By Frances Stebbins, Correspondent
[This is a memory from the many decades the author has been privileged to write for daily and weekly newspapers circulating in Western Virginia.]
With the recent retirement of Dr. Kevin Kelleher, who wrote a column on medical issues, especially important to senior adults, I am the contributor who has been writing the longest time for “Senior News.”
If you’re not familiar, it’s a monthly free publication available in Food Lion grocery stores throughout the Roanoke and New River Valleys, as well as the Lynchburg area. It contains a wealth of information of interest, especially to persons in the age group of those eligible for Social Security.
Ms. Ellen Deaton, editor of the publication since its beginning 27 years ago, needs a new Medical Columnist. Three physicians that I consulted on her behalf were unable to fulfill the need. One, a specialist, suggested that a Family Practitioner would be the most likely fit.
Kelleher has had such a practice in the Cave Spring area; he now plans to do some teaching, Deaton told me.
During the many years the Roanoke County doctor wrote the column, he discussed many everyday issues on everything from cleaning ears to allergies, from anxiety to foot problems. He discussed prescription drugs and supplements. Always he used readable language. I, for one, will surely miss his sensible advice.
If you are a reader/physician and want to provide this monthly service for hundreds of senior adults in the region, call Ms. Deaton at 540-354-8157 or email her at SenrNews@aol.com.
Deaton has been a widow since not long after she and her husband Jim established the magazine in Western Virginia. He died unexpectedly around the turn of the 21st century. She lives in the Cave Spring area of Roanoke County. The magazine lists her as Owner/Editor and the Owner/Publisher as Jeffery K. Williams of St. Simons Island, Georgia. Gary Cooper of Roanoke handles advertising sales and relies heavily on the area’s many retirement homes in a 60-mile radius as well as various providers of home health care and services.
Over the years, both culture and people have changed as well as the appearance of the magazine. When “Senior News” was born, the Deaton’s had a daughter of kindergarten age named Lauren; they referred to her in a white lie as a granddaughter to make her seem more relevant to the readers they wanted to cultivate. For a time in her childhood, Lauren contributed a short reflection.
Today, she’s a young adult pictured with her mother on page four, which also carries a short column by Ellen Deaton promoting monthly features relating to the season.
The late Lutheran pastor George Bowers who served St. Mark’s Church in Old Southwest Roanoke for most of his lifetime, told me about the new “Senior News” around 1998. A writer himself, Bowers contributed devotional columns for several years of his retirement time; he thought I, as a longtime Religion Writer for the daily Roanoke newspaper, might like to join the staff. Then, as now, there was no pay for contributors. That comes for me in the widely read periodical, for strangers and old friends like a couple at my church say they enjoy my reflections.
Dr. Kelleher is not the only familiar columnist missing. For many years, I enjoyed the Travel columns of the late Gail Tansill Lambert; we became friends with a mutual devotion to our Southern heritage almost entirely online and in the final year of her life before a fall at her home ended it the past summer.
I’ve changed the title of my column recently from Religion to Mountain Lover. Two new columnists Steve L. Garay {“Just Passin’ Through”) is a Church of God pastor who puts a new spin on family travel. Clinton J. West is a Bishop in the Church of God living near Richmond and currently the State Evangelist. Even when writing of an important cat in his life, he offers a devotional reflection.
And there is now Kyle Edgell, a woman trained as a “Jollyologist” whose column reflects on the value of humor, especially for senior adults who easily fall into sad moods, particularly when alone too much as over the past months.
No space to mention the many other regular contributors to “Senior News” who brighten its pages monthly.
And if you catch it in time, the magazine on Wednesday, November 3, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. is sponsoring the 2021 Senior Fun and Health Care Day at the Salem Civic Center. I’ve been to these for hours in the past and enjoyed – entirely free – talks on relevant issues, free samples, entertainment, cooking demonstrations and music.
And don’t forget: Deaton needs that medical columnist!
