The Tweet of the Year combined with a touching story about the love of Wrexham.
Jeff
Ivey
A missing hoodie, and a viral re-location story about a couple moving from Texas to Wrexham. That's the Jeff and Janice Ivey story. We got to meet Jeff both at the Visit Wrexham offices and then by chance joining him for a pint at the Turf the very next day.
Jeff told us he and his wife Janice both love Wrexham and are in the process of selling up in Texas and settling here.
Early on in our meeting he said to us;
“The more we came here, the more friends we made.”
How their
story started
Jeff loves his hoodies and shared that it all started off with a hoodie. Initially, he ordered two from local band The Declan Swans. But only one arrived and wondered if the other shirt was out of stock. It was then that he discovered that someone had opened the package and stolen a sweatshirt! He sent the photo of the box and unknowingly to Jeff he was liaising directly with the Declan’s lead singer Michael Hett or Scoot as he prefers to be known by. Scoot cared more about the lasting impression the failed order gave than the costs of reshipping – so he sent the missing one, and a lasting friendship was born.
Their love of Wrexham.
Many trips to Wales followed over the next few years. And on each one, the couple from Texas, fell for Wrexham a little more, the local people and the community. Jeff tells us he has Scottish ancestry which allowed him to have UK citizenship easily when they decided to start house hunting this summer.
Community
Support.
Jeff shared with us his touching story about how his younger brother Neil who once visited the Turf, and proudly captured a photo of himself standing outside – and shared it with both Jeff and the family. Sadly, Jeff lost his brother not long afterwards, only last year in fact, and both he and Janice were then overwhelmed with the outpouring of support from the community and people of Wrexham.
On his last trip, when leaving and saying final farewells to his friends Scoot and the team who volunteer at the Wrexham Miners Trust.
Scoot said he had a special gift waiting for Jeff just before he left. The Wrexham Miners Trust then presented Jeff the very same photo of his late brother posing outside the Turf but presented on a mounted slate, and in that moment the love for the people of Wrexham was cemented for good. Jeff and Janice now volunteer for both the Wrexham Miners Project and the nearby Hope House Hospice.
Jeff kindly supplied this image of Neil, his younger brother, on a mounted slate, presented by the Miners' Trust from his visit to the Turf.
Tweet Of
The Year.
When then the BBC ran their story on 10 August, "Couple to move from Texas to Wrexham after watching Ryan Reynolds series" Ryan Reynolds saw it and posted: "Thank god they didn't watch Chernobyl." That single line sent the story viral across the world. USA Today, the Mirror, Wales Online, everywhere in fact seemed to run the story. For a couple of days last month, a retired couple from Texas were the most talked-about pair in football anywhere in the world.
Local
Radio.
Even today they are still in high demand, and Jeff tells me he has been invited to an interview later in September with our friends Wrexham City Radio, where they will talk about the forthcoming Terry Fox Run, scheduled October 4 at Bellevue Park again this year. Jeff is on the committee helping to organise it.
Genuine
Inspiration.
For Wrexham, it's the ultimate proof that Welcome to Wrexham isn't just a docuseries - it’s something that genuinely inspires people and changes lives. Having met Jeff in person, understanding his story adds another captivating chapter to the ongoing global Wrexham story.