the airy life

In the classic “The Andy Griffith Show” episode “Stranger in Town,” a man moved to Mayberry, N.C., because he had heard so many good things about the town.

And in real life, Darrel and Debbie Miles, big fans of “The Andy Griffith Show,” made the same decision.

They are originally from New Albany, Ind., but just over three years ago they decided to make the move to Mount Airy, the town where actor Andy Griffith grew up and that was the inspiration for Mayberry. They opened Mayberry on Main, a store on Main Street that sells memorabilia related to “The Andy Griffith Show” as well as hot sauces and salsa.

Debbie Miles recalls the first time she found out that there was a real “Mayberry,” back in 1992.
“Reruns of the show were always on during dinner time,” she recalled. “Like any other family, we’d be getting dinner ready and ‘The Andy Griffith Show’ would be on. Then one day when I was at work, my oldest daughter, Natalie, called and said, ‘Mom, there really is a Mayberry, and Oprah’s there!’ I said, ‘Well, find out where it is!’ ”

When they got home, Natalie had written down “Mount Airy, N.C.”

“That minute on, we made arrangements to visit,” Debbie Miles said. “And then every year at least once a year we could come down.”

They made the eight-hour drive to Mount Airy, first for the annual Mayberry Days festival and then more frequently. They made friends in Mount Airy during those visits.

“We found more and more times when we had a few days off, we’d be driving down to Mount Airy,” Darrel Miles said. They visited frequently over the course of about 13 years.

And when Darrel Miles retired from the manufacturing company where he had worked for 32 years, they decided to move to Mount Airy.

“We decided about three years ago we were going to do something together,” he said. “We started thinking about all the places we had visited and vacationed, and wondered, where would we like to live and have a small business and just have more time together?

“We talked about several places we enjoyed, and as big Mayberry fans as we were, we thought, ‘Oh, gosh ...’ ”

Finishing his thought, Debbie Miles said, “ ‘Wouldn’t that be great?’ ”

Natalie, who is now 28, thought the move was a good idea.

Their youngest daughter, Samantha, who is 25, wasn’t so sure. “When we moved down here, she thought it was real corny,” Darrel Miles said. Eventually, their daughters moved to North Carolina as well.

Russell Hiatt, who runs Floyd’s City Barber Shop on Main Street, said that he wasn’t surprised when the Mileses decided to move to Mount Airy. “They had been coming here every year and always come in to see me,” he said. “Then they came in one time and told me they were wanting to move here and go into business. ... I was tickled because they were great folks. I helped them find a building.”

The decision to open a store was a bigger leap of faith.

“I had not a clue about wholesale or retail,” Darrel Miles said.

“We had a few yard sales and those were always good,” Debbie Miles pointed out.

Much of their store space is filled with Mayberry memorabilia, including videotapes, DVDs, T-shirts, tin signs and more. They also sell coffee and they have a wall lined with hot sauces, salsas, jellies and pickles, including some that Darrel has custom-ordered to have “Andy Griffith Show”-related labels.

After three years, the store has outgrown its original space, directly across the street from Floyd’s City Barber Shop. They moved this week into a larger space down the block, at 192 N. Main St.

They get a lot of repeat customers among people who visit Mount Airy regularly. They also draw locals such as Dana Hawks, a Mount Airy native who first met them when they were visiting town. “They’re nice people,” she said. “I’m a regular. I come in here every day.”

Some visitors think that “The Andy Griffith Show” was actually filmed in Mount Airy (it was filmed in California). “We try to break it to them gently, this is really Andy’s hometown, this is the real place he lived,” Debbie Miles said. “We came for Mayberry, but Mount Airy, you fall in love with it. It’s the kind of town everybody would want their hometown to be.”

Tim Clodfelter is a staff writer for the Winston-Salem Journal.