Saying Goodbye to Bill | Part 2
A selection of fond remembrances of a notable soul on his passing | february25.2024
‘FLOWER CHILD” | Bill brings to the attention of his sister a Queen Anne’s Lace plucked near his home in Braxton County, W.Va. | august2023 | FARYL HART photo
NOTE: This is a reprint of a post yesterday from theHARToftheMATTER.substack.com, the second part of a three-series of remembrances of one of the more intriguing people some of us have ever met deep in the hills and hollers of West Virginia | editor Douglas John Imbrogno
Our dear friend, Bill Hart, died peacefully at age 69 on Friday, Feb. 9, 2024, at his home in the rolling hills of Braxton County, W.Va. (See the first part of our three-part farewell here.) Below are remembrances and homages to this intriguing, complicated, fascinating fellow, who led a rich and notable life, the last nearly half-century of it up in the Appalachian mountains of central West Virginia. There, he concocted a slew of world-class instruments, learned back-country lifeways and folkways, told 10,000 stories, and touched a bunch of lives. Free subscribe to theHARToftheMATTER site and check out the archives of other stories from the life of a human being worth knowing better (including the time his Dad invited him to watch an atom bomb go off).
Betty Rivard
Bill was a very special person in my life and the life of our family over a period of about four decades. He used to travel almost exclusively on horseback and came by to visit with us on our farm. He and Ricky were the closest of friends to the end. I know that our sons both have many fond memories of Bill as a part of our lives.
Sometimes, Bill would bring one of the new pieces that he had made, usually out of wood. I think each of us in our family still have a candlestick or vase that he made that we treasure. He also made special gifts for our youngest son, who he watched grow up. These included a dulcimer and a ceramic sailboat with cloth sails, both meticulously crafted.
‘LEG UP’ | Bill perches on the back-porch of the Rivard farm, his second home in the West Virginia hills. | april2022 | theHARToftheMATTER.substack.com photo
One of my early adventures, which I think was when our younger son was in middle school, was when Bill brought over enough horses for us all to take a trail ride over the hills the back way to where he lived. He took us through the woods to a site that still had scraps of black flint on the ground. He said this was where Native Americans from the Kanawha Valley used to come up to trade with those who were local, approximately fifty miles to the north.
His knowledge of this land and its history made a big impression on me. He was a respectful steward of the land and attentive and caring to the people he knew here.
More recently, he lived on and took loving care of our family’s farm, after I had to move to town and he needed to move from where he had lived. He truly made it his own with his gardens and workshops where he did his magical work.
‘A BOY AND HIS DOG.’ | Bark Raven — named after the revered West Virginia band Stark Raven — gazes at the man who rescued her from a sickly backwoods life, nursing her back to happy, playful life. | april2022 | theHARToftheMATTER.substack.com photo
During the early years of COVID-19 when social contacts were limited, we had several long phone conversations that I found to be very comforting. Just knowing Bill was up there on the farm really meant a lot. I also enjoyed the couple of visits when a friend brought me up there and we all had a simple lunch together and had glimpses into the good life that he had made for himself there.
I also enjoyed hearing about his interactions with our beloved neighbors who shared that same special part of our state. Once he and Raven found each other, it was really a great joy to see him share his daily life with such a wonderful dog.
Bill left a large empty place but his strong spirit at least helps to fill it. Rest in peace, dear friend.
DAVID ROBERTS
David Roberts met Bill growing up in the same Braxton County neck of the woods where he came to know the Rivard family, whose house Bill later came to live out his life in and where he passed away this month. Bill was older than him, but once David left the service he came home to share with him a love and fascination with designing electronics and circuits. In the video below, he recounts Bill’s native genius in speaking the language of electricity and making circuits come alive, mentoring him along the way.
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FARYL HART
Faryl Hart is the younger sister of Bill Hart.
Bill taught me pretty penmanship, throwing a boomerang, and skipping rocks. More importantly, he shared his love of music. "Get Off of My Cloud," "Mrs. Brown, You’ve Got a Lovely Daughter," and "California Dreamin'" were a few from the 1960s. The 1970s exposed me to Creedence Clearwater Revival and Led Zeppelin. ‘Mountain Stage's’ 1980s performers, such as Keb 'Mo, Saffire-The Uppity Blues Women, and Loudan Wainwright III were a few of the ones we saw together in Charleston.
‘PAUSED.’ | Bill, framed in living color on his deck, from an August 2023 visit to West Virginia by his sister and her husband. | FARYL HART photo
Bill and I picked fresh raspberries and blackberries up in the hills behind his Cowskin Fork house in Braxton County to make "R & B" cobbler for Bruce Hornsby's sold-out ‘Mountain Stage’ performance. It worked! Seats were found for us.
His musical circle was completed when he gave me all his CDs. He will stay in my "hart" through his eclectic musical collection.
JOHN KESSLER
‘A MAN OUT STANDING IN HIS FIELD.’ | Bill waits for Raven to finish whatever Raven is doing. | april2022 | theHARToftheMATTER.substack.com
John Kessler, the former bass player for Stark Raven and past musical director of the “Mountain Stage” music program, has for nearly a quarter century hosted the program “ALL BLUES” on KNKX Radio, with studios in Seattle and Tacoma, Washington. Below, he recalls a notable passenger on the way to a Stark Raven gig, way back in the day in West Virginia.
Stark Raven was on the way to some gig up north, probably in Clarksburg or Morgantown, W.Va. Bob Webb informs us that his pal, Bill, will be joining us, so this might have been the first time I had met him. When we asked Bob where to pick Bill up, he says, "Mile Marker 47" — which I must admit seemed a little odd.
And sure enough there is this tall, gangly guy waiting along the highway for us. Bill was so friendly and so interested in the music that he was welcome in our stepvan, already crowded with seven people. Of course, I don't remember anything about the gig, but on the way back to Charleston, in the middle of the night, we ask Bill where we can drop him. And he says: "Right by Mile Marker 47" (or something like that). We were all a bit puzzled to just be leaving him alongside Interstate 79, but it all became clear when he got out and gave a loud whistle.
A few moments later a horse comes running out of the woods!
We asked him how he knew his horse would be there. Bill said, "Well, Nelson's a good horse and he knew I would be back for him." Bill then jumped on Nelson bareback and rode off into the night.
Unforgettable!
RON SOWELL
Ron Sowell was lead singer of the band Stark Raven from which Bill’s dog, Bark Raven, draws her name. Hang around until the closing scene of the video below, which features Raven in a full and glorious dog-joy romp. You’ll also learn of the curious, inventive uses one can make of the stiff cardboard boxes in which roses are delivered. With the right lathe, vision, and teamwork — Bill and his soul-mate brotherman, Bob Webb — you can introduce a kid to the first musical instrument they’ll ever play. And they might even get a hand in designing and ornamenting it.
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DAVID IMBROGNO
A number of Bill’s friends, including me, came to Bill’s bedside to make sure that his wish to die at home was fulfilled. His wish was realized. But Bill isn’t gone. Hundreds, or maybe thousands of folks, have something of Bill incorporated into their life and being.
Every time I visited Bill he was doing something new, be it his latest original guitar build or a new kind of tomato in the garden. He had new (and old) stories during each visit. You don’t gather new stories unless you are hanging around where those stories happen. He lived on his own terms no matter what influences from the outside pursued him. Thus, he chose to live in a cabin deep in the West Virginia mountains. He could have lived otherwise. Being born in Naples, Italy, and having lived all over the U.S. with his military family offered him many other options.
‘BASS NOTES.’ | Bill riffs along with Nature on a homemade instrument on the porch of his first house on Cowskin Fork Road in Braxton County, W.Va. | august2019 | DAVID IMBROGNO photo
Perhaps the most significant of his many facets was that lived in the present. He continued to live as he always lived during every stage of his worsening illness. About the only change I saw in him over the past year or so was his declining weight.
Bill didn’t teach others about any of the above (except for those he specifically schooled in the art of electronics and instruments). Good teachers don’t teach, they inspire learning. That is what Bill did, he inspired others to strive for the many things they saw in him which they wished to incorporate into their own character.
Bill is gone now but it isn’t too late to meet him. Just look up one of his many friends. That is where he lives on.
ASHLEY SKEEN
Ashley Skeen came to know Bill late as these things go in West Virginia— in 2018 — given the man’s nearly half-century long tenure in the state’s hills. Yet as she says in the video below: “He always loomed large in our family legend ..” since her uncle Bob was one of Bill’s closest friends and she was a cousin to Bob’s daughter, Erin. Then, there was the time Bill and Ashley raced each other to an airplane so they wouldn’t bet late for the wedding …
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P.S.
Free subscribe for the final part of these remembrances, showcasing the debut of an original recording of the great Dave Carter/Tracy Grammer song, “When I Go,” featuring some past members of Stark Raven and other musicians. Bill loved the song — his spirit is deeply reflected in the soul of the tune — and he wished to be memorialized by it.
Thank you for sharing this journey of Bill’s transition with his circle of friends who accompanied him.