Blue Ridge Country July/August 2023 - 7

FROM THE EDITOR
packages on mountain people and places over
the ensuing decade or so before embarking elsewhere.
Now lives again in the Roanoke area.
7. Helen Barranger (Sept/Oct '88) realized
her life-long dream to be a professional
writer in our pages, contributing meticulously
researched and written stories on things like
the tragic 1969 flooding of Nelson County,
Virginia, the frescoes of Ashe County, North
Carolina, and many more. The magazine's first
contributing editor died in 2020 at age 98.
8. Steve Shaluta (Sept/Oct '88) was the
magazine's go-to cover photographer in the
early years, with four consecutive covers from
the second issue through the fifth. The former
photographer for the West Virginia Department
of Commerce (1985-2015) still contributes
images to the magazine from his retirement
spot in Florida.
12. Liz Houhoulis began as an account
rep in '93 and served as lead sales person for
the magazine for most of the years until 2014.
The annual Travel Guide in each Jan/Feb issue
was her conception. She passed away in 2017
at age 56.
9. Joan Vannorsdall (May/June '89)
has been, since that first issue's piece on West
Virginia's Sweet Chalybeate Springs, the magazine's
most important history writer. Her first
piece on the Melungeons served to bring the
publication to a wider audience and to establish
its credibility as a voice of the region. She is
the author of two fine novels, a former member
of the Alleghany County, Virginia, Board of Supervisors
and continues to contribute features
and her " Our Blue Ridge Towns " column from
her beloved town of Clifton Forge, Virginia.
She is a contributing editor.
10. Bruce Ingram (May/June '89). His
interests in the outdoors in general and in specifics
ranging from birds and wild edibles to
paddling and fishing the region's rivers have
been a part the magazine since its second year.
He is a long-time teacher in the Botetourt
County, Virginia, school system, has spent his
adult life working to own and preserve land
and is gloriously married to his long-time
sweetheart, with whom he shares the grandparenting
duties that are the substance of his
column, " Gifts of the Land. "
11. Marla Hardee Milling (Sept/Oct
'89) has long been the magazine's go-to for all
things Asheville and many things North Carolina.
She is the author of three books about
Asheville and another about North Carolina
travel. Her pieces about Thomas Wolfe and
Zelda Fitzgerald are among the most popular in
the magazine's history. She became a contributing
editor in 2013 and continues to contribute
from her home in Asheville.
13. Theresa Lewis (Sept/Oct '93) began
with the company as a typesetter for all our
publications, and led the company into the
realms of email, electronic production, databases
and perhaps 10 other innovations we take
for granted today, all while serving as the most
amazing assistant/fact-checker/Radar O'Reilly a
guy could have. Her ability to see everything
coming and to figure out anything at all that
the rest of us couldn't resulted in a companywide
jolt when she retired in 2019.
14. Jo Diedrich (Sept/Oct '94) began her
distinguished sales career with the magazine
and has come back to it from time to time over
the years as she has become Leisure's secondlongest-tenured
employee and its record-revenue
sales person. For most of the last 20 years
her primary title has been sales director for the
Virginia Travel Guide as she has served as a
leading face of the company all over Virginia
and beyond.
15. Pat & Chuck Blackley (March/April
'95). Pick any of the seven Blue Ridge Countrycoverage-area
states, or most any U.S. state for
that matter, click into Pat & Chuck's Smug Mug
page and you will find . . . well, pretty much
whatever you need in the way of a beautiful
outdoor image. There've been many times over
the years where we've lacked a key photo until
the Blackleys sent along a dozen shots of the
entity for us to choose from. They continue
their work from Staunton, Virginia.
16. Patty Jackson (Sept/Oct '95) has
served as production director for all of Leisure's
publications since that year, guiding the company
through paper crises, transportation tangles,
printer negotiations (through which she
earned her nickname as " The Velvet Hammer " )
and a thousand other invisible details mostly
known only to her and which parallel the life
of an umpire-tireless, invisible work with toolittle
notice.
17. D. Gail Fleenor (Jan/Feb '97). The
magazine's third contributing editor was a
hard-working a freelance travel writer for more
than a decade. She lives in Bristol, Virginia,
and is a contributing editor for Progressive
Grocer magazine.
JULY/AUGUST 2023 7
Blue Ridge Country July/August 2023

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Blue Ridge Country July/August 2023
