Appalachian History

Burkittsville, MD is usually noted either for its role in the 1862 Battle of South Mountain during the War Between the States, or for its proximity to the Appalachian Trail, which passes over the crest of that same mountain. However, fans of the popular horror film "The Blair Witch Project," a perennial Halloween favorite, have a very different view of the town.

The movie draws on various local myths and legends in addition to adding its own backstory of 'historical facts,' as it propels its three doomed protagonists into the dark woods to locate the trail of the witch. The film's writers developed a very believable character in hermit Rustin Parr.

Parr's saga runs as follows: In November 1940 Parr gruesomely murdered seven local children on the supposed instructions of the Blair Witch. He lured the kids into the woods with candy. Kyle Brody, an eighth child who survived, was forced to face the wall while Parr stabbed Emily Hollands multiple times in the cellar of his house.

One spring day in 1941, Parr came into town and declared that he was "finally finished." Police searched his house and found the bodies of the seven kids buried in the cellar’s dirt floor. The children had been disemboweled and strange markings had been carved into their flesh with knifes. The event tore the town apart.

On July 17, 1941, Parr was tried in court on seven counts of first-degree murder. "The small town of Burkittsville was pulled into the national spotlight," said Washington Press reporter Lawrence Haten, "as they held Parr's trial after refusing extradition." He confessed to all seven murders, not knowing the names of the children. Parr expressed his apologies to the parents of the deceased.

Kyle Brody testified that Parr was the one responsible for the killings, and the jury came back with a guilty verdict, resulting in an outbreak of applause in the courtroom. "At his sentencing, the ever quiet Parr reacted little to being sentenced to death," noted Haten. The townspeople burned Rustin Parr's house to the ground that night.

Rustin Parr was hanged November 22, 1941, the first Maryland prisoner to be executed by that method in eight years.

Kyle Brody never recovered from the two months trapped in Parr's house. He would live an institutionalized life until his death in 1971.


http://blairwitch.wikia.com/wiki/Rustin_Parr
http://www.blairwitch.com/parr6.html


Blair+Witch Rustin+Parr Burkittsville+MD appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

Posted by Dave Tabler at 8:30 AM | 3 comments Links to this post    
Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, Blair Witch, Burkittsville MD, Rustin Parr

Halloween’s tomorrow. Here’s a little haint tale for the occasion from Putnam County, Tennessee.

About one mile and a half east of Cookeville the Buck Mountain Road is crossed by the old Sparta-Livingston Road. Turning to the left here and going about a quarter of a mile in the direction of Livingston one reaches the scene of the noted ante-bellum mystery. The large and dismal swamp that once covered several acres on either side of the road is now only a memory, due to the propensity of modern man to clear, drain and cultivate the soil. But the name, "Booger Swamp," still clings to the spot after nearly three-quarters of a century.

One dark night in the early fifties a well-known minister of the gospel, whose name is not essential to our story, was passing this lonely spot on horseback, when suddenly an apparition appeared before him—or, at least, he said it did. After a great deal of discussion and several futile efforts to induce the spook- seeing brother to retract his story, he was finally arraigned in a formal church court and tried, convicted and expelled from the ministry. According to his story, the apparition was a pure white body floating about a yard above the ground and "about the size and length of a weaver’s beam," to use his exact language. It made some effort to communicate with him, but his horse became unruly and dashed away.

A History of Putnam County, Tennessee by Walter S. McClain, Cooksville, Tenn., Quimby Dyer & Company [c1925]

A "haint" is an unsettled or angry dead spirit; the term, like "hag," is of Germanic-British origins. A haint can range from a ghost to an undefinable something that scares the bejeevers out of you. In the same way a haint tale covers everything from a ghost story to a yarn about an odd event. A haint tale doesn't even have to be scary; some are quite funny. But there are two common ingredients shared by every haint tale. One is that it must involve frightening a character, the listener, or both. The other is that it must include the supernatural, or supernatural overtones. Sometimes it can be a normal event perceived as supernatural, but the paranormal must get mixed in there somehow or other.


source: http://tinyurl.com/24xeun

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian mountains history, haint tales, Putnam County TN

"This was last used in 1942. It's one of the mills that supplied part of the valley in here.

"The original mill didn't belong to my grandfather. It belonged to a family of Matthews that owned this property at that time. The Matthews were . . . I'm sure you've heard of the old Federal Judge George McClintock used to sit on the bench in Charleston. Well it was his grandfather that had it originally.

"I can remember when I was a kid people would come in covered wagons. I can still remember the wagons coming, and they would spend the night. In fact in that old log barn up where . . . up on the hill where I lived . . . there were two stalls they called the mill stable . . . that the people who stayed overnight to get their grinding done kept their horses in, and we had a room up in the house . . . in our home up there that they spent the night in.

"My grandmothers fed an awful lot of people there who have come to the mill, and that was part of the service. They got patronizing this mill. Was a place to spend the night if they were going to stay overnight.

"They had a millwright come twice a year and sharpen the stones. If you got [the two stones] a little too close, it burned the corn . . . well you could smell it . . . You'd see the miller run to the . . . raised the stone up a little bit . . . start burning a little bit . . . You could smell it all over the mill. The miller would stand around there when he was grinding . . . he'd feel the texture with his hands . . . and then he would smell it . . . I remember seeing him do that, and then he would rub it between his fingers . . . see what texture he was getting . . . whether it was going to be too coarse or not.

"[The wheat sifters were] covered with fine silk That was one of the reasons . . . It was right at the beginning of World War II, and the silk came from Japan. And they couldn't get it, and that was one of the reasons the mill went out of use."

Richard McNeel
1913-1980
Describing the old grist mill at Mill Point, WV, thought to be the oldest mill of its kind in the state

Source: www.marshall.edu/library/speccoll/cass/html/richard_mcneel.asp


Mill+Point+WV grist+mill appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture history+of+appalachia

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SALLY GOODIN'

Love her, love Sally Goodin'
Love her, sweet thing Sally Goodin'

A big piece of pie, a big piece of puddin'
Give it all away, to hug Sally Goodin'

Looked on the hill, seen Sally runnin'
Yes my my, sweet thing Sally comin'

Up and down the road , the road all muddy
To hug Sally Goodin, till she can't stand steady

Upon the hillside, hewin' on a log
Frogs in the millpond, barking like a dog

Before you hear that rooster crow
Sprinkle little meal before her door

---Queen family version of traditional western North Carolina folk song

Old time music matriarch Mary Jane Queen [born Prince] (1914-2007) grew up in southwestern North Carolina with eight brothers and sisters in a home that was a local hub of musical activity. Family members regularly sang at church and social events in the Caney Fork community in Jackson County. She learned the banjo and absorbed a singing repertoire that included old ballads and story songs sung around the house to accompany everyday work.

"My dad worked in lots of places," said Queen, "and there’d be a group of men working together, cutting down the harvest in the fall, and they’d ask if my dad could sing and if they could sing he’d learn it from them."

Her marriage to Claude Queen, a banjo and guitar player, brought together the music and song traditions of two neighboring families. Not surprisingly, they raised a musical family of eight children.

Just a few days before her death this past summer, she was given a 2007 National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship for a lifetime spent working and preserving Appalachian songs. Mary Jane Queen also received the Mountain Heritage Award, the NC Folk Heritage Award, and the Brown-Hudson Folklore Award.


sources: www.ourtownnc.com/issues/2007/mary_jane_queen.html
www.smokymountainnews.com/issues/4_01/4_25_01/front_mary_jane.shtml


Mary+Jane+Queen Claude+Queen Queen+family Sally+Goodin+lyrics Caney+Fork+NC appalachia Appalachian+ballads appalachian+culture

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Labels: appalachia, Appalachian ballads, appalachian culture, Caney Fork NC, Claude Queen, Mary Jane Queen, Queen family, Sally Goodin lyrics

NY TIMES (Oct 24, 1936): "Further evidence of Hollywood's knack of distorting historical characters into stock figures of blood-and-thunder fiction is presented at the Palace in "Daniel Boone," which purports to be a reasonably accurate chronicle of the frontiersman's trek with a party of settlers from Yadkin, N. C., across the trackless Cumberland Mountains up into the fertile country that now is Kentucky.

"Though the film is supposed to be a chapter from the trapper's life, it resembles a dozen others of a genre which languished when the screen started to talk. With such hoary tradition behind it, the new photoplay could not have failed to be a visually exciting cowboy and Indian drama.

"Among the stock story devices note Daniel tied to the flame-encircled stake, his miraculous escape when the faithful Black Eagle tosses a tomahawk from a cliff and cuts the ties that bind him, Daniel's flight through underbrush and over mountain with five tribes on his trail, and finally the hand-to-hand struggle with the renegade Simon Girty on the edge of a cliff.

"For all his physical prowess, George O'Brien manages to project Daniel Boone as a shy, unassuming adventurer, which is presumably what the man was. John Carradine plays Simon Girty with all the malice he can command, and sets a new high in facial contortions. Helpful bits are contributed by Heather Angel as the dreamy-eyed girl who wins Boone's heart, George Regas as Black Eagle, Ralph Forbes and Clarence Muse."


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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian mountains history, Daniel Boone, George O'Brien

"I was born on the Virginia Polytech Institute campus in October 1903, the son of Dr. Ellison Adger Smyth, Jr. of Charleston, South Carolina who came here with Dr. McBryde to found the Biology Department in 1891.

"Mama, my mother, being from Charleston, did not feel that the house was really established unless there was a black in the kitchen. Domestics, that was the place for a black woman to me. A black man, farm work, painting, carpentry, any make-shift job that you could get. There were not many blacks in Blacksburg. Out on Nelley's Cave Road, the Mills family and hangers-on and kinfolk to them, very fine black family. In town there were a few blacks living up Bitter Hill, the oldest section in town.

"On the campus, us kids, they called us the Faculty Fumblers when we played football. We always fumbled the ball. But I played opposite Booker T. Washington who chewed real tobacco. We were allowed to chew licorice and spit what looked tobacco, but we couldn't chew real tobacco. But Booker T. Washington chewed REAL tobacco, and he played opposite me, right tackle.

"He lubricated the grass in front of me with real tobacco juice, and I didn't like to roll in that. Anybody who passed by was free to join in the football games. We played Potlikker Flats [north Blacksburg], we played Bitter Hill, and they always beat us, but it was a lot of fun. Sometimes even college students passing by from the Aggie Hall would stop, "Can we play too?" And they would choose up sides."


Ellison A. Smyth
Blacksburg, VA
1991 interview

http://spec.lib.vt.edu/archives/blackhistory/timeline/smyth.htm


appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history Blacksburg+VA Booker+T+Washington Ellison+A+Smyth Virginia+Tech

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, Blacksburg VA, Booker T Washington, Ellison A Smyth, Virginia Tech

Ever wish you could access all the libraries and archives you need for your historical research efforts from just one link? I know I have in the course of writing for the Appalachian History blog. Online Education Database, of Chicago, seems to have sensed this need. I got an email the other day from the company founder, Jimmy Atkinson, who pointed me to an article on their site titled “250+ Killer Digital Libraries and Archives" which reads, in part:

"Hundreds of libraries and archives exist online, from university-supported sites to individual efforts. Each one has something to offer to researchers, students, and teachers. This list contains over links to libraries and archives that focus mainly on localized, regional, and U.S. history, but it also includes larger collections, eText and eBook repositories, and a short list of directories to help you continue your research efforts.

"The sites listed below focus on a certain state's towns, cities, counties, or regions within a given state. If a state is missing from this list, it's because that state hasn't begun to compile digital archives online. This does not mean that you cannot find information about that state on the Web. Try one of the multi-state collections following this category for your search. Or, you can look for a state's physical archive Web site or local historical society online for more resources. RootsWeb and the USGenWeb archives also hold localized information, or you might try a directory like Cyndi's List for more information."

Happy digging!


Mr. Atkinson has a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics from the University of Notre Dame.

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If you’re anywhere near Big Stone Gap, VA this weekend, head on over to Mountain Empire Community College for the 35th annual Home Craft Days festival. Crafts and demonstrations include weaving, pottery making, grist milling, wood crafting, basket weaving, broom making, quilting, and tatting.

Tatting?

Tatting is the centuries-old art of making fine lace. The lace form consists of circles and curved lines which are created by looping and tying knots which slide on a core thread. This fine thread is fed into a cat-eye-shaped shuttle. The tatting shuttle consists of two oval blades of either bone, ivory, mother of pearl or tortoise-shell, pointed at both ends, and joined together in the middle.

A good shuttle contributes materially to the rapid and perfect execution of the work. In the eighteenth century, when tatting was in great vogue, much larger shuttles than today’s were used, because of the voluminous materials they had to carry, silk cord being one.

The English name of tatting is said to be derived from ‘tatters’ and to denote the frail disconnected character of the fabric. The Italians called it ‘occhi,’ while in the Orient it still bears the name of ‘makouk,’ from the shuttle used in making it. The term tatting can encompass a variety of lace-making styles, as well as social aspects of gatherings.

In the early 20th century, Anne Orr emerged as a champion of the needlework arts. Her magazine pieces published in Southern Woman's Magazine, Good Housekeeping and Better Homes and Gardens made tatting patterns available to all.

Anne Champe Orr (1875-1946) was endlessly fascinated with needlework and designed and sold hundreds of thousands of patterns for cross stitch, quilting, crochet, filet crochet and tatting. Orr began her career as art editor for the Nashville-based Southern Woman’s Magazine in 1913-14. She quickly became widely known at home and abroad for the published needlework patterns she began producing in 1915.

Even though she was not a needleworker herself, she created easy-to-follow charted designs for cross-stitch, embroidery, and crochet, later doing the same for knitting, lacemaking (particularly tatting) and rugmaking.

Orr's designs were innovative to boot. Teri Dusenbury, in Tatting Hearts, says of Orr’s contribution to the craft: "Through the genius of one designer, Anne Orr, tatting evolved one step further with one of the most innovative techniques to be discovered since the true chain was established in 1862—split ring tatting. The technique first appeared in 1923 in a J&P Coats publication entitled Crochet, Cross Stitch and Tatting, Book No. 14. Of the thirteen edgings shown, twelve utilized the new technique."

Anne Orr provided employment for women throughout the Appalachians, who thanks to her skilled guides could make such things as appliqued quilts and delicate tablecloths for sale.


sources: http://crafts.resourceplaza.com/crocheting/news/archives/2005_11_01_archive.php
"Encyclopedia of Needlework" Therese de Dillmont, 1906, DMC, Dornach, Alsance
http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/imagegallery.php?EntryID=O017a
"Tatting Hearts" Teri Dusenbury, 1994, Courier Dover Publications

related post: "Winter's the Quilting Season"


Home+Craft+Days Big+Stone+Gap+VA Tatting Anne+Champe+Orr appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture appalachian+mountains+history

Posted by Dave Tabler at 8:30 AM | 5 comments Links to this post    
Labels: Anne Champe Orr, appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian mountains history, Big Stone Gap VA, Home Craft Days, Tatting

"The 1927 Sessions in Bristol [TN] were so successful artistically and in terms of commercial sales," says Dr. Ted Olsen, interim director of East Tennessee State University's Center for Appalachian Studies and Services, "that the other labels said, 'Aha, Victor is doing something really smart' ... by going to the mountains to get the music rather than expecting mountain musicians to travel outside Appalachia to the big cities of Atlanta or New York."

Johnson City, TN, like Bristol, was a haven for early recording artists, including the legendary Jimmie Rodgers. And so, in 1928 and 1929, Frank Buckley Walker, head of the Columbia Records “hillbilly” recordings division, headed there, field recording instruments in tow, in search of native Appalachian musical talent. The scraggly bearded man was known by Johnson Citians simply as "Uncle Fuzz."

From October 15-18 1928, the Brading-Marshall Lumber Company’s business office at 334 East Main Street (a site now occupied by an Interstate 26 onramp) attracted a myriad of local musicians, each auditioning for a potential record contract with Columbia Records. Walker listened intently as each individual or group played music, in hopes of being invited back that same week for a recording session in their rented temporary makeshift studio. Historians would later tag his pioneering efforts as the "Johnson City Sessions."

One of the most well-known old-time musicians to emerge from these sessions was Country Music Hall of Fame fiddler Charlie Bowman. Three of his brothers and two of his daughters recorded with him. The two daughters, Jennie and Pauline, were among the first sister acts recorded in the genre. Fiddlin’ Charlie Bowman was a major influence on the distinctive fiddle style that defined 1920s and 1930s country music, and cut two of his signature pieces --- "Gonna Raise the Ruckus Tonight" and "Roll on Buddy" --- in Johnson City.

The Roane County Ramblers, another group that developed a wide following, recorded four songs on Oct. 15, 1928, and another six, including “Johnson City Rag,” on Oct. 21, 1929.

The Bentley Boys' "Down on Penny’s Farm" from the 1929 sessions ricocheted forwarded 30 years to impact a young folk singer from Minnesota who was about to make his own mark on the world.

"Bob Dylan was so moved by that particular performance from the Johnson City Sessions that he used the melody for a song ... 'Hard times in New York Town,'" Olsen said.

Olsen said Dylan also borrowed the theme of "Down on Penny’s Farm" for the classic, "Maggie's Farm."

But the gravy train would not continue. "…the deepening Depression eventually curtailed field recording activity," says Charles K. Wolfe in The Bristol Sessions, "and after the 1929 Columbia sessions in Johnson City, no more records would be made in the Tri-Cities area until after World War II."

“If not quite as majestic in scope as the 1927 Bristol Sessions, at least the 1928-29 Johnson City Sessions are extremely distinctive in terms of the quality of music they produced,” said Olsen.

Sources: www.tricities.com/tristate/tri/entertainment/crooked_road_promo/partthree.apx.-content-articles-TRI-2007-03-03-0073.html
www.birthplaceofcountrymusic.org/node/468
www.gotricities.com/content/article.dna?idNumber=031022121606

"The Bristol Sessions"
Writings About the Big Bang of Country Music
Edited by Charles K. Wolfe and Ted Olson
McFarland, Jefferson, NC, 2005


Johnson+City+Sessions Columbia+Records Frank+Buckley+Walker Charlie+Bowman Roane+Country+Ramblers Bentley+Boys appalachia +appalachia+history Appalachian+ballads appalachian+culture appalachian+history

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Labels: Appalachian ballads, appalachian culture, appalachian history, Bentley Boys, Charlie Bowman, Columbia Records, Frank Buckley Walker, Johnson City Sessions, Roane Country Ramblers

Alabama has 3,400 documented caves. The most famous of these is Russell Cave (now a national monument), the oldest rock shelter used regularly for a home in the eastern United States. Named for Thomas Russell, a veteran of the American Revolution who once owned the land above it, this limestone cave is located south of the Alabama-Tennessee border along the southern end of the Cumberland Plateau in northeastern Alabama. Russell Cave is about 210 ft (64 m) long, 107 ft (33 m) wide, and 26 ft (8 m) high.

The cave was inhabited during all Prehistoric time periods: Paleo, Archaic, Woodland and Mississippian. The artifacts found in this karst indicate intermittent human habitation for almost 9,000 years.

'Karst' describes a landscape that is principally formed by dissolving bedrock and is characterized by caves, sinkholes, springs, and underground streams. Karst is a hollow terrain much like a piece of Swiss cheese coated with a thin layer of soil. These interconnected cavities can range in size from tiny cracks to stadium sized rooms. Geologists consider Alabama’s northeast corner a significant 'karst' region.

Since the first excavation by the Tennessee Archeological Society in 1953, archeologists have thought that the cave was used in winter by people who in warmer months moved to villages along the Tennessee River. The cave mouth faces east, away from the cold north wind but letting in the morning sun. It would have been cool in the summer. Cool waters from the cave spring meeting with the warmer outside air often cause a fog to hover over the front of the cave. The archeological evidence indicates that in the years before European contact in the 16th century, the cave was used primarily as a hunting camp.

Most groups inhabiting the cave would probably have numbered no more than 15 to 30--their size limited by the need for mobility and by how many people the land could sustain. They were likely extended families or several related families. Certainly some groups would have used the cave year after year, but varying styles of spear and arrow points tell us that it was inhabited by different bands. Nine burials have been found in the cave, ranging from an infant to a 40-50-year-old woman.

From the remains it appears that these people were short and muscular. In appearance they probably resembled the peoples Europeans first encountered in the 16th century.

The Cherokee Indians occupied this part of the Tennessee Valley. They, and the European settlers who followed them, made little use of the cave. The few objects they did leave were found very close to the surface.

Russell Cave National Monument constitutes only part of the cavern that was discovered in 1953. The national monument was established in 1961 on 310 acres of land donated to the people of America by the National Geographic Society.

sources: www.karstconservancy.org/karst/wallpapers.asp
www2.nature.nps.gov/geology/parks/ruca/
gorp.away.com/gorp/resource/us_nm/al/russell.htm

related post: "I heard rumors of the blind fish"


Russell+Cave karst Cumberland+Plateau Tennessee+Archeological+Society appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+mountains+history

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian mountains history, Cumberland Plateau, karst, Russell Cave, Tennessee Archeological Society

Scots-Irish Impact on the Appalachian region

Please welcome guest blogger Byron Chesney. By day a computer applications engineer in Knoxville, TN, Chesney is also an active observer of the Southern Appalachian scene on his numerous Tennessee and Knoxville area related websites. Somewhere in all that he manages to eat and sleep!

Stubborn, proud, independent, rugged, individualistic are all terms used to describe the people known as Scots-Irish. They came to North America in the early 1700’s from Ulster in Northern Ireland, where they were forced to flee due to political and religious persecution as well as high rent and a shortage of land. As they tried to settle within the American colonies, they soon discovered that they didn’t fit in there either. Many of the same problems that they had experienced in Ulster were also prevalent in the colonies. So, they packed up their pots and pans and headed south to the mountainous regions that we call the Appalachians. It was here that they settled in the hills of Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Carolina, and Georgia, and lived life the way they saw fit.

These fine folks, though regarded by outsiders as “peculiar,” brought with them not only their beliefs and values, but also their traditional brand of music, poetry, and folklore. Today’s country and bluegrass music scenes can trace their humble beginnings back to the hills of Appalachia where families would play handmade acoustic instruments and sing songs of life, love, and lore. Country music superstars Tim McGraw and Kenny Chesney, as well as many others, can map out their families’ roots back to the Scots-Irish. Many present-day poets and writers can also thank these ancestors for their rich and colorful talents.

Able to scratch out a living and raise a family on an acre of rocky hillside, the Scots-Irish are largely responsible for the independent thinking and determined will of the present-day people of the southeast and regions west. Over 25 percent of Americans can trace their roots back to the Scots-Irish. You might go so far as to say that they were mainly responsible for blazing the new American frontier.

Religion played a huge role in the life of the Scots-Irish; after all, it was their religion that first drove them from their native homeland of Scotland, over to Northern Ireland, and ultimately to the Americas. They chiefly held Presbyterian beliefs and greatly influenced the beginnings of the Baptist and Methodist faiths of Protestant religions in the South. Strong spiritual and family beliefs were instilled in their mind-sets, which naturally have been passed down and are still present in the lives of their descendants today.

Along with music and religion, the Scots-Irish had strong political views. They built up a calculated indifference towards the dictatorship of British rule and the Roman Catholic Church under which they had lived both in their native homeland and in the American colonies. They were heavily involved in the Revolutionary War, fighting on the side of the Patriots. After the war, as payment for their loyalty, many state governments issued land grants to war veterans, allowing them to move their families into the westward expanding territories of North Carolina and what would eventually become the state of Tennessee.

From this group of independent thinkers, we gained the likes of pioneers such as Davy Crockett and Sam Houston, and American presidents Andrew Jackson, James K. Polk, Andrew Johnson, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and yes, even William Clinton. The role of the Scots-Irish on the Appalachian region and the United States of America should not, cannot, and will not be dismissed or overlooked. I, as a seventh generation Scots-Irish Appalachian American, will see to that! Independent? Yes. Proud? Yes. Stubborn? Definitely!


Scots-Irish Ulster Presbyterians appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, Presbyterians, Scots-Irish, Ulster

On October 14, 1947, Chuck Yeager became the first man to pilot the Bell X-1 faster than the speed of sound, above the California desert at Muroc Dry Lake Bed.

"We just didn't know what would happen when we reached the speed of sound, because we didn't have any wind tunnel data. We could put a model in the wind tunnel and blow air by it at supersonic speeds, but what happened, a shock wave would form on that model at about .9 mach, or 90 percent of the speed of sound, and that shock wave then would bounce off the wall of the tunnel, and it would choke up the tunnel. We didn't have any data from about .9 mach to 1.1 mach. People really just didn't know. It was ignorance. They thought that an airplane would never go faster than sound, because of the shock waves that built up on it. But, as I say, that really didn't make any difference to me. I could care less. It's your job to try it. And that's the way it worked out."

Chuck Yeager
American Academy of Achievement interview
February 1, 1991
Cedar Ridge, California

After the flight, the Army clamped tight security on the whole thing, and Yeager wasn’t permitted to tell anyone. He celebrated with just a few other pilots at a local watering hole. He flew a dozen more transonic flights in the X-1, but still under tight wraps. His accomplishment wasn't announced to the public until mid-1948.


"I lived my first 18 years of my life in Lincoln County, WV," says Yeager. "That's where you're molded. The rest of the time you're working. But you're molded into what you're going to be in those first 18 years."

Yeager says he had not thought much about the future when he was growing up. He had fun as a youth flying kites and hunting squirrels in the mornings. Sometimes, he says, he would arrive at school 15 minutes after starting time, and the principal would not be too sympathetic with the explanation that he had had squirrels to skin.

Yeager recalls spending a lot of time playing football and basketball.

"I was trained in sports," he says. "Sports are a big part of your life training for adulthood."

The Ford garage and Shorty Hager's garage, he says, were the vocational schools of his day. “They turned over their garages to us. They taught us what we knew.”

"A machine" he said, "will bite a person who does not understand it."

What he learned from Shorty Hager and from Carl Clay at the Ford garage he credited with keeping him alive over his flying years.

"I learned how to push a machine without it biting me."

After Yeager's historic flight was declassified in June 1948, he was awarded the Collier Trophy, the most prestigious honor in aviation, and accorded celebrity status as "The Fastest Man Alive."


sources:www.acepilots.com/usaaf_yeager2.html
www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/yea0int-3
www.wvculture.org/HISTORY/notewv/yeager1.html


Chuck+Yeager breaking+sound+barrier Bell+X-1 Lincoln+County+WV appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+history

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian history, Bell X-1, breaking sound barrier, Chuck Yeager, Lincoln County WV

From 1935-1943, President Franklin Roosevelt looked to the U.S. Farm Security Administration, under the direction of Roy Stryker, to photograph people in need across the country in order to help sell his New Deal programs to the public.

Ben Shahn was one of the first photographers Styker hired. Shahn worked for a part of the project called Special Skills, and also helped create posters and other graphic arts.

"It was a really tough time," remembered Shahn years later, "and when this thing came along and this idea that I must wander around the country a bit for three months. . . I just nearly jumped out of my skin with joy. And not only that, they were going to give me a salary too! I just couldn’t believe it."

In October 1935 Shahn and his wife Bernarda started out on the first trip in a Model A Ford. Heading for West Virginia, he took photographs in Monongalia County before arriving in Logan County. The couple spent a Sunday and Monday in Omar and also visited Freeze Fork before moving on through Williamson to Kentucky and Tennessee, and then into the deep South.

"I did a series of photographs on a Saturday afternoon in a small town in Tennessee, I believe, of a medicine man. He had a little dummy, ventriloquist dummy, and he had a Negro to help him and so on. It was Saturday. I don't think there were ten cars in the square, they were all mule drawn carts that had come there. This was 1935; it was incredible you see. The same was true of a lot of areas we covered. You'd have that feeling then of being way far back; but tragically enough, just about a month ago we took a train from Washington to Cincinnati. As I went throughout West Virginia, it hadn't changed. It just made me sick to see the same darn thing.


"The other thing that startled me; when I was down in the mine country, I think it was Kentucky, there was some local strike taking place and I thought I want to cover that. It was being picketed and I thought, 'Now how do you get into a conversation with a union picket? You offer him a union made cigarette.' So I bought a pack of Raleighs and I offered him a cigarette and he says, 'No, I don't smoke that awful stuff.' In stronger language than that. He says, 'Here, I've been in the union for thirty years and I won't smoke that,' and he offered me a non-union cigarette. This to me is startling you know.

"As was the fact that John L. Lewis, who was a kind of a God of theirs at that time, and you didn't dare say a word against him...if you had a copy of The Nation with you, I think they'd run you out of town. There was this incomprehensible conflict there you know.

"I got into homes. I stayed with some families. I knew how to do that pretty well, and got to know them, and we still remember their names."

sources: www.aaa.si.edu/collections/oralhistories/transcripts/shahn64.htm
www.wvculture.org/museum/omar/index.html


Ben+Shahn Farm+Security+Administration appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, Ben Shahn, Farm Security Administration

"The first session of the John C. Campbell Folk School at Brasstown, N.C. is scheduled for this winter," says the October 1927 brochure. "It will begin December 1st and cover the months of December, January and February. The course is open to all sixteen years and over, regardless of the number of grades they have passed, who are really interested in continuing their education and in developing the best they have in them. There are, therefore, no stated requirements beyond a serious desire to learn and grow.

"Subjects to be given fall into different groups: simple field-surveying, construction of model farm equipment, such as colony hog houses according to Government blue-print; cooking and sewing; grammar, reading, writing and arithmetic of the most practical kind; lectures in history, literature, economic geography, natural history, civil government and health; daily music, Danish gymnastics and sports. An opportunity for special group study of agricultural science, book-keeping and forestry will be offered to those interested.

"No examinations or credits will be given for this course, which is not intended to fit for particular trades, or to prepare for the graded school or college. It is designed to help young people take advantage of their natural powers and to make their life in the country better, more efficient and more interesting.

"Inquiries may be made in person at the school or addressed to Mrs. John C. Campbell, Brasstown, N.C."


source: wcudigitalcollection.cdmhost.com/index.php

related post: 'The Vardy School'


John+C.+Campbell+Folk+School Brasstown+NC appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, Brasstown NC, John C. Campbell Folk School

Please welcome guest blogger Timothy W. Hooker, author of the Sushi Tuesday blog. Tim teaches English at Cleveland State Community College [TN], is a "Point of View" moderator for WDEF-TV 12, and is the author of several works, including: "Rocket Man: A Rhapsody of Short Stories," "Duncan Hambeth: Furniture King of the South," and "Looking For A City."

The old Bob Seger song, "Against the Wind," is stuck in my head.

Why?

It’s the time of year for me to consider, like the songwriter, "what to leave in, what to leave out."

As a history buff, it’s an important concept. A lot of stuff is constantly going on all around us. How do we decide what’s history and what’s not worth our attention? What do we hang on to and what do we discard?

That’s why journalism is called "the rough draft of history."” A newspaper reporter can discover the Who, What, When, Where, and How of a story. But, a reporter will never have the time or resources to discover the Why.

It could take decades for the Why to come to light.

And, history is all about the Why.

This is further complicated by being a Southern Appalachian. We come from an oral tradition, dating clear back to the Druids, who spent decades memorizing the components of their faith system. Sure, as various invaders came to the British Isles, they brought written forms of their languages with them, and those various influences evolved into what we think of as Modern English. But, we in Southern Appalachia have a long tradition of keeping our stories alive by passing them down speaker-to-listener, from generation to generation.

This creates a problem, though.

History is a function of memory. Memory is a function of language. And, if your language base is oral, then history becomes a function of communal memory. We remember it because we all got together and Aunt Sally remembered a little bit. Cousin Bob remembered some of it. Grandpa remembered a bit. Junior recalled a portion.

And, thus, if no one is around to remember it, it may easily fall through the cracks.

But, on a more selfish note, this is a time for me to consider “what to leave in, what to leave out” because today is my birthday. And, as I stand in the middle of the River of History, I find myself looking at what I’ve chosen to hang on to, where I am now, and what I hope to send down the river to future generations.

From my ancestors, I've clung to the stories, family stories of hard times and hanging on in spite of them. I’ve hung on to the sayings of my father. I've kept the revolver my great-grandfather used to commit suicide. I've got pictures of ancestors who I never met and I really couldn't tell you who they are; but, I can see myself in them. I've got one picture of my grandfather's generation, back when they were making and moving moonshine; I call it "The Wild Bunch" photo.

I've got my mother's Scofield Bible, all marked up and colored. And, I've got two rings that my father lathed down from stainless steel bolts-- one for himself, one for my mother.

So far, I've got three published books to my name. I'm married to the most beautiful girl in the world. I have four cats. I have a home. I have a red Ford pick-up truck. I have a pump shotgun. I can't count how many books I own. I have a wall-full of college degrees that say I'm trainable. And, I have a website I'm pretty darned proud of.

What I'd like to leave to future generations is the clear message that you can have anything in this world that you want, if you want it bad enough. Nobodies can become somebodies. Losers can become winners. And, love is the only thing worth getting up in the morning for.

History.

What to leave in, what to leave out.

It's up to you.

TWH


Sushi+Tuesday Timothy+W.+Hooker appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture history+of+appalachia

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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, history of appalachia, Sushi Tuesday, Timothy W. Hooker

"Well, of course, we had to help with the housework, all . . . we had to do the sweeping and the dishwashing and the scrubbing of floors. We . . . we just had wood floors, no . . . with no paint on 'em, no nothing on 'em, and . . . and we scrubbed those with . . . with the lye soap and . . . and . . . and, of course, swept 'em with a broom. You didn't have any vacuum cleaners or anything of that nature. We'd all pitch in. Sometimes even . . . I mean, the boys, I'm s-. . . remember them helping scrub the . . porches and things and, you know.

"But the chores of girls were to . . . of course, we had to go draw water from the well and . . . and bring it in. We had to . . . Mother always did the milking, but we had to h-. . . I remember we'd have to "bug the beans." You'd go out and pick the bean bugs off the beans. And you'd go out and you'd pull weeds out of the onions. You'd...I mean, all kids did that. We would have to just do everwhat she wanted us to do, which was anything a child could do, I guess, that would make it a little easier for them as parents.

"Dad worked in the field, we'd have to carry him water to drink, and if he was far away where it would interrupt his work a lot, we'd take his lunch to him. Mother'd cook and put it in...well, we'd carry it in buckets, you know, as in...things she'd get lids on...that would keep the...from getting it dirty or spilling it. But most of the time he was close enough that he'd come in and eat. But I remember carrying his dinner up on that hill to where he would be so far back hoeing corn.

"I'd walk up to my Grandmother Frazier's every day at noontime. My brother and sister, if we could get all of our jobs done, why, Mother'd let us go up there and listen to "The Midday Merry-Go-Round" which was a comedy-type show out of Knoxville. Minnie Pearl was on it, and you've heard of Minnie Pearl, and all of her comic . . . comics. And she would . . . and then there was Rod Brassfield. And I remember all those . . . now I've forgotten 'em, but . . . but we'd just sit there and listen and laugh."



Florene Smith
b. 1929
interviewed July 24, 1991
Whitesburg, Kentucky

Kentuckiana Digital Library
University of Kentucky Oral History Program

related post: "You would wear yourself down winding it up"


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"Extensive national playgrounds have been reserved in various parts of the country for use by the people for camping and various kindred purposes. Most of these are in the West where Uncle Sam's public lands were located. They are in the Yosemite, the Yellowstone, and many other National Parks - covering about six million acres in all. Splendid work has been accomplished in fitting these Parks for use. The National Forests, covering about 130 million acres - chiefly in the West - are also equipped for public recreation purposes.

"A great public service has been started in these Parks and Forests in the field of outdoor life. They have been called "playgrounds of the people." This they are for the Western people – and for those in the East who can afford time and funds for an extended trip in a Pullman car. But camping grounds to be of the most use to the people should be as near as possible to the center of population. And this is in the East.

"It fortunately happens that we have throughout the most densely populated portions of the United States a fairly continuous belt of under developed lands. These are contained in the several ranges which form the Appalachian chain of mountains. Several National Forests have been purchased in this belt. These mountains, in several ways rivaling the western scenery, are within a day's ride from centers containing more than half the population of the United States. The region spans the climate of New England and the cotton belt; it contains the crops and the people of the North and the South.

"The skyline along the top of the main divides and ridges of the Appalachians would overlook a mighty part of the nation's activities. The rugged lands of this skyline would form a camping base strategic in the country's work and play."

---Benton MacKaye, “An Appalachian Trail: A Project in Regional Planning.”

Benton MacKaye (1879-1975) was the first person to propose the idea of the Appalachian Trail, which he did in October of 1921. He grew up in Shirley Center, Massachusetts, reading the work of American naturalists and poets and taking long walks in the mountains of Massachusetts and Vermont. MacKaye sometimes claimed that the idea for the trail was born one day when he was sitting in a tree atop Stratton Mountain in Vermont.

Throughout his professional career MacKaye worked for a number of Federal bureaus and agencies, which included the U.S. Forest Service, the Tennessee Valley Authority, the U.S. Department of Labor.

MacKaye was responsible for convening and organizing the first Appalachian Trail conference in Washington, D.C., in 1925. That gathering of hikers, foresters, and public officials embraced the goal of building the Trail. They established an organization, called the Appalachian Trail Conference, appointed MacKaye as its "field organizer," and named Major William Welch, manager of New York's Harriman Park, as its first chairman. The Appalachian Trail Conference became the Appalachian Trail Conservancy in 2005.


Sources: Benton MacKaye, “An Appalachian Trail: A Project in Regional Planning.” Journal of the American Institute of Architects 9 (Oct. 1921): 325-330.

www.appalachiantrail.org/site/c.jkLXJ8MQKtH/b.786749/k.D5F9/History.htm

related post: "Emma Gatewood, 67, walks Appalachian Trail solo"


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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, Appalachian Trail, Appalachian Trail Conference, Benton MacKaye

The American Museum of Science & Energy is today’s No. 1 Oak Ridge, TN tourist destination. But from 1941 to 1949 Oak Ridge was a town that did not exist. It was one of the top secret facilities for creating the "Manhattan Project" atom bomb used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This was the site of a working nuclear reactor for producing fissionable isotopes of uranium.

The gates to both the city and the Manhattan Project’s laboratory museum opened the same day: March 19, 1949. The town quickly became a tourist spot. The museum was sponsored by the Oak Ridge Institute of Nuclear Studies, now Oak Ridge Associated Universities. Then called the American Museum of Atomic Energy, it profiled the peaceful uses of atomic energy. Housed in a former World War II-era cafeteria, it created and sold "Irradiated Dimes."

• The dimes are the product of a special isotope cabinet, not a nuclear reactor.
• The radioactivity lasted about four minutes.
• Irradiated dimes are chemically different from others.
• Only silver dimes could be irradiated.
• More than one million dimes were created from 1949-1975.

Were the dimes a radioactive danger to the public?

"I grew up in Oak Ridge, Tennessee," says DeeDee Halleck in Perpetual Shadows: Representing the Atomic Age. "… As a child, I sensed that neither of my parents liked the fact that Oak Ridge was identified with atomic weaponry -- especially since the government had actually used the bomb during World War II. The national celebration, so prevalent in Life magazine's version of post-war America, did not extend to that part of Tennessee. Maybe Oak Ridge knew too much … After [my mother] died, we discovered in her safe deposit box four irradiated dimes, one for each of us. I shudder to think of the damage this "fun house" souvenir may have done to young ovaries and testicles in close proximity to children's pockets."

"The coins are not 'hot,'" states Dr. Paul Frame, Ph.D., a health physicist with the Oak Ridge Associated Universities and author (with William Kolb) of Living With Radiation: The First Hundred Years. "It is impossible to say exactly what the activities would have been at the time that the dimes were irradiated since I have not seen the results of any analyses that were done then.

"But it is possible to hazard a guess, and I did some back-of-the-envelope type calculations. While the results suggest that the maximum induced activity would have been on the order of 20 microcuries (and this would decay away quickly), it is probable that the actual activities were quite a bit lower. Keep in mind that I had to make wild guesses as to what the irradiation times and the neutron fluence rates were."

The dimes were discontinued in the late '70s, after the government changed metal composition in the coin, causing them to "hold on to radioactivity longer," says American Museum of Science & Energy museum exhibit manager Lenell Woods.


related post: "Did Early Polio Vaccine Cause Cancer?"

Sources: www.canadian numismatic.org/ebulletin%5CEBulletinVol3No05January26_2007.pdf
www.coin-newbies.com/articles/irradiated.html
www.knoxnews.com/kns/fun_stuff/article/0,1406,KNS_309_4350090,00.html

Living With Radiation: The First Hundred Years.
William Kolb and Dr. Paul Frame (self-published ISBN 060806162x)

Perpetual Shadows: Representing the Atomic Age
DeeDee Halleck
Wide Angle - Volume 20, Number 2, April 1998, pp. 70-76
The Johns Hopkins University Press

For the generous research assistance he provided on this article, I am indebted to Terry Thornton, author of the Hill Country of Monroe County, Mississippi blog.


Irradiated+dimes American+Museum+of+Atomic+Energy Oak+Ridge+TN atomic+energy appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

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Labels: American Museum of Atomic Energy, appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, atomic energy, Irradiated dimes, Oak Ridge TN

Please welcome guest blogger Barbara Fisher, author of food blog Tigers and Strawberries. Says Fisher of her blog: 'On the farm, I gathered eggs and learned how to dress out hogs, steer and chickens and how to harvest and preserve the fruits of summer. With a childhood like that, it’s no wonder I became obsessed with food.'

"I grew up helping my grandmother plant, tend, harvest and preserve the produce from her two very large garden plots. She and my grandfather had a farm in Putnam County, West Virginia, and between the two of them, they raised enough food to keep most of our large family in food.

"Preserving the harvest of the farm took many forms, from freezing, fermenting, drying, pickling and root cellaring, but the one process we spent the most time on was canning.

"Each year, we canned hundreds of jars of fruit, jellies, jams, tomatoes, sauces, beans, relishes, pickles and kraut. The time and effort it took to accomplish this gargantuan task was phenomenal; but even as we spent hours blanching, boiling, sterilizing, packing jars and processing them, Grandma told me it was much easier using the new lids than the old glass lids with the rubber gaskets. She’d saved a few of these relics from her early days, and I could see she was right—while the new metal lids could be used only once (though the rings we used over and over), they were more reliable than the rubber gaskets, forming a durable seal with few failures.

"Grandma was quick to adopt new technologies as they became available. She had a pressure canner, and used it for the low-acid vegetables she didn’t freeze, such as green beans and beets. She wouldn’t let me near that hissing behemoth--which was fine with me—it looked like a menacing contraption from Dr. Frankenstein’s laboratory, and its ominous sputtering intimidated me.

"When we used the hot water bath canners, however, I got to help with nearly every aspect of the process. I strained fruit juices for jellies, cooked down applesauce, and stuffed cukes into jars with umbrels of dill flowers and cloves of garlic. Then it was my job to screw on the lid rings, while Grandma popped filled jars into the canner. I was also the official seal tester—after several hours of listening to the distinctive ping-pop of the lids sealing, I’d go down the rows of gleaming jars and poke at the lids. Any that moved up and down, I’d mark with a grease pencil for us to watch carefully. If they didn’t seal after 24 hours, the lid was popped off and the food cooked; we either ate it then, re-canned it or I carried it out with the hog slop.

"Now, I find myself canning the summer and autumn harvests of Athens County, Ohio, to store for the winter. Since I don’t have a garden, I buy boxes of vegetables and fruits from local farmers and make my own preserves, jellies, salsas, sauces, pickles, and tomato products. While times have changed a lot in the past thirty years, I have to say that the main difference in my experiences canning then and now are that the foods I choose to can are different.

"Grandma never heard of salsa, but as I stir a concoction thick with tomatoes, jalapenos, onions, garlic and chipotle chilies, I cannot help but think she would have liked it. She’d never laid eye on tomatillos, but after tasting them, would have made a jam from them. My predilection for kimchi would have amused her; to her mind, it would be nothing more than “kraut with a kick.”

"The other big difference is the fact that today’s tomatoes are not as acidic as the ones we processed in the 1970’s hot water bath canners. Today, you either use a pressure canner to can tomato products, or you must acidify them before putting them in the hot water bath.

"Other than that, canning now is as it was thirty years ago or so. It is still a lot of work, which cannot be valued monetarily, but which can only be measured in the love of family, tradition, the land, and fresh, truly good, food."

Barbara Fisher
Athens, OH

related post: "Mountain Heritage Day Festival"


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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian mountains history, Athens OH, Barbara Fisher, home canning, Tigers and Strawberries

A headline on page 594 of the 1908 Sears Catalog probably startled readers used to page after page of plows, obesity powders, sewing machines, and cook stoves. It announced: "$100 set of building plans free. Let us be your architect without cost to you." From 1908–1940, Sears, Roebuck and Company sold roughly 75,000 homes nationwide through their mail-order Modern Homes program. Illinois probably has the largest collection in the US, but Sears homes are located in all 48 contiguous states.

Over that time Sears designed 447 different housing styles, from the elaborate multistory Ivanhoe, with its elegant French doors and art glass windows, to the simpler Goldenrod, which served as a quaint, three-room and no-bath cottage for summer vacationers.

Customers could choose a house to suit their individual tastes and budgets. A few weeks after the customer selected a home and placed the order, two railway boxcars containing 30,000 pieces of house – everything from doorknobs and carved staircases to varnish and roof shingles – would arrive at the nearest train depot.

How to get it from the station to the lot was up to the new homeowner. In the early days, people made trip after trip between the building site and the railroad station. Since it would have been difficult to transport all that material long distances, Sears homes were often located within a mile or two of train tracks and in cities that were reachable by rail.

Karen Hudson, of the Library of Congress’ American Folklife Center, reports the results of a 1992 survey the Center conducted in the New River Gorge region of West Virginia to describe that area's built environment:

“The survey revealed a much more diverse landscape than has been described in the past,” she notes. “While it was easy for project researchers to locate log cabins and abandoned coal towns, we also found many cinder block bungalows, glazed tile barns and silos, Lustron houses, concrete block churches, Sears mail order homes, and geodesic domes. Contrary to past reports, the New River Gorge cultural landscape reflects the history of a community that designed, built, and used its buildings according to individual tastes and principles.”

In 1932, Sears Modern Homes department began operating at a loss for the first time since 1912. The company's annual report stated that sales of the mail-order homes had dropped 40 percent in one year.

Sears closed the Modern Homes department in 1934. At a time when the average Sears house cost well under $3,000 (and mortgages were typically a fraction of that amount), this was a staggering sum. Foreclosing on (and evicting) customers from their homes became a public-relations nightmare. The Modern Homes department was reopened the following year, but the days of Sears "easy payment" mortgages were over.

Between 1932 and 1940, Sears probably sold another 15,000 to 20,000 homes, perhaps fewer. When the last Sears Modern Homes catalog was issued in 1940, Americans had purchased an estimated 75,000 homes.


sources: www.searsarchives.com/homes
www.csmonitor.com/2002/0612/p11s02-lihc.htm
www.loc.gov/folklife/news/Spring92.txt


Sears+mail+order+homes New+River+Gorge+WV American+Folklife+Center appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

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Labels: American Folklife Center, appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian history, appalachian mountains history, New River Gorge WV, Sears mail order homes

"Pa bought a mountain farm of about eighty acres that was located about five miles up Coon Creek from where the state road went from Pikeville, Kentucky to Williamson, W. Va. This farm had a framed four-room house on it, but Pa was never satisfied with it, as it was all hillside except maybe two acres.

"Pa and Ma both worked hard and were good managers. They raked and scraped and saved all they could, and didn’t waste anything. Pa was a great hand to set out fruit trees, so naturally he had an apple orchard. They canned apples in fruit jars, dried apples over a kiln, and made apple butter. Of course there were other fruit trees on the place, such as a cherry tree, several peach trees and some pear trees. They made use of all the fruit. When apples were ripe, they would peel a couple of bushels at night by kerosene lamplight, then they would work them up the next day.


"Pa was intelligent and he had about fifth grade education at three or four months per school term. Women in those days rarely attended school as it was considered useless as a woman's place was in the home. So naturally Ma could neither read nor write. Pa taught her to read, write and count. He used a blue-backed speller as a textbook. Ma would practice writing or printing the words from the speller, and soon she could read her bible and the mail order catalog.

"Ma was an intelligent woman and had great pride in her manners, cleanliness and character. She always had a smile for every one and never downed people. They seemed to prosper right along, and they vowed they would send their children to school and educate them. This they did.

"Bertha completed eighth grade, took six weeks of high school, took a Normal Course Examination and received her certificate to teach school. She taught school for three years on Brushy Fork of John's Creek. Orrison completed high school at Pikeville, and went to the University Of Kentucky at Lexington, where he graduated with a Law degree. He was admitted to the Bar in Kentucky, and set up his practice in Pikeville. John completed high school in Pikeville, and was an outstanding basketball player. After high school, he went into business with Garfield Blackburn, selling White Sewing Machines."

TELLING IT LIKE IT WAS
By Ireland Everett Layne
Born 1919
Coon Creek, KY
http://www.rootsweb.com/~kypike/layne.htm


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Labels: appalachia, appalachia history, appalachian culture, appalachian history, Apple harvesting, history of appalachia, Pikeville KY