Appalachian History

No more important fruit tree graces the homesteads, farms, and backyards of Appalachia than the apple. When early settlers headed west from the eastern seaboard, they took apple seeds because they didn’t weigh too much or take up too much space.

And no figure from American folklore personifies the spread of the apple into the heartland like Johnny Appleseed, aka John Chapman. Not a great deal is factually known about him, and by now the tall tale spinners have probably entirely obscured the full reality of the man himself. He was a strict vegetarian. He also primarily wore discarded clothing or would barter some apple saplings for used clothes. He walked alone in the wilderness, without gun or knife, slept outdoors, walked barefoot and ate berries. Stories that he wore a cooking pot as a hat, however, seem to have been stitched on at a later date.

Reproduction of an illustration depicting John Chapman, known as Johnny Appleseed, published in A History of the Pioneer and Modern Times of Ashland County From the Earliest to the Present Date by H. S. Knapp, 1863.

One thing is clear: he was as his legend suggests a man who moved around a great deal. Born in Leominster, MA, on September 26, 1774, John became a Christian minister who beginning in 1802 and for 43 years thereafter planted apple orchards from western Pennsylvania, across central Appalachia into Kentucky, and on throughout Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. While doing so, he spread the word of God as a self-appointed missionary for the mystical Swedenborgian church.

Legend says Chapman’s first seed scatterings were culled from the orchards he frequented as a child. It’s said that he gathered canoe-fulls of apple seeds from western Pennsylvania at cider-making time as he headed westward.

It’s easy to forget that Chapman, painted as a romantic mystic, was a level-headed, if eccentric, orchard businessman. For example, he owned more than 1074 acres of land in fifteen different tracts in Ohio. He sold his seedlings for three cents each, or planted an orchard for six cents a tree, earning about three dollars a day (compared to laborers in Philadelphia who earned about a dollar a day.) One of Johnny Appleseed’s authenticated varieties, the Albemarle Pippin (also known as the Newtown Pippin) is today one of the premier mountain varieties.

There are no records to indicate John Chapman had a wife or children, but according to the Johnny Appleseed Education Center & Museum in Urbana, OH Chapman had a sister and a brother. His brother died in infancy and mother soon after. Chapman's father remarried and had an additional family, thus giving Chapman ten half brothers and sisters. Visits to them help document his whereabouts at various points in his life.

We know, for example, that in 1816, while visiting family members in Center Township, OH he planted at least one orchard in Bristol Township for a Mr. Fuller.

Chapman’s last Ohio visit, in 1842, included a trip to Moscow Mills in Center Township in Morgan County to see his brothers Nathaniel and Parley and sister Sally Whitney, who lived there. In March 1845, Johnny Appleseed passed away at age 70 in Fort Wayne, IN.


Sources: www.morgan.lib.oh.us/Morgan%20County%20History%20Stories.doc
http://www.a-spi.org/tp/tp50.htm
www.urbana.edu/appleseed/museum.htm
www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=94


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The Chicken Thumb
A far fetched folktale from NC

Well folks, sit right back and let me tell you a little tale about how Hoopie the farmer and the Rooster named Red went at it one day.

Before I start, it is necessary for me to tell you a little something about Red. Red is one of them Barred Rock roosters. That’s the kind they take to them events called Cock Fights. Now Red was always doing things around the farm that were of questionable nature. To make a long story bearable, he did his job quite well: fertilizing that is. He done it so well that chickens no longer satisfied his insatiable appetite for fertilizing. That’s when the trouble begin.

At first it was Guinea hens that were the object of his desire. That was okay. Then next it was the ducks. That was a little odd but still bearable. It was when he moved up to geese that we began to take notice.

The day Hoopie woke up to Daisy, the milk cow, half mooing half screaming was the day that began as the end, or so we thought.

What happened next is about the craziest thing you ever did see.

Hoopie went running up to the barn to find Red eyeing Daisy in a way that makes your skin crawl, much like when you see a snake crawl up your pant leg. Hoopie commenced to chasing Red. Well Red ran and ran and ran. Hoopie chased that darn rooster for two days. Meanwhile, the weeds were growing up in the fields and the cow was about to burst from lack of milking. Hoopie stopped to milk and weed, then the chase started for another two days.

Something had to give.

Thinking ahead, Hoopie come up with a trap for that darn rooster. He went into his wife Maybelle's closet and picked out a right purty dress that he figured ole Red might find attractive. One thing led to another (you need to use your imagination here) and as Red tried to jump Hoopie, who now was the object of Red's desire, Hoopie swung around and grabbed that dab burn ole rooster around the gizzard.

There was feathers flying, necklaces flying, sqwaking and cursing. When the dust settled, Hoopie was sittin straggle legged on the ground with his wife's wig in one hand and Red in the other.

Hoopie gathered himself and immediately took action. He carried ole Red over to the wood pile where fate awaited.

Now Hoop had a few swigs out of the shine jug before he was able to get into Maybelle's dress and attire. Afterall, this was crazier than he could take sober. So, when the axe swung downward, aim being on the left rooster head instead of the right head, the axe blade cut clean through the fat thumb of Hoopie's left hand.

Red jumped up with just a knick and began crowing his success. Hoopie jumped up with a bloody stub for a thumb screaming for help. The rest of the thumb just laid there on the chopping block and stared blankly at the scene slightly removed from reality.

Hoopie scooped up the rest of his thumb and yelled for Maybelle. Off they went to the hospital with the thumb in a bucket of ice.

When Hoopie returned home from the hospital he was quite a sight. There he was with the thumb all bandaged up and Maybelle's dress and necklace for clothes with boots not to match. He was beyond mad at this point. All he could see were the looks of the people in the emergency room when he and Maybelle came running in with matching dresses and an apparent bucket of ice.

Well now, what happened next is only as predictable as the sun rising in the morning. Hoopie marched up to the barn and cornered Red in the hay loft. Red more or less knew that what was about to occur was destiny. So, Red went the way of all chickens that meet up with the losing end of a twelve gauge shotgun.


http://www.ibiblio.org/bawdy/folklore/thumb.html


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Sweat flies, Russian hornets, sand hornets, and Japanese hornets are some of their common nicknames. Warm weather’s here, and that means they’re starting to come back. In both Appalachian and Ozarks folklore, news bees appear as omens to those wise enough to read them.

They have the peculiar habit of just hanging motionless in the air watching people as they do things. There are yellow news bees, which mean that good things are in the offing-- it's good luck if you can get one to perch on your finger--and black news bees, which warn of imminent death. The black news bees fly in the windows and out again, and fly straight for the nearest cemetery; they hover making a sound like a human being talking.

Those of scientific bent probably want to know that flower flies, many of which are called "hover flies," belong to the family Syrphidae in the order Diptera (true flies). The most commonly seen species of flower flies are brightly colored, bee-like flies with yellow and black markings. Although flower flies resemble bees, they can be distinguished by their wings: flower flies (like all flies) have only 2 wings. Bees have 4 wings.

The many species of hover flies in Appalachia are found in weedy habitats and gardens. Flower flies are often called "sweat bees" because of their resemblance to bees and because they often land on human skin to gather sweat. Flower flies cannot sting, but there are small black bees in the family Halictidae (also commonly called sweat bees) that will occasionally sting humans while they are gathering sweat.


sources: www.iras.ucalgary.ca/~volk/sylvia/TheBestiaryProject.htm
www.uky.edu/Ag/CritterFiles/casefile/insects/flies/syrphid/syrphid.htm#myths


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