.; Mansfield, Texas; Van Buren, Ark.; Danville, Ill.; and Hicksville, Ohio, trying to bring people together.

“It’s corny in a way for one man from Cochran, Georgia, to think he’s going to do anything by introducing people to each other,” he says, “but I see that it makes a difference.

“These folks that live in small towns, sometimes they don’t realize how blessed they are. Sometimes it takes a guy from the outside to write about them or to stand up and say, ‘Man, you live in a beautiful town here and it has the nicest people.’ It’s like we can’t see ourselves until someone tells us how we look.” And from Clark’s perspective, that’s a good reason to keep telling hometown America’s stories.

Vyvyan Lynn is a writer based in Kite, Ga.

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