Appalachian History

We post a new episode of Appalachian History weekly podcast every Sunday. You can start listening right away by clicking the podcast icon over on the right side of your screen. If you’d rather grab the show off itunes for later listening, click here: We open today’s show with an appreciation for America’s most sociable [...]

On August 17, 1925, screen actress Gloria Swanson, her husband and her staff arrived on a special train from New York. They were in New Martinsville, WV to film “Stage Struck,” a movie about a restaurant waitress who dreamed of a stage career and started on a showboat. The idea has been done a hundred [...]

There’s no dispute that a trademark application for a soda named Mountain Dew was filed on November 12, 1948 with the U.S. Patent Office by Hartman Beverage Co. of Knoxville, TN. After that the path of Mountain Dew to its current worldwide popularity breaks into a number of offshoots that parallel, intertwine, and circle back. [...]

People with an abnormally strong sex drive were said to suffer from white liver. The folk medicine record contains scant information on this folk illness, because openly talking about sex was taboo in the past. The earliest and most complete description of white liver comes from Vance Randolph’s study of folk culture in the Ozarks: [...]

If you’re an Ohio briar you might be familiar with Dayton’s Mountain Days Festival, a local celebration of the culture and heritage of Appalachian people. It has usually taken place annually since 1986 at Eastwood Metropark, though has been postponed for lack of funding in 2010 & 2011. Those not familiar with the connection between [...]