A Biographical Bit­­
by
Martha Sexton

When Doug is not on the road performing and telling stories, he at home in North Alabama.  His farm is 120 acres where he tends and manages a vineyard, has a herd of Scottish Highlander cattle and grows sorghum cane for the best molasses you ever put in your mouth.

He is truly an amazing and talented person.  He can be slopping the pigs at three o’clock in the afternoon, dressed in a tux and playing a serious piano concert at eight in the evening and giving a lecture on quantum psychics at a university the next day.

How it all got started- - -
Limestone County was a buzz wit the talk of World War II, in the summer of  1942, when Doug made his way into this world.  The depression had left his family without money but they had faired better than most because they on a farm and produced their own food.
 
When Doug was just tall enough to reach the keyboard of his grandmother’s piano-He knew what would be a life long passion.  He would how to play the piano.

When Doug started first grade, it wasn’t long before the teacher caught him talking in class. “Well Doug it seems that you enjoy talking so much, why don’t you come up here  in front of the class and Talk-non stop for twenty minutes- - that will be your punishment”.

Doug went to the front of his class.  He had spent the summer with his other grandmother in New Orleans and had gone to Audubon Park Zoo.  He proceeded to tell the class about the zoo and the birds and animals that lived there—his classmates were fascinated with the story because they had never seen these animals.  These were the days before Television.  His story lasted well past the twenty minutes and when he finished, the teacher led the applause.  She forgot all about the punishment.
  
From time to time she would ask him to tell a story to the class.  The class had a designated rest period called “sleepy time” where the children would lay their heads on the desk and nap.  One time teacher found the students a little restless and she asked Doug to tell them a bedtime story --- He went to the front and told the about “Kenny the Caterpillar” a silkworm who was building a cocoon to sleep in.  He spoke in a soft, pleasant voice – a bedtime voice.  When he finished all the students were on the edge of their seats, but the teacher was sound asleep on her desk.  She slept there peacefully until she was awaken by laughter when she started snoring. YES Doug was a natural born storyteller at age 6.