In order to gain a better understanding of the origins of hip-hop culture in Athens, you have to know someone who was there. Or know someone who knows someone who was there. The lives these individuals lived, and the stories they have to tell, aren t going to be easy to find on Google or even at the local library.
Willie Wester is one of those who was there, and his personal account of how hip-hop made its way into his life, and ultimately saved it, is the stuff of great autobiographies and feature films.
Born in Hempstead, N.C., in 1969, Wester s family moved to Gainesville, Ga., when he was 6 years old before settling in Athens when he was in the seventh grade. It was then, as a student at Clarke Middle School, that Wester s lifelong love of hip hop began.