(34) ROY THOMPSON and THE WINSTON-SALEM JOURNAL

As I mentioned previously, in the Cover Tune era, a song that became popular in one region might be recorded in another region by another artist who was especially popular there. This is the way small record labels earned their bread and butter, though sometimes all the competition for the best cover diluted the profits. United Artists really beat the publicity drums for me and I traveled all over the country and my record sold all over too, but I was especially popular in the Winston-Salem, Greensboro, and High Point, "Tri-City" area of North Carolina. As a result my traveling always included a stop there.

I made my first demo record in a kitchen with some other kids in Winston-Salem, when I lived there while building homes and additions with my father. Dad remarried some time after mom died and he lived in Winston-Salem with his new wife in a house I was able to buy him lock, stock, and barrel, from my first residuals check for "Lonesome Love," and "Tiny Spaceman." Dad had always built homes with quality in mind but he never profited enough to buy a home for himself. I was so proud of being able to reward him for all his hard work with a house, and he took to it with saw and hammer to custom build the interior.

When I became a teen idol, journalist Roy Thompson from the Winston-Salem Journal took special pleasure in letting everyone in town know that the home town boy was back to visit.

Roy Thompson, with his Sherlock Holmes pipe and natty clothing, meant to do well by me.

But he let information slip that lead the girls to my dad's phone number in the book and my dad's address.

My dad found it all amusing but his wife was barely able to cope with the invasion of girls that appeared around the house and yard waiting for me after Roy announced my presence in town.

The phone kept ringing. And ringing. And ringing!

A couple years back I tried to find out where Roy Thompson was to THANK him. I was told he was retired from the paper and might be living in a senior apartment somewhere... If anyone knows where I can contact Roy, please let me know.

Here's a little article on Roy Thompson that has a picture of him looking like Sherlock Holmes that my writing partner Christine and I found on the Internet...

LINK TO PICTURE OF ROY and OTHER INFORMATION above! Click on the title!