The latest episode of Podcast Appalachia is now available! In this episode, I look at the Scots-Irish and their contributions to Appalachia and America. Are you or any of your relatives from the Appalachian region? Then you are probably of Scots-Irish descent. You can listen to this episode here or view a transcript here.
Legendary moonshiner Marvin "Popcorn" Sutton has been arrested. Sutton has been making 'shine for over three decades, and was featured in the History Channel special Hillbilly: The Real Story. Leave him be, I say.
Monday, Nov. 23, 1942---
"The begetter of Barney Google and Snuffy Smith died last week in Manhattan.
"In many ways Billy De Beck lived a life as unreal as the comic-strip characters he fathered. When he was at high school in Chicago he drew imitation Charles Dana Gibson pictures, peddled them for profit. He did cartoons for a theatrical weekly and for several newspapers. But he stayed poor until he turned out a correspondence course on 'How to be a cartoonist and make big money.' He sold thousands of copies for $1 apiece. 
"He was doing a so-so successful strip, "Married Life," for the Chicago Herald at $35 a week when King Features hired him in 1919. Result: Barney Google. Before he died last week at 52 after a year's illness. William Morgan De Beck had a 14-room Florida house, a Manhattan Riverside Drive apartment where, once, he threw dollar bills to kids from the window until he was stopped by police.
"Knee-high, banjo-eyed, potato-nosed Barney Google and his wonder nag, Spark Plug, were to U.S. kids in the '20s what Superman is today. Barney Google ('and his goo-goo-googly eyes') was a 1923 song hit that sold more than a million copies.
"Three Barney Google musicomedies toured the U.S. for two years; a toy manufacturer sold $1,000,000 worth of Google and Spark Plug toys and dolls; many a Google catchphrase entered the language ('Horsefeathers!' 'Heebie-jeebies'; 'Jeepers Creepers!' 'Youse Is A Viper'; 'Bust Mah Britches!' 'Times a wastin!'). In the mid '30s De Beck abandoned Spark Plug, subordinated Barney, brought bodacious Hillbilly Snuffy Smith (also a slangy shorty) to the fore.
"Because of De Beck's illness, an understudy [ed. – Fred Lasswell] has been drawing the strip for months. Just as Andy Gump survived Sidney Smith's death (in 1935), Snuffy and Barney will survive De Beck's."
TIME magazine
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,773938,00.html
related post: "Mammy Yokum, Pappy Yokum, and Fearless Fosdick"
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
appalachia appalachia+history appalachian+culture appalachian+mountains+history Billy+De+Beck Snuffy+Smith
In Appalachia Santa Claus comes the weekend before Thanksgiving.
Since 1943, the Santa Special, more commonly known as the Santa Train, has traveled 110 miles through the mountains of eastern Kentucky, southwest Virginia and northeastern Tennessee to distribute loads of candy, toys and other goodies to eager bystanders, most of whom have made it a family tradition. The train typically passes through more than 30 towns delivering 15+ tons of goodies and Christmas cheer.
This year Patty Loveless, a native of eastern Kentucky, will be taking her third trip aboard the train, during its 65th annual run tomorrow. Loveless grew up in Pikeville, where the trek begins. She rode the train in 1999 and 2002 and chronicled the trips in a song she wrote and recorded titled "Santa Train."
Train staffers throw candy, crackers, popcorn, bubble gum, cookies, stuffed animals, electronic games, hats, handmade gloves, mittens, toboggans, T-shirts, wrapping paper and other treats from the train’s caboose.
The Santa Special, a joint effort of CSX Transportation and the Kingsport Area Chamber of Commerce, was the brainchild of the city's businessmen who wanted to show their appreciation to the people of the coalfields for their patronage throughout the year.
Santa Special officials have said that the first Santa Train pulled just one car and a meager load of gifts. It reached towns and cities that at the time had no other means of transportation. Some believe the train provided many children the only toys they received during World War II.
Joe Higgins played the role of Santa Claus in 1943-44 --- the run's first two years.
sources: www.dickensoncounty.net/santatrain.html
www.kingsportchamber.org/portal/santaframe.htm
http://www.appvoices.org/index.php?/site/voice_stories/santa_train_rides_again_through_appalachia/issue/523
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
Santa+Train Joe+Higgins CSX Kingsport+TN Pikeville+KY Christmas+in+Appalachia appalachia+history +appalachian+culture
Author Gretchen Laskas caused quite a stir at the WV Book Festival several weeks ago in Charleston, where she discussed her newly published second book, "The Miner’s Daughter." We decided to find out what all the fuss is about, and ask her a bit about she’s up to in this young adult novel.
Esther French: You wrote another novel, "The Midwife's Tale," which was also set in West Virginia. Did you intend any connections between the books or any parallels in the stories?
The first rough drafts of each were written around the same time, but other than some of the crossover in terms of timeline and the research I was doing, the two novels don’t share many parallels. I speak briefly of coal towns in The Midwife’s Tale and use a little bit of my midwifery history knowledge in The Miner’s Daughter, but each is, to my mind, its own story.
EF: You call your grandmother "a true miner’s daughter," and your father was born in Arthurdale, the town where Willa’s family eventually settles. How much did your family history influence you when writing this book?
I don’t deny that family history influences my writing – I’m the oldest child of the oldest child of the oldest child of the oldest child. Far more of my extended family was living when I was growing up than not, an unusual situation in today’s world. I came from one of these sprawling, kin-filled worlds where we might argue amongst ourselves, but we could come together at the drop of a hat. This sense of solidarity and on-going communal storytelling definitely influences the work, although interestingly enough, this doesn’t mean the individual stories I tell are based on family ones. My family was not part of the original settlement in Arthurdale, although my family has been part of the community since 1943. But I certainly wouldn’t be a writer without the eight generation of West Virginians that came before me, and I owe a lot to both of my grandmothers in particular.
EF: The Depression is a key piece of the setting, and a major challenge for Willa’s family is keeping together through the tough times. How were your grandparents affected by the Depression?
No one has ever asked me this question, so I hadn’t thought about it, but it’s a good one for the novel. My grandparents had very different experiences of The Great Depression, all of which are in the novel.
My paternal grandparents were among those who like Willa, were more isolated and connected to the coal camps. But each family owned or was able to rent a little bit of land, which made food production easier. We see this in The Miner’s Daughter in references to the farm work the Lowells are able to do, as well as Mama’s ability to can and make the most of all food brought their way. The family is tied to the coal industry, but they came to the camps with more than one skill, which helps them in the selection for Arthurdale.
My maternal grandparents (who are Wayne and Ginny, the couple Willa meets in Fairmont) had very difference experiences. Growing up in the city, without a garden, husbandry or the skill sets of more rural areas, my grandmother experienced real hunger. At school, more affluent students’ dress made her own lack of clothing all the more apparent. Both of these emotions run through the novel: Willa’s black and white dress is taken from an actual blouse my grandmother made at this time, which I now own.
And my maternal grandfather had a life virtually untouched by the Great Depression. The family owned a home on Country Club Road; he had a car, a good job as an accountant, and enjoyed roaming around the country with “the fellows” attending college football games. My grandparents’ wedding video (imagine, a wedding video in the 1930’s!) was lost when the camera it had been taken on was stolen at the Army/Navy game. This is, of course, the world of Grace McCartney and her family.
EF: Willa’s discovery of poetry marks a new stage in her life. What was the awakening moment for you as a writer?
There wasn’t only one, but I remember keenly each and every person who believed in me. My seventh grade English teacher was the teacher I had who thought I’d grow up to be a writer. She taught me the poetry that Willa learns in the novel. I also had an outstanding middle school librarian, who made sure I read all the books to prepare me for life, no matter what choices I decided to make. Such small, everyday actions by adults can have large impact in a younger person, and I take them very seriously, now that I’m the adult.
EF: Willa struggles against government officials who are prejudiced against Americans who do not fit into the “white, native-born, and Protestant” mold. Do you see any parallels between the nativist ideas in Willa’s world and the anti-immigration movement of today?
There are parallels, and they are, to my mind, rather obvious ones. But what I find interesting is how little effort creatively on my part was required to draw them. Simply writing the words that were used at that time made comparisons to “the good old days” stand out. There were people I knew growing up who were prejudiced towards families that came from recently non-English speaking backgrounds such as Italian or Polish, and that was a full generation later. Of course, growing up in Pittsburgh, where it seems EVERYONE is from such a background, I longed for my own Ellis Island story. In that regard I “married in” – my husband is only two generations removed from Europe; none of his grandparents spoke English as their first language.
EF: You mentioned the Appalachian Writers Workshop in your acknowledgements. How did the workshop help you more clearly imagine the coal company town of Riley Mines?
The Appalachian Writers Workshop is a wonderful regional resource. I know of few other conferences anywhere in the country that bring such talented and professional writers together every summer in a setting that is energizing to any writer who takes her work seriously. Several people in particular from that conference have encouraged and strengthened me as a writer; you certainly need talent in this business, but in order to survive the process of writing and then publication, you need what might be called gumption (half courage, half a kick in the pants), and the Workshop gives you that a hundred times over.
EF: At one point in the book, Willa comments on the relative value of money when she says, “If anyone would have told me a month ago I’d be sad about getting only a penny for a treat, I’d have called them crazy.” How would Willa react to modern consumer society?
Good Question. In the Reading Guide, I ask how Willa might feel about our society today. Have we lived up to her hopes of the future? I think we have in some ways, but not in others. This is perhaps the question I hope readers find themselves asking the most. One of the reasons I love writing historical fiction is to ask readers questions like these.
EF: Miss Grace, Willa’s missionary friend, is very supportive of her. What kind of role did churches and missionaries play in 1930s coal towns, especially with regard to education?
Miss Grace has much in common with Mary Behner, a young woman who came to Scott’s Run, West Virginia to teach Sunday School in the 1930’s. She opened a library (of particular interest to me), started the first African-American girl scout troop in the area, and took children who had never left the coal camps to Morgantown to see a little of the world around them. She was one of many who came, and the work they began continues today in many areas of the region.
Eleanor Roosevelt was first alerted to the conditions of the WV coal camps by the Quakers. They had begun trying to revitalize handicrafts as a way for out of work coal miners to earn some money. Eleanor bought one of the chairs – a lovely piece of work that convinced her that anyone who could make a chair like this was well worth trying to help. That was the beginning of what would become Arthurdale.
EF: Willa’s older brother, Ves, wants to help organize labor unions. What shape did the 1930s labor union movement take in southern West Virginia?
In the West Virginia Mine Wars, in southern West Virginia, the Federal government armed itself against its own people and threatened them. And why? For unionizing and fighting for the right for better wages, work safety and fair treatment. To have the federal government turn around in the 1930’s and claim “The President Wants you to Join the Union!” would have been an incredible moment in time, and I understand why Ves and Johnny wanted to be part of that. My family came out of the northern VA coal mine unionization efforts, and my husband’s grandfather was blacklisted in Europe as an organizer, which was how he ended up in the US. My husband also worked for the AFL-CIO and interned with the United Mine Workers during law school. Our sympathies and gratitude for labor run very deep.
EF: When Miss Grace first meets Willa, she mistakes her for a “coal mine girl.” Why does Willa seem slightly offended at this label, when she willingly identifies herself as “a miner’s daughter”?
Believe it or not, my editor and I actually discussed this back and forth a lot. She was in favor of titling the book “Coal Mine Girl” and I was adamantly against it. First, Willa, to my mind, wouldn’t appreciate being called a “girl” after she has grown so much. Also, while the family can leave the mine behind them, we know that the father carries the mine (dust) literally within him. My grandfather stopped mining in the 1950’s, but that didn’t keep black lung from killing him years later. In West Virginia, at some level, we are all “Miner’s Children” no matter how many generations (if any) we are out of the mines themselves.
EF: Your first two books have been set in Appalachia. What’s next for you in your writing?
I’ll come back to West Virginia again – it’s simply too full of stories and characters that are waiting to be written. But I would like to explore some other places in my fiction, especially Pittsburgh, where Appalachian influences play a tiny, but vital, role. Or here in Washington DC, where every third person I meet comes from the region. I’m part of the great Appalachian diaspora, and that is also a side of our history and culture that needs to be told.
Originally interviewed by Esther French at Appalachian History
related post: "author Ted Anthony discusses 'Chasing the Rising Sun'"
Gretchen+Laskas The+Miners+Daughter WV+book+festival West+Virginia+history appalachia +appalachian+culture appalachian+language
How would you like to have attended the same school that Rosa Parks, Eleanor Roosevelt, Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, Martin Luther King Jr., Andrew Young, and Fanny Lou Hamer all attended?
That would be Highlander Folk School, near Monteagle, TN, for many years the only place in the South where white and African-American adults could live and work together, something that was illegal in that strictly segregated society. The 1950s brought Highlander to national attention, as civil rights legends and social activists learned the ways of non-violent protest there in the school’s “Citizenship School Program.” Rosa Parks’ participation in a Highlander workshop in the summer of 1955, 5 months before her back of the bus incident, had a crucial influence on her. And during the subsequent Montgomery bus boycott, Highlander co-founder Myles Falls Horton introduced Rosa Parks to Eleanor Roosevelt as “the first lady of the South.”
But two decades earlier when the school was first begun, poor, uneducated miners learned about self-respect and self-empowerment at the school. In his autobiography, Horton wrote, "We didn't think of ourselves as working-class, or poor, we just thought of ourselves as being conventional people who didn't have any money."
Highlander, Horton once claimed, held the record for sustained civil disobedience, breaking the Tennessee Jim Crow laws every day for over forty years, until the segregation laws were finally repealed.
Horton attended Cumberland College in Tennessee, Union Theological Seminary in New York City, and studied Danish folk school models on site before opening the Southern Mountains School, in 1932. A short time later, he and co-director Don West, a Congregational minister from Georgia, changed the name to the Highlander Folk School. At Highlander the purpose of education was to make people more powerful, and more capable in their work and their lives. Horton had what he called a "two-eye" approach to teaching: with one eye he tried to look at people as they were, while with the other he looked at what they might become.
Not everyone was tickled by the Highlander formula. One anonymous Tennessee citizen wrote FBI director J. Edgar Hoover in 1936: “This school is a hot-bed of communism and anarchy. This is proven by the part taken by its members in the strikes at Harriman Tenn., Daisy Tenn. and at the present at Rockwood Tenn.” Hoover promptly opened a file, one that over the years accumulated in excess of 1,000 pages.
For his outspoken support of union, civil rights, and poor people's organizations, Horton endured arrests, threats, violence, and denunciations from industrialists, politicians, and segregationists.
Finally, in 1961, the state of Tennessee closed the school, revoked its charter, and sold off the assets at auction. During this time, many of the buildings were burned by arsonists. Undaunted, Myles Horton redesignated the folk school as a research center under a new charter and moved from Monteagle to Knoxville, and then to the present location in New Market, Tenn., where it is now known as the Highlander Research and Education Center.
sources:www.etsu.edu/cass/archives/Collections/afindaid/a598.html
http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/2072/Horton-Myles-1905-1990.html
http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/imagegallery.php?EntryID=H073
Related posts: "Don West background"
Originally blogged at: Appalachian History
Highland Folk School, Montagle TN, Myles Falls Horton, Don West, civil rights, adult education, appalachia, appalachian history, appalachia history, history of appalachia
“So many outside writers had come in and . . . and given such a terrible account of the people. They had put 'em down a lot in their articles that I didn't think this was true, because the people that I met were very intelligent and they were very civilized. They were not like they were pictured in these articles at all. And I thought that somebody ought to come through here and give the true picture of them.
"And, you know, the Mary Breckinridge . . . the hospital. Mary Breckinridge, of course, was the first one, I guess, that put the people in this area on the map by going out and soliciting aid, and naturally most of their material was slanted toward the poorer class of people. They didn't tell anything about the fine homes that were here. It was always the little shacks on the hillsides and people going without clothing and half-starved and barefoot. So that most people in . . . outside of Kentucky, they got the wrong idea, and I . . . I thought that ought to be corrected.
“Well, in 1958, the . . . Berea College had asked me to do some research for the Ford Foundation. And I started out in the field, traveling with Rufus Fugate and Ruth Baker, who was a home agent at that time, and I began to find all these old people that had these interesting stories to tell me and I began writing them down. And it just grew and grew from that until I got a good collection and I thought well, it ought to be shared with others and I decided then to have it published. And Vernon Baker came to see me then. He knew that I had this material and said he was interested in publishing it. And he published it under the title Of Bolder Men, but it fell apart. It was just a disaster. [Chuckle]
“So I quit selling the book because it did fall apart. It wouldn't stay together. And then I decided there were so many requests for it that I would write it over again. And they decided to use it as a part of the centennial celebrations for Leslie County then. So I did it over for that purpose mostly, that it might be used for that. [A large part of it is sort of a genealogy] of people who live in Leslie County. I got the history from Leslie County by going to the courthouse and talking to old people who were here, you know, and knew the history of it. The first part of it is involved with the history and development of Leslie County itself, and . . . and the second part of it contains the genealogical history of about forty families.”
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
1978 interview with Mary Brewer,
author of "The Rugged Trails of Appalachia"
Oral History Project, Frontier Nursing Service, Kentucky Virtual Library
http://tinyurl.com/3axr6o
Mary+Brewer The+Rugged+Trails+of+Appalachia Frontier+Nursing+Service Mary+Breckinridge appalachia appalachian+culture appalachian+history appalchia+history history+of+appalachia
It’s tent revival season throughout Appalachia! Last week the Voice of the Word Ministries tent revival took place in Johnson City, TN. This week the Blue Ridge Foothills annual tent revival kicks off in Wolftown, VA. You can bet there are hundreds more throughout the region – the region that invented the tent revival.
The first camp meeting took place in July 1800 at Gasper River Church in southwestern Kentucky. A much larger one was held at Cane Ridge, Kentucky, in August 1801, where between 10,000 and 25,000 people attended, and Presbyterian, Baptist and Methodist ministers participated. It was this event that stamped the organized revival as the major mode of church expansion for denominations such as the Methodists and Baptists, who were newly converted by the teachings of John Wesley.
“The significant and most recurring theme in mountain preaching,” according to Deborah McCauley, author of Appalachian Mountain Religion, “is that of a broken heart, tenderness of heart, a heart not hardened to the Spirit and the Word of God. Mountain people teach through their churches that the image of God in each person lives in the heart, that the Word of God lodges itself in the heart, and the heart is meant to guide the head, not the other way around.”
“God led me into the Free Methodist Church when in 1935 I was sanctified in a revival preached by Brother Albert Faust from Pittsburgh,” said West Virginian Dewilla Lemmon of her revival experiences. “Melrose Uphold, a neighbor, and Sister Eva Young, a local Free Methodist preacher, arranged for a meeting in a vacant building near my home. This came as an answer to prayer for me because I had been privately seeking holiness, not really knowing what it was, only that for many months I had craved a pure, perfect condition of heart with God, notwithstanding the knowledge that I had been born again.”
One of Lemmon’s fellow worshipers, “Sister Uphold,” explained to her that the experience she sought was “sanctification.” “So I went to the altar and prayed for it. I also made various restitutions. Brother Faust quoted the Scripture: ‘The Lord whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple.’ And Jesus did just that for me on the night of September 22, 1935 after Brother Faust had delivered his sermon and while Sister Young walked up and down behind me at the altar quoting in a strong voice: ‘This is the will of God, even your sanctification.’”
Sources: http://are.as.wvu.edu/ferber.htm#_edn24
Lemmon, Dewilla. “Camp Memories” journal exercise recorded by Pauline Shahan. July 6, 1980
Appalachian Mountain Religion. University of Illinois Press: Chicago; 1995
http://www.theopedia.com/Great_awakenings
Related Posts: "Warmly Tactile Worship Behavior"
Originally blogged at "Appalachian History"
tent+revival camp+meeting mountain+preaching appalachia appalachian+culture appalachian+history history+of+appalachia
"Yes, I am working on a part time job as cook, but you don't need to ask what I'm doing the rest of the time. What don't I do? I get up early and sometimes wash out clothes or clean house. You'd be surprised at the dirt these roomers bring in; they never think of wiping their feet on the mat. My mammy gets dinner ready for the girls when they come home from the mill, but she won't wash up the dishes. She leaves them for me to wash when I come home. And then the family expect me to get supper. Sometimes I find my mammy and my youngest sister--they always sleep together and are just like twins--layin' on the bed waitin' for me to git 'em somethin' to eat. After supper me and another sister go out and work the garden until dark. So you see I don't have time to git lonesome.
"I hardly get time to go to church either. My family was Lutherans in the old days, but there ain't no Lutheran church here and we are all mixed up; we go to different churches--when we go at all. One of my sisters bought a good second-hand auto and we sometimes spend Sunday visiting our relations in the country. They always have plenty to eat, and I like a change of vittles sometimes. And it's good for sore eyes to see somebody else wash the dishes.
"One church we don't go to is the one down there by the mill. They have lively times down there, they tell me. When I go to church, I want it to be like a real church, and when I go to the movies I want somethin' else. I'd go to church oftener if I had the right kind of clothes; but when I have a nice dress I may not have a good hat or decent shoes, and when I have a good hat and shoes maybe I haven't a nice dress. I don't care very much about clothes, but I like to look as decent as anybody else. So I go to church when I feel like it and when I have respectable clothes; and it's nobody's business but my own."
Miss Ophelia Mull
Brevard, N.C.
Interviewed June 26, 1939
American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1940
http://tinyurl.com/2hvvlk
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
Ophelia+Mull Brevard+NC Lutherans appalachia appalachian+culture appalachian+history history+of+appalachia
During last night's YouTube Democratic Presidential Candidate debate, a couple of witty hillbillies identifying themselves as the "Red State Update" from Murfeesboro, Tennessee, asked a tongue in cheek question of the candidates about Al Gore's continuing unseen presence as a Democratic contender in the 2008 presidential race. Referencing the mainstream media's continuing interest in "Ole Al Gore", the two men, identifying themselves as Jackie Broyles and Dunlap asked the candidates, "What we want to know is, does that hurt ya'll's feelins'?"
Seeming to not understand or care about the intelligent satire implicit in the question, candidate Joe Biden seized on the opportunity to take up for the good citizens of Tennessee by responding, "I think the people of Tennessee just had their feelings hurt." While I didn't grow up in Tennessee, I grew up fifty miles from the Virginia/Tennessee border and I for one didn't have my feelings hurt one little bit. While I cringe at dumb Hee-Haw portrayals of Hillbillies, these guys are obviously smart and witheringly funny and while Mr. Biden might not realize it, these men are using humor to show the rest of the thinking world that hillbillies too have brains in their heads. It's irony, Mr. Biden, so please don't take up for us by putting down these creative gentlemen. While some of the well heeled country club types in Nashville might get riled up a bit by the portrayal, I'd like to think that most Tennesseans were rightfully proud of these fellows and their well portrayed parody.
A clip of the question can be accessed via YouTube at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_yVxv0I1_I and the Red State Update site is here.
I visited the site this morning and had a good chuckle. I hope we can laugh at ourselves without needing Mr. Biden to come to our defense. But thanks anyway, Joe.
July 22 will mark the 84th anniversary of Nick Grindstaff’s demise. His gravestone reads: “Lived alone, suffered alone, died alone,” but in the 1870’s he was one of Johnson County, TN’s most colorful residents. Grindstaff was born on December 26, 1851. By the time he was three years old both his mother, Mary Heaton Grindstaff, and his father, Isaac Grindstaff, had died. Nick and his three orphaned siblings lived with relatives until Nick was 21 years old, at which time the parents’ farm was divided equally among the children. Nick built a house on his portion and began to farm the land. After five years of farming Nick sold his farm and decided to go west.
He was an adventurer, and like so many young men of that era, smelled his fortune in California gold. While there he met, fell in love with, and married a young woman. The woman died.
On his way back to Johnson County, legend says Grindstaff was coaxed into the rear of a saloon by a “lovely lady,” whose partner in crime robbed him of his fortune. In another version of this story, he was not robbed, but drank all his money away when his wife out west died; when he became destitute he moved back to Johnson County. In either case, he returned to Tennessee and bought land on top of Iron Mountain, were he lived for 40 years as a hermit with only his dog Panter, a steer and a pet rattlesnake (said to have been killed by a man named Sam Lowe) for company.
On July 21, 1923 Baxter McEwen went by to check on Nick. He found him dead on the bunk in his hut. His faithful dog had been keeping watch over his master's dead body for the previous three or four days. The dog had to be tied before men could carry out Nick's body. Nick was buried, with 200 in attendance, on the mountain peak where he had lived. The house was eventually dismantled for the wood and tin, but the imprint is still on the ground surrounding the gravesite.
Two years later locals erected a chimney-shaped monument made out of mountain granite, which even included some of Nick’s pots and pans in the construction. The citizen who kept the general store down in Shady Valley, Tennessee, where Grindstaff would buy his meal and bacon twice a year, wrote the words. Somebody had to. Nick Grindstaff was a special man, with a story no one ever quite knew.
Today the Appalachian Trail passes by the area. The Appalachian Trail Conference maintains the monument that marks Nick's burial site.
sources: http://www.mce.k12tn.net/johnson/legends/nick.htm
http://johnsoncountychamber.org/JCChamber/chamber/Docs/NewsletterOct.pdf
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
Uncle+Nick+Grindstaff Iron+Mountain appalachia appalachian+culture appalachian+history history+of+appalachia
If you missed the Gatlinburg (TN) Scottish Festival & Games back in May, or can’t wait till November for the Scottish Clans of the South to gather in Hendersonville, NC, don’t panic. The Grandfather Mountain Highland Games in Linville, NC is the largest assembly of Scottish clan society members in the world, and it’s coming up July 12-15.
Scottish-Americans, Scotch-Irish Americans, Scots and would-be Scots converge each year on two rock-strewn pastures, known as MacRae Meadows, in the shadow of the tallest peak in the Blue Ridge chain, the 5,964-ft. Grandfather Mountain.
Dancing, running, throwing large poles and bragging about one's Scottish ancestry-it's all part of a day's work at highland games.
The centuries old Scottish tradition of staging competitions at cattle fairs continued when Scottish immigrants came to North Carolina in the 18th century. The newcomers felt at home in the North Carolina mountains, and descendants of these pioneers continued to speak Gaelic into the early 20th century.
Scottish heavy athletics events include Clachneart (16 lb. stone throw), 22 lb. hammer throw, 28 & 56 lb weight throw, 56 lb toss for height, caber toss, tossing the sheaf (16 lb.) and Highland wrestling.
The caber toss is a contest in which brawny men flip 21-foot (6.4-meter) wooden poles weighing hundreds of pounds end over end. If you imagine that the brawny man is standing in the center of a clock face looking toward the number 12, the objective of the caber toss is to make the pole land so that it's pointing exactly at high noon.
Putting the pole squarely on the imaginary 12 is extremely difficult, however. Sometimes years pass before a contestant nails a caber toss with a perfect landing. More likely, a contestant who can get his caber to point to 11 or 1 on the imaginary clock will win. The first recorded caber toss competition was in 1574.
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cocoon/legacies/NC/200002907.html
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/07/0707_050707_highlandgames_2.html
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
Grandfather+Mountain+Highland+Games caber+toss Scottish+Clans appalachia appalachian+culture appalachian+history history+of+appalachia
Get the ice cream maker out! It’s summer, and there’s nothing so fine as freshly made rock salt ice cream. Just make sure you gather every kid in the neighborhood to take a turn cranking the dang thing.
Johnson’s invention simplified the process of making ice cream, marking a revolution in the history of the dessert. From this time on, anyone could make the very best quality ice cream at home (especially since rock salt, which came to be commonly called "ice cream salt" until the early 20th century, had became a cheap commodity).
The inner can was placed in the outer bucket, and ice and salt were placed between the inner can and outer bucket. The salt lowered the freezing point of the ice, and contact with the inner bucket made a thin layer of milk freeze on the inside of the inner can. The rotating paddle, turned by a crank, scraped off the frozen milk, and let a new layer freeze.
Meantime, by 1919 the ice cream industry was churning out (NOT by hand!) 150 million gallons a year, so if you really didn’t want to wait the time it took to hand-crank your own, you could probably scoot down to the general store for a cup or a cone.
However you take your ice cream, can Ice Cream Socials be far away?
Sources: http://www.zingersicecream.com/history.htm
http://whatscookingamerica.net/History/IceCream/IceCreamHistory.htm
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
Ice+cream+maker ice+cream+socials appalachia appalachian+culture appalachian+history history+of+appalachia
This is a little post on a little play in a little town in Southwest Virginia. It's actually a good-sized production, with a big status--the official Outdoor Drama for the Commonwealth of Virginia. The theatrical treat I'm referring to is "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine" in Big Stone Gap, VA.
The Post newspaper in Big Stone Gap puts it nicely, it is "John Fox Jr.’s enduring love story of the dashing mining engineer, Jack Hale, and the demure and lovely mountain lass, June Tolliver." No, this one has never featured Henry Fonda or Fred MacMurray; that's the 1936 movie by the same name. But the same story and author, and with local talent to boot.
"The Trail" begins its 44th season this evening in Big Stone Gap. If you've never seen it...well then...shame on you! Some nice evening this summer, get over to Big Stone and enjoy theater under the stars.
And if you're not already reaching for your keys, here are a few links to whet your appetite:
Official Site of The Trail of the Lonesome Pine
Official Drama Program, courtesy the Coalfield Progress
Resource Guide by Judy Teaford, Mountain State University
GoTriCities.com Article
And some links on John Fox, Jr.
John Fox, Jr. Museum
Bio from the Kentucky DAR
Tennesseans called it the “la-la.” Elsewhere known as the john, the shanty, the shack, the throne, the shed, the relief office—it was the humble outhouse. The little buildings "out back" were as important as any building built before indoor plumbing. This was the building you located as soon as possible when you came to visit, and if your guest was the preacher, you invited him outside on some pretext so he could spot "the necessary room" without asking.
During the 1930s the WPA built thousands of outhouses across America. Three-man teams would spend an average of twenty hours on the construction of each one. Where possible the farm family receiving the new outhouse would pay for the materials (about $17 per outhouse), while the WPA supplied the labor free.
These were outhouses like America had never seen before. The American Red Cross developed the basic design. This design featured an enclosed, vented pit for the waste, was fly and vermin proof, and afforded a standard of cleanliness and sanitation that earlier generations would have considered effete.
The building had a concrete floor and a carefully carpentered seat with a close fitting lid to exclude flies. Although many design variations existed, the two basic designs were single seater and two seater.
The two seater was preferred by large families---the second seat had a smaller hole to prevent children from falling through---by those who liked company, and by those who needed a place to set their lantern at night.
“To the right of the narrow entrance was a complete collection of fishing equipment ranging from rods and reels to every size, shape and color of lure imaginable. Directly above these hung an array of ingenious traps which proved to be the scourge of every muskrat and mink for five miles up or down river. In the rear of the little edifice stood two tall bushel baskets containing an endless conglomeration of treasures ranging from outdated articles of clothing to ancient magazines.
“The latter provided amusement and literary driblets for the perusal of the lackadaisical visitor who wished to bide his time informatively. And we must not overlook that standard piece of equipment without which the outhouse would not have been an outhouse--that savior of the toilet-paper-destitute family--the good old catalog. Where would we have been without it? Why do you think the mail-order house was such a thriving success?”
Robert E. Dalton
born Robert E. Lee Dalton, 1938,
in Itman, Wyoming County, WV
This entry started on an entirely different subject, but forces from the vast reaches of cyberspace pulled it in a new direction. After an undetermined amount of time clicking through page after page, I emerged from the rabbit hole that is the internet and found myself with a handsome list of Appalachian reading materials(Amazon and their endless suggestions had much to do with this). I thought to myself, 'Why not just blog some of these books that keep catching my attention?'
My summers have always been filled with reading, even in my early days earning a penny per page from my mom. Since we already have our 'ritin' assignment, I thought a readin' list might be good, too. Now we just need a mathematician among us to provide our 'rithmetic!!
Here are several books that I've added to my reading list:
edited by Rudy Abramson and Jean Haskell
(I just received a copy for my birthday from my sister who works at ETSU's CASS. At 1864 pages, this one might take until next summer!)
by John B. Rehder
by Anthony Cavender
by Thomas E. Wagner and Philip J. Obermiller
as sung by Jean Ritchie
Got any other good finds in your stack of books? Tag them on in your comments!!
When you’re talking with family, are you liable to let down your guard a little and use a bit more Appalachian English and a bit less Standard American English?
For example, the Standard American English word might be faucet, but the Appalachian English version would be spigot. If somebody looks sick, we might say, "he's peaked" (that's peek-ed). Did you hurt your finger? Then we might say you "stoved it up." Some people say "knowed" rather than "knew." We're famous for our double negatives. "I don't have none of that." Our present perfect tense has raised some eyebrows, too. "He's done done it now!" While we’re at it, here’s a little mini-dictionary to amuse the lexicographers:
A little past plumb-----not right in the head
Atter wile-----------------after a while
Back door trots-------------diarreah
Beer Eats-----fastfood joint
Buss-----kiss
Can't put an old head on young shoulders--intelligence differences
Cassins-----tires
Dead dog tired--------- weary
Don't swing so big----don't swing so high
Dreckly-----directly, in a short while
Fast as greased lightning------------speedy
Fixing to-----getting ready to
Full of spunk------------ spirited
Gittin too big for his britches-----conceited
Gommin' up the table------making a mess
Gumption-- drive or spirit
Herrit-----hello
Jerk a knot in your tail-----parent to unruly kid
Juberous----- leery
Made the riffle------ completed a business deal
Nary a one----don't have any at all
Ninny----short for nincompoop
Nussing----- nursing
Peep-Eye-----same as peek-a-boo
Pime blank---exactly
Play purties-----toys
Poor as Job's turkey----------without funds
Reach me that-----give me that
Rue-----regret
Shirky--------doing a job poorly
Shite poke-----skinny, sickly looking
Slop jar-----a chamber pot
Sober as a judge-------sobriety
Spoondiken------also known as 'courting'
This milk's blinky-------spoiled milk
Three sheets in the wind----------intoxicated
Too slow to stop quick---------- pokey
Vittles-----food
Weed monkey----a loose woman
With-----tree branch, used for punishment
Woods colt-----child born out of wedlock
Originally blogged at Appalachian History
appalachian+history appalachian+culture applachia history+of+appalachia
Masking tape was invented in 1925, cellophane tape in 1930, and duct tape in 1940. What on earth did people use before these wonderful adhesives? Why, string or twine, of course. And chances are that the first two inventions were new enough in the culture during the 1930s that plenty of people, out of old habit, still relied on tying things rather than taping them. And furthermore, because of their newness, tapes were pricier than string.
You’re a thrifty farmer, it’s the Depression, and that new fangled tape, though appealing, is expensive. You might simply purchase store-bought string. Better yet budget-wise, you could pull odds & ends of string from say, butcher’s packages, or the morning newspaper ties, and create yourself a Big Ball of String to tap as needed.
So it comes as no surprise that a farmer would be the one to take this originally very sensible idea to its extreme conclusion, and create not just A big ball of string, but the BIGGEST ball of string! 17,400 lbs. and 12 feet in diameter, and twine, to be exact. Nor does it come as a surprise that the farmer, Francis A. Johnson, of Darwin, MN, was born in 1904. In other words he was of a generation used to using string or twine, not tape, to bundle things.
No, Johnson never lived anywhere in Appalachia, but you can bet there were and are plenty of farmers just like him throughout the region who’ve got their more humble, if perhaps a bit more useful, version of the big ball of string.
Orginially blogged at Appalachian History
