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IT GETS CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER
IT GETS CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER
By Leonard Shapiro
Whenever I speak to high school or college students interested in possible careers in journalism, I always focus on what I consider to be the most important trait of all. It’s called curiosity, which may have killed the cat but is the coursing lifeblood for any reporter or editor on the planet.
Readers often ask how we manage to fill Country ZEST with so many interesting stories, and for the most part, the answer almost always has to do with curiosity.
A few years ago, we did a piece on a local Marshall business that had a small fleet of old military vehicles out in the parking lot—trucks, jeeps, armored cars and more. I passed the place virtually every day for years until my curiosity finally got the best of me and I called to set up an interview.
Turned out the owner not only was a collector—acquiring them online, at auctions or private sales—but also ended up renting many of them out for use in popular TV shows and well-known movies.
Who knew?
For years, I was curious about a gravestone a few yards off Route 50 under a tree not far from the Atoka Road. A while back, so was one of our writers, who delivered a fabulous story about the history of that marker over the grave of a slain Confederate soldier.
He’d been badly injured in a local Civil War skirmish, taken in by owners of a nearby farm, then buried right there (long before Route 50) when he succumbed to his fatal injuries. Now, I look for that stone marker any time I’m driving west to east toward Middleburg. Maybe you will, too.
I’ve always been intrigued by my neighbors, the entrepreneurial couple of Tara and Ben Wegdam. They own four different shops along the main street of Middleburg, and 24 in all from Connecticut down to South Carolina. And 2025 marks the 25th anniversary of their remarkable retail enterprise, so what better time to feature them and their fascinating story on the cover.
How many times have you driven through town on the way to Aldie and seen the sign for Mickie Gordon Park? Curious to know more about Mickie? Some long-time residents surely remember him, but writer Denis Cotter has done a wonderful job in telling the rest of us all about the late, long-time youth baseball coach.
Salamander Middleburg has a relatively new managing director, Scott Little, and you can read all about his long, impressive career in this issue. And lowkey but totally dedicated town manager Danny Davis has done wonderful work steering the town in all the right directions. If you’re curious about more details, keep turning the pages, where you’ll also find so much more to add a whole bunch of ZEST to your summer reading enjoyment.
Leonard Shapiro Editor
badgerlen@aol.com 410-570-8447
