All artists have their favorite tools. Michelangelo fared well with a hammer and chisel. Isaac Stern worked wonders with his violin bow. For Pell City’s Dale Griffith, the implement of choice is … needles.
Dale is a prima quilter. She produces bed covers fit for a king – or a queen or twin or whatever size bed you own. For more than 40 years, scores of happy sleepers have enjoyed her meticulously crafted bed-wares.
Born and raised in the sea islands district around Brunswick, Georgia, she moved to Pell City in 1987, where she married Bill in 1990.
She sets a very high standard for her quilts, throws, spreads, comforters, shams, duvets, baby coverlets and many other embroidered and crocheted wares. For instance, Dale never uses anything but pure cotton for her quilt liners and bottom backing sheets. All woven materials must be between 300 and 400 thread count.
Custom Alabama quilt
The inner layer is always cotton, never the fluffy plastic froth found in most store-bought products. Nor will ordinary thread suffice; she uses a rather expensive, tough, permanent variety that’s been waxed for easy penetration of three layers of heavy material.
Dale takes a deep personal interest in her work. “I want my quilts to produce warmth, and peace of mind,” she says. “Only the best will do.”
As one might imagine, such standards require much time and concentration. Dale only works on her quilts when she is feeling good, with no outside conflicts to diminish her focus.
She can pursue her craft with all kinds of extraneous background noise, such as conversation, TV, etc., but that’s not her ideal work environment. “My favorite way to quilt is on a nice day, with the windows open and nothing but fresh air and the sounds of nature.”
There are so many technical considerations when making even the simplest of quilts – even more so for some of her special custom designs.
Dale shops relentlessly for the finest materials, traveling all over our part of the state to search for topping fabrics, inner liners, bottom sheets and specialty items. She takes quality very seriously and refuses to skimp on any part of her creations and designs. “I need to actually feel the fabric before I buy it,” she adds.
One of her favorite quilts is in daily use in Scotland. It’s a custom design showing the colors of that country along with one of their native plants, the thistle. Dale made another quilt for an East Coaster, with embroidered squares featuring fish, lighthouses, nautical implements and edged with real rope. She’s also made special Roll Tide spreads, as well as others whose tops are made up of copied photographs, ink-jet printed onto special fabrics.
Dale makes everything from baby quilts to throws, twin, full, queen, king and California king sizes. There is no easy way to create such things, nor are their components inexpensive. Each one involves interminable hours of delicate, tedious, exacting hand work. For instance, a regular queen size pattern quilt can involve as long as two months of daily labor!
Dale Griffith quilt on writer’s 4-poster bed
When asked how many yards of thread are needed for a queen size, Dale estimated three large spools with 10 bobbins for the top, and at least six spools for the final assembly. Each spool is 255 yards. This comes to some 2, 295 yards, or roughly 1.3 miles!
And those nine spools can be as much as six dollars apiece. There is scarcely a square inch of quilt that doesn’t have a stitch running through it. That’s what keeps the liner from bunching up inside.
So, how is a quilt made? First, all the tiny pattern pieces for the top must be cut from various fabrics or produced from printed cloth or even old souvenir T-shirts. These must be accurately sewn together into a number of pattern squares of equal size.
In olden times, every part of a quilt was sewn by hand, but nowadays the tops are usually sewn with a special machine. Dale uses a Baby Lock designed for that purpose. When enough squares have been created (sometimes as many as 88), they are then stitched together into a single piece the size of the quilt.
Once the top has been assembled, the real work begins. Every part of the quilt must be hand-stitched together as a unit, with a needle pulling thread through the combined thicknesses of top, liner and backing sheet. This is usually done on a quilting frame, of which there are many designs. Dale’s husband, Bill, made her a rather ingenious one, using PVC pipe.
Dale says that most buyers balk at the asking price but, when given the actual materials cost as well as a couple months of tedious labor, her products would be a steal at double her prices. Anyone who has ever actually made a quilt will gladly accept, especially after examining the superior quality and durability of the finished product.
Dale loves chit-chatting with other quilters. She can be searched on Facebook as D Dale Griffith.
Besides looking great on one’s bed, there is another factor that makes her quilt special – the almost instant warmth experienced a few seconds after crawling under the covers. Because of the choice of fabrics, her quilts do not draw away body heat. They simply capture it and give it back all night long, thus fulfilling Dale’s mission of providing warmth.
The peace of mind part of her wish list comes every night, as one experiences that warmth as well as reminiscence of the heirloom quilts that comforted many of us in our earlier years. Little in life is better than a good night’s sleep, especially under such fine bedding.
A good quilt is made to last and be treasured for several generations. Dale has successfully repaired worn bed covers that were hand made in the 1800s.
Your writer is the proud owner of a Dale Griffith patchwork bed cover that is the perfect complement for my old steel and brass four-poster that’s been in my family for several generations. For me, at age 82, it’s like a sort of time machine that provides comfort on several levels.
“ I want my quilts to be used, not stored away,” she declares. “They are household items, not keepsakes. I make them to last, so there’s no reason not to use them.”
From St. Clair County, Michigan, to St. Clair County, Alabama
Story by Joe Whitten Contributed photos
For someone to live 78 years in St. Clair County without ever eating barbecue sounds like cuisine deprivation. But that was 90-year-old Les Johnson’s sad truth. He deserves compassion, however, for he grew up in St. Clair County, Michigan. “I came to Alabama for the first time in 2012, and I ate my first barbecue at Charlie’s in Odenville,” Les admitted, “and I’ve never stopped eating them since.” In St. Clair County, Alabama, he not only enjoyed barbecue but also collard greens, fried okra, butterbeans, and cobbler pie.
Les’s story starts in Canada where his father, Leslie Hontoon Johnson, was born. Leslie was awarded US citizenship for fighting for America in World War I. After the war, he worked as Chief Steward on a Great Lakes freighter. When he was on leave in Port Huron, Michigan, he became friends with Eva Fleming. They fell in love and were soon married.
Because Leslie was on the ship for months at a time, Eva moved back with her parents at the farm. Two daughters, Mary and Grace, were born there, and on July 4, 1934, Les joined them. Today he says all the 4th of July fireworks are for him.
Les enjoyed a special relationship with his grandfather. “I loved living on the farm,” he recounted. “My grandfather died when I was five, but I still remember him. He was over six feet tall, and there weren’t many men that tall then. He had huge hands, and he’d take mine and cover it with his.”
A creek flowed by their farm, and in winter he and his granddad would walk the frozen creek in the snow to the nearest town to buy supplies.
When his grandpa died, his mother ran the farm and his dad continued on the freighter.
Les spoke fondly of the farm. “We sold chickens and eggs and butter. My mother made butter with a churn. The Kroger and A&P stores would call us and tell us how many chickens they needed for the weekend, and we’d get the chickens, stick ‘em in the neck with a sharp knife, and hang ‘em on the clothesline to let the blood drip. Then we had to put them in tubs of hot and cold water and pull all the feathers out.” No automation in those days.
Les in uniform in his early 20s
The Johnson children peddled their products on Saturdays to regular customers in Port Huron. “We already had their orders,” Les related. “My sister would take one side of the road, and I’d take the other. We always had eggs and butter. And when strawberries were in, we sold strawberries for 25 cents a quart.”
Just like Alabama kids, Les took chances, without much consideration of consequences. He and sister Mary rode a horse that refused to cross a wooden bridge over the creek. “One day, we decided we’d get at the top of the hill and get him going as fast as we could downhill, so he’d have to cross the bridge.” However, the horse stopped stone still the second his hoofs hit the wood. “The hor se stopped, but we went across that bridge,” he laughed. “We were picking gravel out of our legs for months.”
Les got the better of his sisters many times. He would scrunch himself between his sister and her boyfriend until they paid him to leave. Sometimes he would lock a sister in a room until they paid up. But they loved him, and his 98-year-old sister, Grace, recently said of him, “Les was always so spoiled by everyone because he was so much younger and the only boy. He got away with everything! He was and is so loved by everyone.”
As the ship’s Head Stewart, Leslie Johnson could take his wife on two trips a year and young Les went with her. They would drive to Lorain, Ohio, where the ship unloaded and uploaded. “We would get onboard there,” Les said, “and we’d go through the locks at Sault Ste. Marie and get a ship load up there and come back to Lorain. We had a ’36 Chevrolet, and I’d sit on the armrest on the back seat while my mother drove us back home.”
Les with sisters Mary and Grace
Those times ended when Les’s dad had a heart attack on ship. The crew lowered him on a stretcher into a Port Huron mail boat which brought him to shore. Leslie was at home for about a month before he died.
The Johnson family continued farming for about two years, then his mother sold the property, and they moved to Port Huron where she took a job as a butcher. Sister Mary had married. Sister Grace lived with an aunt, and 12-year-old Les lived with his mother.
Les recalled having to move. “It was terrible, moving to a city—a city I’d never been to except for shopping. I had to get new friends and go to a different school. The first couple of weeks, I hated it, but then I made some friends and liked it a little bit. But I missed the farm.”
Having learned how to work at the farm, in the city, 12-year-old Les soon had a newspaper route. When he turned 14, he got a job cleaning an appliance store, and when he got his driver’s license, he began delivering appliances. “My first car,” Les laughed, “was a ’29 Model A. It cost me $30.00, and then it cost me $50.00 for insurance.”
Les and Fay Johnson at a grandson’s wedding
On June 16, 1953, Les graduated from Port Huron High School, but perhaps the more memorable event had occurred a few weeks earlier on May 21, 1953. During the afternoon of that day, an F-4 tornado, over a mile wide, wreaked destruction throughout Port Huron, then whirled across the St. Clair River into Canada. In remembering the tornado, Les told how “It blew the roof off the back of our house where my mother was sitting in the kitchen. It never touched her, but she was so frightened that her hair turned white, and it never turned back to brown. The colloquial name for this phenomenon is the Maria Antoinette Syndrome, for her hair is said to have turned white overnight from the trauma of the Reign of Terror’s’ guillotine.
Les enjoyed building and remodeling houses. When asked about this, he said, “I worked for a construction company, and I always loved building stuff. The week before I graduated from high school, I got a job with a construction company, and they said they’d try me out for two weeks. I stayed there for 25 years. When I first started working there, I was in the union, and I got $1.95 an hour. When I retired, I was getting $28.00 an hour.” That company built houses and factories, so Les developed expertise in carpentry and ironwork. He left that company in 1978, then worked for a power company until 1983.
In 1954, Les married Fay Burns, and needing a house to live in, he built it. Having learned never to waste anything, he tore down an old house for material for the new house, salvaging everything. He and Fay pulled out all the nails and filled five five-gallon buckets and sold them for scrap.
Les worked his regular job during the day and worked on their home in the evenings. He had it roughed-in when his draft notice arrived. Three weeks later he was in the army. He boarded up the windows and put tarpaper over the top, and there it sat for two years until he was discharged.
The Johnson children arrived by adoption. Fay and Les adopted Lori in 1962, Steven in 1963, and Lynette in 1968. A few years after, Les’s sister-in-law and her husband both died close together, so, the Johnsons took his niece, Michelle, into their home as their daughter.
Any time the siblings are together, they enjoy recalling good times growing up. “When I was a kid,” Lynette related, “we used to go to a campground called Pigeon River Campground in Michigan. One night when we were sitting around the fire, dad decided to do a rain dance around the fire. It worked! Not only did we have rain that night, we also had a tornado. He still performs a rain dance on occasion.”
Les and his four children, Michele, Lore, Lynette and Steve
Sister Lori added hers. “When dad lost his leg from the work accident, he gave us kids a choice: either a pool or go to Florida. We got both,” she laughed. “When we wanted horses, he drove us all through the country and would say ‘How does that smell?’ We would respond with ‘That smells bad because it’s cow manure!’ Then we went by the horses and would say, ‘Humm that smells good! Must be horse manure!’ That worked too. We got our horses! He taught us a good work ethic. We couldn’t have asked for a better dad!”
Steve’s memory connects with horses. “In 1975, dad bought a frame for a one-horse sleigh at an auction, and he and I restored it in his workshop in the basement. He built the body, the seats, and everything. Some friends of his gave him the harness. We had a few horses, and one was able to pull the sleigh. So, he put bells on it, and at Christmas time he would take us for rides through the snow around the neighborhood in the sleigh. Those were extra special moments—both helping build the sleigh and riding it.”
Michelle’s memory shows Les’s ability to assess character. “I had a date, and our dates were required to come to the door. Les answered the door and told my date, ‘You have 30 seconds to get off the porch and out of the driveway—and you better move it because it’s a long driveway.’ I was so upset, and I cried and cried. But Les said, ‘That boy’s no good, I just know it.’ And low-and-behold, a couple years later that same young man went to jail! I hated to admit that my dad was right,” she laughed, “but he certainly was. He is an amazing man, and we are all blessed to have him in our lives.”
Les’ tomato harvest
The Johnsons enjoyed the outdoors, especially hunting. They owned a parcel of hunting land, but it had no cabin. Les, who never saw a job he couldn’t do, solved that problem. The Grand Trunk Railway Company’s nearby railyard refurbished boxcars, and Les bought a truckload of boxcar two-by-sixes. “They delivered them,” he said, “and I had a John Deere tractor with a 30-inch sawblade, and I sawed the two-by-sixes down to two-by-fours and framed a cabin in my back yard—bolted the sections together, numbered them, and took it down.”
A friend loaned him a truck to haul the cabin sections to the site. On Les’s brother-in-law’s trailer they put some furniture on, and the two headed out at 3:00 in the morning. They arrived onsite at 7:00 and started working. They finished at 7:00 that night and headed home.
Les enjoyed hunting even after an industrial accident cost him a leg. He and son-in-law Tim often hunted together. “We were walking out of the woods one night,” Tim laughed, “and Les fell over. He said, ‘I stepped in a hole.’ I helped him up. He took one step and fell down again. When I helped him up that time, I noticed that his foot was missing—it had broken off his artificial leg. We hobbled to the cabin and took three of his old legs and engineered a new one for him to get home.”
All of Les and Fay’s children married and raised families in Port Huron. Grandchildren came and the grandparents enjoyed being part of their lives. However, one day Tim dumbfounded everybody by announcing his family was moving to Alabama. His company had transferred him.
When asked how that news was received, Les chuckled, “Well, my wife had a fit. ‘You can’t take my grandkids and go to Alabama! I don’t know where that is.’ I wasn’t happy about it either,” he admitted, “but we helped them move. I drove the U-Haul with Tim. We came at the end of October 2012, and my wife and I stayed that winter with them.”
The tightknit Johnsons adjusted and started making the drive from Port Huron to Alabama. Les and Fay came each winter and enjoyed the warmer Alabama weather.
When Les’s wife died in 2016, he lived alone in their Michigan home for two years. Lynette and Tim encouraged him to sell his home and move to Alabama and live with them, and in 2018 he moved in with them.
Les began attending First Baptist Church Springville with the Hoffmans. He made friends easily and was soon involved with Sunday school and church, the Saints Alive senior group, and the Over the Hill Gang, men who meet at the Farmhouse Restaurant every Friday for lunch.
Desiring to join First Baptist, Les attended the New Members Class with the pastors. Having come from a Methodist and Lutheran background, he needed to be baptized by emersion. But how could a one-legged man get in and out of the baptistery? No problem for two deacons, as Les tells it. “I took my leg off, and Lee Love and Al Rayburn carried me down the steps into the baptistry, and Pastor David DuPre dunked me.”
After the baptism, Pastor Chip Thornton told his favorite story about Les. “He was put under anesthesia for surgery. When they rolled him out of the recovery room, he was flat on his back, still under the effects of anesthesia, but he had his arms in the air, and was saying, ‘Thank you, Jesus! Thank you, Jesus! Thank you, Jesus!’ The congregation loved it and applauded.
One reason Les enjoys Alabama is the long gardening season. “I can garden almost year-round,” Les comments. “Certain things I can plant in the fall, and others in the spring” For early start, he needed a greenhouse, so he and Tim built one. They bought used windows, put a skylight on the roof, and heating bars inside. “I use it to grow tomatoes, peppers, cabbage and cauliflower seedlings, then I give most of them to people in the church,” he laughed. “It’s just fun watching them grow.”
Gardeners at church gave Les hints on Southern gardening, and his grand-son-in-law, Matt Hyatt, of Chandler Mountain, gave pointers as well. Les may be 90 years old, but he still enjoys learning.
And learning more about the Bible, God, and Jesus his Savior is what he enjoys most. When asked about the difference in church and preaching in Michigan and here, he responded: “Like between night and day! I thought I was getting the Word of God,” he lamented, “but I wasn’t. It is so different. Here they go through the Bible. When I first got down here and went to Sunday school class, they could a verse—or one word–and teach on that for a whole hour—what it means and where a word came from. They never did that up north. It’s just a blessing to be down here. I love all our pastors, and I love all the people in my church.” He paused, then added, “And they love me. I couldn’t get used to that at first. When people would say, ‘I love you,’ I thought, parents and my family say that. But down here, they all say they love me!”
And they do. In the spring of 2022, Les was going through a down time resulting from events in October 2021 on a trip to Port Huron. On the first day of that trip, the airline misplaced his luggage, and someone hacked his credit card. On the second day, he stumbled and broke his hip, which resulted in hip-replacement surgery and two weeks of recuperation in a nursing home and three weeks at his daughter Lori’s home. When he finally arrived back home on Beaver Ridge Mountain, he said, “If you want to see me again, come to Alabama.” His spirits were so low that a Sunday school buddy, Chuck Whitiker, suggested to the Sunday school teacher that the class plan a surprise birthday party for Les. The class agreed and managed to keep it secret from Les.
Back, Les and Grace; Front, Mary and their mother, Eva
On the day of the party, Lynette and daughter Sara decorated the church’s Family Life Center. Jeri Jenkins prepared the food. Tim’s job was to get Les to the event. By creative subterfuge concerning a church meeting that needed Les in attendance, Tim got Les in the truck; however, Les, being significantly disgruntled, grumbled his discontent all the way to the church. Tim opened the FLC door and frowning Les entered to be greeted with shouts of “Surprise! Happy Birthday!” Thus, he was shocked out of the doldrums into good spirits to enjoy the day.
Les thinks of Heaven often and that his body will be in working order—he’s had 25 plus surgeries, has one artificial leg, an artificial hip, is blind in one eye and has macular degeneration in the other, and he has scalloped edged ears from removed skin cancers. “I’ll have everything new in Heaven,” he laughed.
He recently received a hand-held gadget that allows him to read and listen to the Bible, and that makes him happy. His grandson-in-law, Matt, built a prayer bench for him which they placed in a wooded nook, and in good weather, Les spends time there praying for his family and thanking God for all his goodness and kindness to him. If one happened to be nearby and unseen, he might hear Les singing “And He walks with me and He talks with me, and He tells me I am his own. And the joy we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known,” for “In the Garden” is one of his favorite hymns. The time he has spent in God’s Garden of meditation is reflected in his life. Les Johnson is a one-of-a-kind inspiration.
Gaston Williamson enjoying life as a professional puppy transporter
Story by Scottie Vickery Photos by Graham Hadley Submitted photos
Gaston Williamson spent most of his career helping to connect consumers with the products and services they wanted. He’s doing much the same thing in retirement, but the process is a lot more fun.
These days, the former regional product manager for UPS is focusing on transporting cute, cuddly, playful puppies to their forever homes and families. He’s a canine courier of sorts, and his reward is lots of puppy kisses and happy smiles.
“The best part is the excitement I see when I make the final delivery, especially with the children,” Williamson said. “It gives me such a thrill to get to see them.”
Gaston holding one of his puppy ‘fares’
Williamson, who lives in Cropwell, was looking for an English Springer Spaniel for his wife, Cynthia, when he met a breeder in Tennessee. They struck up a friendship, and sometimes when Williamson’s work took him nearby, he’d stop in to see the puppies.
“One time I mentioned I was going to be retiring, and the breeder mentioned this and said I should do it,” he said. “She’s the one who got me into it.”
Williamson had helped transport rescue dogs before, so it wasn’t an entirely unfamiliar concept. After hurricanes in Texas and Louisiana in 2017 resulted in a large number of displaced dogs, he became part of a rescue chain made up of volunteers from across the country who helped transport the animals to shelters on the Northeast Coast.
“I’d drive a 100-mile leg and pass the dogs off to someone else,” he said. The process continued until the dogs were ultimately delivered to shelters until they could be reunited with their owners or placed in new homes. “I was still working at the time, but I did that for a couple of years on the weekends,” Williamson said.
That’s why, when he retired in 2021, he became more intrigued with the idea of working with breeders. And now, the name of his Facebook page, Have Puppy Will Travel, pretty much sums up his philosophy these days.
“There’s no telling how many thousands of miles I’ve covered delivering puppies,” he said.
One of two puppies delivered during an 800-mile trip
So why does he do it? “Number one, I love dogs, and I enjoy the puppies,” said Williamson, adding that he and Cynthia have four dogs, three of which are Springer Spaniels. “Also, I get to see a lot of places I’ve never been. I traveled a lot with my job – I traveled eight states – and I wanted to keep traveling as much as I could.”
The experience is a rewarding one, as well. “A lot of times, I deliver to families who have just lost another dog. It just gives me a kick to see the smiles on their faces.”
Williamson, who also is a driver for St. Clair Area Transportation (SCAT), primarily works with eight breeders in Georgia, North Carolina, Kentucky and Tennessee. “You’ve got to be careful because you can run into some puppy mills, which I don’t do,” he said.
He vets all of the breeders he works with and makes sure they are certified by Good Dog, an organization that helps ensure its breeders follow responsible breeding practices. Although there have been exceptions, the majority of dogs he transports are Spaniels.
“I’ve had requests for cats, pot-bellied pigs and rabbits,” he said. “I’ve mostly stuck with Springer Spaniels since I know the breed so well.”
Williamson had no idea the gig would become such a big part of his retirement years. “It started out as a hobby, but I go about two or three times a month,” he said. Sometimes it’s a quick trip to Tennessee, but other times there’s a lot more involved.
“A few weeks ago, I left home about 6 a.m. and drove to Bardstown, Kentucky,” he said. “I picked up a puppy and headed to Alpena, Arkansas. I dropped the dog off at 9:30 p.m. and drove 1,007 miles in one day. I got a motel room real quick.”
Another time he picked up a puppy at the Atlanta airport that had come from the Czech Republic and delivered it to a woman in Kentucky. In cases like that, the dog is shipped via air cargo. “It’s a controlled cargo part of the plane that’s heated, cooled and has oxygen,” Williamson said. “I’ve been real impressed with the way the airlines take care of the dogs.”
Gaston and three of his four dogs
He’s not just going to airports to pick up puppies, though. A lot of times, he acts as a “flight nanny” and accompanies the puppies on the flight. “You can take a puppy on an airplane as long as it can fit in a flexible carrier that can go under the seat in front of the passenger” Williamson said.
He’s taken lots of plane trips with puppies, and he said they usually sleep for most of the flight. So far, he and his charges have flown to Denver twice, Boston twice, Boise, Dallas and to Bozeman, Montana and Washington, D.C.
It normally costs $85 to $125 for the puppy to fly, but that’s included in the expenses paid by the new owner or the breeder. Williamson charges a fee in addition to the expenses he concurs, whether it’s gas, plane fares or lodging. “My limit is about 13 hours a day,” he said. “Anything over that, I’m probably going to get a hotel room.”
At last count, Williamson had traveled to or driven through about 30 states while transporting puppies. He’s dropped off precious cargo in New Mexico, Phoenix, Utah and Indiana, to name a few. He’s driven through all kinds of weather, including snow, high winds and record flooding. Sometimes it’s a day trip while others take two or three days.
Cynthia has joined him on a couple of the shorter drives, but sometimes he and his wife take a trip later that was sparked by one of his deliveries. “I’ll go on a trip, and I’ll see something interesting. I’ll come back and talk about it, and we’ll end up taking a trip there,” he said.
Williamson said one of his favorite trips was when he delivered some puppies to a family in Philadelphia on Dec. 22 one year. The only thing the parents told their children was that they were going to the airport. “They probably thought they were going to Disney World or the Bahamas or something,” Williamson said with a laugh.
The kids weren’t disappointed, however. “Those three little kids went crazy over their puppies,” he said. “They were just screaming and going crazy. It was so much fun. It’s things like that that make this so rewarding.”
Former Odenville resident wins 2025 Iditarod Dogsled Race
Top Photo: Jessie Holmes, formerly of Odenville, taking part in the Iditarod Dogsled Race, which he won this year. Photo by Dave Poyzer, online at davepoyzer.com
Story by Roxann Edsall Submitted photos
A trip by car from Odenville to Boston is 1,159 miles. From Odenville to Tucumcari, New Mexico is just under 1,100 miles. Now imagine a similar distance in the harsh, winter environment in Alaska, but instead of being inside your warm car, you are standing on the footboard of a sled racing through the frozen tundra at 10 to 12 miles per hour.
Alabama native Jessie Holmes knows firsthand the experience, as a musher and veteran racer of long-distance dog sled races.
He won this year’s 1,128-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, the longest Iditarod in the race’s 53-year history. Due to a lack of snowfall along parts of the normal route, the official start of the 2025 race was moved from Willow, Alaska to Fairbanks.
The routing of the race was also altered, a precaution made to protect the safety of the mushers and their dogs, but adding over 100 miles to the grueling journey.
Holmes crossed the finish line in Nome at 2:55 a.m. on March 14, having completed the race in 10 days, 14 hours, 55 minutes and 41 seconds, just a little more than three hours ahead of second place finisher, veteran musher Matt Hall. The win brought with it a check for $57,200.
This was the 8th Iditarod for the 43-year-old Holmes, his strongest Iditarod finish. He placed 3rd in 2024 and in 2022.
Success, for Holmes, has been hard fought. Born in Sylacauga and raised in Phenix City by his mom, Judy Holmes, he admits to running away and getting into trouble a lot. As a teenager, he spent two years living with his father in Odenville and attended St. Clair County High School. Still getting into trouble there, he left school and headed out West hoping to figure things out.
“I was traveling, jumping trains, hitchhiking across the country working odd jobs,” says Holmes. “I settled in Montana for a little while working for a family. Then I headed up north into the Yukon Territory, wanting to be a mountain man.” He ultimately landed in Alaska, where he has thrived living off the grid.
He calls the wilderness the cure for the troubles of his youth. “It was what my soul needed,” admits Holmes. He credits the loving guidance of his grandfather, Gene Richmond, with his love of the wilderness lifestyle. An army veteran of World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War, his grandfather lived on Fort Benning, just minutes from his Phenix City home.
As a youngster, Holmes was happy there playing with the chickens and beagles and in the garden. “I was always trying to round up stray dogs everywhere I went and was always getting in trouble for it. I’ve had a strong empathy for animals my whole life,” Holmes says. “If you ran over a turtle, I was in tears.”
From his grandfather, young Jessie learned to hunt, fish, trap, garden and raise dogs, skills he still uses to provide for himself and for his animals. His grandfather has since passed, but his “granny” still lives in Phenix City.
With his human family so far away, Holmes’ describes his dogs as family. And a big family it is. Working with 60 to 70 dogs in his kennel, he breeds, raises and trains dogs for his teams and for other mushers.
He has apprentices who work with him at his homestead and learn about training sled dogs. He still trains his “A-team,” which is about 30 dogs, while his apprentices work with the “B-team” and “C-team” dogs. He’s mentoring these young people just as he was mentored by special people when he first arrived in Alaska.
Gettting ready to bed down with his dogs for a short rest
Holmes gratefully acknowledges the men who took him under their wings. Jerry (Gerald) Riley, the 1976 Iditarod champion, was influential in steering the Alabama transplant through some challenging times. “He kind of adopted me,” says Holmes. “He’s the one that really saw that I could be a champion and convinced me of it. I had kind of a negative perception of myself.”
Riley taught him some important wilderness skills and got him interested in dog breeding and racing. “I learned a lot about race tactics from him, like psyching out your competitors and not letting people play mind games on you. He was a master at race strategy.” Riley never got to see Holmes win the Iditarod, having passed away last fall.
For a few years, Holmes lived in Nenana and had other Iditarod racers as neighbors. 1983 Champion Rick Mackey taught Holmes more on strategy, numbers and dog care. Bill Cotter, whose top finish was 3rd place, became a father figure to him. “All three of them taught me so much,” says Holmes.
“They came from a different era of mushing,” Holmes adds. “They didn’t typically travel all through the night because they didn’t have the high-level headlamps that we have now. All the gear is a lot more high-tech now. When it felt tough for me, I thought about them. I focused on doing this for a bigger reason than myself. I did it for all the people who believed in me and for those mentors that have passed.”
Reality Star
The Iditarod isn’t Holmes’ only claim to fame. When a National Geographic channel series producer was looking for cast members for Life Below Zero, a show about sustenance living in remote villages of the Alaskan wilderness, friends recommended Holmes. He was cast in the show, which ran from 2015 to 2023, and won nine Academy of Television Arts & Sciences prime time Emmy Awards.
“I wasn’t interested in the show at first, but I was paid very well and that gave me the income boost that I needed to be able to do the racing and the lifestyle I wanted,” Holmes explains.
Jessie tends to the needs of his dogs before his own
He had already been excelling in mid-length races but hadn’t had the money to put into training and the expenses for the longer races, like the Iditarod. With his earnings from Life Below Zero, he was able to buy better dogs, breed them and increase the quality of his team.
He began training for his first Iditarod, and the show documented and filmed that first attempt and his second year. He was named Rookie of the Year with a 7th place finish in his first attempt in 2018.
“You’re cold, hungry, sleepy,” describes Holmes of the race experience. “You’re excited and, you know, scared. It’s almost every emotion you can imagine, all wrapped up in each day.” There are many dangers on the trail, including frostbite, whiteout conditions, injuries to the musher or the dogs and dangers from wildlife.
In the 2024 race, he ended up breaking his hand defending his dogs from an angry moose. “We kind of came up on it, and it was sleeping on a real narrow technical spot on the trail,” Holmes recalls. “The dogs were just trying to go by, and it tried to stomp some of the dogs in the team. It reared up and stomped towards the dogs and me and the sled. We’d just startled it, and it was using its survival instinct, but I came face-to-face with it and had to punch it in the nose.”
Very real dangers during races also include sleep deprivation and complete exhaustion, even to the point of hallucination. “I’ve only hallucinated once years ago,” says Holmes. “I was in a pretty depleted state. I was along the coast and saw semi-trucks going down the sea ice and going like 60 miles an hour. I was in this crazy state of believing that it was really happening, and I was so irritated that they would let that happen on the race trail. Then there was like a massive white wall about three feet high, and I felt like I had to duck under it, so I threw the sled on the side and ducked underneath it. When I jumped back up and threw the sled upright, I looked back and it wasn’t there.” That experience shook him, and he ended taking a 9th place finish in that year’s Iditarod. Since then, he’s learned to manage his energy and prioritize his health.
His health has been an issue for him the past three years as he recovered from nearly being crushed by a house. In September of 2022, Holmes was helping in the recovery efforts after Typhoon Merbok hit the coastline of Western Alaska nearly destroying the town of Golovin. He and other volunteers were pulling out wet insulation and plywood from under a house and when he pulled his last nail, a portion of the underside of the house collapsed, pinning him beneath. Friends pulled him out and got him to the hospital.
“I broke three ribs and shattered my wrist,” tells Holmes. “That all happened at the peak of training for that year’s Iditarod. I entered that race with a lot of physical problems and basically emaciated at 142 pounds. So, I had a tough time on the trail. I ended up getting 5th that year.
With his health a priority, this year’s race strategy was to catch a one-hour nap each time he had to stop. He planned five-hour rest stops to give himself ample time to get his dogs taken care of and to give them 3½ hours of uninterrupted sleep. After they were put to bed, he made sure his hydration and nutrition needs were met, which left him about an hour of sleep time.
“So, the first thing I do right when I get stopped is to direct them off the trail somewhere,” explains Holmes. “My leaders listen to me, so a few commands, and they’ll park themselves off the trail.”
Having settled the dogs off the trail, he gets a cooker going to melt snow. It takes 3 ½ gallons of boiling water to thaw the meat his dogs will need. Because of the incredible amounts of energy needed for the race, sled dogs needs approximately two pounds of meat at each feeding. Holmes also uses the boiling water to thaw the ointments and massage oils to help each dog with sore muscles and foot abrasions.
“After they’ve gotten their ointments and massage oils, I add the kibble and supplements to their meat,” Holmes adds. “When they’re done, I put their coats on them and get them settled in the straw bed. Then it’s time for me to eat, repack my sled and climb in the straw with them for about an hour of sleep.”
Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race rules mandate three stops along the race route, with one being a 24-hour stop at a major checkpoint and the other two being 8-hour stops. These required stops are designed to ensure that there is ample time for dog care and rest for the musher and his or her team.
It is also where mushers arrange for resupply shipments to be picked up. “I use them mostly for refueling points,” explains Holmes. “I get my straw, fuel for my cooker and my drop bags with supplies that I’ve ordered. I don’t stay in the towns. I camp in the country with my dogs.” That way, he says, he can keep his focus on the race and have fewer distractions.”
Holmes is very proud of all his dogs, particularly the team that won the Iditarod. “It was pretty special to have like that whole 10-dog team that I finished with be those that I bred and raised and have a deep connection to,” he says, adding that he loves them and wants them to succeed like a parent wanting to see his children succeed. “You know they’re not your children, but it’s a very blurred line for me.”
Two months before the start of the Iditarod, Holmes and his team won the Copper Basin 300, a 300-mile race. Then, just three weeks after winning the Iditarod, Holmes won the Kobuk 440. “That was my goal for the season,” says Holmes. “I saw how good the team was, and I knew we were at the peak of our career and had put the work in. To accomplish big goals, you have to set big goals.”
Holmes loves a challenge. “My goal was never to just live the simplest life in the world. It was to thrive in the wilderness,” he says. “I’m just an odd duck up here. I came from Alabama with a dream and a passion, and I pursued it to no end.
“I think it’s our southern heritage, the resilience and toughness that characterizes us from the South. When you’re hitting some terrible adversities, you’ve got to take it one day at a time, even one mile at a time.”
Editor’s Note: A special thank you goes out to Dave Poyzer for working with us to make sure we had the perfect cover shot for this edition. That is an outstanding photo taken in a difficult environment to shoot in. You can find his photos online at davepoyzer.com.
Dirk Walker’s artwork has found homes all over the world. His paintings hang in houses, churches, businesses, corporate headquarters and sports stadiums. They grace walls all over the country and faraway places like Germany, Denmark, Australia, and the United Kingdom.
It all started with his own bare walls.
“I wanted to buy art for our home,” said Walker, who lived in Birmingham at the time. His search took him to the Loretta Goodwin Gallery, and by the time he left, Walker, who worked in banking at the time, couldn’t shake the feeling that he was meant to be an artist.
“I don’t know why I thought I could do it, but something appealed to me about trying to learn how to paint,” said Walker, who has had a studio in downtown Pell City for 11 years.
Fans of his work are awfully glad he did. Walker’s paintings, both oils and watercolors, are known for their bold colors, rich texture and loose brushstrokes. His subject matters are varied: he has collections ranging from landscapes and city scenes to his spiritual series. He also paints sporting and hunting scenes, art focusing on the growing bourbon culture, and whimsical subjects like Santa Claus.
“The variety of things I like to do just keeps me fresh in all of them,” he said. “I’m not doing the same thing all the time – that would drive me bonkers. A lot of people can’t say they love what they do, but I get a lot of gratification from it. Once I get in to doing a painting, everything else just sort of goes away.”
Finding purpose
There were signs early on that Walker had the makings to be a great artist. Growing up in Birmingham, he watched his father dabble in watercolor, and his own high school work caught the attention of his art teacher. She encouraged him to pursue it, but his interest and talent lay dormant for years.
After graduating from Vestavia Hills High School, Walker earned a degree in industrial design at Auburn University and that helped provide a foundation in drawing and perspective. “I did a little design work right out of college, but I had the opportunity to go with the bank, and it was a better option for raising a family at the time,” he said.
Debbie and Dirk Walker in the Pell City studio
After the visit to the gallery, however, Walker decided to give in to the pull. His first painting was a still life. “It was horrible, looking back on it now,” he said with a laugh.
Still, he took it to back to the gallery to be framed, and Loretta Goodwin, who would become a dear friend and mentor, saw something he didn’t. She asked him who had painted the piece. “I said, ‘I did,’ and she said, ‘Can you do it again?’”
It took him about two years to create something he wanted to show her. “It was the most nerve-wracking experience,” said Walker, who started painting with oils. “I circled the block two or three times because I wanted to throw up I was so nervous.”
The first few times he showed Goodwin his work, she told him, “You’re not quite there, keep trying,” Walker remembered. “I’d tuck tail and go back home and stay at it. Eventually, I got to the point where she thought she could do something with it.”
Goodwin was a tremendous influence on Walker. “She loved the arts, she loved local artists, and she did so much to promote the arts in Birmingham. We formed a deep friendship where we talked as much about the business of art as we did the painting process. It instilled in me a love of both.”
She wasn’t his only influence. Hungry to learn, Walker sought guidance and inspiration from Alabama artists John Lonergan, who taught art at Pell City High School for 25 years, and Tom Black, who grew up in Gadsden and lived in Pell City before moving to Arizona. “I would go up to Tom’s studio and just watch him mix color and see what he’d do. I was too nervous to paint around anyone,” he said.
Walker later met and took workshops from David Leffel and Sherrie McGraw, both artists who taught at the Art Students League of New York. His early style was similar to those who had influenced him – “very much the Old Masters, very much the old Renaissance look,” Walker said. “It was the play of shadows and light, light flowing over objects.”
Still working at the bank while pursuing his art, Walker didn’t have the luxury of painting outside during the day and taking advantage of the natural light. “At night, I’d go down to my studio and set up a still life so I could control the light,” he said.
Walker’s work soon grew a following, and in addition to the Loretta Goodwin Gallery, his art has been featured in eight galleries across the country. When his job went away after a bank merger, Walker bought Goodwin’s gallery, which he owned for 20 years before becoming a full-time artist.
Changing times
Walker, who now lives in Cropwell with Debbie, his wife of eight years, has said that painting “is a lifelong struggle, but one that is well worth the journey.” He said he loves the fact that he continues to grow and change as an artist.
“It’s something you never completely learn,” he said. “I think that’s one of the big appeals for me. Forty years later, I’m still learning and experimenting and making mistakes.”
The artist’s spiritual series stems from his personal faith
In fact, Walker said his willingness to continue to explore techniques and subjects and experiment with color has been a big part of his success. “So many artists just kind of get stuck and they wonder why their art isn’t being accepted the way it was maybe years earlier,” he said. “I learned how to watch what people responded to, and through the years, it impacted how my style changed.”
Walker’s portfolio soon expanded to iconic landmarks. His work includes Alabama landmarks like Sloss Furnaces, the Alabama Theatre, Vulcan, the Pell City Depot and the Mobile Bay Lighthouse. He eventually added scenes from Atlanta, as well as places like the Lincoln Memorial, the Brooklyn Bridge and the Eiffel Tower.
“I started off painting very tight, very traditional, and then I wanted to go a little more abstract, a little more impressionistic,” he said, adding that one of the first steps was adding nondescript figures to some of his landmark paintings. “Through the years, I kept pushing in that vein.”
Walker started experimenting with sporting and hunting scenes after his son, Geoffrey, who works in the sporting goods industry, showed his artwork to Kevin and Kathleen Kelly, owners of Kevin’s Fine Outdoor Gear & Apparel. Based in Thomasville, Geogia, it is one of several retailers who represent his work.
“They asked if I ever did hunting scenes, and Geoffrey said, ‘I don’t know; I’ll check,’” Walker said. “He called me that night and said, ‘Dad, I think you need to try doing some hunting scenes.’”
Walker took his son’s advice, and the collection has been wildly popular, thanks in part to his abstract realism style. “I think my style was a really fresh approach,” he said. “Most of the wildlife art you see is very tight, very realistic, very static. Mine was loose and colorful, and I think it caught people at the right time. There’s been a tremendous response to it. It’s just kind of blown my world up.”
Walker, who lived on Logan Martin Lake for years before he and Debbie moved to their gentleman’s farm in Cropwell, has fond memories of fishing and hunting growing up and eventually fishing with his own kids. “We’ve got so many great memories of being on the water,” he said. “That’s one of the really neat things about that genre of work. People connect to it on an emotional level. They want a painting of a dog like they had, or they hunted with their kids. It evokes a lot of memories.”
About four years ago, Kelly approached Walker about doing limited edition prints of some of his paintings. He was reluctant at first, but he realized that people who couldn’t or wouldn’t invest in original art might spend $300 or $400 on a print.
They began offering a line of collector’s closed edition prints, and “we get orders almost every day,” he said. Debbie handles that side of the business, and “it has really broadened our exposure,” Walker said. “Now I get calls to do commissions from all over the country and from other countries, as well.”
Higher calling
Another series that has been personal for Walker is his spiritual collection, which includes depictions of Jesus’ baptism, the Last Supper, the feeding of the 5,000, and the crucifixion. The series was born of his own personal faith and struggles.
Raised in the church, Walker said “if the doors were open, we were there.” As an adult, he went through a period where he floundered a bit, but “something was calling me back to the church.” Not long after he returned, he felt ta strong desire to paint scenes from the Bible.
“Being a person of faith, I think everyone is given gifts on some level, whether it’s music, art, writing, whatever,” he said. “This is something that’s He’s given me, and it’s a way for me to kind of give back and witness a little about my faith. I try to portray something in a way that might cause someone to want to sit and think, and if it also helps someone else find the Lord or deal with issues, that’s a blessing for both parties.”
Walker spent a lot of time on his spiritual art the past two years after being commissioned by Vestavia Hills Methodist Church to paint a series of scenes portraying the life of Christ according to the Gospel of John. Baptist Health also commissioned artwork for all of its hospitals in Alabama.
He also was commissioned to do several large pieces, including a portrayal of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane, for collectors in Australia and Germany. The connection was largely the result of his online presence.
“Without the internet, that never would have happened,” he said. “It’s kind of a God thing. He’s using this voice of mine to reach people literally around the globe. It really makes me very humble and proud.”
A new medium
While he has painted with oils for most of his career, Walker was moved to study a new medium about six years ago when he introduced his bourbon series. “Bourbon is such a collectible thing right now, and they’re a lot of fun to do,” he said of the paintings. “Watercolor is sort of the perfect medium for that subject.”
Walker said he strives to create the same kind of look as his oil paintings – the boldness of color, for example – so his approach is a little different than that of traditional watercolorists. While most watercolors tend to have a lot of transparency, he often uses gouache, which is similar to watercolor, but more opaque. The result is paintings with more dimension and vibrancy. “My technique is a little different in that regard,” he said.
The challenge is part of the allure. “Watercolor is a hard medium,” he said. “I enjoy it equally as much as oil, but I’m still kind of learning as I go.”
Walker, his own toughest critic, has a stack of watercolors in his studio that he has discarded. “You’re never completely satisfied no matter how good a painting might turn out,” he said. “I can go back and look at a painting I did yesterday or 10 years ago and see things I wish I’d done differently. Even to this day I’m frustrated by why one painting works and one doesn’t.”
Finding balance
At 70, Walker has no plans to stop painting. “Debbie and I work really hard at this, and I’m up in the studio almost every day,” he said. “I enjoy it, though, and it’s something I hope I can do for years to come.”
Vintage Pell City train depot, an original painting Walker donated to Museum of Pell City as a fundraiser
They do make time for other pursuits, however. Debbie, who traveled the world in her younger years is trying her best to help Walker catch the travel bug, and being with family will always be a priority for both of them.
Their combined family is a big one. Walker has four children, Debbie has two, and there are nine grandchildren and three great-grandchildren with another on the way. One of his greatest joys has been creating scenes that mean something to them and will be around for generations.
“I’m so proud that my kids have been able to see me develop, although they give me grief about it,” he said. “If they ever think my ego is out of check, they bring me back down to earth. But it’s so cool because they’ve all told me, ‘Dad, you want to give us something for Christmas, give us a piece of your art.’ That, as a parent, is awesome.”
Chances are, there are a lot more Christmas gifts in their future. Walker, who said he can’t see ever retiring, will never get too far from his red Craftsman tool cabinet that holds brushes and paint and other tools of his trade.
“I once read, ‘Art is a delicate balance between the visual concept and each artist’s technique,’” Walker has said. “After years of chasing that artistic balance, it is the anticipation of the struggle that keeps me coming back to the canvas.” l
Story by Joe Whitten Photos by Wallace Bromberg Jr. and Submitted Photos
In the words of American Bandstand’s Dick Clark, “Music is the soundtrack of your life,” and that fits Pell City musician Floyd Waites like a well-tailored 5th Avenue tuxedo.
Born to Edmond and Beatrice Waites in the Glenn City area of Pell City, Floyd was the youngest of their five children – three boys and two girls. This was a loving family overseen by Mrs. Waites after Mr. Waites became an invalid from a stroke.
By his teenage years, Floyd’s siblings had left home, so his mother depended upon him with chores and cleaning. “I was always singing when I was helping around the house,” he recalled. He heard the music coming from the radio, and he knew in his heart that if he had a piano, he could play those songs.
“I went to my mother and said, ‘I want to get a piano.’” He smiled as he told her reply. “She said, ‘Floyd, I can’t get no piano!’ She wasn’t able to buy a piano. But a few months after that, I began to get a small check from Avondale Mills because my daddy had worked there before his stroke.”
Floyd and Marie Knight take a bow at a concert in Paris
With that income, another plan took shape. “I told my mom that I was gonna try to get a piano (with that money),” he reminisced. “There was a piano company in Anniston, Alabama, called Forbes Piano Company. So, someone carried me there, and I looked around and spoke to the man in charge, and he said, ‘I can let you have it for so much,’ – whatever it was priced at that time. And I said, ‘Well, how much will that be a month?’ He told me what it would be and said, ‘Could you pay ten dollars a month?’ And I said, ‘Oh, I can pay ten dollars a month!’ And, so, they brought the piano out to our house.”
Oh, happy day! Now, with the radio on, Floyd could sit at the treasured piano, with his fingertips eagerly searching out the notes and chords and runs of what he heard. He was a natural – born for the piano and music.
He must have played too much Fats Domino or Chubby Checker, because one day his mother said, “Floyd, I don’t want you playing just anything and everything. You’ve got to play for the Lord.” He chuckled at the memory. “I said, ‘Oh, yes, Mama, that’s what I plan to do.”
And he did just that, beginning at Rocky Zion Missionary Baptist Church under the guidance of Rev. Silas Woods, who encouraged him in his playing for the Lord.
Floyd enjoys recalling those early years with Rev. Woods. “We had a Sunday for the young group to sing, and I began playing for them – songs that I knew and could catch onto. Rev. Woods liked for the Junior Choir to go with him when he preached at other churches. And I would go with them and play piano. I was encouraged a lot by Rev. Woods.”
In the spring of 1965, Floyd graduated from St. Clair County Training School, began looking for work and found scant possibilities locally. The Waites’ across-the-road neighbors had moved to New York City, and they encouraged him to come live with them. “You could get a job up here in New York,” they told him. “We could take you to the state unemployment agency, and they will find you a job.” Therefore, with hope in his heart, Floyd boarded a Greyhound bus and headed to the Big Apple – without a clue as to the places God and his piano would take him in the years ahead.
His friends met him at the bus station, took him to their home, and gave him a room until he could find work and rent an apartment of his own.
At the New York Unemployment Office, the interviewer asked him what kind of work he was interested in. and he told them he was a church musician. “They went into the back,” Floyd laughed, “and came back with a uniform, a khaki uniform, and they said, ‘This will fit you very good.’ And I said, ‘What’s that for?’ And they said, ‘This is for you to become a New York City police officer.’ And I said, ‘Oh, no! My Lord, no! That won’t work! I don’t think I could handle anything like that! Don’t you think you could find me something else?’”
So, they sent him to another section where he had a more favorable offer. The lady interviewing him said, “Mr. Waites, we have an opening for a job in the Bronx at a school, and it’s dealing with food service.” This interested him, and the lady’s next question raised his spirits higher, “Can you cook?” Floyd, feeling almost back home in Pell City, replied, “Honey, that’s right down my alley!”
Then she told of a position at the Walton High School, and Floyd said, “I would love to do that because that’s what I studied in school.” He was referring to the St. Clair County Training School where he was more interested in cooking than in farming and had taken Home Economics rather than Vocational Agriculture.
Following the lady’s instructions, he went to Walton High School Monday morning, and after being interviewed there, he was hired. The school system sent him to various training sessions that prepared him for a career in New York City school food services – the job he worked until he retired.
Music opportunities in New York City’s Harlem seemed to find Floyd without his looking for them. The leader of the Jimmy Smith Singers came up to him and asked him if he could sing.
“Oh, yeah, I sing,” Floyd replied, adding, “I’ve got a friend who sings, too.”
“Bring him along,” the leader told him. The friend was one he grew up with in Pell City, and he and Floyd had connected again in New York. The two young men rehearsed and sang with the Jimmy Smith Singers for a while.
“But it was still like something was missing,” he said. His mama’s words, “You’re not gonna play just anything and everything” no doubt hummed in his mind along with sacred memories of Rocky Zion and Rev. Woods.
Floyd and Evelyn Waites
“The pianist for the Jimmy Smith Singers was playing for a church in my Harlem neighborhood, and he said to me, ‘Floyd, why don’t you come to my church? I play up here at The Gates of Prayer Church. There’s a lady that’s pastor of the church, and her name is Prophetess Dolly Lewis.’ I said, ‘I don’t live too far from there. Maybe I’ll come one Sunday.’”
Not too long after that invitation, Floyd attended The Gates of Prayer Church, and there, by God’s providence, he found his spiritual calling.
Living close to the church, he walked to the service, and as he got closer to the sanctuary, the organ’s chords and crescendos urged him onward. He opened the church door and looking up to the pulpit, he saw a woman dressed in gleaming white looking out over the assembling congregation – Prophetess Dolly Lewis.
Floyd remembers the day. “She looked directly at me and says, ‘Come on in. Go over there and sit down at the piano.’ I must have looked funny, because she said, ‘Yeah, you can play, and you can sing.’ Now, nobody in New York had heard me play, and I wondered, ‘How did this lady know this?’ But I never did ask her.”
From that Sunday, Floyd played piano and sang at The Gates of Prayer Church under the guidance of Prophetess Lewis.
When she went to other cities, he traveled with her to play piano at her preaching services. For one who had never flown, an added excitement was flying to and from these destinations. On these trips, she also held private sessions in her hotel room, and people would be lined up to get messages from her. “A word from the Lord” in today’s Pentecostal parlance.
Prophetess Lewis introduced Floyd to two famous gospel singers – Marie Knight and Sister Rosetta Tharpe. He enjoys recalling those singers. “One Sunday, this lady walked into the church, and everybody looked around. Prophetess Lewis looked at the newcomer and said, ‘Come on up, Marie Knight.’ She was a professional singer, and she would travel all around with this other lady, Sister Rosetta Tharpe. Rosetta was an electric guitar player.” He paused, smiling, “Oh, she could lean back on that guitar and play.”
Godmother of Rock ‘N Roll
Rosetta Tharpe was born in Cotton Plant, Arkansas, in 1915 to Katie Bell and Willis Atkins. Katie Bell played the mandolin, sang, and preached as a Pentecostal evangelist, according to the online Encyclopedia Britanica. She began playing guitar at age four and at age six she traveled and sang with her mother.
After moving to Chicago, she developed her own guitar style under the influence of Chicago’s blues and jazz musicians. When she moved to New York City in the 1930s, “…She sang traditional gospel songs with contemporary jazz tempos that she played on her electric guitar. With these performances, she introduced gospel into nightclubs and concert venues. Her work influenced early rock and rollers such as Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard and Elvis Presley.” She came to be called the “Godmother of Rock and Roll” and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2018.
The ‘Voice’
Marie Knight, born in Florida in 1920 or 1925, depending on the source, grew up in Newark, New Jersey. According to the online African American Registry (AAREG), Marie started touring in 1939. Sometime in the 1940s, she performed at the Golden Gate Auditorium in Harlem along with Mahalia Jackson.
Sister Rosetta Tharpe attended that concert and “…recognized something special in Marie’s contralto voice.” Rosetta invited Marie to tour with her, and they performed as a team for several years. Sister Rosetta and Marie’s 1947 recording of Up above My Head There’s Music in the Air reached number 6 on the Billboard chart in 1948. Marie sang both Gospel and Rock and Roll, but in her later years sang only Gospel.
When Marie Knight moved back to New York City, she began attending Dolly Lewis’ Gates of Prayer Church, where she organized the choir. Floyd was the pianist and his friend from Pell city the organist. “So, we started playing for Marie,” Floyd smiled. “I’ve got albums that I’m playing for Marie.” He lowered his voice to a baritone before saying, “She had a voice!”
When Marie began planning another tour, she came to Floyd and said, “How would you like to travel to Europe with me?” Floyd laughs as he tells it. “I said, ‘Oh, I don’t know about that!’ ‘Well, you’re gonna get paid,’ she told me. So, I said, ‘We’ll have to ask Mama.’ That’s what we called Pastor Dolly Lewis.”
Floyd asked Lewis’ advice, and after consideration, she agreed for him to travel with Marie, and assured him, “I’m gonna make sure she pays you, cause she’s kind of close with money.”
Floyd flew with Marie Knight and her entourage to Paris. Landing at the Charles De Gaulle Airport, they were met with the concert tour officials who took them to their lodgings for the night. From Paris they traveled to a city in southern France, whose name Floyd could not recall. From that city, Marie, accompanied by Floyd at the piano, gave concerts in various locations.
Then, it was on to San Sebastian, Spain, for the concluding few weeks of Marie’s tour. Then back to New York City.
“From that day,” Floyd recalls with pleasure, “Marie was happy to have me with her. But she paid,” he laughed. “Those hundred-dollar bills smelled good! And I kept on playing for her.”
Floyd met his future wife, Evelyn Keith, at Gates of Prayer Church. Evelyn grew up in Childersburg, so they had mutual connections back home. She was a singer, so she and Floyd sang together at whichever church he played for. They had one son, Kenny.
Floyd continued playing piano for Prophetess Dolly Lewis at Gates of Prayer Church until she died. When Lewis died, Marie Knight – now singing only Gospel – became pastor of Gates of Prayer. Floyd played piano at the church until Marie died in 2009 from pneumonia complications.
The Waites were on vacation in Alabama when Marie passed, Floyd relates. “They got in contact with me while my wife and I were down here on vacation, and we rushed back to New York.” When asked if he played piano for her service, Floyd responded, “I didn’t do too much playing, but I did sing some of the songs that she had sung, and I had played for her down through the years.”
Floyd also directed the choir in singing one of Marie’s best known Gospel recordings, Didn’t It Rain.
Dual roles
Most of the years that Floyd played piano at Gates of Prayer, he also played for another nearby church, Greater Hood Memorial AME Zion Church. “I was playing at Hood Memorial all along, because it was on a different time schedule for that church … And it was just around the corner from Gates of Prayer. I played the piano for them for years. And I played organ for them, too, because I had gotten into playing the organ. I played for the choirs – they had a nice senior choir that sang anthems,” Floyd paused, then added, “It was a fairly big church.”
Greater Hood Memorial is historic in Black churches in America. Established in 1824 as Harlem AME Zion, this oldest Black church in Harlem has survived economic downturns (the Great Depression put them in dire financial circumstances), several relocations and a few name changes. But it has survived with Sunday services continuing for 200 years.
Having reached retirement age, Floyd supervised his last school lunch, played his last Sunday service in Harlem, packed his belongings and returned to the place called home, Pell City, Alabama.
Floyd relates how he and Evelyn came to Pell City every year for the month of August to visit relatives and churches in the area. They always visited Coosa Valley Baptist Church in Vincent where Rev. Willie Joe Posey was pastor.
Floyd in France at the Bosendorfer piano
“He would always tell me, when me and my wife would come down from New York, ‘Floyd, come on up here and sing, you and your wife,’ and we’d go up and sing for him. And he’d say, ‘Y’all see that man there? If he ever decides to come outta New York City, I want him right there,’ and he’d point to the piano.”
Today, Floyd is the full-time pianist at Coosa Valley Baptist where Rev. Posey still pastors. However, he ministers alone, for Evelyn died while they were living in New York. “I’ve been with Rev. Posey ever since I came back home to live,” Floyd muses quietly.
“I don’t charge them at the church, but Rev. Posey told me, ‘Oh no, you have to accept something, because people know how good you play and sing, they gonna take you away from us. The church will have to give you something. We don’t want you to leave us.’ So, I said, ‘Well, just sometime give me a love offering, but I don’t expect to be on salary. I don’t charge anything.’ So, every third Sunday, they give me a love offering, and I accept it.”
Rev. Posey has pastored the church for 48 years, and speaks highly of Floyd. “He has proven himself a believer in God and Christ. He’s a faithful man. He’s true to his word. … When he was in New York, I told him when he moved back here, he had a place (at our church), and he’s been with me.” Rev. Posey also noted the beautiful vocal harmony when Floyd and Evelyn sang together at the church.
In the community, Floyd is frequently asked to play for revivals, funerals and special events. At the 2024 Black History event at the Pell City Museum, he was one of the featured musicians of the day.
Many in the community call him “Uncle Floyd,” as did Amelia Beavers when she was asked for a comment. “There are so many things that I could say about Uncle Floyd, but the best thing is that he loves the Lord, and he loves people. He helps throughout his community any way that he can.
“If a loved one dies, he is willing to come to play and sing for the family. He has been a jewel of a friend coming back home to live. He is a beautiful asset to our community. I pray for him many years of serving the Lord and his community. All you have to do is ask and if he does not have another engagement, he is more than willing to accommodate.”
Floyd and Evelyn’s son, Kenny, lives in Childersburg, so Floyd is active in his life and the lives of his four grandchildren – two girls and two boys.
How would he like to be remembered? “I’d just like to be remembered as using the gifts that the Lord has given to me. If I was called to do something, it wasn’t for reimbursement. I thank God for the gift, and I thank Him that He allowed me to use it … It’s a gift that He has given, and I just want to give back.”
As a child and as an adolescent in Pell City, music captivated Floyd Waites and has held him fast all his years. One of the songs he played for Marie Knight was the traditional song Up Above My Head, and the lyrics are true for Floyd –
Up above my head, there’s music in the air Up above my head there’s music in the air, Up above my head there’s music in the air, And I really do know, Yes I really do know, There’s a heaven somewhere.
So, Floyd Waites, keep on playing and singing “for the Lord” and sharing your God-given gifts, for without a doubt, you enrich the music life of Pell City and St. Clair County. l
