"THE CURSE OF THE WERE-RABBIT" AND THE LIBERTY THEATER

Last night my wife and I went to see Wallace and Gromit in their latest movie. If you don't know who or what I am talking about, give yourself and your family a treat and go see it. It's a hoot. Wallace is a sweet but utterly clueless inventor with a passion for cheese. Gromit is his faithful dog - and clearly the brighter bulb of the two. They run a company called "Anti-Pesto" to rid their community of pests, in this case vegetable eating bunnies. In a humane manner, of course, which seems to mean keeping the little beasts down in their basement. When Wallace decides to brainwash the bunnies to hate veggies, something goes dreadfully wrong and he creates a monster - the Were-Rabbit! Gromit has to step in to save the day, as usual. This is all done with old-fashioned claymation, moving clay models a fraction of an inch to photograph each frame. Do that about a million times and you have a movie. Do it with genius and you have this movie.

We saw it at an under appreciated gem of Wilkes: the old Liberty Theater. Nothing fancy, just an old cinema on main street, one of the last. No mega-plex with sound systems capable of registering on the Richter scale. Just a simple little place like the old days. The problem was that half way through the movie the projector went haywire. First the frame began to flutter faster and faster until it was a blur, then went black while the sound got slower.... and s-l-o-w-e-r... and then came to a long slow halt. Things were beginning to get ugly with the five year old crowd until the technician got it fixed in the nick of time. If it is a problem with the film they can send it back, if it is a problem with the projector it could be a real headache for the owner.

I am not sure we understand just what the Liberty means to the community. Ever since the West Park cinema closed it is the only place to see a movie without a long drive to Boone (also reduced to one cinema) or to Jonesville (which has problems with its equipment also). Or, you can always drive down to Winston. But for a quick matinee with the kids, what could be better. And it is right here in North Wilkesboro. Cheap too.

But I have questions. There is at least one other abandoned theater rotting here in Wilkesboro. What happened to it?Is it because of videos, tape and DVD, computers and cable, that communities are losing their own downtown cinemas? Can the Twin Hamlets continue to support the Liberty? Can we ever get West Park back? Anyone out there have any ideas?

REVERSE HORSE THIEVES....

I'm not sure what is going on, but here is a story from The Wilkes Journal-Patriot for 3 October.

"A woman who lives ... in eastern Wilkes County reported to the Wilkes Sheriff's Department that she found two horses she hadn't seen before in her fenced pasture near her residence....

"... one horse is a paint with three white 'stockings' and the other an appaloosa with chestnut spots, stated the sheriff's department report. The horses appeared in good condition.

"There was no damage to the fencing so someone had to have put the horses in the pastrure, the report said."

Perhaps is was simply Otis.

WHEN INTELLECTUALS GO BAD...

A friend returned from the Wilkes library in North Wilkesboro today and said police were there investigating a stolen truck. It seems a gentleman discovered his late model pick-up was stolen and put the word out. A friend of his was driving by and noticed it parked in the library's parking lot. Police were called to investigate. Nothing was stolen or broken. The assumption is that teens stole the car for a joy ride and then dumped it at the library. Let's hope they chose the spot because they like to read.

NOT MAYBERRY ...... WELL, MAYBE

I thought I was being clever in calling a site about Wilkesboro "Not Mayberry," thinking this would lead to all sorts of interesting exposes of the darker side of life in a small town (what's really going on with the town/hospital fight, etc). Then this morning I was told by a local amateur historian that he had been told by a professional historian that Wilkesboro actually was the model for Mayberry!

If you stop and think about it it makes sense. Mayberry had no hint of a working class mill town, which is what Mt Airy is. It was close enough to the mountains so that real mountaineers sometimes wandered into the plot yet it didn't seem to be in the mountains itself. In general the whole atmosphere of Mayberry may have been closer to Wilkesboro, and probably not North Wilkesboro which was a bigger town with a great deal going on, at least in the 50's and 60's.