City >> Huntington >> Famous People
Many famous folks -- singers, actors, writers -- have called this region home
With more than a quarter of a million people living in the Tri-State, famous folks who have made a name for themselves in entertainment -- everything from big-time movies to music -- are not uncommon.
There are literally hundreds of Tri-Staters out there working on stage and behind the scenes as some of the top names in their fields.
The past year has been a big one for Tri-State native artists in the news.
In 2005, Lawrence County, Ky., native Ricky Skaggs picked up his 10th Grammy Award for his latest bluegrass CD, "Brand New Strings," Charleston native and actress Jennifer Garner swept front pages everywhere with a high profile marriage to Ben Affleck.
And yes, they are expecting.
And Ashley Judd made the cover of Time magazine in August, making her mama proud after being named Time's "Most Inspiring Woman" of 2005.
Here's a look at some other famous folks from the region and what they've been up to lately.
One of the Tri-State's greatest concentrations of celebrities have been country music stars, most who have hailed from Eastern Kentucky. U.S. 23, the Country Music Highway, has been home to dozens of country music stars who remain some of the biggest names in the business.
Ashland and Boyd County were the birthplace and home for many stars including Billy Ray Cyrus (Flatwoods) and Naomi, Wynonna and Ashley Judd.
Wynonna and Naomi both have been busy in 2005.
Wynonna made a big splash on the scene Sept. 27 when she released a DVD and live CD, as well as a memoir, "Coming Home to Myself."
Naomi Judd is taking her down-home philosophies and hard-won, practical wisdom to a Hallmark Channel Sunday series that will be called "Naomi's New Morning." That shows begins Nov. 27.
Like the rest of her family, Ashley Judd has been busy in showbiz, but equally immersed in helping folks.
In addition to the Time cover, Ashley also had a one-hour VH-1 special in August that chronicled her trip earlier this year to Africa with YouthAIDS.
Judd, who has worked closely with such artists as U2's Bono to raise global awareness of the AIDS epidemic, is set to go to Central America in early 2006 to do more goodwill work with YouthAIDS.
Billy Ray, the multi-platinum artist who isn't a doctor but played one on TV, has been busy with several cool projects in 2005.
In the fall, Billy Ray and his daughter Miley Cyrus, teamed up and taped 20 episodes for a new Disney Channel live-action comedy called "Hannah Montana," which is set to air in the new year.
Cyrus, who played Dr. Clint Cassidy on the PAX hit TV show, "Doc," also tried his hand on the stage, starring in a production of "Annie Get Your Gun" in Toronto.
Ashland also was home to TV star and game show host Chuck Woolery and National Public Radio reporter and author Noah Adams.
Boyd County is also home to bluegrass legend Melvin Goins, who has the distinction of being the only bluegrass musician ever featured on the cover of "Smithsonian" magazine. In 2005, Goins hooked up with fellow national-act bluegrass artists Don Rigsby and Ernie Thacker to form America's Bluegrass Band, which produced a critically acclaimed gospel CD that also spawned a Sunday morning TV series, "America's Bluegrass," on WSAZ, and which got the trio of locally-based national-act artists to the IBMA FanFest in Nashville in late October.
The latest young country stars and songwriters who are on their way can be seen and heard monthly at the WTCR Highway 23 Jamboree at the Paramount Arts Center in Ashland as well as with the Kentucky Opry at the Mountain Arts Center in Prestonsburg, Ky.
Lawrence County, Ky., was the birthplace for 10-time Grammy Award-winning country and bluegrass music multi-instrumentalist Ricky Skaggs, as well as one of country's music's top songwriters, Larry Cordle, who happened to pen Skaggs' No. 1 country song, "Highway 40 Blues."
That was Cordle's first hit, and Cordle, who toured in the fall of 2004 with his bluegrass band Lonesome Standard Time, has written songs that have sold more than 44 million records for everyone from Garth Brooks to George Strait.
Down in Johnson County (about an hour from Huntington) in Van Lear, is the humble homeplace of Loretta Lynn, one of the great female performers ever. Lynn, of course, also has a younger sister you might know, Crystal Gayle. Johnson County also produced bluegrass legend Hylo Brown.
You can check out multimedia presentations about all the artists of The Country Music Highway at the new Country Music Highway Museum that opened up in 2005 in Paintsville, and at the Country Music Heritage Exhibit at the Highlands Museum and Discovery Center in Ashland. The late, great guitarist, singer and songwriter Mike Murphy was honored in 2005 as the latest artist who has an exhibit at Highlands.
South Charleston native Bishop T.D. Jakes is pastor to what Christianity Today called "one of America's fastest growing mega-churches." Since relocating the church from West Virginia to Dallas, Texas, the congregation grew from about 50 families to more than 28,000 members in five years. Jakes was also featured on Time magazine's September 2001 cover as "America's Best Preacher."
In the Huntington area, many artists have come to the city's theater programs and clubs to hone their craft.
One of the country's greatest TV comedians, Soupy Sales, who is now in his late 70s, grew up in Huntington and graduated from Marshall University before gaining national fame with children's television shows and comedy in the 1960s.
Contemporary Christian music superstar Michael W. Smith, who has sold more than 10 million records in his 20-year career, hails from Kenova. Smith, who often swings his tours back home, spent October touring in Europe and finishing up his inaugural movie project, to be released in 2006.
Bobaflex, a five-man metal band from Mason County, has kept the well-honed noise happening on a national level. This year, Bobaflex released its first CD, "Apologize For Nothing," on TVT Records (home to Sevendust, Lil Jon and Ying Yang Twins) and was tabbed by metal giants Megadeth to tour on the mega rock festival, Gigantour.
Another young rock band making a national splash in 2005 was the five-man Charleston native band American Minor, which released its first CD on Jive Records. The band toured with Blues Traveler in the summer and early fall of 2005.
On Broadway, Huntington native Mark McVey has long been a leading man. McVey, who played Jean Valjean in "Les Miserables," was the first American to perform that role in London's West End.
In 2005, McVey has been touring the nation singing with symphonies in major cities including the Boston Pops and the National Symphony Orchestra at Wolf Trap, outside of Washington, D.C., with noted pianist and composer Marvin Hamlisch. McVey, who has tour dates with Harmlisch through April 2006, teamed up with the legendary piano and song man for the CD "If You Really Knew Me: The Music of Marvin Hamlisch."
McVey's sister Beth McVey Adams also has logged decades on Broadway and on the road singing on such shows as Barry Manilow's national tour "Copacabana The Musical."
McVey Adams, who appeared in several shows in 2005, moved back to Huntington and has been teaching and performing with ARTS at The Huntington High Renaissance Center.
Although the wildly diverse actor and singer Michael Cerveris moved around much as a child, he considers Huntington his hometown.
Now based in New York City, Cerveris won the Tony Award this past year for his role in "Assassins" on Broadway and is back in fall 2005 starring in another Stephen Sondheim musical. Cerveris and Patti LuPone open "Sweeney Todd" on Broadway on Nov. 3.
Huntington native Brad Dourif cut his teeth with the Huntington Community Players and has gone on to great film success. Dourif, who turned 55 in 2005, was featured in several films in 2005 and continued his character Doc Cochran on HBO's critically acclaimed series.
Nominated for an Academy Award for his role in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," Dourif has been featured in wide range of roles including the voice for the criminally possessed doll in the "Child's Play" series, and as Grima Wormtongue in "The Lord of the Rings" movie series.
Rising star of both big and small screen Jennifer Garner grew up in Charleston and graduated from George Washington High School. The star of the hit spy television show "Alias" took dance classes with Charleston Light Opera Guild director Nina Denton.
Garner hit the big screen in 2005 as the knife-twirling "Elektra" on the big-screen, the high-action movie adaptation of the comic book. Interestingly, she played that character in 2004 in "Daredevil" opposite Ben Affleck, whom she married on June 29.
Garner, who has received three consecutive Emmy nominations for her work on the TV drama "Alias," is working on two movies for 2006, "Charlotte's Web," and "Catch and Release."'
Making her big screen debut in a big way this summer was 6-foot-6-inch Putnam County resident Skytriss, who starred in "Deuce Bigelow: European Gigolo," with Rob Schneider.
Gone but not forgotten are Huntington native entertainers Dagmar, one of TV's pioneers who died in 2001 at the age of 79, and country legend Hawkshaw Hawkins, a Grand Ole Opry star who was considered one of country's music's greatest ballad singers before dying in the April 8, 1963, plane crash that also claimed Patsy Cline and Cowboy Copas.
Diamond Teeth Mary Smith McClain, whose ashes were scattered on the railroad tracks behind Heritage Station, the old B&O train station, was considered the world's oldest living blues singer when she died in April 2000. Smith McClain, a coal miner's daughter who left Huntington at age 12 to sing, played on the Chitlins Circuit in her early years, and gained fame again late in life playing The White House and playing the blues around the world at many of the top blues festivals, including the Chicago Blues Festival.
Plenty of authors have hailed from the Tri-State, too. Perhaps the most famous is Greenup County native Jesse Stuart, whose legacy lives on at the Ashland-based Jesse Stuart Foundation, a regional book press which sells his books and Appalachian books around the world.
Late Milton native Breece D'J Pancake wrote only one book, "The Stories of Breece D'J Pancake," considered by many as some of the best short stories written since Hemingway. He killed himself in 1979.
Among contemporary authors, Marshall University professor and author Jean Edward Smith was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for his beefy biography, "Grant."
Huntington native Chuck Kinder, who was portrayed in the movie "The Wonder Boys," has cranked out several highly regarded books, including "Snake Hunters," and "The Honeymooners." In fall of 2004, Kinder captured the wild and wonderful sides of released of West Virginia life with a memoir called "Last Mountain Dancer."
By Dave Lavender - Herald Dispatch
