♪ JIM EVERITT: A girl walked up the hill, just absolutely beautiful, and she said, "Jim, are you for real?"

(laughter) RUTH PHIPPS: I heard a knock on my door, and I opened it, it was a neighbor.

And tears were streaming down her face.

CINDY PUTNAM: In elementary school, I could not wait to get off the bus and get home.

It meant food and TV.

DEMETRIA KALODIMOS: Our theme tonight is "Tennessee Backroads."

ANNOUNCER: This program is made possible in part by contributions from viewers like you-- thank you.

Here in Tennessee, our backroads, country ways, can be simple yet complicated.

We all know great stories, and we know how to tell them.

Stories about those hot, humid summer days, with a cloud of mosquitoes circling overhead while we sip sweet tea.

Stories where we hint at the ones who done us wrong and proclaim the ones who did us right.

Stories with a very specific place, time, and with people we all know.

Stories that inspire us.

Our storytellers tonight are neighbors.

They speak from the heart of rural America.

♪ PUTMAN: My name is Cindy Putman, and I grew up in this beautiful Upper Cumberland region.

I've lived here all my life, and I love storytelling because my grandfather was the best storyteller in the entire world.

Is this your first time on stage telling a story?

PUTMAN: It's my first time on stage telling a story.

KALODIMOS: Really?

My very first time, and it's really challenging telling a story about yourself.

Are you nervous?

Any butterflies?

I was a little nervous, a few little butterflies, but I love doing it, and I think that it's very important that we remember that we all have stories that we can tell.

So I'm excited to get to share the story.

How do you relate to our theme, "Tennessee Backroads?"

Oh my gosh, all stories in Tennessee happen on the backroads.

I mean, I think about that, you know, family gatherings and decoration days, at cemeteries and going to church and going to singings and all those... going to the ballpark, all the things that we did as a family, as a community, and we travel down those backroads to visit relatives.

And those are where stories are the purest, when you're around family and they tell stories.

And one thing I've realized is the stories that families tell, everyone tells the story different, because it's all about them.

It's interesting how we can all look at the same story and yet see it in so many different ways.

In elementary school, I could not wait to get off the bus and get home.

It meant two things: food and TV.

As soon as I ran into the house, my mama had a plate of peanut butter and crackers on the snack bar with some Kool-Aid.

I'd grab the peanut butter and crackers and the Kool-Aid and I'd run into the dining room.

I don't know why we called it a dining room.

We didn't have a dining room table, but smack dab in the middle of that room was our TV.

I'd lay down on the burgundy and gray linoleum floor, and I'd take off my shoes and socks, and I'd rub my bare feet on the scratchy volume panel across the front of the TV.

(laughter) We only had four channels, and so I would turn the knob till I found him.

And there he was.

He had already slipped out of his suit coat into a sweater and out of his dress slippers into his sneakers.

And for the next 30 minutes, with my Kool-Aid and crackers, I could tune out the rest of the world.

He said I was his favorite, he said I was special.

I didn't feel special.

I was a chubby, pale kid born into a skinny, athletic family who were all able to get marvelous tans.

All summer long, I sat at the ballpark while my skinny, athletic, tan siblings excelled on the baseball field.

I sat in the shade, humped up with a chapter book, not an athletic bone in my body.

My grandmother said I was "stout."

And then in the next breath, she would say, "So why don't you just eat one piece of my yellow cake?"

I felt fat.

I felt ugly.

I felt like an oddity.

I felt like I didn't fit in.

But not for those 30 minutes with Mr. Rogers.

He said I was his favorite.

He said I was special.

My ears heard it, but my heart did not believe it.

But there was one thing I excelled at, and that was sneaking food.

I knew exactly which kitchen cabinet doors would open and close without making a sound.

I knew how to lift the lids on the kettles sitting on the stove eyes in the kitchen, and scoop big bites of mashed potatoes out of the pot before dinner and then smooth the top back down with a serving spoon.

So no one knew any bites were missing.

Food was everything to me.

It was my harbor in the storm.

It was my comfort.

It was my friend.

It numbed me.

It made me feel calm.

It kept the demons in my life behind closed doors.

Food was much more important to me than anything else that I could have imagined.

Now my grandmother made my dresses, and they were always polyester, and she made them on her kitchen table, and she didn't pin them down to a pattern.

She just laid table knives there and cut it out.

Because as my waist grew thicker, the dresses that she made me looked like square boxes with arm holes.

I never wore a two-piece bathing suit.

I never walked into a store when I was in junior high and bought a ready-made pantsuit that didn't look like a middle-aged woman.

I never was picked for a team at recess, but that's okay.

Don't worry, because I do not like to sweat.

(laughter) But I will tell you, even though I did not believe what Mr. Rogers said, that I was special, I really believe that all kids were special, so I became a teacher, and for the next 25 years, I loved little learners.

I wiped their noses.

I put gold stars on their papers.

I greeted them when they walked in my classroom every morning.

I comforted them.

I comforted Jacob, whose dad was in prison and had sent him a peach pit Christmas ornament that he had carved.

I wiped away Krista's tears when she told me that her mama had sold all of the clothes I bought her at a garage sale.

Krista, who on bring your pet to school day brought her pet in a Quaker oatmeal container on the school bus.

I was summoned to the cafeteria, and there stood Krista, dirty clothes, unbrushed hair, holding her Quaker oatmeal container with a smile from ear to ear.

"Krista, do you have a pet in that container?"

"Yes."

"Is it a snake?"

"No."

"Is it a kitten?"

"No."

"Is it a frog?"

"No."

And then she opened the container and out flew the biggest black rooster that I had ever seen.

(laughter) I said, "Krista, did you bring that on the bus?"

"Yes."

I said, "How did you get the rooster in that container?"

And she demonstrated: You just put his head in and then you take your foot and you push.

And that is exactly what I did at the end of the day, when it was time to put Krista and the rooster back on the bus and send them home to public housing where Krista lived.

I comforted Lance, who only wanted on his third-grade Christmas wish list, a tombstone for his mama's grave.

I loved them all.

And when they came in my classroom, I told them that they were the most special, unique creatures ever made and then I backed up those words with actions.

I looked them in the eye and said good morning to them.

I helped them pursue their dreams or discover what their dreams were.

And as I stood, I tried to pretend like their little face was the only face that I saw in a sea of 26 little bodies.

I hugged them all.

I hugged the skinny ones.

I hugged the angry ones.

I hugged the broken ones and I hugged the chubby ones.

And I hugged the chubby ones a little bit tighter.

Because I wanted them to know that their worth as a person is never defined by a number on a scale or what your street address is, or the kind of tennis shoes that you wear in gym class.

Or if you live in a house with a mom and dad, or two mamas and two daddies, or grandparents or foster grandparents, or if you sleep in your car or you live in a pay-by-the-week motel room, that their worth as a person is defined because they are them, and that there will never be another person in the entire world exactly like them.

They are unique, they are special, they were my favorite.

And all of a sudden, my heart started to realize and believe Mr. Rogers' words.

As I taught those kids that they were special, my heart started to believe that maybe I was special, too.

(applause) Thank you.

♪ EVERITT: My name's Jim Everitt.

I come from a family of six children spread over 20 years.

I grew up on a farm that was was really...

I didn't realize until I was a grown man that I lived in a magical, magical place.

In my imagination... when I went to the woods and the creek and I'd come back home and tell Mom about the lions and bears I saw, she'd say, "Jimmy, there's no lions and bears back there," and I'd just argue, argue, argue with Mom.

Did you hear a lot of stories growing up?

Yeah, from, from elder people that-- actually, I hate to say this, I was too busy building my own stories.

Like I say, I'd tell my mom whoppers.

Yeah, and I guess being a barber, you've got to have a few just to make the time pass.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's fun.

Well, I guess early on, you knew that you could maybe get your mother's attention with these stories.

- Uh-huh.

Did it work for you in school?

Believe it or not, I really was kind of quiet in school.

Just, just a quiet kid, didn't get involved.

I was involved in music, I sang some in, in high school, and I had a baritone voice and played the trumpet, that kind of stuff, but as far as storytelling, it really didn't mature till I got behind the barber chair and then it just went-- (makes whooshing sound) blossomed out, you know.

If you've figured out what I am here in Crossville, I've been here in the barber business for 53 years now.

That puts me in my 70s.

(applause) And I've met some wonderful people.

About 50 years ago, I was working in a barber shop in Battle Creek, Michigan.

It was a busy Saturday.

We were really storming.

And an old gentleman got in my chair, and you know how you... you think you know somebody, but you don't know him.

And I said, "Sir, "I don't think you've been "in the barber shop before, "but I think I've seen you somewheres.

"Are you from Richland, Michigan?

I'm from Richland, Michigan."

He says, "Son, I'm not from around here."

And he said quietly to me, he kind of reached up to me, he said, "If I had my hat and glasses on, "you'd probably know who I was.

If you've ever watched 'Hee Haw,' I'm Grandpa Jones."

So... (laughter) 50 years ago, I met Grandpa Jones in the barber shop, and he was in Battle Creek, Michigan, to do the county fair on a Saturday night, and that's how I happened to meet him.

Well, several people over the years have asked me, "Jim, how'd you become a barber?

How'd you become a barber?"

You know, what you do.

I said, "Well, I was in third grade "looking out the window, and Mrs. Brown said, "'Jimmy, Jimmy, don't look out the window, son.

"'Don't look out the window.

I have a lot of important things to say.'"

And well, another 20 minutes, I'm looking out the window and Mrs. Brown's saying the same thing to me.

And then we have lunch and recess, my famous time of the day, and back to school, and back with Mrs. Brown on the board.

And I'm looking out the window.

She comes back to me and... Mrs. Brown is a wonderful, wonderful school teacher, very pretty, and she bent over and took a hold of my shoulder very softly.

She was so sweet.

She said, "Jimmy, if you don't pay attention "to this board work, "you're going to end up going to barber school and have to marry a school teacher."

(laughter) Well, my next nine years were purposeless in public school.

They didn't teach me how to sweep hair up.

Anyway, I went off to barber school, got back, worked six months, and then I had to find a school teacher.

(laughter) I made a sign that said "Wanted: education major.

"Okay, elementary, marriage, children."

And I put my name down the bottom-- Jim.

I put it on a stick, went to Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo.

Went to the top of the hill where everybody had to pass going from academics to dorms, stood there.

(laughter) Hey, don't laugh, this is important.

I had gray slacks on, a blue blazer with little gold buttons on it.

White shirt unbuttoned here, and I stood there.

Kids started to walk across the street.

Boys would heckle me.

Girls would stare at it, look, and walk on.

Some stopped and thought.

A girl walked up the hill, just absolutely beautiful.

Stopped at the corner, stared at me, stared at the sign, and kind of walked down to the dorms.

Still standing there.

And I'm getting heckled now.

The guys are really ragging me.

So, there's a real group of people there now, and up walks the hill is that girl that was so beautiful going this way.

She walks up and she has a skirt on, sweater over arm because it's September and it's going to be cool for the evening.

She has flats on, nylons, her hair's combed, fresh makeup.

She comes to the edge of the crowd and looks at me for a minute.

Doesn't hesitate.

She walks right up to me and she said, "Jim, are you for real?"

(laughter) (laughing): And I said, "Yes, this is for real."

Well, she said, "I dressed myself for dinner, you're dressed for dinner, let's go."

We... (applause) We turned and walked away, going down the hill.

And she pointed out to me that one of the words on my sign was misspelled.

(laughter) Now remember, I didn't pay attention, but she's been correcting my English spelling for 53 years now.

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) Thank you.

♪ PHIPPS: My name is Ruth Phipps, and I was born in 1928.

I've got lots of stories and lots of changes in my life, And you told me that you went to college at a... when?

I graduated when I was 70, and I did a double major.

I did sociology because I love people, and I did fine arts.

And you've been a Tennessean all your life.

Did you ever leave?

Well, I've left now and then.

You know, during the war, my parents moved to Detroit because they were changing their factories into war plants.

My mother, she made parachutes, and my daddy, he made parts of planes.

So I lived there during that time.

And then I lived in Wichita, Kansas, for a while because my husband got a job there when we got married.

But you always came back.

I always come back.

This is home.

It'll always be home.

It doesn't matter what other climates, what other beauty is in other places.

This is my home, Tennessee.

Rocky Top, Tennessee, and I love it.

It'll always be in my heart, no matter where I am.

I was born in 1928.

Many, many, many... (applause) things have changed... (applause) ...have changed since then.

One thing never changes.

God gives us all a purpose.

And my daughter had a purpose.

So I want to tell you about my daughter, Patty.

She was born when I was 19.

And when she was eight months old, she had spinal meningitis.

It was a dreadful disease and still is.

And her fever rose so high, it damaged her brain.

People then that had brain damage was labeled "retarded."

It was a hard time for them.

They were rejected and sent to institutions and hidden away at home.

I was determined that my daughter Patty would never go to an institution.

Well, when she was eight or nine years old, we moved into a good neighborhood.

Professional people, good people.

And I thought they would be understanding.

So we been there about two or three weeks, and everything was beautiful, and we were happy.

And then I had a visitor, a judge, and I was pleasantly pleased until he started talking.

And he said, "Well, "your neighbors came to see me "and they told me you had a retarded child living here.

"And I've come to tell you "that I'm going to send her to an institution or you'll build a fence around your yard."

Then I was shocked.

And I said, "I'm here to tell you "that she will never go to an institution, "and no one... (applause) "...no one will ever put her there, but I will build a fence around my yard."

So I had a fence built.

And I built a sandbox, and we had a table back there where we had tea parties, and we also had a pet dog.

He was gentle and sweet, so she was happy.

And we had tea parties, and one day, she come running in the house, and she got a tray, a cup of coffee; it was cold.

And a napkin, a spoon, sugar, and cream, and I thought, "Another tea party."

But it wasn't.

She ran to a fence where a neighbor was hanging out clothes, and she stood there with the tray until the neighbor came and got the tray.

About 30 or 40 minutes later, I heard a knock on my door and I opened it.

It was a neighbor with the tray, and tears were streaming down her face.

And she said, "Your daughter has "shined a light into our neighborhood.

Open the gate."

So Patty's love-- because she had heard the judge say, you know, she had to be put in a fence or in an institution.

And yet she had this unconditional love, and she wanted to show that unconditional love.

And this was the time when programs should be started, because President Kennedy just came into office.

Well, Kennedy had a sister that was mentally challenged, and Humphrey, the vice president, had a grandson, so they were both very interested in programs.

Well, they had to have groundwork done by volunteers.

I was one of them, but finding the people, the children that had been hidden away, wasn't easy.

But I had doctors that were friends.

They told me.

And I had milk carriers that were friends, and they told me.

Well, I found ten.

The parents were reluctant, but this is where Patty come in.

She visited with me and her smiles and her love, and they wanted their children to have some of that.

So we needed a place.

Well, one the churches gave us their big fellowship room, and that was good.

And we needed transportation.

And one of the automobile dealers, he gave us a brand new truck, so we had a volunteer bus driver.

We needed a volunteer teacher.

It was me.

(laughter) So, it was beautiful to see the children that hadn't had chances to learn.

We got typewriters donated to us.

I guess you all know what they are.

(laughter) And so, anyway, one of them wanted to be a preacher.

One of the guys wanted to be a preacher.

And he learned to type his name and he thought, "Okay, I'm prepared to be a preacher."

(laughter) But of course his speech was impaired.

But it didn't matter.

That's what his heart wanted to do.

And one girl, she wanted to be a song leader.

But her speech was impaired, but it didn't matter.

We sing... and this is the way she led her sing.

But we had fun, we enjoyed it.

And we thought, we need to learn a sport.

So it was softball.

They could hit the ball.

Bases, they just kept running.

(laughter) But you know what?

We started with one and we graduated to three.

The thing they loved most was going places.

Well, we went to the movies.

One of the parents had money, so he paid for it.

We went out to eat, and he paid for it.

Of course, parks and fishing was free.

But then the JCs and the Civitan Club, they got interested.

So they helped us.

And the high school kids, they went to activities so we'd have more to help us.

Today, though, things have changed.

Great programs, educational programs, achievements.

My friends have jobs.

And I want you to remember Patty's purpose of smiling and love.

And we too can make that our purpose, of spreading love, and we can change the world, just like she changed the lives of so many people.

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) ANNOUNCER: This program is made possible in part by contributions from viewers like you-- thank you.

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