Appalachian History

Louis Bryant and Justus Stearns needed each other, and it’s surely no accident that their worlds finally intersected. Bryant, a bright young mining engineer, had moved into what is today McCreary County, KY at the beginning of the 1890s to consolidate mineral and land holdings acquired there by his father. But while the Bryant family [...]

She was the only woman to take part in the negotiations that brought about the creation of Shenandoah National Park in 1935. Addie Nairn Hunter, an accomplished, independent divorcee from Washington, exercised an enormous impact on the direction of George Pollock’s Skyland resort in Stony Mountain, VA from the moment she swept into Pollock’s life. [...]

To the locals, he was an arrogant and self-serving businessman, responsible for the dislocation of over 400 families when he sold his mountaintop acreage to create the core of the Shenandoah National Park. One neighbor felt “especially betrayed by George Pollock…[for] “pushing the people out. And, you know, coming up with all the stories of [...]

Listen to 1921 recording of “St. Louis Blues” by Original Dixieland Jazz Band, with Al Bernard William Christopher “W.C.” Handy, acknowledged ‘Father of the Blues’ and composer of such American musical standards as St. Louis Blues and Beale Street Blues, was born on November 16, 1873, in Florence, AL. He grew up in a log [...]

Amelia Earhart flew into the Anderson, SC airport in her Pitcairn PCA-2 Autogyro on Nov 14, 1931 and attracted over 1,000 spectators. Mayor G.T. McGregor and other city leaders met her at the airport. In May of that year, flying that plane, the thirty three year old had set a world altitude record of 18,415 [...]