Kathy Watson, our new neighbor in Unit #1785, moved to Huntington Woods from Deep Gap, NC, a mountain community just east of Boone on the way to Wilkesboro,
where she grew up. Kathy came from a law enforcement family and married into a law enforcement family. Her father was a sheriff of Wilkes County and her husband David’s grandfather was a sheriff of Watauga County. She has great memories of growing up in Wilkesboro, all of which made me think of “Mayberry, USA”. Neighbors watched over all the children, so she and her six friends could freely roam, visiting storekeepers and other adults for candy and homemade treats. Occasionally they were allowed to slip into the back of the local courthouse to quietly watch the trials.
Upon graduation from high school, she moved to Boone and worked in Blowing Rock until she married her husband, David. During her time there, Blowing Rock was
just beginning to grow and become the vacation and tourist spot that it is today. Kathy shook her head with amusement when she said that she met some “very interesting” people while living there.
After their marriage, in 1974, they built their home in Deep Gap. They loved the mountains, especially the seasonal changes, the snow and snow sports. It was a great place for family life, picnics on the Blue Ridge Parkway, tubing on the New River, annual trips to Tweetsie Railroad, and delicious homemade ice cream on the 4th of July while watching fireworks. David worked for Bell South Telephone Company and Kathy was a stay-at-home mom to raise their two children, Scott, and Brandy.
Early on Kathy began her “career” of volunteer work when she and David volunteered for the Telephone Pioneers of America, a non-profit charitable organization. Pioneer volunteers donate as much as 50 million hours a year to charitable work in different states. David also served as a volunteer fireman and Kathy joined that auxiliary. Later she joined Ruritan Club, a service group, that helped with heating bills, scholarships, parks, and donated books. Other volunteer work over the years included Relay for Life to raise funds for cancer research and with Samaritan’s Purse where she helped make homemade clothes and toys for their shoe box gifts for Third World Countries.
David and Kathy did a lot of traveling to other states through their volunteer work with Telephone Pioneers, as well as frequent personal travel to Florida and to New Orleans.
A special, fun family vacation was a trip to Paris when Brandy graduated from high school. Scott had already done significant traveling by that time, so he was their tour guide throughout the trip.
When Scott and Brandy were grown, Kathy began working at the Appalachian State University Bookstore in a position that she enjoyed because of her work with students. She was there for seventeen years before retiring, although she does keep her hand in business by managing the two rentals that she owns,
Her hobbies include a love of crocheting and sewing, gardening, baking, and singing gospel music. She also collects beer steins and stamps. Kathy’s parting words to me were that she considers her greatest achievements to be her two children, Scott Watson and Brandy Young, her three grandchildren and her three greatgrandchildren.
Welcome to our community, Kathy.
