Remembering Mary Tyler Moore's impact on the Shenandoah Valley

Mary Tyler Moore, the star of two of TV's best-loved sitcoms, died at the age of 80 this week.

After gaining fame as Laura Petrie on "The Dick Van Dyke Show" in the 1960s, she starred as Mary Richards, a Minneapolis TV news producer on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" -- bringing to TV audiences an independent, 1970s career woman. The series ran seven seasons and won 29 Emmys.

But what you might not know is that Moore had ties to the Shenandoah Valley.

The Stonewall Jackson Headquarters Museum in Winchester will always remember her generosity - it's a house where her family roots run deep.

"This is a small piece of American history, but it's an important piece of American history," tour guide Brian Daly said.

But it's not just an important piece of American history; it's also an important piece of her history.

"For someone like Mary Tyler Moore who might say 'Two generations before me, I had roots in the Valley, but I'm not a Valley girl. I'm not a Valley person,'" Daly said.

During the Civil War, her great-grandfather Louis T. Moore owned what is now the Stonewall Jackson Headquarters Museum, a home to the general for several months.

It took one visit in 1992 for Mary Tyler Moore to offer her generosity.

"At that point, she asks what she can do and one of the things we were looking for was a reproduction of wallpaper that Jackson had described. We found in the 1960's actual remnants of that paper," Daly said.

That wallpaper is what hangs in her memory today.

"It's a hook. It brings people nowadays in 2017, who are my age and remember her when we were in our 20's and 30's seeing her in movies," Daly said. "And we say what a wonderful thing she did. It's great she gave back to the community."

Mary Tyler Moore was the woman who could turn the world on with her smile, and Daly knows she made this museum worthwhile.

"She's one of the pioneering women in the TV and film industry in the country," Daly said. "And the fact that she took time out of her busy career to come here and then for her to say 'Is there anything I can do?' She could've easily said here's $1,000. Thank you for showing me around and be gone. But she wanted to know what she could do and what she could continue to do."

To this day, not a tour goes by without people leaving knowing that she made it to the Valley after all.