| Woodrow Landfair | |
|---|---|
Woodrow Landfair on the machine that took him around America |
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Stanley Wood Landfair, Jr. |
| Born | November 9, 1982 Richmond, Virginia, USA |
| Occupations | Storyteller |
Woodrow Landfair, born Stanley Wood Landfair, Jr. on November 9, 1982 in Richmond, Virginia also called Pack Landfair, is an American storyteller. Landfair gained notoriety in 2006 and 2007 while chronicling a 48 state motorcycle trek and paying his way as a laborer from town to town across all 50 states. During his life on the road, Landfair stayed in two New York City homeless shelters, worked with illegal immigrants, and spent over a month living within the Anarchist group Common Ground Collective in New Orleans's Lower Ninth Ward after Hurricane Katrina. Among other odd jobs, Landfair worked as a day laborer, a swimming pool lifeguard, a bouncer, a truck driver, a door-to-door salesman, a beverage delivery man, a stagehand, and a waiter for a New York City Italian restaurant with ownership ties to the Gambino crime family. Landfair used the jobs, as well as his previous experiences, as material for oral stories.
Between traveling and working, Landfair began self-promoting in roadside bars and coffee shops where he talked about his hoboing experiences. He developed a storytelling act through 71 cities across 48 states, eventually appearing in theaters and on regional and nationwide television.
As of May 2007, Landfair had performed his oral stories in 41 cities in 32 states. He was featured in several newspapers nationwide and on May 8, 2007 appeared on the front page of the Austin American Statesman as part of a two page spread. On September 23, 2007, Landfair authored and performed a one man show 48 States of Adventure at Washington D.C.'s Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts in front of a capacity crowd. The show was recorded as an album, 48 LIVE, which sells on iTunes. On September 24, 2007, the Fox News Channel ran a feature on Landfair, his stories and his travels. Anchor Shepherd Smith referred to Landfair as aspiring to become "the next John Steinbeck or Louis L'Amour."
After graduating from the University of Texas in the spring of 2006, Landfair terminated the lease on his apartment, adopted the nickname "Woodrow", pawned what he could—including his National Championship ring—and left on a Suzuki Intruder 800 motorcycle. Landfair recovered his National Championship ring in 2010, buying it back for $1,500.
From 2001 to 2006 he attended college originally on a full scholarship from the United States Navy. Landfair, whose ambition was to become a Navy SEAL, injured his lower back running marathons then tore two discs in his spine in 2005 while catching in the bullpen as a member of the NCAA National Champion Texas Longhorns baseball team. Without playing an inning in his three years on the roster, Landfair was named Teammate of the Year by his fellow players for the 2005 and 2004 seasons. He lettered all three years then joined the staff as the Student Assistant to the Strength Coach for the 2006 campaign. From 2004 - 2006, Landfair was employed by the athletics department as an Academic Mentor for student-athletes. He was the only student-athlete to hold such a position. Landfair studied Creative Writing under Zulfikar Ghose and earned his degree in English.
According to IMDB, Landfair appears in the Richard Linklater documentary Inning by Inning: A Portrait of a Coach, which aired on ESPN in 2008 and was filmed during the 2006 season in which coach Augie Garrido attempted to capture back-to-back national titles. Landfair is also listed on the credits of Benjamin Moses Smith's short film David and the Fish. Landfair is a character in the EA Sports video game MVP 06: NCAA Baseball represented by number 35 on the Texas Longhorn roster. Major League Baseball players Huston Street, Brad Halsey, JP Howell, Omar Quintanilla, Curtis Thigpen, Michael Hollimon, Matt Holliday, Drew Stubbs, Sam LeCure and Taylor Teagarden were teammates or friends of Landfair at the University of Texas.
Landfair grew up with his mother and two sisters in Springfield, Virginia and spent summers with his father, a California attorney.