NYT parachutes into Mount Airy, ponders the well-worn ‘Mayberry strategy’:
In 2010, the 50th anniversary of the show drew 50,000 people to the annual Mayberry Days festival, held each September.
But hard times seem just around the corner for the Mayberry strategy.
This year, organizers hope the festival will at least reach the 30,000 it has in other years. But that might be optimistic. Shopkeepers report that the number of visitors who wander the streets whistling the show’s theme song, which is piped out from speakers, are definitely thinning.
It does not help that people connected to the show are dying. Last year, Mr. Griffith died. So did George Lindsey, who played Goober. In January, the town lost Emmett Forrest, 85, Mr. Griffith’s childhood friend and the force behind the town’s embrace of the Mayberry way of life.
Even Russell Hiatt, the elderly barber who says he was the inspiration for the character Floyd, is moving slower, giving fewer and fewer trims as the months pass.
The question, then, becomes, how much longer can one little town rely on the gimmick?
Went to Mount Airy a few years ago to —of all things — have my iMac rebuilt after it crashed. Nice downtown, but it was clear then than the ‘Mayberry strategy’ had worn then. Low point was when the dude dressed as Otis grabbed the mike and started singing ‘The Fishin’ Hole and everyone just passed right by.
