Minor E. Clark Fish Hatchery, Morehead, KY, July 8, 2019

On July 8, 2019, we took our nine year old nephew, Connor Nehlson, to the Cave Run Lake Spillway for a picnic, a hike and a visit to the Minor E. Clark Fish Hatchery just below the spillway.  I have known about the hatchery for at least twenty years but I had never visited it until a month or so ago while I was hiking at the spillway.  There is an old paved service road which runs between the hatchery and the dam and I figured that out by accident simply by following the service road until I found myself at the hatchery. That service road is an excellent place to hike, easy to hike, tree covered all its length, and it connects with the other hiking trails in the area of the Cave Run dam and spillway.  When I took Connor there, I took along my camera and got a few photographs around the hatchery.  The hatchery is comprised of a couple of what appear to be residential houses for senior staff, an equipment garage, and a large building which is both an office complex and the hatchery building itself.  In front of the office and hatchery building there is a large concrete holding tank which is used as a display tank in warm weather so that visitors can see specimens of several of the larger fish breeds which are either native to Kentucky or raised at the hatchery.  The tank is somewhat like a large livestock watering tank but considerably larger but only about three feet deep.  Most people, including children of eight or nine can see over the top of the concrete sides into the tank.  There are two or three species of catfish including two paddle bill catfish about three feet long.  There is also an albino catfish which must be about ten or 12 pounds.  There are also about a dozen large outdoor ponds in which fish are raised until they are ready for stocking.  There are gravel service roads around these ponds and I have hiked on them a few times but I am not certain whether hiking is actually permitted around the ponds or simply ignored by the staff. These ponds are also an excellent place to hike, absolutely flat but totally exposed to the sun, near several staff which increases the safety factor for at risk hikers, they attract several species of water birds, and the area is fully visible from more than a hundred yards away.  There are also three or four long, narrow, shallow concrete holding tanks in the ground between the buildings and the ponds which appear to be used for holding fish temporarily until they are transported for stocking.  

Paddle Bill Catfish In The Observation Tank--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

The hatchery does give indoor tours of the hatchery building between 7am and 3pm according to the state website.  There are actually three fish hatcheries in Kentucky but I have not visited the other two. The Minor E. Clark Hatchery at Morehead and the Peter W. Pfieffer Hatchery east of Frankfort are both operated by the state of Kentucky and raise fish species which are considered endemic to either cool or warm waters.  A federally owned hatchery is operated under the name Wolf Creek National Fish Hatchery at Jamestown, Kentucky.  The Wolf Creek National Hatchery raises cold water species of fish such as trout. 

Connor At The Observation Tank--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

If you love fishing, icthyology, hiking, bird watching, or biology this will be an excellent place to visit. It can be educational, great exercise, and good, clean, fun. It can also teach you a lot about the fish stocking and individual species preservation efforts in Kentucky.  It is located less than ten miles from I-64 and can be accessed from the Morehead exit or the Sharkey/Farmers exit.  It is also only a mile or so from US60 and about the same distance from Pop's Barbecue which is an acceptable place to eat.  There are also motels between the hatchery and the interstate.  If you are in the Morehead area, you can combine a trip to the hatchery with fishing, boating, and hiking at Cave Run Lake.  You can also visit the Kentucky Folk Art Museum and Morehead State University, my alma mater, in nearby Morehead and make a day or a weekend trip out of it.  

Connor Nehlson At One Of The Concrete Fish Holding Tanks--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

Kingdom Come State Park--July 25, 2019

Kingdom Come State Park is the highest elevation state park in Kentucky and one of the most unique with respect to the natural features it holds.  It is just outside Cumberland, Kentucky, in Harlan County.  My wife and I visited the park on our long day trip on July 25, 2019, and I hiked for about an hour on an old road which passes from the park toward Whitesburg, Kentucky, fourteen miles away.  The one lane gravel and blacktop road extends 38 miles along the crest of Pine Mountain from Whitesburg to Harlan. It is sometimes known as the Little Shepherd Trail, a name taken from the book "The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come" by John Fox, Jr.  The road crosses through the park near the summit of Pine Mountain. The great majority of the road lies outside the boundaries of the park on what I suspect is primarily corporate land being held by coal and timber companies.  Only about a mile of the road lies within the park boundaries.  But there are rumors of an attempt by the Kentucky Parks system to use the road as part of a longitudinal park which would run from Harlan to the Breaks of the Mountains Interstate Park on the Virginia border in Pike County.  Kingdom Come State Park allows vehicular, but not ATV, traffic on the road inside the park.  Outside the boundaries of the park, it is my understanding that ATV's, dirt bikes, horses, and vehicles all travel the trail/road which is an absolute shame.  Dirt bikes and ATV's do nothing except destroy flora and fauna and severely disturb larger animals.  It is my considered opinion that those who use such vehicles to "see" the mountains and parks anywhere are simply too lazy to hike on foot, too uncaring of wildlife to stop disturbing them, and too unaware of the importance of the flora to stop destroying it.  But Harlan county has catered to ATV and dirt bike riders in order to gain more tourism dollars and have actually developed what they call the Off Road Adventure Area for such vehicles on abandoned strip mined land.  Since that land has already been mutilated, destroyed, and left a wasteland by the coal companies, in most cases, I have to admit that this ATV "adventure area" is the best answer for the problem.  It would be a wonderful  thing if all ATV and dirt bike riders stay off all other land in the mountains  and let the flora survive and the wildlife live in peace.  

Path To Kingdom Come Overlook--Photo by Trip Advisor

Now to my hike which was in the heart of bear country.  The Little Shepherd Trail, as it is sometimes called, does allow vehicular traffic and during the hour I was on it I did see three cars as I recall.  They were all driving slowly and safely. I probably traveled about a mile each inside the park and outside the park boundaries since I did a straight hike and a round trip. The trail begins at an overlook which does have protective railing, bear resistant garbage cans, and a small parking area.  I have to say that the microchip in my camera had run out of storage space during my long day trip, and I did not take any photographs on the hike.  I will try to post a few here from the public domain.  This overlook allows you to see the valley below over a portion which extends probably two or three miles.  It is a fabulous view but, since I was married at the main overlook of the New River Gorge National Park, I know it is not the best overlook you will ever see.  Also, since my wife is in a wheelchair, handicapped accessibility is important to us and the path to the overlook is not accessible.  It has several steps on a stone path leading to it.  There is also a small piece of land to the right of this path which could be easily converted to wheelchair accessibility with a bit of leveling and stone work. But for now that possible wheelchair route to the overlook is blocked by tree roots, rocks, and one tree which would make it too narrow without some effort to widen it.

Kingdom Come Overlook--Photo by Harlan County Trails

The hike was in the heart of bear country and I was mildly apprehensive about the possibility of contacting a black bear.  But during my entire hour long hike of perhaps 3 to 4 miles round trip, I saw absolutely no wildlife other than a few butterflies and mosquitoes.  I saw no bear, elk, deer, coyote, coon, bobcat, possum, skunk, rabbit, or squirrel, and the area was one where I had thought I would see a few animals.  But do not take this as a blanket statement that no wildlife are in the trail area.  It was a hot day and I hiked in mid-afternoon when many animals might have been laying up in the shade between their morning and afternoon feeding periods.  The trail is nearly one hundred percent shaded so in cool weather you probably need long sleeves or a jacket. There is quite a bit of uphill and downhill along the trail and they can be fairly steep.  I would rate the difficulty of this trail as moderate due to the grades even though it is along an old highway.

The park also has a small man made lake which allows fishing and paddle boating with compliance to the Kentucky Fish and Wildlife Regulations.  There are also a fourteen other short hiking trails inside the park with none being longer than a mile.  There is also a multi-use amphitheater at the base of Raven Rock which we did not see due to our intense schedule for the day.  Overnight primitive camping is allowed in designated areas with a fee. According to the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife "as part of the Fishing in the Neighborhoods (FINS) program, this lake is regularly stocked with catchable-size catfish up to four times annually. Additionally, this lake is stocked with rainbow trout in the spring and fall. Largemouth bass and sunfish are regularly sampled and stocked if necessary". The park does not have a lodge or restaurant and that is a shame.  But the park is well worth a visit especially if you like to hike, bird watch, or fish. 

Kentucky Coal Museum--Benham, KY, July 25, 2019

As I mentioned in my previous blog post about our long road trip to Harlan County and beyond, my wife Candice and I toured the Kentucky Coal Museum in Benham, Kentucky, on July 25, 2019.  I am involved in a large research project about a particular coal camp town right now and I am deeply immersed in as much coal camp information as I can gather which has been reflected in many of my recent blog posts.  Even though it is a bit far flung from my main research interest, Candice and I both wanted to go to Harlan to the museum and thought the trip was worth while.  It really was worth while.  I have been fascinated and greatly pleased that a little over two  years ago the museum converted to solar power but I did not discuss it with the employee on duty since most of the early questions I asked her seemed to be a bit over her head.  That was the only negative aspect of the entire experience in my mind.  I would have loved to meet a docent who actually knew a lot about the museum, the industry, and life in the area as far back as 125 years ago.  The other biggest knock on the place is that, like most museums, art galleries, and zoos, you enter the place directly into the store area where they are hawking everything from soup to nuts.  

But the museum is located in an old store or office building has has four levels with displays.  There is the ground level, a mezzanine above that, a second story above that, and a basement which is primarily filled with coal mining tools and a facsimile mine.  I took as many photos as I could and they allow you to take photos freely which is great.  The collection is diverse, reasonably well curated, and organized into logical sections according to subject matter.  There are several photos and other material from Drift, KY, in Floyd County which was a surprise since that mine was near where I grew up.  There is also a fairly large display of Loretta Lynn material which has some logical connection because of her "Coal Miner's Daughter" record and book and the fact that she grew up in Van Lear, KY, a coal camp in Johnson County.  There is also a small museum in Van Lear which is not nearly as complete, well curated, or diverse.  I am going to add as many photographs to this post as I can logically and will, from this point on,  and will make only short explanatory notes where necessary.  I hope my readers will enjoy this blog post, tour the Coal Museum on your own, and read the other posts which I have provided links to in this piece.  

The mezzanine level, which we visited first has a large collection of memorabilia from the several local schools which existed in Harlan County before consolidation.  These are the schools which the children of coal miners attended until the mergers began.  This is a sports letter sweater from Lynch High School which no longer exists.   

ALL PHOTOS ARE BY ROGER D. HICKS AND ALL RIGHTS ARE RESERVED UNDER US COPYRIGHT LAW.  DO NOT USE ANY PHOTOS FROM THIS BLOG WITHOUT EXPRESS WRITTEN PERMISSION FROM ROGER D. HICKS. 

Lynch High School Letterman's Sweater--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

This is obviously a Lynch High School cheerleader's uniform which was worn by a girl named Joyce. 

Lynch High School cheerleader's uniform--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

Car Decorator Plate from Benham, KY, the home of the museum--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

Below we have a pre-employment warning sign which would have been posted near the entrance to the coal company employment office and harks back to signs which used to appear in New York City which said things like "No Irish Need To Apply".  In the early era of coal mining in Appalachia, companies could get away with all sorts of discrimination and maltreatment which would be crimes today. 

Pre-employment Warning Sign from Benham--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

Life Sized Carved Wood Bust of a Coal Miner--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

I assume this sign, hand written with a finger in coal dust is authentic although I did not ask.  If you read it carefully, it says, "42 men alive in Left Mar 4, 1915 at 4:30pm

This is the coal camp church display in the museum.  Notice that the museum staff worked diligently to make the church racially integrated with an African American minister.  But most companies owned the buildings in which the churches were held or built racially segregated churches for both races and strictly controlled who could preach in them, what they could preach, and who they could preach it to.  For instance, read about the churches in the book I reviewed recently, "Coal People Life In Southern Colorado's Company Towns".  Also, some mention of this subject takes place in George D. Torok's book, "A Guide To Historic Coal Towns Of The Big Sandy River Valley" which is reviewed at this link.  While all the same practices were not followed from state to state or company to company, the companies universally used every device at their disposal in order to control every aspect of coal camp life.  Interestingly, in Eastern Kentucky and parts of Southern West Virginia and Western Virginia, the Old Regular Baptist Church was a big influence on the people of coal camps and always owned their own churches which were also always outside the city limits such asd the Steele's Creek ORB Church at Wayland where the moderator, E. Hawk Moore,  was also a miner and served as the funeral committeeman for the UMWA for many years.  But it is also necessary to note that the ORB church did not usually meddle much in coal company matters and their churches only held services on site one weekend each month which was throwback to the days of the circuit riding preachers in Appalachia. 

Here is a photo of a wonderful coal and wood burning cook stove on the floor of the museum which houses most of the items related to Loretta Lynn.  However, please note that nothing in the section particularly seems to be labeled as having been owned by Loretta Lynn or her family. 

Here is a wonderful Singer treadle sewing machine from the bedroom of that same section of the museum.  The bedroom suite of which the chest of drawers is partially visible appears to be from the late 1950's or early 1960's based on the type of drawer pulls it has.

The section of the museum which represents stores, both country stores and company stores takes me back to my childhood growing up in a country store.  They have a great collection of period appropriate items in the shelves along with a good scale from about the 1950's. 

I hope you have enjoyed this insight into the collections at the museum.  But please do not allow these photographs to prevent you from actually taking a trip to Benham, KY, to tour the museum.  If you have any interest in or connection to coal camp towns and coal mining, you will appreciate their collections. 

ALL PHOTOS ARE BY ROGER D. HICKS AND ALL RIGHTS ARE RESERVED UNDER US COPYRIGHT LAW.  DO NOT USE ANY PHOTOS FROM THIS BLOG WITHOUT EXPRESS WRITTEN PERSMISSION FROM ROGER D. HICKS. 

A Long Day Trip In The Mountains, July 25, 2019

"The Miner's Home", Photo By Roger D. Hicks

Yesterday, July 25, 2019, my wife Candice and I took a long road trip in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky.  We left home at about 8:30am and never got back until about 7:15pm.  I drove 289 miles across parts of seven counties, Morgan, Wolfe, Breathitt, Perry, Leslie, Harlan, and Letcher.  We covered a lot of ground and still got a lot done, met one or two interesting people, had a pretty good lunch, and still got home in time to watch Jeopardy.  I will post just three or four photos on this blog post and will write at least two other posts about specific sites we visited with a lot more photos specific to those sites on the blog posts about them.  The original intent was to see the Kentucky Coal Museum in Benham, Kentucky, and for Candice to be able to say she had been to the top of Black Mountain and had been to Harlan County.  Actually, by the time we had made it home, we had been across the two biggest mountains in Kentucky, Black Mountain and Pine Mountain.  And, due to the time and distance, we did not get to stop and see several, perhaps many, of the things we would have liked to see such as the statue in tribute to Mary Breckinridge and the Frontier Nursing Service and the Hurricane Creek Mine Disaster Memorial both in Hyden .  We also had thought about trying to see the Portal 31 Exhibition Mine but it is not possible for Candice to see it in her wheelchair and I decided to try to do more of other, more accessible things.  I do plan to return to Harlan County sometime soon, see some of the things I had missed and shoot some photos in the old coal camps we saw such as Harlan, Lynch, Benham, Loyall, and Evarts. Lynch is actually one of the more preserved sections of coal camp homes I have seen.  We were also struck by the similarity of one section of the street in Lynch to that in Wayland, Kentucky, in Floyd County.  Even with modern remodels, many of the homes in both coal camps are built along a very similar and basic coal company plan. 

Pro-UMWA Poster, Photo by Roger D. Hicks

We left home through Cannel City, KY, actually another old coal camp town, and passed through Jackson and Breathitt County, Hazard and Perry County, Hyden and Leslie County, and finally got to Harlan about lunch time.  We had seen an Indian restaurant advertised on the internet known as "Little India" and wanted to have lunch there but we couldn't find it.  We did find a police officer on duty in Loyall, KY, and asked him.  He grinned and said, "She changed the name of it to "Good Eats" because people around here...".  I interrupted and said, "...wouldn't eat Indian food."  We had a chuckle about it and he said, "I was eating there just this week.  People said it was too spicy but it's not really."  I thanked him and we went back to Good Eats which we had actually seen while searching for Little India.  We went in and found a local Caucasian woman behind the counter and met the wonderfully friendly Indian-American female owner a bit later.  She actually grew up in Oklahoma City and was raised, as she put it, "By  my grandmother and she was a very traditional Indian Muslim woman."  There was only one Indian item on the menu, Chicken Tikka Masala, which we both had while nearly everybody around us ate fish.  When I told what the police officer said, the owner said "He eats here a lot."  The server told us to choose a degree of hotness somewhere from 1 to 10.  Candice chose 3 and I chose 6.  I could not have handled 7 but I liked the food except for the fact that it was served in Styrofoam containers with plastic utensils.  But the overall impression I got from the encounter is that I am glad this woman came to Harlan and I never asked her why.  But it is great to see a friendly, intelligent, welcoming Muslim raised Indian-American woman helping to spread brotherhood around Southeastern Kentucky.

Candice Hicks In The Fountain at Mine Museum, Photo By Roger D. Hicks

After lunch, we toured the Coal Mine Museum, went to the top of Black Mountain and headed toward Kingdom Come State Park where I hiked an hour along the primitive road, actually known as the Little Shepherd Trail, which runs from the park to Whitesburg, KY, fourteen miles away.  It is the heart of bear country and has cautionary signs posted everywhere.  During my hike which must have been three to four miles along the ridge, I never saw any wildlife of any kind and got back home to learn that one of my old high school teachers had a bear in her yard in Knott County that day.  But I never saw bear, elk, deer, coyote, bobcat, fox, coon, possum, rabbit, or squirrel for the entire hike.

I Always Wanted A Photo With A Long Legged Cheerleader, Photo by Candice Hicks

Then we left the area on US119 to Whitesburg, turned on KY 15 South through Isom and on to Hazard and Jackson.  I will write more about this trip on separate blog posts about the individual sites we saw, so please come back and look for those posts.

Poster For The Day Hank Williams Died, Photo By Roger D. Hicks

The Perfect Political Cartoon

Finally, after about 60 years of reading political cartoons, I have found the perfect political cartoon not just for this time but for all time.  I have already posted it on my Facebook page and said that I will not be posting any other on that page but will continue to repost this one about once a week on my Facebook page until something is done about the American constitutional crisis. Here it is on this blog as well.  I sincerely hope that all of you will become regular readers of this man's political cartoons.  He is a genius whose work deserves a far wider audience.  His name is Benjamin Slyngstad and his work can be found on his web page at:   https://www.slyngstadcartoons.com/political

But here is the cartoon which I consider to be his best work ever.  I also consider it to be the best political cartoon I have ever seen.  I realize I just repeated myself but I assure you this deserves to be repeated until the problem it discusses is indicted, convicted, impeached, and imprisoned.  

This Is The Battle I Was Trained To Fight!

America is in the midst of the worst constitutional crisis in the history of the country.  I had considered saying that we are in the worst constitutional crisis since April 12, 1861, the day the Civil War began.  But after careful consideration, I realized that even during the Civil War, the forces which were fighting against the United States of America were not controlled by a foreign power.  They were not fully committed to destroying Democracy in North America.  They were not fully committed to destroying the US Constitution.  Today, we are in a battle in which the individual who illegally occupies the White House is fully committed to destroying America, American Democracy, the US Constitution, and everything they all represent as he works to support his Russian master and the ideas of his heroes such as Adolph Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Adolph Eichmann, and every other Fascist and dictator who ever lived.  These are the worst days in the history of the country, worse than the Civil War, worse than World War I, worse than World War II, worse than the Great Depression.  We are literally engaged in a battle which will decide if this country will survive as the greatest democracy in the history of the world.

Statue Of Liberty--Photo by Ellis Island

So the question becomes what will each of us do in response to this widespread Fascist attempt to destroy America.  I don't know about you but I will fight it to my dying breath.  Just as the title of this blog post says 'This is the battle I was trained to fight'.  I have been incredibly lucky to be born in the greatest democracy on the face of the earth and so were most of you. And, of course, some of you were born in other countries and chose to immigrate to America for a better life in a better country.  I applaud each immigrant in America and know that the great majority of you are also deeply involved in this battle for the country you loved enough to leave everything and everyone you had ever known to become Americans. Each immigrant citizen in America is under attack today and living in fear of seeing the destruction of the constitutional process which made you an American.  I was incredibly lucky to have been born into a family which was composed of intelligent, politically aware people who were able to understand an attack on our country and to train me to understand it also along with being able to see and understand any future attacks long after the people who raised me were dead.  I have been incredibly lucky to have found, wandered into, or been divinely guided to other teachers, mentors, heroes, and friends who expanded on that early education I received at the feet of my elders.  Collectively and individually these people gave me a base of knowledge, morals, values, and resources which make it not only suggested but mandatory that I stand up for what is right in the face of any attacks which occur to destroy that which is valuable to and life sustaining for a democracy.  I sincerely hope each of you who read this has also had some level of the same type of mentoring, instruction, and moral training to teach you the same things.  At this time of incredible crisis in America, it is necessary that every American citizen with enough intelligence and morals to understand the nature of the intensifying attack on our country and its sacred institutions  must be willing to stand up, stand out, speak up, and speak out on a daily basis to confront the incredibly Fascist and anti-American ideas which are arising from the Radical Right and from Russia and their minion in Washington.

Albert Stewart--Photo by Lexington Herald-Leader

I have often written on this blog about some of the people I have encountered in life who have reinforced the democratic and patriotic values which my parents instilled in me.  Probably the first such person I met was William Howard Cohen when I was about 14 years old in Upward Bound on the campus of Alice Lloyd College.  Bill Cohen became my professor, mentor, and friend and taught me both by example and by didactic methods to stand up for what is right.  Bill Cohen went out in Eastern Kentucky to strip mines and lay down in front of coal trucks in his fight against strip mining and eventually lost his job at Alice Lloyd College because of it.  But because he was right, he never stopped speaking out against wrong.  At about the same time, I met Albert Stewart who also taught at Alice Lloyd College but fought his fights in a much quieter  but just as firm a manner.  In his effort to save his family farm on Yellow Mountain in Knott County from destruction by strip mining, he eventually willed it and gifted it to the University of Kentucky to prevent that destruction.

Robert "Bob" Snyder--Photo by Southern Appalachian Circuit of Antioch College

A few years later, I became a member of a group of people in Beckley, West Virginia, who have gone on to become some of the most respected writers, teachers, and social activists in all of Appalachia.  The Southern Appalachian Circuit Of Antioch College in Beckley was created and directed by Robert "Bob" Snyder one of the best poets and most brilliant minds Appalachia has ever produced.  He also put together a tremendous group of professors and students at that time in the early 1970's who are often spoken of as a group when Appalachian writing and social activism are discussed.  In that group of professors was Don West, P. J. Laska, Rod Harless, and William C. "Bill" Blizzard.  Each of those people further reinforced my commitment to do the right thing no matter the circumstances or the opponent.  I learned valuable lessons from each of them along with several of the other students in that group.

Don West--Photo by Georgia Encyclopedia

Don West had been born in North Georgia as the son and grandson of poor mountain farmers.  He grew up to write, teach, preach, do social action work, and to influence dozens of other American social activists.  He co-created Highlander Center in New Market, Tennessee, with Miles Horton.  He and his wife Connie Adams West created the Appalachian South Folklife Center in Pipestem, West Virginia.  Don fought for the UMWA in Harlan County Kentucky in the 1920's, worked in the defense of Angelo Herndon in Georgia in the 1930's, and saw himself fired from Oglethorpe University due to his social activism.  He was run out of Georgia under a death warrant for his defense of Herndon, saw two homes burned out from under him, and was ostracized in many ways in many places.  But Don West never stopped fighting for social justice.  He also never stopped working to teach anyone he met about the importance of doing the same thing and never stopping in a fight for the good, just, correct thing in a crisis. By the time Don West died in 1992 at 86, his battles had earned him an obituary in the New York Times and a biography in the encyclopedias of two states, Georgia and West Virginia. 

Roderick Mansfield Harless--Photo by the Harless Family

Roderick Mansfield "Rod" Harless was also one of those professors at the Southern Appalachian Circuit of Antioch College.  Rod had grown up in a large family which produced both him and a brother who was a long term official in the United Mine Workers of America.  Rod was quiet, low key, and a wonderful writer.  His "Prince of New Rock" satire series about the candidacy of Jay Rockefeller for governor of West Virginia is an unknown and unrecognized classic. He was a social activist who was deeply committed to always doing the right thing in all circumstances and passed that commitment on to those who knew him.

William C. Blizzard--Photo by Kimberly Clear

William C. "Bill" Blizzard was also a member of the faculty at the Southern Appalachian Circuit of Antioch College after having spent most of his life as a writer at the Charleston Gazette  which fired him for refusing to cross a press men's picket line at the paper during a strike.  Bill Blizzard would likely have chosen to die rather than cross a picket line.  He was the son of William Blizzard, the leader of the United Mine Workers at the Battle of Blair Mountain in Logan County, West Virginia.  Bill Blizzard published a book, "When Miners March" about the West Virginia unionization effort late in life and devoted his life and much of his free lance writing to passing on the socially active values his father and the United Mine Workers had passed on to him as a child.

P. J. Laska--Photo by Roger D. Hicks

P. J. Laska was also a key member of the faculty at the Southern Appalachian Circuit of Antioch College and has been my professor, mentor, and friend since we met in the 1970's.  He is the one living member of that incredible group of teachers and activists who came together in Beckley along with a sizeable group of their students who have continued the good fight in nearly all causes we have encounter.  Laska was a finalist for the National Book Award in Poetry in 1976.  I have been blessed to have known all of these people I have listed so far in this blog post.  But I have been especially blessed to have had P. J. Laska as a friend and mentor for the past forty plus years.  Today, at 80, he is still fighting the good fight just as many of his former students are.  After knowing and having been mentored by this group of people, how could I do anything except keep up the good fight until it is won just as the American Revolution was won, just as the Civil War was won, just as all of our greatest challenges such as the Great Depression have been won?

Dr. Daya Singh Sandhu--Photo by Sikhnet.com

I have also been blessed to know several immigrants who have influenced me deeply over the years.  I have written about some of those people and their contributions to America in this blog and I will continue to do so.  Recently, I have met two new immigrants who work in two of my favorite restaurants who are also inspirations to me.  After having known people like Dr. Elif Arioglu-Oral, Dr. Daya Singh Sandu, Dr. Surjit Dhooper, Dr. Noor Loynab and his wonderful wife, Amena Loynab, all of whom are immigrants, how could I not continue to fight the good fight to keep the open door of America open to all who are willing to come and work to make this country better?  But I have also been influenced by many other immigrants who came to America, became citizens, and spent their lives working as horsemen, waiters, laborers, and other jobs which make a country function successfully?  And, of course, how could any loyal citizen of this country not fight to their dying breath against the nameless TRAITOR who now lives illegally in the White House based on his TREASON with Russia?  I call upon every person who reads this blog post to join in this greatest fight in American history and to continue unflinching until the battle is won.  Do not allow our country's greatest enemy to destroy the US Constitution, American Democracy, and America herself as they are working daily to do?   

Dr. Elif Arioglu-Oral, M. D.--Photo by U of Michigan Health Net

"Coal People LIfe in Southern Colorado's Company Towns, 1890-1930"--Book Review

Book Cover, Photo by The Colorado Historical Society & Rick J. Clyne (All Rights Reserved)

Clyne, Rick J. Coal People Life in Southern Colorado's Company Towns, 1890-1930 (Denver, CO, Colorado Historical Society, 1999)

This little book has been one of the most pleasant and informative things I have read in quite some time.  It began as a masters thesis in history for the author, Rick J. Clyne, when he was a graduate student at The University of Colorado at Denver.  He states that he turned the thesis into this book upon the urging of some of his professors and the Colorado Historical Society which published the book.  It covers a forty year period from 1890 to 1930 in the coal fields of Colorado and is based primarily on information which the author gained from oral history records at the Colorado Coal Project and at the Huerfano County Ethno-History Project.  The photographs in the book are wonderful and wonderfully informative about coal camp life at the turn of the twentieth century.  With that said, I have chosen to scan the book cover with its relatively generic photo of an extended family or group of people in one of the camps.  The other photograph I am including in this review is one of a group of young boys who are either going to work or leaving the mine in one of those camps.  That photo is not labeled as to the site at which it was taken.  But it is one of the most telling photographs of child labor in America that I have ever seen. The photo is printed in the book over two pages and does not scan well but it is still graphic, memorable, and somewhat shocking to see.  The photograph shows eight juvenile coal miners whose ages likely range for eight or nine to about fourteen.  They look tired and far too old before their time.  One of the boys appears to have some sort of genetic based facial conformity which might indicate either fetal alcohol syndrome or an intellectual impairment.  Remember that the author of the book, Rick J. Clyne, and the Colorado Historical Society own all the rights to these photographs and they are fully protected under US Copyright Law.  Do not duplicate, copy, scan or use these two photographs in any manner without the express written permission of Rick J. Clyne and/or the Colorado Historical Society.  

Juvenile Miners In Colorado--Photo by The Colorado Historical Society and Rick J. Clyne, (All Rights Reserved)

 The book focuses on coal camps in Huerfano and Las Animas counties in Colorado and that area includes the site of the Ludlow Massacre, one of the most horrendous events in all the history of coal mining in America.  Clyne gives credit to a visit to the UMWA built memorial to the dead at Ludlow for sparking his interest in the coal camps of the region.  The book is composed of a preface, an acknowledgements section, and seven chapters.  It is only 102 pages of primary of text without the index and notes.  But those 102 pages are incredibly well worth reading for the person who is interested in coal camp life, coal mining, Colorado history, the UMWA, immigration, or company towns.  The author did a commendable job of converting what appears to have been a more academically focused masters thesis into a readable book for the casual student of history or coal camp life. The seven chapters are labeled Coalfields, Companies, and Unions; The Company Town; The Community; A Miner's Life; A Woman's Life; A Child's Life; and Conclusion.  Each of those chapters addresses a key component of life in a company town in the coalfields.  Clyne leaned heavily on those first person oral history accounts and that was an excellent choice.  No history is better than oral history provided by the people who lived it.  But noticeably absent is any sizable input from company officials, company police, or strike breakers.  The author also, in my opinion, attempted to be just a bit too generous toward the companies in his discussion of labor unrest, child labor, or other conflicts except those which occurred between different ethnic groups.  

But, this is an excellent book and well worth reading if you are interested in coal mining history in America or Colorado.  Its positive qualities far outweigh the deficiencies I have noted above.  Since it is from a small publisher or regional history, it is likely that it was published in a small printing and may be difficult to find other than on website of used books.  But it will be worth the effort. 

Baptism In The Creek, Easter Sunday, April 8, 2012

These photos were shot at a baptism in Indian Creek in Morgan County Kentucky on Easter Sunday, April 8, 2012.  I posted them on my Facebook account at that time but, for some unknown reason, I never posted them on this blog or wrote about it.  Sadly, I didn't write down the names of the participants and do not remember them. I will do some checking with my sources in the community and see what I can learn about their identities.  The baptism was being conducted by the Lick  Branch Enterprise Baptist Church in West Liberty, Kentucky.  When I was growing up, nearly every baptism in Knott County Kentucky and the surrounding counties all across Eastern Kentucky and Southern West Virginia was done in the creek and the time of the year usually did not matter.  I have heard numerous stories of ice being broken on creeks in order to conduct a baptism.  But most churches and most denominations all over Appalachia have now installed baptismal fonts and no longer conduct them in the creek.  I have actually attended one other baptism in the creek on Flat Fork in Morgan County where someone I knew was being baptized a couple of years ago and I neglected to take a camera. Sometime in the neighborhood of twenty-five years ago, I also attended another baptism in the creek which was being conducted by the White Oak Christian Church of the Disciples of Christ in Morgan County which is generally considered to be one of the more liberal denominations in this area.  The person being baptized was the son of a deacon who sometimes served as a lay minister and the church had no baptistry at that time. To return to the discussion of the particular baptism depicted in these photographs, the Enterprise Baptist Association is a member of the Kentucky Baptist Convention and is one of the more liberal associations which trace their historical lineage to the Old Regular Baptists or simply the Regular Baptists.  As these baptisms grow more and more rare in the creeks of Appalachia, I urge all of my readers to attend them when you are aware of them and be absolutely certain to take photographs and preserve and disseminate those photographs in a manner which will make them available to historians, researchers, and religious scholars. All photographs in this blog post were shot by Roger D. Hicks and are fully protected under US copyright law.  Do not use these photographs in any manner without express written permission from Roger D. Hicks.

The religious scholar Emma Bell Miles stated that baptisms "...always take place in a pool of water, or the deepest part of a creek, or in a small river, no matter what the season of the year.  Even today it is not uncommon for ice to be cut through.  ...Most of the converts [the newly baptized] are shouting by the time they gain the bank, and nearly run amuck in the crowd before they can be persuaded to retire to a hastily erected brush shelter and change to dry clothing.  No attempt is ever made to check the excitement."  (Quoted in "Appalachian Mountain Religion A History" by Deborah Vansau McCauley, p. 86-87). I cannot state that this particular baptism portrayed in my photographs was that exciting or excitable.  I do recall that both women who were baptized were crying both as they entered and left the water.  But there was no shouting and any expressions of overt excitement quickly died down and the crowd dispersed quickly.  I must also say, in response to the quotation above that I have never seen a "hastily erected brush shelter" at any baptism I was ever witness to and I can remember attending baptisms for about sixty years in Appalachia.  I have seen shouting, crying, spontaneous preaching from individuals other than the preachers conducting the ceremony, and large flurries of hugging, kissing, and hand shaking from members of the crowd.  And while I am on the subject of spontaneous expressions of emotion in church services, I remember how much shouting I used to see in Old Regular Baptist church services when I was a child.  I have always remembered one old woman whose name I forgot long ago but clearly remember her appearance and her shouting in church.  She had a stock phrase which she used when she began shouting.  "Praise the Lord!  Praise His high and holy name!"  I can remember dozens of occasions when I saw this woman move around the church shouting, crying, clapping her hands, shaking hands, hugging other female church members, and repeatedly using that two sentence signature exclamation.

In a section of his book, "Faith and Meaning in the Southern Uplands",  my friend Loyal Jones wrote extensively on "The Importance of Baptism".  In that writing he said several important things about baptism which have doubtless led the research and writing of numerous Appalachian religious scholars ever since.  First and foremost, he discussed the symbolism of baptism and its history within the Christians churches.

"Water is necessary to life, and it is also a cleanser.  In the religious context, water is the universal metaphor for cleansing, renewal, regeneration and rebirth...The symbolism is twofold: first, the burial from the old life and the resurrection to the new; and second, the cleansing from sin."  (Jones, pp. 147-148)   

But for anyone who knows Loyal Jones and his work, you know that he could not discuss many subjects without a dose of humor.  On that same page 148, he tells the story of an old Baptist preacher who was being castigated by his church members and deacons about his belief in total immersion baptism.

"The preacher said he would preach in the old tradition of letting the Bible fall open wherever it would, and take the first passage his eye lighted on as evidence that the Lord wanted him to preach on that text.  So on the next Sunday, he let the Bible fall open, and he read, "The voice of the turtle is heard in our land."  He studied a minute on the text and commenced, "This morning as I was a-crossing the creek on the way to church, I saw an old mud turtle a-sunning hisself.  When he saw me, he went kerplunk into the water.  Now, he didn't reach down there and get a little bit of water and sprinkle on his forehead.  No!  When he went in, he went all the way in, and there you have your doctrine of total immersion." (Jones, p. 148)

That anecdote from Loyal Jones does an excellent job of two things.  First, it explains succinctly the belief that most traditional Appalachian churches and their ministers hold about baptism and total immersion.  Second, it proves once again that Loyal Jones is one of the funniest and most accurate writers in all of Appalachia especially when he is writing about culture, religion, or humor. 

David Kimbrough, in his book "Taking Up Serpents Snake Handlers of Eastern Kentucky, describes total immersion in slightly different but concurring words: "If individuals experienced conversion, they were later baptized in a creek or river.  Converts at Forrester's Creek were baptized by total immersion in a public ceremony.  Baptism was a transformative indication of release from 'the old status order' to a 'new status order'." (Kimbrough, p. 75.) It has been my experience in attending numerous churches from numerous denominations all across Appalachia that most Appalachian believers see the public act of baptism by total immersion in freely flowing water as both a symbolic cleansing and a confirmation of their public admission of the acceptance of faith and their belief that their sins have been forgiven.  Or to put it in a slightly more colloquial manner, they believe they have "been washed as white as snow". 

In conclusion, I would state that baptism by total immersion in freely flowing water is a vanishing practice in Appalachia.  But it is still deeply woven into the religious life of the region.  Many small, more traditional churches still practice some form of total immersion baptism in freely flowing water while also bending to suit the individual beliefs of some of their incoming converts by allowing total immersion in a baptismal font or tank.  Just as many other core Appalachian beliefs are being assimilated out of existence, so is baptism by total immersion in freely flowing water.