In Oakley We Lived on Gentry Hill, Which We Got to by Crayton Rd. and Liberty St.

But now you can only get to it by School Rd.  And there across from us on Dogwood Drive and up on the east side of Gentry Hill sat a big mobile home with a huge pile of beer cans out beside it, being the home of Fiddlin' Bill Hensley:

https://www.shorpy.com/node/6670?size=_original

Joe Gentry loved Fiddlin' Bill and gave him a place to live.  You could tell he was getting old because when he walked his knees often buckled and he'd let out a yelp and a cussword and hopped when he walked, like Gran'pappy Amos McCoy.   I always loved to hear him play his fiddle sitting out on a little deck behind the trailer.   He gave me the first swig of whisky I ever tasted and marveled that I was able to get it down without choking.   I asked him for more but that was my first and last gift from Fiddlin' Bill.  I remember the label on the bottle:   "Stillbrook Corn Whisky."   

If I got too close while he played his fiddle, he'd run me off.   There was something about him that kept me coming back in fascination for the man.   He was old and I was 9 or 10.  At the time I did not realize how famous he was.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgC_lsTdkjM&ab_channel=Banjerholler

I remember this tune.   He always played a variation of it, and then one day he told me if I'd bring such-and-such girl with me up to his little pavilion, he'd play AND sing.   

Her name was Annette but I never could get her to come, although she lived nearby.  

She was the first girl I knew who said she'd show me hers if I'd show her mine.   I did and she cheated.  She reneged.   I kept reminding her:   A few months later at the Rec Park she took me off to a private corner of the pool, pulled down the bottom half of her dazzling bathing suit with daisies on it... and showed me.  She became the girl of my dreams.  I fell instantly in love with her and loved her all my life.

RIP!, Fiddlin' Bill, my dear friend.