Good morning, I'm Johnny Wood

“Good morning, I’m Johnny Wood.”

For several decades on end, those words began many a local morning Bristol TV Channel 5 News broadcast.

The voice. That is what immediately captured your attention. And kept it.

Not the movie star good looks - Johnny would happily joke with you about that.

Not the high intelligence - again, Johnny would be happy to self-deprecate there, too.

It was the voice. Likeable. Trustworthy. Humble. True. All four all at once. A grand slam of a voice, it was.

That voice, so easily recognizable and beloved by so many in our neck of the woods for so long, will now speak no more. Johnny passed away earlier this month at age 82.

I could write here about Johnny’s immensely popular local fishing reports. Or his equally enamoring ‘Lunch With Johnny’ segments. Both productions thrilled thousands of fans and grandly added to his local lore.

But it is stories that reveal the soul of someone - far better than does information alone. So I will tell a story or two here about Johnny.

Johnny sometimes joked about his body being on the portly side. But I can vouch that the vast majority of us locals considered Johnny to be a good-looking individual. Anyone who smiles as genuinely and as often as did Johnny - always so naturally and from the heart - qualifies as handsome and/or beautiful, no matter what body type they may be carrying around.

Johnny also occasionally joked about his intelligence. But anyone who ever saw him “perform” on the air encoutered a man of sharp mind and humble wit. In fact, it was his humility that we perhaps loved the most about him.

That and his trustworthiness.

Johnny once reported a local story that sounded somewhat implausible (as the news sometimes does). A friend happened to be visiting from out of town and watching local tv with me that morning. Johnny came on the air and reported a particular story - I can’t even remember what it was. But whatever it was, my friend said, “I don’t believe it happened quite that way.”

Now I am a nonviolent, peaceable man. I even let flies and spiders out of the house, if possible. But someone doubting the word of Johnny Wood?? Why, them’s pret’near fightin’ words!

I told my friend, “If this man says it happened, it happened.”

My friend then countered Johnny’s reporting some more.

I stood up and said, “I’m tellin’ you, if Johnny reports it, then it’s the Gospel truth to us around here.”

And you can bet it was. Johnny Wood was that good.

Just last spring I was privileged to pay a personal visit to Johnny. He was in rehabilitation at NHC in Bristol. As always, his famously humble self-deprecation came shining through. “Ben, I’ll bet you didn’t think I could look any worse than I did. Hey, but I have lost a few pounds.”

Ever the jolly soul, Johnny went on to talk about me - not him. That was Johnny’s way. He made you feel like you were the most important person in the room.

“Ben, I remember in February of 1978 you came home one weekend from college. You sat behind me at a THS home basketball game. I only knew you by name at the time. But you went out of your way to speak to me and asked me how I was. I will never forget that. I became a Ben Talley fan from then on.”

I replied to Johnny, “Now that’s strange. I remember that happening, but I remember it the other way around. It was you who turned around and talked to me, asking me how I was.”