Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, August 28, 1995 TAG: 9508280167
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WINCHESTER LENGTH: Medium
Many Winchester residents once considered the late country singer Patsy Cline an immoral, wild woman. Now - to the irritation of other places where Cline also lived - the city is claiming bragging rights as her hometown.
Winchester will throw its first-ever ``Patsy Cline Festival'' this weekend. Hundreds of fans are expected to attend a memorial service at her grave and visit her old high school and the pharmacy where she once served sodas.
But Gore, a community 12 miles away that was Cline's first home, isn't part of the tribute. Residents there resent it.
``They think Gore is nothing,'' said Lyndell Anderson, 63, a truck repairman who went to elementary school with Cline. ``We feel left out.''
Winchester's embrace of Cline also is annoying because Winchester residents shunned Cline when she was alive, Gore residents say.
``It's a joke,'' said a cashier at Gore's only store, the C&S Again Groceries. ``She was considered a wild woman who ran around with men, and people in Winchester didn't like her much. Now, all of a sudden, they're like, `Oh, we're the home of Patsy Cline.'''
Gore residents would like to turn their abandoned elementary school into a memorial to Cline. Frederick County officials say they aren't interested in funding the project but would consider helping to pay for a Cline museum in Winchester, although Winchester plans to raise most of the money from private sources.
Then there is Elkton, a Rockingham County town where Cline and her parents lived briefly. It has drawn up plans to build a Cline concert hall and museum in the center of town.
More is at stake than hurt feelings. A community's link to Cline is worth some tourism dollars, local officials acknowledge.
Cline, who crooned hits such as ``Walkin' After Midnight,'' ``I Fall to Pieces'' and ``Crazy,'' died in a plane crash in 1963 at the age of 30. Sales of her recordings have boomed in recent years, in part because of her depiction in the 1985 movie ``Sweet Dreams,'' starring Jessica Lange.
Margaret Jones, author of a recent Cline biography, said there are a dozen places in Virginia that could claim to be the nomadic Cline's hometown.
``Part of the problem is that the family moved around 19 times before she was 15,'' Jones said.
Winchester officials, however, say their city should be considered Cline's home because she lived here longest - 12 years - and always identified herself as being from Winchester.
According to Jones, the singer was born Sept. 8, 1932, at Winchester Memorial Hospital, but her home address at the time was in Gore. Her family stayed in Gore only a few weeks before moving to a farmhouse just outside Elkton. They returned to Gore twice before making a final move to Winchester when Cline was 15.
As an adult, Cline moved to Frederick, Md., to live with her first husband, Gerald Cline, and then to Nashville with her second husband, Charles Dick.
As recently as 1986, the Winchester City Council rejected plans to name a street after Cline. But six years ago, a real estate developer convinced city leaders that honoring the country queen would be good for business. The city put up a sign declaring itself to be Cline's hometown and filled a display case in the visitor center with the singer's records.
by CNB