Outdoor storytelling artist Garvey Winegar dies

I worked with outdoors columnist Garvey Winegar for years at the Richmond Times-Dispatch and find that many of the things I appreciate about the outdoors in Virginia come from my observations of his work. My favorites were his journal detailing his canoe trip down the entire James River and the Step Outside series he and Henry Christner did […]

July 8, 2011; 6:49 AM • by Phil Riggan

I worked with outdoors columnist Garvey Winegar for years at the Richmond Times-Dispatch and find that many of the things I appreciate about the outdoors in Virginia come from my observations of his work.

My favorites were his journal detailing his canoe trip down the entire James River and the Step Outside series he and Henry Christner did detailing outdoors options in each of Virginia’s 95 counties.

What Garvey did so well was tell stories. In the media today we have too many straight news people. Garvey could tell a story with flair and could even make a day of sitting on a stump fishing seem interesting. Storytelling is an art, and I admired his skill as a storyteller.

The work of outdoors writers is often underrated, but Garvey was very dedicated and creative in how he covered his beat. Rest in peace Garvey.

See the Times-Dispatch article for many more compliments on his work:

Garvey Lynn Winegar wrote of the outdoors with an uncommon grace, a poet with a fishing pole who made friends of readers who loved the fields and streams as he did and those who didn’t know a rainbow trout from a rainbow.

Mr. Winegar, who retired from The Times-Dispatch in 2003, died Monday in his native Scott County in Southwest Virginia. He was 73.

July 8, 2011 6:49 AM 0