NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — A crowd gathered at Woodmont Christian Church. They were ready to hear a story from someone who first made national news 50 years ago; Barbara Jenkins.
"Yes, I walked across America in the 1970s," Barbara said, taking the podium.
We'll start even earlier than that. Barbara was born in southeast Missouri.
"We were very poor," Barbara nodded. "I grew up very resilient, not very entitled."
Barbara had no idea how much that would prepare her for something.
She was getting her masters in New Orleans when she met and fell in love with a man named Peter Jenkins.
"He was actually walking across America for National Geographic magazine," Barbara remembered.
Disillusioned by the Vietnam War, Peter was braving the elements to meet people all across the country. He wanted to discover the true America. He wanted Barbara to join him. Barbara was more than a little hesitant at the idea, but the two went to a church service.
"The title of the sermon was, 'will you go with this man?'" Barbara remembered. "For me, that was like God pointing a finger and asking me. I felt like it was a call on my life."
Now married, Barbara and Peter set out on a three-year, 3,000 mile walk to Oregon. Barbara still has an August 1979 copy of National Geographic with the couple on the cover.
"Well, we're walking across America for National Geographic," Barbara said, remembering what they used to tell people. "That lent a credibility that helped us not appear like we were totally crazy. I was hit by a car in Utah, squarely in the back. I flew through the air and landed on the lawn of a Mormon mortuary. I was almost struck by lightning. I lived through a tornado. I discovered I was two months pregnant with my first child. I had 400 miles left to walk, and I was sick as a dog."
Barbara said again and again, she met people who kept her going. It was people like Ruby Martin.
"This was a pioneer woman," Barbara remembered. "She said, 'why, Barbara, you can walk across America. It ain't nothin'. You haven't lived until you've picked cotton all day in the hot Texas sun for 25 cents, 100 pounds. Ruby was my angel in disguise at that moment of great need in my life when I wanted to quit. She was my encourager. She was the person who said, 'arise. Get up. You can do this.'"
The Walk West was a 1981 book collaboration between Peter and Barbara. The two had three children and later divorced.
"My granddaughter came up to me, she calls me YoYo," Barbara said. "She said, 'YoYo, did you really walk across America?' It was like a brick hit me. I had to tell my story from my point of view and in my voice."
Barbara has released So Long As It's Wild. Barbara said the book is now being optioned for a movie or series.
From her Missouri upbringing to studying in New Orleans, from a 3,000-mile walk to living in middle Tennessee, Barbara has a distinctly American story.
"I know many of you in this room are going through something, and you want to quit," she told the crowd from the podium. "Here's what I want to tell you. What I learned walking across America is to just keep putting one foot in front of the other. Just keep on keeping on. For we walk by faith, not by sight."
Do you have a positive, good news story? You can email me at forrest.sanders@newschannel5.com.
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