Every culture has its own ingredients and, over the last few weeks, we’ve tasted many of the ingredients that make up Appalachian culture.

We’ve eaten southern cooking, listened to bluegrass music, studied mountain religion, visited a NASCAR track, watched a theatre group perform local folk tales, and done much more.

With all of that out of the way, it was time to dance!!

Warren Doyle, an Appalachian educator at Lees-McRae College, taught us two dances: a circle dance and the Virginia reel. At one time, both dances were planted firmly in the mainstream of American culture and everyone knew them. Over time, they have been displaced by other dances and are now artifacts of the past (though Doyle says they are enjoying something of a revival). School children are still taught these dances, in some school districts, but they quickly forget them.

Both dances are attractive in these ways: They are easy to learn, don’t require much rhythm, and are lots of fun. Performing them is a bit like bowling. You don’t need to be good to enjoy yourself.

The dances are so much fun, in fact, that it’s hard to imagine why they ever went out of style. They are both social dances. Participants not only dance with a partner, they dance with the group. It’s a communal experience. One member of our group said the circle dance was like “a religious experience.” And it was.

Circle dance

Viginia reel

Wikipedia article on “reel” dances
Wikipedia article on “circle” dances

There’s nothing quite so eery and mysterious as fog.

What lurks out there?

Take comfort, the fog will soon disappear.

I took these pictures at Breaks Interstate Park. The three photos at the bottom show the Towers, a pyramid of rock one-half mile long and one-third mile wide. The Towers is estimated to be 250 million years old. Local lore suggests that Englishman John Swift buried a vast silver fortune in the area.

The Grand Canyon of the South

Breaks Interstate Park bills itself as the “Grand Canyon of the South,” which reminds me of something Lloyd Bentsen once said to Dan Quayle. To paraphrase him, “I’ve been to the Grand Canyon, I know the Grand Canyon, and…” you get the idea. Nothing really compares to the Grand Canyon.

Having said that, Breaks Park is quite beautiful. The park is located on the Virginia-Kentucky line along the Russell Fork River. It encompasses 4,500 acres of land — 3,000 in Virginia — and offers a wide variety of recreational activities, including camping, hiking, white water rafting, fishing, and swimming.

Most people come to Breaks to see the canyon. The Russell Fork River has carved a gorge— a “break” in Pine Mountain — five miles long and 1600 feet deep. It’s the largest canyon east of the Mississippi.

The hike into the gorge isn’t easy. I took the River Trail, which is described in park literature as “extremely steep and rugged with many descending switchbacks.” They’re not kidding.

In many respects the River Trail is more difficult than the trail I encountered at the Grand Canyon several years ago. The Grand Canyon trail is heavily used — by men and mules. It is generally broad and flat. You can hike for a long time without seeing anyone, but eventually, someone will come along. And the National Park Service has constructed comfort stations along the way equipped with emergency phones.

The River Trail, by comparison, is narrow, rocky, steep, and — at least on this day — wet. A perfect storm for hikers. Of course, the Grand Canyon is much larger and deeper than Breaks Canyon. People fall off cliffs in Arizona and die. Or they get lost, can’t find their way out of the Canyon, and succumb to the elements. It happens. I don’t think too many people have died at Breaks. (If you trip, trees “break” the fall.)

A narrow passage on the way down to the river.

A rocky path on the way down to the river.

Trees will cushion the fall.

I’m not sure how long it took me to reach the bottom of the canyon. The trail did not actually extend to the riverbank, so I jumped off a four-feet ledge and found myself standing at the top of 20-foot ravine. There was no way I could walk down the ravine, so I squatted low, and tried crawling crab-style. I slipped and starting sliding on my behind down the ravine, grabbing a patch of poison ivy with my left hand as I descended. I landed no worse for the wear, satisfied that I had reach may destination; doubtful that I would be able climb back up the hill.

I was tired and hot and weary of the insects flying about my head when I reached the river. I realized then that I had forgotten to pack my bathing suit or a towel. I jumped in the water anyway. It was frigid, but refreshing.

Whitewater on the Russell Fork River

After a nice swim, I stretched out on large boulder, closed my eyes, and listened to the water and to the birds. The midday sun warmed my face, the temperature fluctuating as clouds pass overhead. I opened my eyes and spotted a group of butterflies parading nearby.

I ate two oranges for energy, dressed, and began the long trek up the mountain.

Useful links:
The area also has an interesting history. Daniel Boone was the first non-Indian to visit the area. James Garfield made a name for himself by routing Confederates here during the Civil War. The Hatfields and the McCoys began fightin’ in the area. For more information visit the park’s website.
Breaks Interstate Park

The entrance to the fan room at the Pocahontas mine. A large fan drew pollutants out of the mine.

Coal mining in Pocahontas, Virginia, began in 1881. The coal found in this part of the country is some of the best in the world and coal operations boomed through two world wars.

The mine shaft is wide with a high, 13-foot ceiling.

The U.S. Navy preferred Pocahontas coal in World War II.

Working in a coal mine in the 1880s was like working in Dante’s Inferno — it was a hellish experience. All of the work was done by hand. Health and safety regulations were pretty much non-existent. Injured workers were pushed to the side, and no one received medical treatment until the end of a shift.

Dynamite, shovels, and saws. That’s what miners used to extract coal in the late 1800s.

These boots were made for working.

The coal operators used mules (a cross between a donkey and a horse) to cart out the coal. The mules were housed underground and saw little daylight. Eventually, they went blind.

Most of the men who worked in the Pocahontas mine were immigrants from Eastern Europe or African Americans. Men were paid by the ton with a sixteen-ton quota. Whole families (but no women) worked in the mines to ensure that papa made his quota. Child labor was common. In 1884, 114 men died in a mine accident, though the true toll may have been closer to 180 fatalities, since so many family members were working in the mine on the qt.

A light at the end of the tunnel. This is the view that generations of miners saw as they left the Pocahontas mine after a hard day of work.

Coal operators paid the men with credit vouchers, which were only good at the company store. Consequently, miners could never accumulate any cash savings. You may remember Tennesse Ernie Ford’s famous lament:

“You load sixteen tons, and what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt.
Saint Peter, don’t you call me, ‘cause I can’t go;
I owe my soul to the company store…”

If the miners were mired in debt, the coal operators made handsome profits. Many of them lived in nearby Bramwell, West Virginia. Even today, after decades of economic decline, the town boasts a charm that few other towns can match.

Downtown Bramwell still sparkles, even on a rainy afternoon.

The Bramwell train depot

According to local lore, Bramwell was the wealthiest city per capita in the United States in the late 1880s. It had 4,000 residents and 14 millionaires. Many of these millionaires lost their shirts (and took their own lives, I’m told) in the crash of 1929. But their homes still stand.

The Collins House.

The Cooper house features a copper roof and an indoor pool. It’s still owned by the original family.

The Mann House is now a bed and breakfast. It’s up for sale.

Eventually, the coal industry cleaned up its act, paying a fair wage to laborers and adhering to health and safety regulations. They mechanized the mines, which made the mines safer, and which allowed the operators to higher fewer workers. The result can be seen in downtown Pocohantas. The population has declined from 5,000 residents to about 400 and the town is literally falling apart.

Consolidated Coal used to operate a company store on this block. Consolidated is still mining coal in the region.

This building, like the town, has seen better days.

As recently as the late 1980s, the city’s main commercial thoroughfare boasted a Kroger grocery store, a Thom McCann shoe store, a car dealership, a theatre, the fire department, and city hall. Today, there is nothing.

A sheet of tarp hangs from the old fire department.

This former miner has lived in Pocahontas much of his life. He doubts the town will ever come back.

It’s ironic, but just when the coal operators began treating workers well, they figured out a way to get rid of them. They not only mechanized the mines, they developed new methods of mining. Surface mining — whether strip mining or mountaintop removal — requires fewer workers than underground mining.

The coal operators are still in business. In fact, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, US coal production peaked in 2006. (It dropped slightly in 2007.) We are producing roughly twice as much coal today as we did during World War II, but with half as many workers. According to the Columbia Encyclopedia, the United Mine Workers had 240,000 members in 1998. It had more than a half a million in 1946.

It’s a strange paradox that is repeated throughout the coal mining region: Just as things started getting really good, they got really bad. On the plus side, a big new business opened in Pocahontas last year.

A new prison.

Useful links:
Pocahontas mine
Bramwell
National Mining Association (Industry statistics)
United Mine Workers (The Columbia Encyclopedia)

When I was young and innocent, I believed what I saw on television. Eventually, though, I learned that television shows were not always true. Hollywood executives produced entertainment shows to attract an audience. And sometimes truth fell victim to the profit motive.

But at least we had documentaries. Documentaries were true.

Eventually, though, I learned that documentaries were not always true. Directors produced documentaries to express their views and to inspire change.

But at least we had the news. The news was true.

Eventually, though, I became a news reporter and learned that the news wasn’t always true. Reporters were assigned to write “stories.” Reporters shaped these stories by writing the narration, by selecting whom to interview, by editing what the interview subjects said, and by choosing what video to broadcast. Each story was an edited product shaped by the intellect and biases of the reporter.

I learned — long before Michael Moore, long before “reality” TV — that what seems “real” isn’t always “true.” Which brings us to the movie “Mountain Top Removal” produced by Haw River films. MTR was produced to illustrate the evils of “mountain top removal mining.” With this mining technique, mining companies clear cut mountaintops, blast away earth to expose coal seems, and use “drag lines” to remove excess dirt, which is then moved into valleys. The elevation of the mountain is sometimes reduced by hundreds of feet. Under federal law, mine operators must “reclaim” mountaintop sites once they have been mined. This usually involves planting grass to control for erosion.

MRT suggests that there are serious environmental problems with mountaintop removal. It follows the story of March Fork, West Virginia, residents who are concerned that a large slurry pond is located near their elementary school. (Slurry is a semi-liquid byproduct of the mining process.) Residents angrily confront Governor Joe Manchin, demanding that the state spend $6 million to build a new school in another location. They do this, according t the movie, without approaching the local school board. (More likely, they approached the board and were dissatisfied with the response.)

The movie is pretty straightforward. Coal companies are bad. Local residents are good. Mountaintop mining must be stopped. The movie includes an interview with one local woman who supports the coal company. It also includes comments from an industry spokesman — it’s hard to imagine what convinced him to participate — but they are just “fair and balanced” window dressing.

I am not qualified to address the environmental issues surrounding mountaintop mining. It certainly doesn’t look pretty, though I can’t say if that really means anything.

(I can’t refute the movie’s environmental claims, though it’s hard to take seriously a movie that makes simple mistakes. One environmentalist says mountaintop mining is a serious problem because it’s happening in southern Appalachia “one of the fastest growing regions in the world.” Huh? Since when has the coalmining region of Appalachia — Kentucky, West Virginia, southern Ohio — become one of the fastest growing regions in the world?)

Mountaintop mining isn’t the producer’s real target anyway. The producers’ real target is the coal mining industry. The movie includes comments from an environmental activist who makes this clear: “It’s hard to get around the problem that coal is the problem,” he says. “Coal is the problem.”

Why are the producers targeting the coal industry? Well, it’s the only target remaining.

The United States pretty much stopped building nuclear reactors and hydroelectric dams decades ago. We’ve blocked oil drilling off the coasts of Florida and California. We’ve blocked it in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Environmentalists have prevented timber companies from logging in national forests — despite the fact that the federal government established the forests with logging in mind.

So that leaves the coal industry, still standing after all these years, as the next big target. Environmentalists do not want “clean coal.” They want no coal. Heck, even if the industry produced only clean coal that would not be enough. One of my colleagues put it best in discussing mountaintop mining: “If the coal industry could do mountaintop mining without harming the environment, would that make it OK?” The answer, of course, is “no.”

The coal trains still run in parts of Appalachia...

...but some day the trains may cease to run entirely.

Environmentalists do not oppose mining simply on environmental grounds. They oppose it on spiritual grounds. They oppose it because it disturbs the natural environment. Environmentalists see the world as they imagine Native Americans once saw it — as something to be preserved. In this theology, resource development is a sin. Environmentalists oppose resource development on principle, as an article of faith, and not as a matter of science.

It’s important to understand that all human beings, even the most secular, profess a faith. They go to church, they worship, the enjoy fellowship. The “church” may be a meeting of the Sierra Club. It may be a protest march. But it’s still a church — a place where like-minded people express their common values. And let there be no doubt, secular fundamentalists take their faith every bit as seriously as Christian fundamentalists. And they are just as doctrinaire.

In this vein, we might consider wind power. Wind power would seem like the perfect, renewable energy source. Not al environmentalists agree. Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy has blocked a wind farm proposed for the waters off Cape Cod. Congressman Nick Rahall blocked a wind farm proposed in West Virginia. In both cases, many residents opposed the projects on environmental, more like aesthetic, grounds. Wind farms, apparently, are not attractive.

A colleague told me this week that he has problems with mountaintop mining, highways, and man-made lakes. Why? Because they damage the “spiritual environment.” Hmmm. I’m not precisely sure what that means, but I suspect that he’s right.

Of course, there are always competing values. Highways are ugly, but they do serve a purpose. Ditto for man-made lakes. We need to be more honest about the tradeoffs that are sometimes necessary in a modern society. I can no longer sympathize with people who complain about $4 a gallon gasoline, yet oppose oil drilling, hydroelectric dams, the harvesting of timber, nuclear power…and wind farms!

P.S. I can’t wait for the day when we all drive home in battery-operated cars. But what will happen when we all plug them in at night to pick up a charge? Where will all that electricity come from? (Please don’t’ make me laugh and say “solar energy.”)

Useful links
Pro-mountaintop mining site
Anti-mountaintop mining site

Vaughn Chapel is the most striking building on the campus of Ferrum College. It’s impressive during the day, but more so at night. Look at how it bursts into color.

The Blue Ridge Institute and Museum operates a historic farm on Route 40, across from the Ferrum College campus.

The history of Virginia is inextricably linked with the history of tobacco. Since the early 1600s,Virginians have been planting tobacco, making money, and sowing bad health. Tobacco is no longer the dominant industry in Virginia, though it still plays a role in the economy, sometimes in surprising ways. (Stick with me on this one. It may take a while.)

Ferrum College operates the Blue Ridge Institute and Museum, which operates a historic farm across the museum on state route 40. The farm includes a home and barn, a cookhouse, a small garden, and an animal stall with half a dozen sheep and a donkey that likes to be petted.

Farmers once considered donkeys useless, but many of them are now used to guard sheep from coyotes. Some donkeys, to my surprise, are quite friendly.

The farm includes a vegetable garden maintained by volunteers.

The farmhouse is furnished with period furniture (or replicas) and antiques. It’s very educational, if you like that kind of thing, which I do.

The interior of the home is decorated with antiques or “rustic reproductions.”

A while ago, museum curators noticed something bothersome. When they took school children on tours, the children would become distracted whenever cars drove by. Museum officials came up with a plan: They’d rebuild the house and barn a hundred yards farther away from the road.

Specially trained craftsman have already begun building the new house and barn. Once the two buildings are finished, museum officials will transfer all of the household goods from the old buildings — which I toured — to the new building. They will then demolish the existing buildings.

A laborer (upper left hand corner) works on the new farm house.

The new barn is well on its way to completion.

Although this may sound simple, it is not. Very few people know how to build homes the old fashioned way. And everything must be done to make sure that the new buildings are historically accurate. Museum officials estimate this project will cost up to $1 million dollars.

The entire annual budget of the Blue Ridge Institute is about $180,000. The historic farm actually loses money, yet the Institute is spending a million dollars to improve its aesthetics.

The point of the farm “renovation” project — it’s not called a “preservation” or “restoration” project — is not simply to improve the visitor’s experience. The point of spending the money is … well, to spend the money.

The relocation of the farm is described as a “renovation project.”

There isn’t a lot of economic activity in Franklin County. At one time, tobacco farming dominated the eastern part of the county, while textile mills and furniture factories dominated the western side. Moonshine played a role in both parts. Most of this is now gone, aside from an occasional cabinetmaker. What remains is Ferrum College.

The college is an economic driver. It recently built a new residence hall, Arthur Hall, where I am staying, using low interest loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The government provides these loans to rural colleges in recognition of the role they play in local economies. The state of Virginia now requires colleges to produce a report every year outlining their impact on local communities.

The Blue Ridge Institute serves an educational purpose, but it is not in Ferrum’s Academic Affairs department. It is in the Office of Institutional Advancement. The Institute is viewed as a vehicle for attracting new donors to the college.

The Institute is relying on local people to help pay for the renovation project. But they will only have to cover half the cost. The Institute has already received a $500,000 grant for the project. The grant money came from the Tobacco Indemnification and Revitalization Fund, an endowment the state created using some of its share of the 1997 tobacco settlement.

So even today, tobacco money is the straw that stirs the drink in the economy of rural Virginia. Without it, the Blue Ridge Institute would never be able to spend a million dollars rebuilding an old farmhouse in a new location.

The old house, seen from the rear, will be demolished once the new house is completed.

Primary source: BRI Assistant Director Vaughan Webb, historic farm walking tour, June 11, 2008. Webb is not responsible for any errors in this essay.

Useful links:
Blue Ridge Institute and Museum
The Tobacco Indemnification and Community Revitalization Commission

Larry and Glenna Moore have opened a restaurant in Rocky Mount, Virginia. The Angle Dining Room features southern cooking.

Rocky Mount resident Glenna Moore remembers the day her mother applied for a job at the silk mill owned by Nathaniel P. Angle. Her mother was turned away. “The mill wouldn’t hire blacks,” Moore says.

In 2005, Moore and her husband Larry purchased one of Angle’s old homes in Rocky Mount, Virginia. That’s a sign of progress — and poetic justice.

The Moores bought the old Angle house with the intention of renovating it as a dwelling for two of their sons who live in the area. When the sons decided to stay in their own places, the Moores created a new restaurant. And because they’re pragmatic people who don’t carry grudges, they kept the Angle name, since it’s well known in the area.

The restaurant occupies the ground floor of the home. The Moores are renovating the upstairs to serve as a corporate guest house.

The Angle Dining Room opened in October 2007. It features southern cooking. “It’s what we ate,” Moore says. “It’s what my grandmother made.” The menu includes sweet potato, corn, pinto beans, cornbread, stewed tomatoes, black eyed peas, baked apples, gravy, snaps (green beans), collards, stewed tomatoes, and mustard greens. There’s also fried chicken, fried squash, fried cabbage, fried chicken livers, and chicken fried steak.

From left to right, Laura Cramblet, Winter Elliott, Zola Noble, and Jaclyn Jeffrey enjoy dessert in the Angle Dining Room.

People in different parts of the South have developed their own variations of southern cuisine, such as low-country, Creole, Cajun, and Tex-Mex. Everyone in the South seems to barbecue, but the style of barbecue changes from place to place. Mountain cuisine is not particularly distinctive. Residents of southern Appalachia used local ingredients, though, so they rarely ate fish or prepared rice or navy beans. Potatoes and pinto beans were — and are — staples. White residents eat much the same food as black residents.

Southern cooking has a reputation for being unhealthy and fattening. A colleague put it this way: “Southern cooking is fat, dipped in fat, fried in fat, and then seasoned with fat.”

The consequence of so much fattening food is a fat population. According to a 2006 report from the Centers for Disease Control, southern states have the highest obesity rates in the nation: more than 20 percent of residents are obese in Virginia; more than 25 percent are obese in Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Kentucky; and more than 30 percent are obese in West Virginia and Mississippi. (The rate is 25 percent in Ohio). Heart disease and diabetes are common.

Glenna Moore, who teaches home economics and nutrition full time at a local high school (where her husband is vice-principal and one of her sons teaches), is well aware of the pitfalls of southern cooking. “It’s heavy,” she says. “It doesn’t have to be, but it is.”

Most of the people who eat at Angles are over the age of 50 and the Moores have made adjustments to protect their clients’ heath. “They don’t need extra fat or sugar,” Moore says. The restaurant’s cook, Josephine Edwards, now fries food in vegetable oil instead of lard. She seasons food with olive oil or margarine instead of fatback. She cooks baked chicken, as well as fried chicken, so that customers have a choice.

Josephine Edwards learned to cook from her mother, but she’s updated her cooking techniques to ensure healthier meals.

The bad news: There are dishes to wash. The good news: Someone’s going home with leftovers.

I ate baked chicken with corn, mashed potatoes, and baked apples with strawberry shortcake for dessert. The food was delicious. Heaven sent. And at Angles a typical dinner entrée with sides costs $10 — a fantastic, hard-to-believe value.

The Angle Dining Room is located at 215 Claiborne Avenue. Call 540 489-1893 for more information.

Useful links:
U.S. Centers for Disease Control
Wikipedia article on southern cuisine

Fieldale, Virginia, founded as a “company town, epitomizes the charm and the struggles of small town America.

Think of the 3M company. What city comes to mind? Minneapolis, no doubt. Think of Boeing. What city? Seattle, of course. Kodak? Rochester. Proctor and Gamble? Cincinnati.

Across the United States, certain companies are synonymous with certain cities. The companies are either headquartered in these cities or have significant operations there.

It isn’t always easy growing up in a “company town.” So much of the city’s life revolves around one company and one corporate culture. On the other hand, in an age when many old industrial companies have gone belly up, one thing is clear: The only thing worse than having a dominant employer is not having one.

Company towns were once quite common in Appalachia. Beginning in the 1880s, coal companies set up work “camps” for their miners. Living conditions in these camps were often very poor. Eventually (from 1890-1920), some of the larger companies set up larger coal “towns” offering improved infrastructure and sanitation. A few companies established “model” towns in the 1920s. These towns offered excellent amenities. (Model towns represented about two percent of the company towns in Appalachia.)

Bassett Furniture company founded the town of Bassett, Virginia. This is a view of the railroad junction in town.

Bassett Furniture is still headquartered in the town, though the company has moved its manufacturing overseas and no longer employs many residents.

In a company town, the company provided a variety of services: housing, health care, law enforcement, and schooling. It often operated a company story. In some instances, it paid the salaries of local clergy. The quality of amenities depended on the profitability of the company. Large, well-capitalized firms provided more services than smaller firms with fewer resources.

Some workers received extra benefits. They could negotiate better terms if they had special skills or special standing in the community (because they were civic or religious leaders), or if they could play baseball well. (Every company town fielded its own team, and the competition among towns was fierce.)

Appalachia is dotted with these towns, including Stanleytown, Danville, and Lynch. The Fieldcrest textile company built one of the best towns, Fieldale, Virginia, in I919. The homes it built for workers are still in use. They were larger than the homes in most other company towns and each home was a one-of-a-kind.

Here’s one example of the homes found in Fieldale. I’d buy it in a minute.

Fieldcrest maintained an apartment building for single men and another, a suitable distance away, for singe women.

The town also operated a community center, outdoor pool, two schools, and a health clinic. It operated its own power plant and septic system. Fieldale was the first town in southwestern Virginia with sidewalks, electric lighting, and municipal water and sewer. The community center and pool are still operating.

The Fieldale swimming complex consists of three separate pools.

The community center is a focal point in Fieldale.

A religious group has purchased the old school.

The first home I ever owned, located at 237 Victoria Avenue in Charlotte, North Carolina, was built for workers of the Victor Cotton Mill, which opened on a hill in 1884. My home was just below the mill, three quarters up the hill. The Victor Mill closed in the 50s or 60s and the neighborhood subsequently declined. I purchased the house as a fixer-upper.

It was a real pleasure working on that old house. A 1206 square-foot craftsman bungalow, it featured hardwood floors and crown molding in every room, built-in cabinets in two rooms, windows with sills; and solid, six-panel-wood doors throughout. This is what the Victor Mill built for its workers in the early 1900s. Historian Dan Woods say companies built homes-to-last because, in most cases, they owned the homes.

Historian Dan Woods gives a tour of industrial sites and company towns near Franklin County, Virginia.

Companies engaged in “welfare capitalism” to attract and retain a suitable work force, to increase productivity, and to enhance the company’s public image among workers, investors, and the public. Companies wanted to keep workers happy to discourage them from organizing unions and to preclude the government from taking an active role in labor relations.

The conventional (i.e. Hollywood) wisdom has always been that life in a company town was poor, nasty, brutish, and short (to steal a phrase). People who disapproved of the mining companies’ anti-union activities perpetuated this image. Business owners built company towns to discourage their workers from joining unions, so the towns got a bad rap.

Certainly, by today’s standards, conditions were primitive. Then again, by the standards of the 15th century, conditions were pretty good. By the standards of the day, it was a mixed bag. Some companies operated quality towns. Other companies operated inferior towns. Either way, there were plenty of people eager to work and live in them.

Working for the man is not always fun, but it beats starving.

Under the best circumstances, companies cared well for their employees. But even under the best conditions, the companies were paternalistic. Workers had little freedom. The company ran the town and set all the rules. Whether you believe this was a good or bad thing depends on whether you believe ordinary people are capable of successfully running their own affairs.

The coal mine owners and textile operators’ experiment with welfare capitalism did not last long. Company towns were expensive to run. Business owners sold off the company-owned homes in the 1930s and the schools, health clinics, and recreation centers soon after. The last company town in Appalachia closed in the 1950s.

Once the companies sold off the towns, people were left to their own devices. “People had no clue how to organize anything,” writer Pete Crow says. “They had always been under the thumb of the company.” In many instances, dependence on government followed closely on the heels of dependence on the company. (The “company town mentality” of Appalachia is closely related to the “plantation mentality” of the Deep South.)

Ultimately, most of the textile operators either went out of business or drastically downsized their operations — moving their manufacturing facilities overseas and converting their Appalachian plants into warehouses. (Most of the local furniture makers did the same thing.) Some coal operators remain in business, but mechanization has allowed them to drastically reduce the size of their workforces. Most of the old company towns are a shadow of what they used to be. Fewer than a 1,000 people live today in Fieldale.

Just about every county in southern Appalachia has two monuments to the nation’s trade and industrial policies: a shuttered manufacturing plant and a Super WalMart. Ain’t that grand?

You’ll find shuttered textile plants throughout Appalachia. It’s hard to imagine what the local communities were like when these plants were open for business.

The plants may be empty, but the Rocky Mount WalMart is open 24 hours a day.

Primary Source: Phillip Obermiller, senior visiting scholar, School of Planning at the University of Cincinnati, lecture June 17, 2008. Dan Woods, history professor, Ferrem College, tour of industrial sites in Appalachia, June 18, 2008. Neither man is responsible for any errors in this essay.

A lot of history, especially early American history, occurred in Virginia. Most of it happened along the coast. Very little happened in the mountains. This annoys some Appalachians, but facts are hard things.

I visited Williamsburg with my sister Faith and her two children, Timmy and Joey. Timmy will matriculate at William and Mary College in the fall, so we may a day of visiting the campus and the “living history museum” next door.

Williamsburg, for those who don’t know, is a colonial-era town, once the capital of Virginia, that has been lovingly preserved by Rockefeller money. You can tour the town and see people in period dress explain early American history and demonstrate age-old trades. You’ve seen this dog and pony show before — but you’ve never seen it done so well.

Colonial Williamsburg is interesting, educational, and fun. It is not, however, inexpensive. Even Rockefeller money can only go so far. A one-day, basic admission ticket costs $37 for adults and $18 for children. (There’s plenty for children to do.) That’s a lot of money for many families. On the other hand, Busch Gardens Williamsburg charges $56.95 for adults and $49.95 for children. Both parks are fun but only one is educational.

Here are some photos:

The Virginia House of Burgesses.

We watched as this judge decided three court cases.

Court
official

Side entrance to the Governor’s Palace.

Side view of the House of Burgesses

The courthouse

The Siverds of South Hill

Useful links:
Official Williamsburg site
Williamsburg foundation

The Floyd Country Store is a happening place Friday nights, with music performances inside and outdoors.

I am going to tell you something that may change your opinion of me. I know something that decent people simply do not know. I’ll tell you what it is, but I ask you not to jump to any conclusions about how I came upon this bit of knowledge.

And here it is: I happen to know that there is a “hillbilly” moment in ever episode of the Jerry Springer show. In this moment, the Springer circus comes to a halt — the guests stop throwing punches, audience members refrain from mooning the cameras — and then, suddenly, everyone begins dancing to hillbilly music. Some audience members dance a jig. Others do-si-do. Everyone laughs in merriment.

It goes without saying that music critics in New York and LA have never taken to Appalachian music as enthusiastically as audience members of the Jerry Springer show. Cultural elites love jazz and the blues. They disdain string music and bluegrass. Personally, I think the elites are simply more interested in the lives of African Americans than Appalachians. If they knew that many African Americans live in Appalachia, that African Americans perfected the art of guitar playing, and that African slaves brought the banjo to the New World, they would appreciate Appalachian music much more. But they don’t.

Regardless of its critical standing, Appalachian music has proven durable and popular. It encompasses a range of musical forms. Among others, these include:

• Ballads/Sentimental lyric song — In the late 1800s, as people began leaving farms for textile and furniture factories, musicians began writing songs of regret and nostalgia with themes of love, death, and sorrow. These “sentimental lyric” songs feature unemotional lyrics (which seem very sad) and a moderate tempo. The presentation is very simple, often just the singers accompanied by a guitar paired with a mandolin or autoharp. The Carter family of Scott County, Virginia, defined the genre.
Play the clip of Claude Sexton and Janice Turner to hear an example.

• Work music — “Cadence songs” feature a group leader who calls out a lyric and generates a response from workers. It is used to set a rhythm for laborers moving together, to establish a work pace. The military uses cadence music when teaching soldiers how to march. “Coal mining” music involves stories set in the mines.
Play the “Ron Short” music clip to hear an example of coal mining music.

• Religious music — “Lining out” is a tradition of Primitive Baptists and related churches. These congregations have no music directors, choirs, hymnals, or instruments. Instead, a church member sings the first line of a hymn, and the congregation joins in. The leader then continues to chant each lyric just before the congregation sings it. “Southern gospel” evolved in the 1930s and 40s. There is “white” gospel music and “black” gospel. Some churches use musical instruments; others do not. Religious music is the most popular music form in Appalachia.
Play the clip of Lelia Davis and her brother David Stump to hear an example of gospel music.

• String band music — This is dance music that centers on the fiddle and banjo, both playing lead simultaneously. Other instruments, especially guitars and standup basses, fill out the string band or “old time” sound. It evolved as a new form in the 1850s.
Play the clip of Ben Harmon and Cherie Quinn to see and hear people dancing to string band music.

• Blue grass — This is up-tempo concert music featuring a high tenor singer, the banjo, guitar, fiddle, mandolin and bass. Blue grass bands may play gospel, sentimental songs, and string music, but the vocal style and instrumentation make it bluegrass. Blue grass, like jazz, requires band members to improvise during each performance.
Play the clip of Ashlee Blankenship or the born-again bluegrass band “Statement” to hear examples of blue grass.

Blue grass music has overtaken old time string music as the most popular form of music used for entertainment in the mountains. It is considered “traditional” music but is a relatively recent phenomenon. Kentuckian Bill Monroe is credited with inventing it in the 1930s. The Stanley Brothers’ Clinch Mountain Boys band from southwest Virginia helped popularize it.

Bill Monroe and Ralph Stanley are often credited with inventing bluegrass music. (Poster courtesy of the Blue Ridge Institute.)

Both blue grass and old time string music are generally performed acoustically, meaning performers do not use electrified instruments of any kind (though they may use microphones for amplification or recording purposes). They do not use percussion, brass, or woodwind instruments either — just strings.

Blue grass and old time string music are part of the country music family, though it’s difficult to say what constitutes “country” music. It’s a very broad genre, basically “pop” music. Many country music bands include percussion instruments like drums. Old time string music and blue grass do not.

Virginia tourism authorities have invented the Crooked Road — “Virginia’s Heritage Music Trail” —to capitalize on southwest Virginia’s music tradition. Many influential performers have come from the region including the Hill Billies, the Stonemans, the Carter Family, and Ralph Stanley. The music trail winds through a dozen or so counties — some of which have genuine attractions, some of which do not. It’s not clear yet whether the trail will actually produce economic benefits, but counties are working to upgrade infrastructure: improving roads, building museums, and creating concert venues. At least one county, Patrick, has asked to be dropped from the trail, tired of paying membership dues and convinced that the trail will never take off.

The crooked road passes right through Ferrum.

Everyone in Appalachia is pursuing the holy grail of tourism. Virginia already has a huge tourism industry. History lovers visit Williamsburg, Jamestown, and Yorktown (the “historic triangle”), Mount Vernon, Monticello, Richmond, Appomattox, and many more sites. Beach lovers head to the coast.

The state is hoping to direct music lovers and eco-tourists to the mountains. Given the state of the economy in many mountain communities, it is a worthwhile effort. However, it is unlikely that tourism will ever pay as well or employ as many people as mining, furniture making, textiles, and tobacco. Let’s face it: There are only so many birdwatchers and kayakers to go around. And everyone is competing for their attention. Ditto for country music fans who already have Nashville, Branson, and a variety of music trails, in a number of states, to visit. And not every town can be an “attraction.” There’s only on Gatlinburg. If every town was like Gatlinburg, Gatlinburg wouldn’t make any money.

The star attraction on the crooked road is Floyd, a town in Floyd County. Floyd has developed a great, Friday night tradition — the Jamboree — in which local musicians gather downtown to play music on the street and in the Floyd Country Store. Musicians of all ages gather to play. They form bands, just for the night, and jam. It’s interesting, fun, and for the most part, free.

An old time string band performed in the street outside the Floyd Country Store.

Guitarist Laura Cramblet joins a group of musicians who had just met … and started to play.

Primary sources: Vaughan Webb, assistant director of the Blue Ridge Institute, lecture June 16, 2008 at Ferrum College. Also, the “Crooked Road” exhibit in the BRI. Webb is not responsible for any errors in this essay.

Useful links:
There are a number of Internet sites that allow users to download music. The Blue Ridge Music Trails site provides a listing of upcoming concert events.
Floyd Chamber of Commerce
Smithsonian folkways music catalog
Digital Library of Appalachia
Blue Ridge Music Trails
The Crooked Road (news article)

St. Peters in the Mountains

Some years ago, a church van crashed in South Carolina killing four or five people. I worked at WBTV in Charlotte at the time and the station sent me and a photographer to cover one of the funerals.

We drove to the rural county where the crash had occurred. And got lost. We stopped at a service station to get directions. I asked a grey-haired man for help.

“Can you tell us how to get to ___________ Baptist Church?” I asked. The man was friendly and eager to help. He opened his mouth … words came out … but I understood nothing. The man spoke in a deep — almost impenetrable— Strom Thurmond mumble. I glanced at my photographer, who was a native of the Carolinas, but he offered no assistance. So I asked the man again. “Is that the best way?” He repeated what he had just said— so I imagined — and I thanked him for his time. My photographer claimed innocence. “I have no idea what he said.”

At that moment, I felt as though I had stepped through the looking glass and into another time and another place. Charlotte, which is in the South, had never seemed particularly Southern. A bit like Columbus but with more NASCAR fans. This was something different.

We found the church in a clearing down a long country road. A small, white paneled place like you might expect. Mourners arrived in time, many by pickup truck. Most of the men wore jeans and T-shirts, often emblazoned with a large number signifying their NASCAR loyalties. (This was definitely an Earnhardt crowd. Jeff Gordon would have been run off the property.) The congregation, at least on this day, included both black and white worshippers.

The funeral service drew a nice crowd, but one the small church could hold. We had been asked to stay outside and I walked to the back of the church and put my head next to the door. Inside, the parishioners were signing. I can’t remember what they were singing — the words or the name of the song. I just remember that it was very, very sad. I could hear in the music the parishioners’ sorrow and faith.

I have always remembered that day when listening to pundits talk about religion in the South. It’s true, people in the South have always “clung” tightly to their religion (to use an Obama word) and not just in times of economic uncertainty (to use an Obama explanation). They practice their faith in good times and in bad. It gives them purpose, guides their behavior, and connects them to the past, as well as to the future.

There is no place in America where religion is as important as it is in the South. Except in southern Appalachia. Appalachia is probably the most churched place in the most churched country in the Western world. Drive down the road and you will find all manner of churches. Churches big and small; churches rich and poor.

Rocky Mount United Methodist

Rocky Mount Presbyterian

Faith Temple church in Rocky Mount

The largest Christian groups in the United States are, in order of popularity, the Catholics, the Baptists, and the Methodists. The Big Three also predominate in Appalachia, though Baptists outnumber Catholics.

(I am told that Appalachia has more kinds of salamanders than any place in the world. The same is true of Baptists. There are many, many different kinds of Baptists, including Southern Baptists, Primitive Baptists, Free Will Baptists, Regular Baptists, Missionary Baptists, American Baptists, and so on. My suite mate is an independent, pro-choice, pro-gay rights, liberation theology Baptist. Meeting him was like spotting a Unicorn. I never imagined that such a beast existed.)

Scholar Melinda Wagner says The Big Three — Catholic, Baptist, and Methodist — attracted seven out of ten churchgoers across the nation in 2006. In Appalachia, they attracted four out of ten.

Dan Woods, a professor of history at Ferrum College and a Holiness Pentecostal minister, says a wide variety of smaller churches, including many non-denominational churches, fill the gap. This variety makes Appalachia the most diverse region in the country in terms of the Christian faith. (It is perhaps the least diverse part of the country in terms of the other world religions. You won’t find too many Jews, Moslems, Hindus, or Buddhists here. New Age spiritualists are in short supply…Scientology is a Hollywood thing.)

Because there are so many different kinds of churches here, it is difficult to draw easy conclusions about “mountain religion.” Wagner says religion in Appalachia is characterized by fundamentalism (a literal interpretation of the Bible), Puritanism (a strict code of conduct, which may include rules against drinking alcohol, gambling, dancing and the like), an emotional expression of faith (rowdy worship services), emphasis on a personal relationship with God, and fatalism (an acceptance of God’s will).

Many Appalachians invest a great deal of time, money, and effort in their churches. They attend church two or three times a week — or more — even as services run two or three hours in length. Many church members tithe. These people not only “practice” their faith. They live it.

Good news for people who bought SUVs.

The congregation that travels together, stays together.

As an outsider looking in, it is sometimes difficult to know what to make of mountain religion. Take talking in tongues, for example. I’ve seen it on TV. I wonder: Is this real? For all of the people participating? Or just some? If it’s not real, do the participants believe that it’s real? Are some of them just playacting? If they are playacting, could there be some benefit, spiritual or otherwise, to the activity?

The social benefits of a strong religious culture are difficult to establish, as well. One would think that it would lead to lower divorce rates (and therefore lower poverty rates), lower crime rates, fewer sexual transmitted diseases, fewer teen pregnancies, less alcoholism, less domestic violence, more volunteerism, more philanthropy, etc. But evidence on that is somewhat mixed.

Religious people tend to be social conservatives, but they are often liberal in other ways. You might say that they are people who don’t like gays but have a healthy appetite for government spending. Robert Byrd, West Virginia’s doddering senior senator, is perhaps the best example of this breed. Byrd joined the Ku Klux Klan as a youth and opposed Civil Rights legislation as a U.S. senator. He supported the Equal Rights Amendment, but opposes gay rights. Byrd brings home the bacon, and he has proven quite popular with voters. Liberal activists lionize him for his opposition to the war in Iraq.

The best thing I can say about religion in Appalachia is that there’s something for everyone. It’s like a smorgasbord of Christianity. You find a church that seems appealing and join. Or you start your own church, which many people have done. Personally, I find the Primitive Baptist Universalists quite appealing. They don’t believe in Hell (other than what we experience on earth.) You might think that that would be quite a selling point, but the PBU is a small denomination — though I suspect it does well on Death Row.

Primary Sources: Dan Woods, professor of history at Ferrum College, lecture June 13, 2008. Melinda Bollar Wagner, “Religion in Appalachia” a chapter in “A Handbook to Appalachia,” University of Tennessee Press, 2006. Woods and Wagner are not responsible for any errors in this essay.

A view of Rock Castle Gorge off the Blue Ridge Parkway.

The Blue Ridge Parkway meanders through scenic Appalachian Mountains at a leisurely pace. Traffic moves slowly. It’s stop and go all the way: You drive a few miles, stop at an overlook, drive a few miles more, stop at old country store, drive a few miles more…and stop again.

The Parkway runs 465 miles and connects Shenandoah National Park in Virginia with the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee. I took a 20-mile drive along the Parkway and stopped at a winery, an old mill, and a log cabin. I saw relatively few motorists. I guess you could say that the Parkway is “the road less traveled.”

This log cabin has weathered many storms.

The Mabry Mill is reputedly the most photographed site on the Blue Ridge Parkway. It’s not hard to see why.

The area along the Parkway is sparsely populated and the scenery is truly spectacular. Be forewarned, however, that the mountains are typically shrouded in haze. This haze is especially noticeable during the “lazy, hazy days of summer.” (See Cole, Nat King.) In the summer, the air is stagnant and pollution from coal burning power plants sits in the atmosphere. Trees are also more active, photosynthesizing, releasing water into the atmosphere. The week that I traveled the Parkway a large forest fire in North Carolina sent smoke into the mountains.

The most striking aspect of the haze is its color: blue. Hardwood trees, especially pines, release terpenoids. These organic compounds react with ozone to create blue haze. Terpenoids are the reason we have the “Smoky” Mountains and the “Blue” Ridge mountains. (The blue haze is not always obvious. In that way, it’s a bit like the blue grass in Kentucky.)

How blue is my valley?

The Appalachian mountain chain runs 1100 miles from Mississippi and northern Georgia to Maine. It is the most biologically diverse region in North America. There is an abundance of plant and animal life. Partly, this is a function of forest cover. Most of the mountain chain — up to 70 percent of it — is forested. This is impressive considering that early settlers pretty much clear-cut the entire chain at least twice. Consequently, less than one percent of the forest is “virgin” or “old growth.”

Black bears have returned to the Appalachian mountains. Earlier this year, a bear walked into a hospital in Rocky Mount. He walked right through the front door. Another bear walked onto the campus of Ferrum College.

This red salamander is one of many in the Blue Ridge mountains. Appalachia has more species of salamanders than any part of the world.

Birdwatchers like Carol Keller of Austin, Texas, love the Appalachians.

Biological diversity is also a function of topographic diversity. Each mountain has its own elevation, grade (or slope), and aspect (the direction it faces). These characteristics determine whether a given mountain is suitable for a given species. The more varied the topography the more likely that a given species will be able to find a suitable place to grow or live.

The Appalachian Mountains are very old and this is the most significant reason for the diversity of plant and animal life. Mountain chains in general promote biological diversity. They separate animals and plants from members of the same species. Over time, the separated groups evolve into different species. This phenomenon is true of all mountain chains, but is especially true of the Appalachian chain because of its age.

Geologists estimate that the Appalachian mountain chain is about 580 million years old, making it one of the oldest — if the not the oldest — mountain chain in the world. Dr. Todd Fredericksen, a forestry professor at Ferrum College, says the mountains are so old that they have been worn down flat — by wind and rain — twice. Each time, natural forces raised them up again.

The best way to experience the mountains, of course, is to walk over them. The Appalachian Trail runs 2175 miles from Georgia to Maine (and then 690 miles into Canada). Many people claim to have walked the entire trail. I prefer the Blue Ridge Parkway, but if gas prices continue to rise, I may put on my hiking boots.

Forestry professor Todd Fredericksen leads a bird watching expedition on the campus of Ferrum College.

Primary Source: Dr. Todd Fredericksen, forestry professor at Ferrum College, walking tour and lecture, June 13, 2008. Fredericksen is not responsible for any errors in this essay.

Useful links:
Blue Ridge Parkway Association
National Park Service Blue Ridge Parkway site
National Park Service Appalachian trail site
Appalachian Trail Conservancy group
Wikipedia site on the Blue Ridge Mountains

Gun in hand, pickup truck awaiting, this little hillbilly is ready for fun.

Americans have always loved to make fun of hillbillies. Admit it. You grew up watching Ma and Pa Kettle. Or the Beverly Hillbillies. Or the Dukes of Hazard. Hillbillies are fun. They’re sweetly innocent, very musical, and a little dumb, which makes us feel better about ourselves —— even if it makes hillbillies feel bad about themselves.

Americans didn’t always make fun of mountain people. When the nation was young, mountain people — the one’s who lived in New England — were viewed quite favorably. They were poor, yet self sufficient; uneducated, yet uncomplaining. They were “salt of the earth” people.

Our view of mountain people began to change just after the civil war. The famous Hatfield and McCoy feud simmered in the years following the war and then escalated sharply in the 1880s. The nation’s penny press followed the feud closely and brought it to a national audience.

Writer Mary Noailles Murfree, writing as Charles Egbert Craddock, planted the seed of a new stereotype in 1884. Murfree had spent her childhood summers in East Tennessee. Murfree’s book, “In the Tennessee Mountains,” suggested that mountain people were ignorant, uncouth, and pretty much hopeless. “She was densely ignorant,” Murfree wrote of one character. “She lived in a primitive community.”

Murfree’s book sold well and inspired an avalanche of similar books. John Fox Jr. wrote one of the best in “The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come.” Published in 1903, it tells the story of a Kentucky mountain boy who helps save the union. “The Little Shepherd” has successfully been adapted into a stage play, a 1927 silent film, and a1961 family film. It’s still in print. (Readers may also download it from the Internet at no cost from Project Gutenberg.)

The little shepherd was heroic but kinda wild in a 1927 film of the same name.

“The Little Shepherd” is no hatchet job. Fox communicates the impact of war as few books of the time did. Here is how the “New York Times” reviewed the book when it was re-released:

“Makes one realize as never before the peculiarly agonizing effects of the Civil War in a border state, the line of cleavage parting parent from child, brother from brother, friend from friend.”

At the same time, “The Little Shepherd” cemented the emerging stereotype of the dumb, primitive, wild southern hillbilly. Once it was made into a silent film, the stereotype reached a mass audience and spread like a tumor. Dr. Gordon B. McKinney, chair of the history department at Berea College, says there were 400 silent films about Appalachia and they all portrayed mountain people the same way: negatively. D.W. Griffith is famous for degrading African Americans in “The Birth of a Nation” He did the same thing to mountain people six years earlier in “The Mountaineer’s Harem,” starring America’s (Canadian) Sweetheart, Mary Pickford. (The dark side of the hillbilly stereotype probably reached its zenith, or nadir, with the Burt Reynold’s film “Deliverance.")

Berea College professor Gordon McKinney has studied the birth of a stereotype.

A lot of people from outside the region had a vested interest in the hillbilly stereotype. Well-meaning Christian missionaries used the stereotype to raise money for their mission work in Appalachia. “These people need your help,” they might say. “They’re pathetic.” Industrialists demeaned hillbillies as a way of justifying economic injustice. They stole land, damaged the environment, and imposed brutal labor conditions in Appalachia. And if that seemed a little unfair, well, the victims were just hillbillies, anyway. White southern Democrats had their own reasons for demeaning and marginalizing hillbillies. During the reconstruction era, white mountain people usually voted Republican. African Americans did the same. (Imagine.) Voting together, these two groups could — and did — win elections. So the Democrats imposed literacy tests and poll taxes to suppress the black vote — and the mountain vote.

The media helped perpetuate the hillbilly stereotype. It sold well even if it was unfair. Interestingly, though many Appalachians objected to the hillbilly stereotype, they were often the most reliable consumers of stereotypical material. TV shows such as the Beverly Hillbillies, the Real McCoys, Hee Haw, and the Dukes of Hazzard always drew strong ratings in rural Appalachia. (I find a similar dynamic at work with my African American students. Most of them object to rap music, yet still buy it— or more likely, download it for free off the Internet.) Jesco White is the latest, Hillbilly phenomenon.

Appalachians may have objected to the hillbilly stereotype, but they also recognized the characters, felt comfortable with the type of humor, and appreciated that Hollywood had, in its own way, acknowledged their culture. And, of course, it’s not as though the stereotype was completely negative. The Clampetts were good people. Jed may not have had much education, but he was pretty clever. Granny was pretty insightful. Jethro was dumb but strong. The only really nasty character was the banker, Mr. Drysdale.

How do you know you’re a redneck? You can’t remember the words to the “Star Spangled Banner” but you know the “The ballad of Jed Clampett” by heart. (See ballad below.)

In some instances, Appalachians have bought into the hillbilly stereotype and tried to sell it. They’ve embraced the stereotype in an effort to market the region. Pikeville, Kentucky, celebrates “Hillbilly Days.” Franklin County, Virginia, bills itself as “the moonshine capital of the world.” Depending on your perspective, these activities are either empowering or embarrassing.

Surprisingly, in our politically correct era, it is still acceptable to make hillbilly jokes. You can’t make fun of gays, Jews, African Americans or Moslems. But you can ridicule rednecks. (See photo caption above.) There is no Appalachian Anti-defamation League.

Of course, culturally sensitive people no longer laugh quite so hard at hillbilly jokes. (Unless they are alone. Or know everyone in the room.) Vice-President Cheney is the only guy who didn’t get the memo and I’m sure — since his “West Virginia joke” — he’s been sent one.

Primary Source: Dr. Gordon B. McKinney, chair of the history department at Berea College, lecture June 10, 2008, at Ferrum College. McKinney is not responsible for any errors in this essay.

Useful links:
The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come (Project Gutenberg)

“The Ballad of Jed Clampett”
Come n’ listen to my story ’bout a man named Jed
A poor mountaineer, barely kept his family fed
And then one day, he was shootin’ at some food
And up through the ground came a bubblin’ crude
Oil, that is, black gold, Texas Tea

The Jack Tales Players recruited a surprised, but game Carol Keller for the finale of their performance.

It is no secret that the literacy rate in Appalachia lagged behind the rest of the country for many years. And where literacy is weak, oral tradition is strong.

Early settlers in southern Appalachia reworked European folk tales giving them a local flavor. Many of the tales revolved around a hero named “Jack” — the same fella who climbed the beanstalk —and these stories became known as Jack Tales.

During the depression, folklorists began collecting and preserving the tales in written form as part of a Works Progress Administration project. Richard Chase published a collection of the stories, “The Jack Tales", in 1943 and a second collection, “Grandfather Tales” (without Jack), in 1948.

These books represented just a small fraction of the tales that folklorists recorded during the depression. Many of the tales languished in a Virginia library until Rex Stephenson rediscovered them in a trove of 40 boxes decades later.

Rex Stephenson (left) listens to folklorist Richard Chase discuss the Jack Tales in this archival photo.

Stephenson originated the Jack Tale Players in 1975 and has been presenting the stories to young and old alike ever since — making it America’s longest continuously running children’s theatre troupe. The Players are college students (from Ferrum College during the school year and from around the country during the summer).

I saw a performance of two Jack Tales with members of my Appalachian fellowship group. WOW! What a fantastic, fun, clever production. Each tale was told in the mountain idiom with great flair. The student actors were energetic and engaging.

The Players perform the tales on the road in non-traditional settings. Consequently, there is less emphasis on production values — sets, costumes, and effects — and more on staging. Their performance was a good reminder that you don’t need a lot of props to put on a good show.

Artistic Director Rex Stephenson speaks to the audience before a performance of two Jack Tales.

“Hardy Hard Head” on stage.

The Players also present “legitimate” plays in the Blue Ridge Dinner Theatre, located on the campus of Ferrum College. This summer, they are appearing in four plays, as well as touring with the Jack Tales. It’s an astonishing workload.

The Blue Ridge Dinner Theatre is presented in the Sale Theatre on the campus of Ferrum College.

Student actors are paid for their work. Many of them receive internship credit from their local colleges. Rex Stephenson and executive director Jody Brown travel to giant casting calls in St. Louis and Boston every year to recruit the actors. It’s a very competitive process. Thousands of students appear on stage —for two minutes at a time — trying to land a job. At the same time, hundreds of theatre managers and theme park directors watch the students perform hoping to hire the best actors available. From what I saw, the Blue Ridge Dinner Theatre more than holds its own in the recruiting process.

The Jack Tale Players cutting loose after a performance.

Useful links:
Appalachian literature for chlidren and young adults
Richard Chase’s Jack Tales (google excerpts)
Blue Ridge Dinner Theatre
The Jack Tales Players

Nothing much has ever happened in Appomattox, Virginia. It’s a small town and a quiet place. No one would remember it, and certainly no would visit it, if not for The One Big Thing that happened there.

On April 9, 1865, General U.S. Grant sat down with General Robert E. Lee in the parlor of the McLean family residence and the Army of Northern Virginia surrendered to Union forces. The slave state revolt ended shortly thereafter.

I’ve always wanted to visit Appomattox. Here are a few pictures.

The town of Appomattox still looks much the way it looked in the 1800s.

General Grant stopped here, on the Richmond Lynchburg stage road, before meeting with General Lee. He was told that Lee was waiting for him in the house barely visible on he right side of the road.

The McLean house was owned by a Confederate supporter. Grant’s aides wanted a meeting place that would be suitable for a conversation. They could have met in the courthouse nearby, but decided that it was too formal, too institutional.

Lee arrived first and chose the larger desk on the left. Grant sat at the desk on the right. They talked for a while about their experiences in the Mexican War, and then, Lee surrendered. Grant was magnanimous in victory.

General Grant ordered his men to print “paroles” for Confederate soldiers, so that they could return home unmolested by Union soldiers. The printing presses in this house ran around the clock and produced 30,000 paroles.

In other words, slavery wasn’t such a bad thing.

Some of the last fatalities of the Civil War were buried here. Most of them were secessionists, just one American.

He said the war would be brutal, and he was right.

I suppose we’ve all seen the scene in “Gone with the Wind” when Scarlett’s friends learn that war has broken out. The men whoop and holler and run from Twelve Oaks plantation eager to enlist. They parade down Main Street and crowds cheer. Everyone is excited. Except Rhett. He’s the only realist in the bunch.

We have all heard about the Solid South. It was solid during the Civil War when everyone wanted to fight Yankees. It was solidly Democrat after Roosevelt and solidly Republican after Reagan. In reality, it was always less solid than it seemed.

Prior to the bombing of Fort Sumter, most southerners opposed secession. A number of southern states had held plebiscites on the issue after the election of President Abraham Lincoln. The voters usually said “no.” North Carolina residents voted against secession. Tennessee residents blocked a statewide convention to decide the issue. Louisiana residents voted against secession, too. Secessionists then forced a recount upon which they garnered (just) 51 percent of the vote.

All along the mountains — in Alabama, Georgia, East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and Eastern Kentucky — residents voted against secession. In large numbers. Between 65 and 85 percent of mountain voters wanted to stay in the union.

It’s difficult to say why mountain people remained loyal to the union. Some people believe, wrongly, that slavery did not exist, or barely existed, in Appalachia and hence, that residents did not have an investment in the slave system. While it’s true that most Appalachians did not own slaves — which was true elsewhere in the South — some did.

Appalachian plantations existed in industrial settings. They did not conform to the popular understanding of slave plantations. Most people believe that plantations were agriculture enterprises that used slave labor to cultivate crops. In reality, a plantation was defined as “an holding of 20 or more enslaved people.” So there were plantations in Appalachia.

Some people in Appalachia have suggested that slavery was more benign in the mountains. That’s a self-serving and highly debatable point (refuted in John Iscoe’s “Mountain Masters.”)

Regardless, several things seem true: Slaves represented a smaller slice of the population in Appalachia — about ten percent —than they did in many areas of the Deep South where they represented 40-50 percent of the population. So “race control” was less persuasive an argument for slavery. Second, the economy of Appalachia was less reliant on slavery than the economy of Deep South. Third, Appalachian culture was different from the culture of the coastal plains, which was almost British in its pretentiousness and class-consciousness.

Berea College professor Gordon McKinney points out that many of the people who had settled in Appalachia were former Revolutionary War veterans. They had been paid for their service with free land out “west” — in Appalachia. Their descendants remained loyal to the union. More importantly, he says, most Appalachians knew instinctively that the region would be a prime battleground in any war between the states. Knowing that they would bear the brunt of the war, they were understandably less eager to facilitate its start.

After the bombing of Fort Sumter, President Abraham Lincoln called up federal troops. This galvanized support for secession in the South. However, there was significant opposition to the war among white southerners in Appalachia. The residents of east Tennessee still voted against secession. The residents of western Virginia formed a new state. More than 100,000 mountain residents joined the union army (300,000 served in the confederate army).

Appalachia was split in two during the Civil War. It was hardly “solid.”

Primary Source: Gordon B. McKinney, chair of the history department at Berea College, lecture June 9, 2008, at Ferrum College. McKinney is not responsible for any mistakes in this essay.

Ferrum, Virginia, is what used to be known as a one-horse town and what would later become known as a one-light town. (However, I have yet to find a traffic light in Ferrum.) There’s a bank, a Dairy Queen, a muffler shop, an antiques store, a tanning salon and … not much else.

The Methodists established a school in Ferrum (“Fair-um” pronounced “Firm” by some locals) in 1913 as part of an effort to bring elementary and secondary education to the young people of the region. When local authorities opened a public school, the Methodists opened a college. No one really visits Ferrum. They visit Ferrum College.

Over the years, Ferrum has grown to just under a thousand students. It offers nearly three-dozen majors and fields a variety of sports teams. It occupies a well-manicured, 700-acre campus, in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The campus includes the Blue Ridge Institute and Museum, the popular Blue Ridge Dinner Theatre, and the usual assortment of academic buildings and sports facilities. There’s no need for a bike on campus. Most of the buildings are clustered together in a small section of the campus. Everything is within walking distance.

Ferrum College is not particularly wealthy — the endowment stands at about $38 million — though the campus gives every impression of success and prosperity. Several new buildings have recently opened, including the Arthur Residence Hall and the Skeens Conference Center. (A faculty member donated a million dollars to help build the conference center.) The university is currently building another new residence hall.

The campus is surpassingly tidy. The grounds are well tended. Flower beds have been planted — and weeded. All of the buildings are in excellent condition. Most rooms in most buildings feature fine, original art. Dr. Jennifer Braaten, Ferrum’s president since 2002, told me that the college shows a “women’s touch.” Indeed.

The view of Arthur Residence Hall from the cafeteria.

A view of the cafeteria and conference center from across Adams Lake.

(I’ve spoken to two faculty members both of whom spoke approvingly of Braaten. One professor said, however, that some faculty members believe Braaten has spent too much money upgrading the campus and not enough money upgrading the academic program. This is a common complaint on college campuses.)

Ferrum’s tidy campus not only suggest a well-run institution, it suggests well-behaved students. The university hangs beautiful artwork everywhere and no one is worried, apparently, about theft or vandalism. You’ll find beautiful wooden rocking chairs outside many buildings. On most college campuses, chairs like these would be chained down to prevent them from “walking away.” But they aren’t chained down at Ferrum.

(From left to right) Aaron Barlow, Erica Locklear, Tiffany Kershner, and Dale Hartnett enjoy conversation on the front porch.

Braaten subscribes to the “broken window” theory of crime prevention. This means that if the authorities find a broken window on campus they fix it quickly lest the students come to believe that vandalism is an acceptable behavior. By responding quickly to minor incidents, the university lets students know what is expected of them.

Ferrum College President Jennifer Braaten

I have no doubt that Ferrum’s campus impresses visiting parents. The college is small. Students know each other and their teachers. (The student to faculty ratio is an amazing 12:1.) The academic program is strong. The location of the college means that students are less likely to be distracted from their studies. The school makes an effort to impart good values to its students. The campus itself is neat and safe. The surrounding countryside is gorgeous.

At the same time, I’m sure that some prospective students are a bit more skeptical. The small student population can be intimate — or suffocating. The campus is rather isolated. The university offers a variety of activities, but it’s still 45 minutes to Roanoke, the nearest city of any real size. A no-light town is not for everyone. It’s not “exciting” and it’s not always convenient. And that brings me to a story.

On my first night here, I realized that I had forgotten to bring clothes hangars. I jumped into my car to go shopping. I drove off campus and stopped at a convenience store. I asked an older gentleman getting into a pickup truck if he knew where I could get some hangars. He responded in true Southern fashion: “Well, I’m not sure, but I just bought a house not too far from here. I don’t know if there are any hangars in the closets, but we can go check.”

I told him that I didn’t want to impose on him and he then suggested that I visit the WalMart in Rocky Mount — ten miles up the road. I got lost — I’m not sure why, since Wal-Mart is on Route 40 like the college — but I eventually managed to buy some hangers.

I drove back to Ferrum in the dark. At one point, a cat ran across the road. I tapped my brakes to make sure that no other cats were planning to follow. None did. But a white dog ran onto the road and I hit him hard and square. The dog yelped for an eternity and I thought that I might be dragging him down the road. I stopped when I could and turned back down the road. No dog. I figured he had scampered into the brush, and I turned back around.

I then noticed a group of about six people standing on a porch outside a small house to my right. I pulled over and got out of the car. As I walked to the house, I noticed a small heap of dog sprawled out on the porch. “I hit your dog,” I announced. “That’s OK,” called out a voice. “He’s all right.”

“Really?” I thought. “How could he be?”

Hooch was licking his front paw, which was bleeding, but he otherwise seemed fine. “I thought for sure I killed him,” I said. A man grinned. “Oh, that would take a lot,” he said. “These dogs are pretty tough.” Indeed. The owner thanked me for stopping by and I went on my way.

Hooch lives!

Interesting fact: According to local legend, Ferrum was named for a nearby iron ore furnace. Ferrous became Ferrum. Second fact Ferrum is not, technically speaking, located in Appalachia. Franklin County is not included in the area served by the Appalachian Regional Commission.

Useful link
Ferrum College

Appalachia is a big place. It encompasses 410 counties in 13 states, spread over 200,000 miles, ranging along the mountains, for a thousand miles, from Georgia and Mississippi in the South to New York state in the North. Given its size and population, it’s not easy to generalize about the region. Despite that, most people have a fairly fixed image of it. Those views are not always grounded in reality. As educator John C. Campbell once said, “More is known about this place that isn’t so than about any other place.”

So, as we begin our Appalachia journey, it might a good idea to consider some of the stuff that “isn’t so.”

Myth 1: Everyone in Appalachia is poor.
Reality: The poverty picture is complicated. In 1960, when the Appalachia Regional Commission was formed, one-third of all Appalachia residents lived below the poverty line. The poverty rate was cut in half over the next 40 years. In fact, the poverty rate in Appalachia as a whole is not much higher than the country as a whole — 13.6 percent compared to 12.4 percent.

At the same time, 27 percent of the population is poor in rural areas of central Appalachia — the traditional coal mining region of Kentucky and southern West Virginia. (In rural areas of northern and southern Appalachia it stands at 16 percent. In metropolitan areas in northern and southern Appalachia the poverty rate is slightly below the national average.)

One other significant fact: In 1999, per capita income in Appalachia was about 82 percent of the U.S. average.

This graphic shows that Appalachia is no longer uniformly poor. (Red counties are poor, white counties are in transition, blue counties are well off.)

Myth 2: Most Appalachians live in rural areas.
Reality: About 58 percent of all Appalachians live in metropolitan areas, compared to 80 percent of all Americans. So most Appalachians live in cities, but they are less likely to live in cities than other Americans (At the same time, Appalachia is more densely populated than the rest of the country. According to the 2000 census, 114 persons lived in Appalachia per square mile. 80 persons lived per square mile in the nation as a whole.)

Plenty of people live in cities in Appalachia.

Myth 3: There are no black people in Appalachia.
Reality: There are no black people in “Dogpatch.” In real life Appalachia, there are plenty of black people —eight percent of the population according to the 2000 census. Two percent of the population is Hispanic. Nationwide, African Americans comprise 12.4 percent of the population and Hispanics 14.8 percent.

Myth 4: The Appalachian mountains are covered with virgin forest.
Reality: You can only be a virgin once and these mountains are not virgins. They’ve been clear-cut at least twice. Less than one percent of the forest is “virgin” or “old growth.”

Myth 5: Appalachia is hilly. Everywhere.
Reality: It is hilly, but not everywhere. The Great Shenendoah Valley in Virginia is located in Appalachia.

Where there are hills, there are valleys.

Myth 6: There are no large cities in Appalachia.
Reality: Pittsburgh and Birmingham are pretty big. Roanoke, Chattanooga, Huntington, Charleston, and Knoxville are mid-size cities. Atlanta and Cincinnati are both one county removed from Appalachia.

Myth 7: Few Appalachians live in the North.
Reality: 22 million people live in Appalachia. Nearly 10 million of them live in the North defined as Pennsylvania (5.8 million), Ohio (1.5 million), New York (1 million), and West Virginia (less than 1.8 million). Pennsylvania has more than twice the as many Appalachians as any other state. (Remember: Pittsburgh is located in Appalachia.)

Nearly half of all Appalachians live in the North.

Myth 8: Appalachia is an agriculture, not an industrial, region.
Reality: Many Appalachians worked in industry in the first half of the last century. Coal mines, textile mills and furniture factories employed large numbers of people. They no longer do. People also made money off the land — growing tobacco or making moonshine — but those activities have also declined in importance. (In some parts of Appalachia, marijuana has become an important cash crop.) The economy of Appalachia is increasingly dominated by the service industry and tourism. Franklin county historian Ann Carter Lee Gravely says, “We’re all just doing each other’s laundry.”

Walter Carnelli painted this fresco, which shows men making furniture. The painting can be seen over the headmaster’s door in the Bassett, Virginia, post office.

Appalachians want Americans to avoid easy generalizations and appreciate the diversity of their region. “We always here about the ‘other America,’ “ researcher Phillip Obermiller says. “We seldom hear about the other Appalachia.”

Useful link:
Appalachian Regional Commission

One of the tribulations of being an Ohioan is the fact that so many people think that we are Iowans. Ohio and Iowa are both flyover states with more vowels than consonants. We both grow a lot of corn. But where Iowa is forever flat, Ohio is habitually hilly.

Drive south from Columbus, beyond the expanding suburbs, and Ohio’s fertile farmlands quickly give way to rolling hills. Once past Chillicothe, you won’t find another city until you reach the river. By that time, you will have seen Appalachia Ohio.
Appalachia what? Appalachia Ohio.

Few people know that one-third of Ohio is in Appalachia. Twenty-nine counties, forming a vast arc along the Ohio River, are in Appalachia. Hamilton County, which includes Cincinnati, is the only riverfront county not considered to be part of Appalachia. (Cincinnati would seem to qualify: It is both hilly and poor, so go figure.)

Most Ohioans are blissfully unaware of the state’s Appalachian heritage (except for those who actually live in Appalachia.)

When Ohioans think of Appalachia, we think of people in West Virginia and Kentucky — our poorer cousins. We have lost much of our industry, population, and wealth, but we have not lost our pride or pretension. In our own minds, we’re still rich. (And, at least in spirit, we are. Just go to an Ohio State football game.)

Appalachia Ohio is easy to distinguish from the rest of the state. It is poorer, less well educated, and less diverse than the rest of Ohio. It is also more rural, more scenic, and more traditional.

No one really noticed Ohio’s poverty until its cities became poor. Ohio today has some of the poorest cities in America. But even today, the rural part of the state is poorer still. Rural schools get by on crumbs. Urban schools, by comparison, are well funded.

So in heading to southern Appalachia, I am not so much leaving home, but embracing my Buckeye heritage.

Useful links:
Ohio Governor’s Office of Appalachia