Appalachian History

My father died suddenly at 44 years of age and is buried in a little grave yard, just outside of the town he helped to build among the people he loved. His grave is marked by a stone of Tennessee granite, on which is this description: “Erected to the memory of Walter Phillips by the [...]

EVERY CREEK’S A STORY IN CLINTON COUNTY Ridge hikes and crossroad chats yield a bumper crop of legends 
down near the Tennessee border. By Howard Hardaway —Louisville Courier-Journal, no date, 1930s The ‘New Era’ is Clinton County, Kentucky’s only newspaper. W. H. Nunn has been the publisher for a number of years. He tells a [...]

It was the greatest disaster ever known to this Western Virginia mountain village. On May 2, 1929, the unusually violent storm slammed into the little community of Rye Cove, VA in the mountains of Scott County. During the storm a tornado directly struck the local two-story schoolhouse, with over 150 children and teachers inside. The [...]

I sought and received the forgiveness of my sins in August 1861, at a camp meeting at Bird’s Chapel, in Dade County, Georgia. My conversion was so definite – I may say, so sweet and so satisfactory -followed by so great peace – which I could never be made to doubt that I was reconciled [...]

James Henry Neel Reed, known as Henry Reed, was born on April 28, 1884, in Monroe County, WV,  a rural county lying along the Virginia border in the Appalachian Mountains of southeastern West Virginia. Reed grew up in Monroe County as a member of a large extended family. His father and at least one uncle [...]