J. TODD FOSTER: Faithful Reader, 83, Rates A Special Deal From Paper

After a while, it’s easy for newspapermen and women to get a little jaded and cynical. Sometimes we unwittingly forget why we do this and the lives we can touch. Then someone like William Douglas Jones, better known as “Billy,” comes along and relights our path.
Billy Jones is 83 years old and spent 77 of those years in his native Bristol Tennessee. But by the early 2000s, most of Billy’s six siblings had passed or were in poor health. He moved to a group home for developmentally disabled adults in Eastaboga, Ala., in the shadow of Talladega Superspeedway, near his only surviving brother.
Billy was born in 1925 to Roy and Lula Jones, who raised their clan on Windsor Avenue during the Great Depression. All the children were born healthy, except for Billy. A birth injury left him with a severe speech impediment. He also has cerebral palsy.
HE ATTENDED elementary school until the third grade, when his teacher deemed him “unlearnable” and the school system kicked him out.
“Today, he would be the perfect candidate for special education,” said his sister-in-law, Faye Jones, of Bristol Tennessee.
Billy’s parents only had fifth-grade educations, but Roy worked hard as a railroad machinist while Lula raised the seven children. They made sure their children could read and provided them the only two forms of reading material they could afford: the Holy Bible and a subscription to the Bristol Herald Courier.
Even after their parents passed, the siblings made sure Billy got his newspaper. Then came his move in 2002 to Alabama to live at the Ritch House, a group home at Rainbow Omega Inc.
BILLY IS the oldest of 79 residents there and is universally known as “Uncle Bill.”
As his 83rd birthday approached in February, Billy’s family asked him what he wanted as a gift. He didn’t have to ponder the question long: “The Bristol newspaper.”
Billy’s nephew, Jim Jones, of Bristol Tennessee, approached this newspaper in early May about the possibility of a complimentary lifetime subscription to the Bristol Herald Courier. In these trying economic times for newspapers, such requests generally are not feasible. We made an exception for Billy.
Last week, I called Billy in Alabama and put him on the speaker phone with his caregiver, Stacey McWilliams, a manager at Ritch House. Faye Jones and her son, Jim, were with me on the other end of the call to help interpret Billy’s answers to a few questions.
“I MISS all my friends in Bristol,” said Billy, who remains well known at the Slater Senior Center and First Baptist Church here.
Asked his favorite part of the newspaper, Billy said, “The funny papers and obituaries.”
That brought a chuckle from nephew Jim Jones, 43, a construction superintendent for an area general contractor.
Outside of Billy’s earshot, Jim Jones explained that Uncle Bill’s difficulty communicating is not a reflection on his intelligence. “His mind is sharp as a tack,” he said. “He’s nobody’s fool.”
ADDED MCWILLIAMS: “He’s sharp minded. He’s very into the elections. He talks about Hillary and Obama all the time. He told me this morning [Wednesday] he was going to have to vote Republican.”
Billy passes much of his time in Alabama watching train videos and Westerns. He brags about Bristol Motor Speedway. He laments his lost connection to Bristol but is excited he’ll be receiving the newspaper by mail – even if it’s a few days late.
“He’s been on Cloud Nine,” McWilliams said. “He’s gone around and told every house he can get to that he’s going to be interviewed and in the newspaper.”
A DEVOUT Christian, Billy longs for the day when he’ll meet his maker on that ultimate of level playing fields.
Many years ago, Billy told his mother: “When I get to Heaven, I’ll be able to talk just like everybody else.”
Until then, here’s hoping that the funny papers will keep Billy laughing every day.

J. Todd Foster is managing editor of the Bristol Herald Courier and can be reached at or (276) 645-2513.