There are sometimes stories that you really don’t want to cover, but to remain true to yourself, you have to. This is one of them.
When I was in high school, I don’t know how many times I saw Walking Tall at the drive-in. It was Joe Don Baker’s breakout role, and the movie, part of that 70s vigilante genre that included Billy Jack, Death Wish, and Dirty Harry, was hugely popular in rural Southside Virginia. It was the story of Buford Pusser, the real-life sheriff of McNairy County, Tennessee. He was a former Marine who turned into a pro wrestler. He returned home to McNairy County and, after a brief stint as the chief of police in Adamsville, Tennessee, he became the youngest elected sheriff in Tennessee. He carried on a very public war with the Dixie Mafia and the State Line Mob, using a four-foot hickory club as his weapon of choice.
In the movie, the culminating event is Pusser and his wife, Pauline, being targeted in an ambush on August 12, 1967. Pusser was struck on the left side of his jaw by at least two, or possibly three, rounds from a .30-caliber carbine. Pauline, who was accompanying Pusser on a call, died from gunshot wounds.