Blog bits: Doug Llewelyn revisited, an Ashvegas rock message board and some crazy MackDowell County news

Doug Llewelyn follow-up
It’s always funny how we say things first here, and they show up other places. Last week, we did a post about former People’s Court anchorman Doug Llewelyn being spotted at the Barnes & Noble here in Ashvegas. Then suddenly on Sunday, the Hendersonville newspaper puts out a giant profile on the guy. It’s the first local story we’ve seen about the F-list celeb after 10 years of him living here, but nobody does it until we write about it. Huh.

A snippet:

Llewelyn, 68, has many memorable moments with “The People’s Court,” but one in particular stands out for him.

“I got bitten by a dog on live television,” he recalls. The court case entailed the defendant shooting the neighbor’s dog’s eye out, and then not paying for the veterinarian bills. Llewelyn remembers interviewing the plaintiffs, who had the dog with them. …

“The People’s Court” was just one of Llewelyn’s celebrity gigs.

The walls of his Hendersonville home that he shares with his wife, Dale, are lined with photos detailing the fascinating adventures and colorful career of the Maryland-born television star. Here’s a sample of the big-name celebrities on his wall that he’s been photographed with: Sylvester Stallone, Perry Como, Goldie Hahn, Robert Redford, Frank Sinatra, John Wayne, Roger Moore, Burt Reynolds and Dustin Hoffman.

…

Llewelyn, who’s lived in Hendersonville for the past 10 years, got his start in the news and television industry with his studies at the University of South Carolina.

Working as the chief announcer at a South Carolina television news station, Llewelyn quickly moved up the ranks. He landed a job as a page at NBC in New York and went to work for the late well-known crooner, Perry Como.

Over the years, Llewelyn also worked as a foreign correspondent, an anchorman and a television host in New York, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C.

And then there’s Llewelyn’s entrepreneurial side.

Llewelyn co-created and developed what he dubs the “Electronic Press Kit” for movies in 1980. The kit was a pre-produced, behind-the-scenes look at making a movie in the form of television news stories and short features that are now almost always a part of DVD movies.

“When I say we started an industry — we did,” Llewelyn says. He recalls working on a press kit for a favorite movie: ET The Extraterrestrial, directed by Steven Spielberg. Turns out Spielberg was a fan of “The People’s Court,” so he would ask Llewelyn about cases on the show.

Ashvegas rocks
Here’s a rock’n’roll message board dedicated to Ashvegas music. Interesting.

News from that crazy MackDowell County…
This story was published the day after Halloween:

Gregory Allen Brooks, 35, of Smith Hill Road in Marion reported Monday that someone stole a semi-trailer from the parking lot of the Marion Travel Plaza on Sugar Hill Road.

It was loaded with 30,000 pounds of butterscotch candy.

The trailer was taken sometime between 6:30 p.m. Sunday and 5:30 a.m. Monday.

Capt. Dudley Greene of the McDowell County Sheriff’s Office said Brooks parked the trailer at the truck stop temporarily and drove the tractor part of his rig home. He added that either a suspect purposely stole the trailer or another trucker accidentally got the wrong one.

And while there’s really no good reason for this story, we felt our day wasn’t complete without it:

Cupcake looks fearless sitting on the mo-ped in his Panthers’ helmet, eyes staring expectantly at the convenience store door. He knows any minute his human companion, Victor Rodriguez, will come out and they’ll hit the road again, one of Cupcake’s very favorite things to do.

Rodriguez is glad for the company.

Times were not so good for him a few years back.

Wanting to do something to help her father deal with the sadness he was going through, his daughter gave him a miniature white Chihuahua named Cupcake.