Andy Griffith's Mt Airy, NC

Millions of Americans mourn the passing of actor Andy Griffith at the age of 86. 

To many of them, Andy Griffith was Sheriff Andy Taylor of Mayberry, NC on the Andy Griffith Show, which ran during the 1960's and has been in reruns since.  Mayb....I mean Mt. Airy, North Carolina, is a real place and thousands of tourists visit there each year.

In reality, Andy Griffith was born, and grew up, in Mt. Airy, North Carolina.  I have visited Mt. Airy several times, most recently this past March.  I wanted to share some of those memories of my most recent visit with you.  No, I'm not going to post a picture of the famous Andy and Opie statue (yes, I have a picture of it - of course I do! Why do you ask?) but rather, some different views of the town.

Mt. Airy is a mixture of Andy Griffith tourist memorabilia, Mayberry, and a modern North Carolina town.

One of their older downtown buildings.

The Snappy Lunch of the Andy Griffith show is a real restaurant, open for breakfast and lunch.  We had breakfast there.  It is nothing fancy - basically a hometown small town restaurant where everyone knows each other.  Meals are served on paper plates.  But it was cheap, and it was good.

Floyd Lawson (Mayberry's barber) may be a fictional character who did business at Floyd's Barber Shop but in real life, Mt. Airy has Floyd's City Barber Shop. 

Owner Russell Hiatt is in his 80's, and yes, you can get a cut there at a reasonable price.  I tried to goad my spouse into getting his hair cut there, but he had had his hair cut recently, so on we walked.

This is the inside of the barber shop and yes, that is a wall of photographs.

Finally, a display of old pop (soda) bottles in a Mt. Airy store.

Andy Griffith, incidentally, may have surprised you as a person.  And Mt. Airy is a lot more than Andy Griffith.  If enough of my readers are interested, I'll be happy to post some more photos later this month.

Every year, Mt. Airy holds "Mayberry Days" in September.  This year, George Lindsey's son, and Don Knotts' daughter, had been scheduled to attend.  Of course, George Lindsey (Goober) passed away earlier this year.

What memories do you have of the Andy Griffith Show?  Or, did you enjoy Andy Griffith in some of his other TV shows, or programs he appeared in?