Defamation Of Native Appalachians By The Ignorant

 I just did a spontaneous Google search at about 6:25am on February 25, 2022, on the word "Appalachia" which I frequently do in order to see what might have popped up lately which I might not have encountered yet.  I found this link to a website called Facts.net  and the first question I spotted in that drop down list of questions which often come up with links from Google was this question: "Are Appalachians inbred?"  Naturally, my hackles rose quickly and I went to the site to investigate.  I found the article (if that is not too magnanimous a term to describe the drivel I found) which that link will take you to and the first thing that caught my eye was this: 

The Fugate family head, Martin Fugate, came from France to restart his life in America with a local bride. Though they were unrelated, the gene started from them. This is because both Elizabeth Smith and Martin Fugate carried the genes for it, making it impossible not to be passed down. It was their children that committed incest afterward.

It wasn’t much of a problem before. Having an inbred family was once common in the past. In the 1910s, Kentucky didn’t have easy access to transportation. Because of this, people often married their cousins instead. Nowadays, incest is a moral issue that many people debate about. However, the biggest issue regarding inbred families is not the morality of it all, but the hereditary problems that follow. (Facts.net available on February 25, 2022, at 6:25am) 

I suspect nearly every native Appalachian who reads this will tend to become just as instantaneously angry as I did.  This is something we have heard ever since the first missionary from the great industrial north came to Central and Southern Appalachia and began to tell us what all was wrong with us, our culture, our belief systems, and our lifestyles both as a culture and as individuals.  I happen to be a Hicks on both sides which I have written about on this blog post many times.  I have also often made the joke both verbally and in print that if I could ever trace my ancestry back a few more generations I would probably find "that grandpa came through the Cumberland Gap alone".  But I have also always made it clear that when my parents married about 1946 that no one in the area of Beaver Creek in Knott and Floyd counties could remember far enough back to say that they were related.  I will also say that it is not uncommon in the greater area of Central and Southern Appalachia for people with the same last name to marry and raise large families of perfectly normal children. There are numerous amazingly common last names in Appalachia but that does not mean that every person with one of those names is related to the next person they meet with the same last name.  Examples of these common last names are Hicks, Smith, Jones, Brown, White, Johnson, Jones, and Jackson just as these last names are common all over America.  But nobody ever accuses the people with those last names of being "inbred" if they live outside Appalachia. The blog post on the website above has just enough truth in it, as all blatant lies do, to appear truthful.  That is how liars have continued to exist today.   When the author of that blog post states that

The Fugate family head, Martin Fugate, came from France to restart his life in America with a local bride. Though they were unrelated, the gene started from them. This is because both Elizabeth Smith and Martin Fugate carried the genes for it, making it impossible not to be passed down. It was their children that committed incest afterward. (Fact.net, available on February 25, 2022, at 6:25am)

they are speaking both truth and half truths along with a major outright lie.  The presence of a recessive gene in two parents does not automatically mean that "it is impossible not to be passed down" .  In actual practice, inheritance of any particular gene or related genetic defect is somewhat of a crap shoot. 

In humans, genes vary in size from a few hundred DNA bases to more than 2 million bases. Every person has two copies of each gene, one inherited from each parent. Most genes are the same in all people, but a small number of genes (less than 1 percent of the total) are slightly different between people. Alleles are forms of the same gene with small differences in their sequence of DNA bases. These small differences contribute to each person’s unique physical features. (Medicine Plus , available on February 25, 2022, at 6:51am) 

It is a massive difference between 2 million DNA bases and the 20,000 to 25,000 actual genes each of us inherit and inheritance is a completely random process.  I realize that some fundamentalist religious believers might even totally deny that DNA and inheritance are facts, or they might simply say that what we inherit is a "God thing" and we have no control over it or even knowledge about it.  But, I am certain that no matter what any native Appalachian chooses to believe about DNA they do not, with incredibly rare exceptions, believe in the practice of incest as the article which prompted this entire blog post states as fact.  When I boil it down to its most basic content, I'm pissed off about this screed about the Fugate family and I suspect you are too.  It is just one more instance of the ignorance of someone who knows little or nothing about Appalachia believing they are qualified to disseminate asinine and ignorant lies about all native Appalachians.  The website does not have an easily accessible "Contact" button or an e-mail address appended to the post.  It is also not clearly identified as to author with only a name "Bernice" on the byline.  If you can figure out a way to contact this idiot and complain, I would appreciate it.  I will also and if I can come up with a direct contact means, I will append it to this blog post as soon as I find it.  

 

"While Earth Still Speaks" by Nancy Werking Polling--Book Review

Poling, Nancy Werking, Illustrated by Jerald Pope, While Earth Still Speaks (Black Mountain, NC. Screech Owl Press In Conjunction With Old Mountain Press, 2019)

Nancy Werking Poling is a writer who lives in Western North Carolina but has spent most of her life in other areas of the country.  This is not and is not billed as an Appalachian novel.  It is more accurately described as an environmental novel and is the author's second novel and fifth book overall.  It comes from two presses in Western North Carolina, one of which is a small vanity press,  possibly an imprint of the author, and the other a small press which actually did the printing.  The work on the book printing and binding is an aspect which I watch closely when I read such essentially self published books.  Many, if not most, of these presses are simply in it for the money and unless the author is very diligent and oversees every aspect of the process from start to finish they often produce shoddy work which simply does not appear professional to the trained eye.  This book has a few errors in the review copy which I received but they are minimal and the work is  acceptable overall .

Now, let's talk about the book itself.  The protagonist is a woman of middle to late middle age who has spent her life in a very conservative and restrictive religious sect which devalues and restricts women to something not quite a beast of burden but far less than an equal to their male counterparts.  She is the mother of two essentially grown children, a son and a daughter.  The book is broken into segments which include the family life on the farm, the protagonist's eventful month or so with her daughter in a revolutionary environmental group which kidnaps the head of the North Carolina environmental agency, and interspersed visions which come to the woman from Mary Surrat and the Virgin Mary and can be loosely connected to the main story line. For those  of you who have never heard of Mary Surrat, she was a boarding house operator who was arrested, convicted, and hanged for taking part in the Booth plot to assassinate Abraham Lincoln.  She was the first woman executed in the United States. Mary Surrat is seen, by the author, as an example of the fact that dying for a cause is not always virtuous.  The author states in her acknowledgements section that several people who had read the manuscript had suggested that she remove Mary Surrat from the book.  I agree with those people. But there are hundreds of stories of highly successful authors who resisted strong opposition to their first drafts from editors, family, friends, and the unsuspecting strangers upon whom they foisted their unpublished work in public places. However, in my life, I have known quite a few well known and successful writers who often doubled as mentors, professors, and friends.  I like to believe that I learned at least one or two things from every one of them.  One of the most important things I ever learned was voiced by many of them. That truth is the overly simplistic admonition to write about what you know best.  I also found that truth to be wonderfully expounded upon in the classic motivational book "Acres Of Diamonds" by Russell H. Conwell although his discussion of the subject applied to life and personal achievement instead of writing.  It could be that I have already or will in the future learn something from Nancy Werking Poling.  She has already reinforced a concept for me that many others have expressed in the past: Writers should write every day and avoid the naysayers.  Ms. Poling has published five books and this is her second self-published book while I have only accumulated a couple of dozen publications in three different genres and a book chapter or two while approaching the grave without a published major work while diligently eschewing the vanity presses. But I am not certain that Ms. Polling was writing about what she truly knows in this book.  I do sincerely believe that she is fully and deeply committed to the environmental and the women's rights movements just as is her protagonist.  But I doubt that Ms. Polling has ever joined or even had personal knowledge about a deeply secretive environmental activist group.  I doubt that she ever engaged in a kidnapping to prove a political point as her characters do.  And, in spite of the validity of Stockholm Syndrome and the shining example of Patty Hearst, I doubt that she ever fell in love with a hostage or hostage taker.  I believe her book would have been stronger if she had stuck to the things she knows best in her heart of hearts and written an activist environmentalist book without kidnappers, their victims, or their implausible love affairs. I believe she could do a much better job of writing non-fiction on this subject.  She has actually written one non-fiction book, "Before It Was Legal: A Black-White Marriage (1945-1987)", which I have not read but would like to do so before I make any all encompassing blanket judgments about her skills as a writer.

Speaking of Ms. Poling's skills as a writer, this book is well written but not exceptionally so.  The linguistic skill is above average but the plotting and character development of most of the characters other than the protagonist is thin.  Many of these characters other than the protagonist and her daughter are one dimensional.  They do not live and breath in the highly credible manner which the best writers have developed.  To go beyond what I said earlier about having learned at least one thing from many, if not most, of the writers I have known, I have, for many years, held firmly to two of my own beliefs and theories about good writing.  The first of these ideas espouses a comparison of good to excellent writing as being similar to human DNA.

I have always thought that in the best books I have read in my life  plot is a lot like the double helix spiral structure of human DNA as discovered by Drs. Crick and Watson.  The double helix spiral of DNA is a twisting spiral of two long strands which wrap around each other and twist from one end to the other much like a pair of snakes or two strands of ribbon. Along each of these strands, there are chromosomes and genes for the entire length of the spiral which serve to make up the multi-faceted contents of the DNA structure.  An above average plot also works in much the same way.  In the plot we have parallel plots and subplots which progress for the length of the novel.  Along each of these “strands” of plot and subplot we also have characters, characterizations, key pieces of information, human interactions between characters, individual and group actions, and other elements and portrayals which advance the major plot or subplots throughout the length of a novel.  "While Earth Still Speaks" is not such a well plotted book.  It does not contain that double helix style of writing.  But I will not say that I believe it is the best writing Ms. Poling is capable of producing.  It could well be within her grasp to develop that level of writing.  She has not fully developed what I believe to be her best potential in this book.  


My second idea about good writing is a comparison to good boxing.  Superficially, it seems to be illogical to compare a purely mental vocation such as writing to what many people consider to be a fully physical vocation like boxing.  But good boxing is not purely physical.  It requires a great deal of thought both before entering the ring and definitely inside the ropes against a worthy opponent.  A good to exceptional boxer must think on their feet, constantly assess their opponent and his actions, swiftly adjust to changes in the opponents style, and always counter with both the best defense and offense for fifteen rounds.  A good boxer has an arsenal of several different punches and styles which they use as the circumstances require.  They have jabs, uppercuts, roundhouse blows, body pounding short punches, and every now and then a few kidney punches.  Good writing combines long, complex, well structured sentences.  But it becomes boring if every sentence is ten, twenty, or fifty words long.  Good writing must also have some jabs, short sentences composed of, at most, a subject, object, and verb.  When these combinations are used in writing it is a lot like watching Larry Holmes box during his streak of 48 consecutive wins.  In such novels, there are jabs, roundhouse punches, uppercuts, and a few kidney punches, and the total load of such writing literally knocks the reader out.  "While Earth Still Speaks" does not have that kind of arsenal.  It moves along successfully from the scene in which we meet the protagonist to the scene in which she and her co-conspirators are arrested for their crimes.  But it is not holding you on the edge of your seat.  You are not striving to literally lean on the outside of the ropes to see that knockout blow delivered.  It is functional but not dazzling.  It is readable if you are committed to the environmental or women's rights movements.  But it doesn't leave you asking "OK, what happens to these characters after they were arrested?"  

This is a book which you might want to read.  You might enjoy it.  But you are not likely to return to it every few years to remind yourself of what role Mary Surrat played in the story or to remember just why the protagonist divorced her husband to become an environmental activist.  But it did leave me wishing I could read Ms. Poling's non-fiction book, "Before It Was Legal: A Black White Marriage (1945-1987).  Keep writing and watch a lot of good boxing, Ms. Poling. 

The DNA Of Writing In, Of, And For Appalachia

A few weeks ago I met a young writer in my local area who has already self-published one novel in a series  about an Appalachian mining family of about 1918 to 1925 or so.  They are working on a second novel in the series and, despite the best of religious based intentions, knows very little of Appalachian literature, sociology, culture, or history.  I recently read the first draft of that second novel, set in Harlan County in the coal mine organizing era and made some suggestions about the work, the author's intentions, and the need to know our subject matter if we hope to be successful as writers.  I actually wrote about 2,500 words in discussion of the manuscript, my responses to it, and my suggestions for a better book.  I will use the skeletal structure of that piece of writing in this blog post about writing in Appalachia.  A day or so after I sent the written response to that author, I saw a shared post of a short article from Appalachian author Chris Offutt  entitled "Why I Always Write About Appalachia" which I also sent to this young writer since some of our ideas about writing in Appalachia coincide.  

In my discussion of the young author's manuscript, I used a technique commonly used in the mental health and counseling fields called “Sandwiching”.  What this phrase means is that when we have some negative information to impart to anyone we also impart positive information and we “Sandwich” the negative between an opening and a closing segment of the discussion. That is supposed to lessen the strong emotional responses to the negative. I have always found in pursuing two collegiate degrees and another from an institution known as the Indiana College of Auctioneers that the teachers and professors who were able to teach me the most used some technique either base on or closely related to "Sandwiching" even if that particular teacher or professor had never heard of "Sandwiching" 

 
I have always thought that in the best books I have read in my life that plot is a lot like the double helix spiral structure of human DNA as discovered by Drs. Crick and Watson.  The double helix spiral of DNA is a twisting spiral of two long strands which wrap around each other and twist from one end to the other much like a pair of snakes or two strands of ribbon. Along each of these strands, there are chromosomes and genes for the entire length of the spiral which serve to make up the entire contents of the DNA structure.  An above average plot also works in much the same way.  In the plot we have parallel plots and subplots which progress for the length of the novel.  Along each of these “strands” of plot and subplot we also have characters, characterizations, key pieces of information, human interactions between characters, individual and group actions, and other elements and portrayals which advance the major plot or subplots throughout the length of a novel.  Perhaps the two greatest examples of such novels are “War And Peace” by Leo Tolstoy and “Grapes Of Wrath” by John Steinbeck.  Less well-developed but still wonderful novels are “Anna Karenina” by Tolstoy and “East Of Eden” by Steinbeck.  Much shorter, but equally wonderful novels, little masterpieces, are “Of Mice And Men” by Steinbeck and “One Day In The Life Of Ivan Denisovich” by Alexander Solzhenitsyn.  They have a smaller double helix, a more direct plot with much less subplot, and far fewer strands of events, people, and characterizations along the way.  But they are also genuine masterpieces and among the greatest literature in the world. I have always believed that if Steinbeck and Tolstoy had only written "War And Peace", "Anna Karenina", "The Grapes Of Wrath", or "Of Mice And Men", both of them would have gone down in history as great writers. The majority of novels are not at this level.  I also believe that if we want to become not good but better than average writers trying to be great, we need to read the works of the absolute best writers all the time.  I try frequently, and I believe that every would-be writer should try, to read the works of the writers who have either won or been nominated for the greatest literary prizes in the world: the Nobel Prize, the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the Hugo Award, the Man-Booker Prize, the Caldecott Medal, and the Newberry Medal.  As we read these books, we should also attempt to emulate the best elements of the work of these people.  I also recommend that people read the lesser known works of the same authors, not just their prize-winning masterpieces.  It is a wonderful way to learn about personal development of great writers. 

We should also attempt to write about the things we know best and to know the things we write about better than the people who are going to read our work. In his article about writing in Appalachia, Chris Offut concurs indirectly with that idea by saying "My 1992 book of short stories, Kentucky Straight, was the product of my own quest as a young writer for work that depicted the world I knew."  Instinctively, Offut knew that he needed to write about what he knew not what he wished he knew or what he fantasized about.  And that his where this other young writer went awry by trying to write about an area, a people, and a culture about which they knew little.   We should also attempt to write about the things we know best and to know the things we write about better than the people who are going to read our work.  That brings me to the most important words, in my opinion, in “Appalachian Values” by Loyal Jones.  On page10, in the introduction, we find these two simple, but profound sentences. “Whatever work is done in Appalachia must be based on the genuine needs as expressed by mountain people themselves.  Whatever work is done must be done with the recognition that Appalachian Culture is real and functioning.”  Those two sentences are one of the primary reasons I buy that book regularly and give it to people who express a desire to learn about, write about, or support Appalachian Culture.  Every word I write and publish about Appalachia is intended to live up to those two sentences.  In 2005, and again in 2006, myself and Dr. Heather Ambrose, PhD., one of my former professors, published articles through the American Counseling Association which were based strongly in those two sentences.  The first, “Clinical Supervision Of Counselors in Appalachia: A Culturally Appropriate Model” was delivered by us as an oral presentation at the 2005 National Convention of the ACA and published as a chapter in a book called “VISTAS 2005: Compelling Perspectives On Counseling”.  The other article in 2006, “Culturally Appropriate Counseling and Human Services in Appalachia: The Need and How to Address It” was published on the Internet, along with the first article, on the permanent ACA Internet resource site for professional counselors.  Both are frequently cited and quoted in the work of others who write about Appalachia.  Our article on “Culturally Appropriate Counseling And Human Services…” is quoted in a book called “Public Health In Appalachia Essays From The Clinic And The Field” (2014).  That chapter also cites and quotes the work of Loyal Jones in “Appalachian Values”.   Our other article, “Clinical Supervision Of Counselors…” is cited and used as the basis of much of an article called “Appalachia And Human Services” in “The Encyclopedia Of Human Services And Diversity” (2014).  I say all that, not necessarily to blow my own horn, but to impress on you that I know whereof I speak when I talk about the importance of writing about Appalachia and Appalachian people in a culturally appropriate and well-informed manner.  Both our articles are frequently quoted at the collegiate level in course materials and graduate degree level theses and dissertations.  Both are rooted strongly in the text of “Appalachian Values” and are well respected among other Appalachian writers, professors, and students.

When we write about the things, places, issues, and people we know and know best, we produce our best work.  Words flow naturally, smoothly, realistically.  We create characters who are living, breathing people who leap off our pages and our readers can recognize them and believe them.  Our plots flow naturally and the events we create are credible even to readers who also know the things, places, issues, and people we write about.  Chris Offutt addressed this issue of what happens when we write about the things we do not really know and understand in his article cited above by bringing up what I consider to be, and Offut may well also, the worst and most off base alleged "Appalachian" book written since Harry Caudill's "Night Comes To The Cumberlands", "Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir Of A Family And Culture In Crisis" by J. D. Vance.  Offutt is discussing what he refers to as "...false accounts of Appalachian life..." This is what Offutt says about that book and, indirectly about this compulsion of people who write without cultural, historical, and sociological knowledge, especially in the field of Appalachian Studies.  "The most recent addition to these false accounts of Appalachian life is the widely read book Hillbilly Elegy, the author of which grew up in the decaying Rust Belt town of Middletown, Ohio. Nevertheless, he blames his personal difficulties on the culture of Appalachia. The ongoing dismissal [Depiction?] of Appalachians as “lazy, dangerous, and dumb,” is the same method of denying humanity that has been applied to African Americans, Indigenous Americans, and wave upon wave of immigrant to this country."  I had written about the Vance book on this blog on November 2, 2017, at the article linked above in this paragraph.  I had assessed the book in this manner as "a splenetic diatribe about Vance's extended family which he has attempted to pass off as a discussion of the great values he sees in his deeply flawed family while also attempting to attribute the familial flaws to the general culture of which they are a minor part."  Chris Offutt and I are, by no means, the only Appalachian writers who have assessed the Vance book with similar words.  I bring the book up now only to reinforce what I have said earlier about the need for writers, especially Appalachian writers to know what, whom, and where about which we are writing. 

We must understand, as writers, that when we are not writing science fiction or fantasy literature we have a moral obligation to understand our subject matter and to make every attempt to tell the truth.  Appalachia, the land we love, and all its other people deserves no less. 

My Appalachian DNA

For several years, my wife and I talked intermittently about having our DNA analyzed but never seemed to get around to it.  Finally, last summer, we both sent off DNA kits to Ancestry DNA.  After about six weeks, we got the results back and much like everyone else who has DNA analysis done, we found a couple of surprises.  I had heard a far too common Eastern Kentucky rumor, prevarication, and old wives' tale that my paternal third great-grandfather, Aulse Hicks, had been the son of a man named Charles Renatus Hicks, who had been the first mixed blood chief of the Eastern Band Of Cherokee.  There had always been two schools of thought about this purported connection.  Most of us who had done much in depth genealogical research leaned strongly toward the opinion that there was far too insufficient proof to justify the common belief and there was too much geographical distance between the well known homes of Charles Renatus Hicks in Spring Place, Georgia, and the area of Western Virginia from which Aulse Hicks emigrated to Prestonsburg, KY, about 1790 to 1810.  In the misguided attempt to connect Aulse Hicks to Chief Charles Renatus Hicks, various people had tried to change Aulse's first name from Aulse to Austin or Augustus despite the fact that every piece of paper he ever signed in Floyd County Kentucky as a minister and well known man had been signed Aulse.  There has also never been found a list of the names of the children of Chief Charles Renatus Hicks which listed either an Aulse, Austin, or Augustus.  In my own mind, I was clearly convinced that the connection between the two was purely the work of too many overly active imaginations which wanted to fulfill the oft repeated Appalachian fantasy of "being descended from a full blooded Cherokee Indian".  I freely admit that as I learned more about Chief Charles Renatus Hicks I grew to respect him highly as a successful man in a difficult world.  I would have loved to learn that I was descended from a man who was the first mixed blood Chief of The Eastern Band of Cherokee, who was bilingual and wrote and spoke both English and Cherokee, acted as a primary interpreter for the tribe and the US military, served as a primary sub-chief for many years, owned one of the largest private libraries in the country as an Indian, and died as the Primary Chief of the tribe.  But I knew better and my DNA analysis proved me correct.  

My Father, Ballard Hicks, Photo By Roger D. Hicks

At this point, I will burst bubbles of fantasy for many descendants of Aulse Hicks and other Hicks' in Eastern Kentucky that they are "descended from a full blood Cherokee Indian".  My genealogy is Hicks on both sides.  My father was Ballard Hicks, a second great grandson of Aulse Hicks with the documentation to prove it.  My mother was Mellie Hicks, the granddaughter of Hence Hicks, whose name I have also seen misspelled and misconstrued in various ways in order to support the Chief Charles Renatus Hicks fantasy.  I have seen Hence Hicks mistakenly identified as being named Henderson or Hensley when I knew numerous people in my childhood who knew him well. He was a well known ambush murder victim in 1935 and every public record about him calls him only one name, Hence Hicks.  Both sides of my family were in Knott County in the late 1700's to early 1800's.  I have always said that I am lucky I wasn't born with a square head and that I suspect that if the truth can ever be proven it is highly likely that "grandpa" came through the Cumberland Gap alone.  By that I mean that I suspect that our original ancestor to emigrate to Kentucky came into the region very early in the settlement process, had a large family which dispersed widely, and eventually converged again to intermarry a few generations later after all family memory and the nearly non-existent record keeping of the time had completely forgotten about any family connections three or four generations in the past.  

Now let's get to the results of the DNA Analysis and burst some of those bubbles.  The first, and most painful bubble to be burst involves Native American DNA.  I, Roger D. Hicks, well-documented third great grandson of Aulse Hicks and a Hicks on both sides,  have absolutely no Native American DNA.  The major aspect of the analysis that was not a surprise also confirmed what most Eastern Kentucky genealogists have believed for years.  Ninety-eight percent of my DNA came from Europe and seventy-seven percent of it came from Great Britain and Ireland.  That was no surprise whatsoever.  But there were a couple of other minor surprises and two fairly major surprises left in the DNA. I have seven percent DNA from Scandinavia.  I also have two percent DNA from the Iberian Peninsula and less than one percent each from Finland/Northwest Russia and Eastern Europe.  But the bigger surprise was that I have less than one percent DNA from each of Southern Asia and Nigeria.  Since I have learned of the connections to Southern Asia and Nigeria, I have tried to imagine just how that interaction took place at a time which must have been at least eight or ten generations in the past, roughly two hundred years or more.  With most of my DNA coming from Europe and Great Britain in particular, someone in my far distant bloodlines had to be a bit of a world traveler.  Was an ancient grandfather a sailor who followed the canvas to points in Africa and Asia?  Was an ancient grandmother a slave who was raped by a slave trader?  Or did a pair of my distant ancestors both find themselves stranded in isolation somewhere in a place and time where the most logical response for their own good was to assume an interracial marriage?  I doubt that I will ever find the answers unless the religion of some group of my ancestors or another is correct and we all end up in a common hereafter either sitting around a cooking fire in the darkness, sailing a common vessel on seas yet unknown, or sharing iced tea on a shady porch and telling the stories in whichever place of exactly how we all came to be.  Sorry about all those bubbles!  

Woots Hicks Cemetery Photo by Roger D. Hicks