Patsy’s Fans Make Annual Pilgrimmage to Winchester By: D.S. Tyson The Winchester Star The heavy-set set man with ghost white hair pulled weeds with the vigor of children picking dandelions for their mother. The more he picked the pesky weeds around a flat headstone, the more his emtotions began to show on his chubby face. Small beads of sweat dashed off his face and splattered on a grave that read simply in part: Virginia Patterson Hensley. Betting he could win against time and Friday’s thunderstorm, Bernard Miller of Belvidere, Ill., kept pulling the weeds around Patsy Cline’s plot. When Mother Nature threw her final card, the skies opened and sheets of rain descended from above. Rejected, he walked back to his black car and headed towards a local hotel and his sixth trip to the annual Patsy Cline Fan Club celebration held this weekend in her home city. “She touched my life. We were going through some of the same problems at the same times. She found release in singing; I found release in the bottle,” the 64-year-old retiree said. Nearly four decades after the legendary singer’s death, Miller still remembers sitting in Illinois listening to her smoky voice travel through wires and tubes. A voice filled with pain. A voice telling of heartache. A voice belonging to someone who has been down that road, believes Miller. Rather it was hits like “Crazy”, “Walkin’ After Midnight”, “Sweet Dream,” or any song of the B side, Cline’s voice helped ease the pain that only a heart can carry. Regardless of how bad the spousal fights or the amount of alcohol consumed to forget life, he said by placing a Cline album on the record player his problems rolled away like boulders down a steep mountain. The frankness in her songs is what helped Miller through some trying situations, he said. Her lyrics were about determination and loneliness. Odd in an era when women sang about dependency on men. “From what I understand, she called a spade a spade. If she didn’t like you, she’d tell you, but if she called you ‘hoss,’ you were a friend for life,” said Miller. “I respect a person who is straightforward and honest. And she was.” Although Miller never personally met Cline, he’s read all her biographies, owns a copy of the semi-autobiographical movie “Sweet Dreams,” all her compact discs, and a roomful of memorabilia. “Her songs are real. I think it’s the highest compliment you can pay a singer,” he said. Patsy Cline’s fan club has been gathering in Winchester Labor Day weekend each year for the past eight years. The weekend festivities include dances, dining, and a graveside service.

Originally Published In The Winchester Star On September 4, 2001







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