A burgeoning filmmaker, multifaceted artist, world traveler, caring physician, ballet dancer, promising rapper and a locksmith who dresses like Larry Bird. These are some of the city’s most interesting people.
By Katherine Pyles, Dawn Nolan & Amanda Larch Hinchman
HQ 130 | SUMMER 2025
Over the course of the last 35 years, Huntington Quarterly has featured literally hundreds of interesting people. There have been famous folks like Peter Marshall, Soupy Sales and Randy Moss; history makers like Carter G. Woodson, Hal Greer and Chuck Yeager; and colorful characters like Clint McElroy, Huey Perry and Judge Dan O’Hanlon.
For this, the 130th edition of the magazine, we decided to ask our readers to send us the names of some interesting people we might not have featured in the past. There was no shortage of ideas! After reviewing the long list of suggestions, our staff ultimately selected a dozen individuals from a wide variety of backgrounds to spotlight. We hope the resulting article makes for a most interesting read.
Jamie Sloane
Jamie Sloane is an artist whose oil paintings and sculptures have earned regional acclaim and international interest, but his heart — and his gallery — are firmly rooted in Huntington.
“I take a lot of pride in Huntington,” Sloane said. “I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”
Sloane’s journey began as a composer before turning full time to visual art. His breakout moment came in 2019 with The Visiteur Series, a 12-piece portrait exhibit at the Huntington Museum of Art that was featured in a PBS documentary. He now runs Sloane Square Gallery with his partner, Jimmy Hobbs, on Huntington’s 14th Street West.
Today, Sloane’s paintings and other works sell almost as soon as he completes them. His bold and colorful work spans a wide variety of styles, from realism to impressionism to modernism to pointillism.
In addition to two private studios in Huntington, Sloane operates an off-grid, solar-powered farm and is developing a retreat inspired by the gardens of Claude Monet, where he hopes aspiring artists will come to paint, reflect and reconnect with their creativity. Beneath the many hats Sloane wears is the idea that art is for everybody.
“I grew up in a holler on Beech Fork, and when I visited a museum for the first time it felt like stepping into Oz,” Sloane said. “I want to cut through that pretentiousness. Art is not to be held away from other people. People tell us they come in the gallery when they’re having a bad day, just to feel better — to me, that’s a sign we’re doing something right.”
Deborah Novak
An acclaimed filmmaker, choreographer, musician and writer, Deborah Novak has spent her career weaving compelling narratives across multiple artistic disciplines. She has choreographed ballets, composed music for both film and theater and written everything from theater textbooks to opera librettos. Novak, a ballerina since age 5, attended NYU and lived in New York City for 20 years, performing on both stage and screen. Her contributions to filmmaking have earned her four Emmys and countless other awards. Among her works are locally produced documentaries Marshall University: Ashes to Glory, Cam Henderson: A Coach’s Story and Hearts of Glass: The Story of Blenko Handcraft.
At the heart of Novak’s work is storytelling, bringing stories to life through movement, music and film.
“I’m continually asking myself, ‘What do you want to express here? What do you want to say with this arabesque or jeté, with this piece of music, with the visuals of this documentary?’” she said.
Novak is a 500-hour certified yoga teacher, has taught ballet at the collegiate level and plays the flute, violin and piano. During the COVID pandemic, she decided she might also like to pursue a Ph.D. in dance. In May 2025, at age 70, she officially became Dr. Deborah Novak.
Dave Lavender
Dave Lavender runs the West Virginia Film Office for the state’s Department of Economic Development, a role he accepted after his celebrated portrayal of Devil Anse Hatfield in the History Channel documentary America’s Greatest Feud: The Hatfields & McCoys. For the award-winning journalist and lifelong musician, it’s the latest move in a career defined by the word “yes.”
“I try to say yes as much as I can — which has meant I’ve said yes to a lot of wild things,” joked Lavender, who has played in six bands and served on over a dozen nonprofit boards. He is currently board president for Hope in the Hills, which puts on Healing Appalachia. “Life’s short and I’ll rest when I’m dead. I just try to help wherever I can in little ways.”
The author of the Dave Trippin’ series of travel books, Lavender has been an entertainment and travel writer for decades. He’s also an avid cyclist, having biked to work over 100 days out of the year during his 19 years with The Herald-Dispatch. Lavender regularly contributes his journalism skills — which include reporting for newspapers, magazines, radio, TV and social media — to support the arts, environmental causes, the outdoors industry and creative placemaking.
“Huntington is an inclusive place, where everybody pitches in and brings what they have to the common table,” he said. “That’s a beautiful thing. That’s the kind of world I want to live in — one with more people at the table.”
Dr. Sydnee McElroy
And as always, don’t drill a hole in your head.” These parting words conclude each episode of Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine, an award-winning podcast hosted by Huntington physician Dr. Sydnee McElroy and her husband Justin McElroy. Since its launch in 2013, Sawbones has amassed over 45 million downloads, making it the most popular medical podcast in the world — so popular, in fact, that fans from across the globe have applied to Marshall’s medical school after hearing McElroy describe her experience there. In 2018, the couple turned the podcast into a New York Times bestseller.
But around Huntington, McElroy is best known for her work at Harmony House, where she cares for homeless patients. She began volunteering at the day shelter in 2019, providing free medical care to those in need. In November 2024, Valley Health created a clinical site at Harmony House and hired her as the medical director.
“It’s been amazing — before, it was just me and whatever supplies I could buy myself or get donated,” she explained. “Now I have a nurse and a lab and computers. I can do so much more for the patients than I could on my own. Taking care of patients at Harmony House allows me to help people feel safe and cared for by a health care system that too often alienates them. As difficult as the work can be, I leave every day with a full heart and hope for tomorrow.”
Also active in community theater, she and Justin are co-directing HART in the Park’s upcoming musical The Prom. McElroy said her experiences in both theater and podcasting — including a second podcast, Still Buffering, which she hosts with siblings Teylor Smirl and Rileigh Smirl — have made her a better physician.
“Connection and communication are where it all comes together for me,” she said. “As physicians, we can have all the knowledge in the world, but if we can’t communicate that to patients, if we can’t connect with them or recognize the humanity in them, then it doesn’t really matter.”
Dr. David Gozal
Ask Dr. David Gozal, dean of the Marshall University Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine, where he’s from, and he won’t name a city or country.
“I’m a citizen of Earth,” said Gozal, who was born in Morocco, attended high school in Portugal and earned his M.D. from Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “I’ve lived a life of moving all over the place and being exposed — both intentionally and sometimes unintentionally — to everything that Mother Earth has to give.”
The pulmonologist and world-renowned pediatric sleep specialist is driven by a combined sense of humanism and childlike wonder.
“I’ve kept my childish curiosity, despite my advanced age,” Gozal said. “Any topic at any time can fascinate me — it doesn’t matter what it is, as long as it triggers my curiosity. And my curiosity is very easily triggered.”
Fluent in seven languages, Gozal has spent much of his career providing health care in underserved regions of the world. He has traveled by foot and mule through the mountains of Kurdistan, provided medical care in rural Africa and the Peruvian Andes and, most recently, cared for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh.
“I hope that I have made a difference in people’s lives,” he said. “They certainly have made a difference in mine.”
Heather McComas
When Heather McComas signed up for her first basket weaving class more than 25 years ago, she was expecting it to be a fun girl’s night out with her mom and sister. She never dreamed it would become her life’s work.
“I never really realized I had art talent,” she said.
McComas, who lost her sight when she was 12 to retinoblastoma, had to rely on verbal instructions during the class and weave completely by touch. Yet, she ended up being the first one finished.
“I was quite surprised — I didn’t think I could actually do it,” she admitted.
She kept at it, and after gifting baskets to her professors at Marshall, she was encouraged to start selling her work. She launched her business, 3 Blind Mice Baskets, shortly thereafter.
In 2017, with the help of Goodwill Industries of KYOWVA Area, McComas started working at Heritage Farm Museum & Village as an on-site artisan (and the farm’s first basket weaver). Guests can watch her weave every day that the farm is open during its operating season.
“I tend to stick with baskets that are useful,” McComas said. “I don’t want them to be set on a shelf to collect dust.”
In March 2024, McComas launched a second business, 3 Blind Mice Snacks, with support from the Randolph-Sheppard Vending Facility Program. She now operates vending machines in about a dozen federal and state buildings downtown and in the West End.
Dylan Smith
Music and film are two of Dylan Smith’s greatest passions in life. Through his company, Good Trouble, he has directed and produced cinematic videos in Huntington for a number of hip-hop artists from all over the country, including BIGBABYGUCCI, Father, Nessly and Fijimacintosh. He filmed an Eyes Wide Shut-inspired music video at the Keith-Albee Performing Arts Center for BIGBABYGUCCI’s track Belly of the Beast.
“When I was younger, I would travel to a lot of big music shows in other cities, and the excitement I experienced was a real eye-opener,” recalled Smith. “I knew that I wanted a career in music and film.”
Smith also works with local artist Shelem (also featured in this article), including on the viral “Find Your Wrappiness” commercial for Tudor’s Biscuit World, and has shot commercials for ScragglePop Kettlecorn.
In October 2024, Smith hosted a 60th anniversary screening of Teen-Age Strangler, a cult classic that was filmed entirely in Huntington in 1964. Held at Foundry Theater inside Huntington’s City Hall, the event led to a series of monthly film screenings called Lil Dyl’s Foundry Flashbacks.
“Huntington has so many incredible ties to the film industry and cinema that people might not even know about,” Smith explained. “I’m doing this to share that.”
The first film in the series, shown in February, was Unmasking the Idol, in which Smith’s mom, Richelle Eddy Walters, acted. March’s screening of The Mothman Prophecies featured appearances by Susan Nicholas and Doug Korstanje, a video chat with director Mark Pellington and sightings of the cryptid itself.
Upcoming films include Day of the Dead, Child’s Play and another showing of Teen-Age Strangler. A list of all the shows and ticket information can be found at www.foundrytheater.org.
As for Smith’s long-term goals?
“I’d love to make independent feature films, explore satire and longform narrative — maybe dig into the horror genre,” he said.
Keith Matheny
If you’ve seen a man jogging around Ritter Park in a vintage Larry Bird jersey, green shorts and a sweatband, you’ve crossed paths with Keith Matheny.
The story of the outfit starts in 1984. Matheny was 23 years old, had been laid off for the second time and was at what he describes as “the lowest point in my life.”
“I was just so unhappy,” he recalled. “And I really wanted the Boston Celtics to beat the Los Angeles Lakers. It didn’t look like that was going to happen, though.”
But it did. The Celtics defeated the Lakers, winning the NBA championship in a seven-game series. Bird was named the Finals MVP.
“I was ecstatic,” Matheny said. “Emotionally, I needed that in the worst way possible.”
As things started looking up in Matheny’s life, his wife bought him a Larry Bird jersey, which he began to wear on runs as a motivational reminder.
“Things were going good for me, and it felt good for me to wear it,” he explained.
Over the years, Matheny has drawn honks, waves and photo requests from people — even when he’s traveling — thanks to his distinctive outfit. He admitted he gets a kick out of the attention.
“I did it for me, but it got to be funny,” he said.
When he’s not cosplaying as Larry Bird, Matheny is running his own local locksmith business and performing as a mentalist and motivational entertainer for corporations, hospitals, sports teams and other groups. He captures the imagination of his audience by revealing their thoughts, predicting answers to math problems before they are created and describing objects held by audience members while he is blindfolded.
“I also talk about how to get more out of yourself, overcome obstacles, manage change and have a winning attitude,” he said. “I love helping people and encouraging them to improve the quality of their lives.”
Matheny has self-published two books, Light the Fuse to Dynamite Self-Esteem and How to Develop a Dynamite Memory, and said he hopes to write more in the future.
Joanne Ward Smith
Joanie Ward Smith became an author at age 70, publishing her first novel in 2021, and just completed her ninth book. A series of family mysteries, discovered from her research on Ancestry.com, inspired Smith to put pen to paper. Stories have a way of finding her, it seems.
“I write what I want to write,” Smith said. “I consider myself an author and a storyteller, but not necessarily a writer.”
Twenty-three years ago, Smith opened Bella Consignment with her sister, running it for years before selling it to a beloved employee in 2020. Now, Smith dedicates much of her time to nonprofit and volunteer work. She co-founded ASAP (Advocates Saving Adoptable Pets) and organizes clothing drives for underprivileged residents of Dunlow, West Virginia. For decades, Smith has provided Christmas gifts for senior citizens and clothing and field trips for children, first through Bella and now independently.
“If there’s a need in Dunlow, then I start making phone calls,” said Smith, who raises funds from the sale of scarves and other items she crochets and sews. “I just think we’re called to give. It’s really fulfilling to be able to make something, sell it and buy something somebody needs with it.”
Dr. Stephanie Skolik
For retinal surgeon Dr. Stephanie Skolik, art and medicine go hand in hand. In fact, she said, she couldn’t do one without the other. After work each day, Skolik goes home to paint.
“I need something to paint from, so the people and the stories they tell during the day give me something to think about when I’m painting,” she explained. “One feeds the other.”
Growing up in Huntington, Skolik spent her childhood summers taking nearly every art class in town. She started painting when she was 12, and in college it was a toss-up as to whether she would become an artist or clinician.
“After I had already been a doctor for several years, I was living in Bethesda, Maryland, working at the National Eye Institute,” Skolik recalled. “I began thinking about art more seriously and took two years off from being a physician to work as an artist.”
Her favorite art exhibit, which was titled Inner and Outer Vision, was held at the Huntington Museum of Art in 2014. To make the exhibit multisensory for people with disabilities, Skolik carved her paintings into 3-D clay reliefs, provided Braille labels and displayed QR codes that directed visitors to audio descriptions of the paintings.
Skolik, now in her 40th year as an ophthalmologist, is the founder of the American Retina Research Foundation. Applying her creativity to medicine, she has invented a number of patented medical instruments and is widely recognized for her diabetic retinopathy research.
“I’m very happy to practice medicine and create art in my hometown,” she said. “It has been a dream come true.”
Jessica McCormick
After hearing parents complain about the lack of kid-friendly activities in the Huntington area, Jessica McCormick set out to prove them wrong. She began looking for fun, affordable things to do and sharing them on social media. Her posts led to the creation of the “Funington – Huntington Fun for Kids” Facebook page, which has accumulated 2,400 followers.
“It was very important to me to highlight all the cool things happening in the community,” McCormick said. “Many times, I heard people say there’s nothing to do here for the kids — but in our experience, we had to make choices because there were so many great things to pick from. It became a little bit of a personal mission to highlight how great we have it here in Huntington and how most of the things are accessible and free.”
McCormick, a Proctorville, Ohio, native, has been living and working in Huntington for many years. A sustainer with the Huntington Junior League, McCormick previously served on the board of the Huntington Children’s Museum and is a supporter of many community-driven nonprofits. She’s a firm believer in giving back.
“Whether it’s Harmony House, Branches Domestic Violence Shelter or any other worthwhile cause, I do anything I can to support them and share their stories on social media,” she said.
McCormick’s children are just as involved. From litter pickup events to community theater and fundraisers, they are encouraged to take advantage of all that Huntington has to offer.
Shelem
Whether it’s from his hit single Suga Wata or the popular Tudor’s Biscuit World “Find Your Wrappiness” commercial, there’s a good chance you’ve heard of hip-hop artist Shelem.
Shelem, whose full name is Isaac Shelem Fadiga, is a native of Beckley with West African roots. He started producing, writing and recording his own music around age 14 with his older brother, John. In 2014, Shelem moved to Huntington to attend Marshall University, where he earned a degree in civil engineering. Currently, he works at an engineering firm designing water and sewer systems while also pursuing music.
With a sound that he describes as “bouncy,” Shelem released his first album, The Jaunts, in 2018. He has since performed a number of shows around the area and put out three more albums: UhhYup: The Mixtape (2020), featuring a remix to the track Delivery Man with the Heavy Hitters Band (a funk band made up of Marshall music majors); Live at the Clay Center: Shelem N’Them (2023); and his most recent album, Play It Safe (2024).
“It’s a very introspective album,” he said of Play It Safe. “It was executed in a way that is still light-hearted and fun, but it hit on a lot of hard topics.”
In 2022, Shelem gave a TEDxMarshallU talk titled “What Do a Rapper and an Engineer Have in Common?”
“It was about bridging those two different worlds and showing that, even though people may think of left-brain versus right-brain — creative versus logical thinking — as separate, they’re really the same,” he explained.
The video can be viewed on the TEDx YouTube channel.
As for what’s ahead, Shelem is in the studio, working on projects that have yet to be announced.
Aaron-Michael Fox
Inspired by the resurgence of Huntington’s downtown, Aaron-Michael Fox created the “Downtown Huntington” social media accounts and website more than a decade ago as a way to share what was happening in Huntington.
“I set out to launch a page that was focused on upcoming events before they’d happen,” said Fox, a Marshall grad and die-hard Thundering Herd fan.
Now with 54,000 followers on Facebook, 11,600 on X and 8,500 on Instagram, Fox’s “Downtown Huntington” accounts share upcoming events, restaurant specials, new products at local businesses and more. His website, downtownhuntington.net, features interviews and news stories. It’s easy to see why The Real WV calls him “an ambassador for all things Huntington and Marshall.”
A former stand-up comic who toured nationally for five years, Fox gradually began injecting more of himself and his opinions and jokes into his social media content.
“People genuinely seem to like hearing from the person behind the page,” he observed.
Fox also created the “Vintage West Virginia” Facebook page, where he’s been sourcing and posting photos, stories and memes since 2013. That page has a reach of 165,000.
“It’s basically a statewide version of ‘Downtown Huntington,”’ Fox explained. “I have a generally positive view — I like living in my neighborhood, and I like showing people Huntington the way I see it.”
As if all that weren’t enough for the creative content guru, Fox authored Sorry For The Inconvenience in 2018, a novel set in the fictional town of Jewel City, Vandalia, which is based on Huntington. His second novel, titled Smug & Arrogant: The Epic Times of Ronin P. Smugly, is due out this December.
