
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 8, 1994                   TAG: 9406170014
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 9   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: BIG STONE GAP                                LENGTH: Short

LONG-LASTING DRAMA

``The Trail of the Lonesome Pine,'' the longest-running outdoor drama in Virginia and designated this year by the General Assembly as the ``state'' outdoor drama, will start its 31st season June 23.

Gov. George Allen signed the legislature's designation in April, making it official.

Melanie Horner of Big Stone Gap will return for a second season as June Tolliver, the mountain girl who represents the link between rural life in Southwest Virginia before its coal boom and the modernization that swept into the region afterward. Rocky Cooper, a Big Stone Gap native, will return as engineer Jack Hale, who falls in love with her.

Russell County native Jerry Vencil returns for a third season as Devil Judd Tolliver, patriarch of one of the mountain clan. He will also perform one of his original story-telling characters each Wednesday evening at the drama location behind the June Tolliver House and Museum.

The play is based on the well-known novel by John Fox Jr. It was adapted for the stage by the late Earl Hobson Smith, who also scripted ``The Long Way Home,'' the region's other outdoor drama performed each summer at Radford.

The drama will be performed Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. through Sept. 3. Reservations and further information are available by calling 1-800-362-0149.

by CNB