VINTAGE APPALACHIAN PHOTOGRAPHS

Feeding The Chickens--West Virginia??--Subjects & Date Unknown--Circa 1945-50 (Roger D. Hicks)



As privately owned cameras became more common in Appalachia after the turn of the 20th century, families began to take photographs of family members and those daily aspects of life which were important to them.  After about 1900 to 1910, we begin to see photographs which are more mundane than the old studio photographs with their stiff, dressed up subjects standing ill at ease and often in front of some contrived background which might have been very unfamiliar in daily life.  Instead, in these family created shots, we see the people of the mountains living their daily lives, killing hogs, feeding the chickens, raising crops, riding horses, going to church, and a hundred other activities of daily life which can be educational, touching, and often heartwarming such as the photo above of a little girl and her dog sitting in the chicken lot with a cooker full of feed and the hens pecking contentedly in the background.  I would love to know who this little girl was and suspect I never will.  I found the photograph in a collection of miscellaneous materials from an estate auction. No doubt she is long dead.  But she reaches out and touches us with her childhood simplicity and happiness in her everyday world. She hangs in a place of honor in my home.

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My  auction ring man, Dewey Rogers, from Tinker Fork of Mud Creek in Floyd County Kentucky is a lifelong collector of photographs and high school year books from the area.  Recently, he brought this photograph of his parents with a very large turnip to one of my auctions.  As soon as I saw it, I knew it was a natural for this post of vintage photographs.  It is the very type of shot I am looking for to depict life in Appalachia as it was 50 and 100 years ago.  It shows two ordinary, hard working Appalachian people with the product of their work, a successful venture in gardening which made the local newspaper, most likely the Floyd County Times which published many photographs like this in the days when it was owned, published, and primarily written by Norman Allen.  This photograph also lies within a general category such as the one below of the cow and calf, a photograph of simple items in life which were important to the subjects.  Hopefully, we will be able to add several more photographs from Dewey's ever expanding collection over the next few years.



Dewey Rogers brought in a couple more photographs for addition to this section.  The better of the two is of his grandfather, George Washington Rogers, who was a mail man in Floyd County many years ago.  It shows G. W. Rogers riding his horse on a snowy day and carrying a large box for delivery to someone who might well have ordered it from a Sears or Montgomery Ward Catalogue as an important addition to the home.  The other photograph is actually not a photograph but a photocopy of one which includes several members of Dewey's extended family including G. W. Rogers.  In spite of the increasingly poor quality of the reproduction from photograph to photocopy to computer, I am including it because it is typical of something that happens with important family photographs.  Often several members of an extended family may want a copy and not everyone has the capacity to have them reproduced so they simply take them to someone with a copier and have a copy made.  This is becoming much less common with the proliferation of computers and scanners into many of even the least wealthy homes.  Here are the newest Dewey Rogers photographs.

George Washington Rogers, mailman (Dewey Rogers)

George Washington Rogers & his extended family (Dewey Rogers)

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I am beginning this posting with this photograph and four others which were loaned to me by Paul Jarrell of P. J.'s Pizza in Banner, KY.  My thanks go to Paul for his willingness to have his family photographs shown to the world at large.  And of course, all aspects of copyright law apply to their potential use by anyone.  I will add to this post as I locate and acquire more photos of everyday life in Appalachia of the past.  I would gladly post photographs from my readers with proper acknowledgement.  If you have photos you are willing to add to this collection, contact me by e-mail at rchicks@mrtc.com or at hicksroger_@Hotmail.com and I will be glad to add and properly acknowledge yours.  I am particularly interested in photographs which show people living life on a daily basis: plowing, working, feeding livestock, planting crops, burying the dead, baptizing the living, and scratching a living from the rocky hills of home. 



WHAT A HOG!!! Jarell Family--Prater Creek, Floyd Co. KY--Circa 1950 (Paul Jarrell)

The photograph above shows the great-grandmother and great aunt of Paul Jarrell at hog killing time on Prater Creek in Floyd County Kentucky with a massive hog, the likes of which are not often killed in the mountains today.  It is a wonderful snapshot of everyday life in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky. 

Hog Killing Time--Jarrell Family--Prater Creek, Floyd Co. KY (Paul Jarrell)

The photograph above shows several members of the Jarrell Family with another hog not nearly as large.  This photograph is also a great shot of family life, subsistence farming, food preservation, and life in general.  I have also included a second photograph of the same hog from a greater distance below. 

Cow And Calf--Prater Creek, Floyd Co. KY--Circa 1950 (Paul Jarrell)

The "cream of the crop", a cow and calf from the family photographs of Paul Jarrell.  This photograph with its highly personal and informative note on the back is typical of the kind of shots I discussed earlier in this posting.  It is about animals which were important to family survival.  It is about everyday life in the mountains and must have been mailed in a letter to a family member who lived too far away to come and see the family and the livestock personally.  The pride of ownership in the note is strong and clear.  These were good animals and they were important to the writer and his/her livelihood.  

Message On Reverse Of Cow/Calf Picture--Prater Creek, Floyd Co. KY--Circa 1950 (Paul Jarrell)

Below we have the second photograph of the same hog above taken from a slightly greater distance and showing only three of the family members instead of the four in the first.  The great aunt is gone from the doorway perhaps to check on the water, the knives, the salt, or the smokehouse.  Daily life is going on and this hog will become much of a winter's food for the family.  

Hog Killing Time #2--Jarrell Family--Prater Creek, KY--Circa 1950 (Paul Jarrell)

 The photograph below is of a distant cousin, Clarence Hicks, who was the son of Banner Hicks and the grandson of Hence Hicks, my maternal great-grandfather.  The photograph was sent to me by John D. Shelton, who is married to a descendent of Hence Hicks.  This is a World War II Era photograph in uniform and was most probably taken shortly after completion of basic training and advanced individual training in preparation for deployment to the combat zones of Europe.  Clarence Hicks was in Battle of the Bulge as a Tank Crew Member and wounded 2 times there and died in 1980 of an aneurysm after returning home which so many other Americans failed to do at the Battle of the Bulge which was one of the most devastating battles of the entire war.   I have written extensively about Appalachian Patriotism, one of the key Appalachian Values first documented by Loyal Jones.  That post can be found here: Patriotism, An Appalachian Value  Literally hundreds of thousands of young Appalachians like Clarence Hicks left the mountains to fight in America's wars. 

 Clarence Hicks (John D. Shelton)



A Little Church In North Carolina--My Favorite Places In Appalachia

For the past several years, I have put a great deal of thought into what I am about to write here.  Although I have written more than fifty pages of a first draft of a book about this place, these people, and the various myths, beliefs, and lies that surround them, I have chosen to never complete that book or to publish a single page about them.  But the people involved in this piece, the place I speak of, and the events I have seen there and, sometimes, participated in will forever remain a part of my psyche and served to change me and make me a better human being.  Several months ago, a blogger friend of mine whose wonderful blog can be found at Wayfarin' Stranger wrote a brief piece about these people which prompted several e-mail exchanges between us.  He also suggested that I consider writing about this place and these people on this blog and that we could cross link our pieces about them.  I never gave him a definitive answer and in my busy life never got around to making a final decision about this piece.  I have finally decided to write about them and it is my sincere hope that it is the correct decision. 

The place to which I refer is a little serpent handling church located somewhere in North Carolina.  The writing will also be influenced by nearly a dozen other such churches I have attended in Tennessee, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Indiana.  I will not give any specifics about the location of this church, the names of its people, or directions on how to find such churches. I will not post any photographs of any of these people or their churches.  I have not attended this church in several years and may well never attend it again.  But it will always be in my heart and on my mind. I want to make absolutely clear that this is written with deep, heartfelt love and respect for these people.  It is my hope that this writing can help dispel some of the misunderstandings, myths, and lies which have been propagated about them.  It is my even greater hope that they will not be harmed by this writing and will understand my motives in writing it. 

In 2004, I read Dennis Covington's self-serving and defamatory book "Salvation On Sand Mountain" which is generally the first book anyone finds in a Google search about serpent handlers.  I knew enough about my homeland and its people to know that the book was highly inaccurate at best and a conglomeration of deliberate lies at worst.  But it did prompt me to do further reading on the subject and the next book I found was "The Serpent Handlers: Three Families And Their Faith" by Fred Brown and Jeanne McDonald.  Ever since that day, it has been the book I recommend to anyone who requests information about these people.  It is everything that the Covington book is not.  The Brown/McDonald book is a masterpiece.  It is honest, accurate, caring, informative and well worth reading by anyone who considers herself to be a student of either Appalachia, culture, or religion.  From that time forward, I sought out every written word I could find on the topic and began to seek contacts among the serpent handlers of Appalachia. 

I was eventually lucky enough to make contact with a large number of serpent handling believers and attended my first serpent handling service in September of 2004 at this little church in North Carolina.  It was their annual homecoming service and was attended by more than a hundred people from a dozen or so states all over Appalachia and the area of the Great Migration.  I was able to see serpents handled, fire handled, speaking in tongues, and many other practices which generally occur only in Holiness or Pentecostal churches.  I learned a great deal on that trip, met several believers who became my friends, and attended services at another church in Tennessee.  What I have always said to the uninitiated about that first weekend among serpent handlers is that I believe that no one can see serpent handling practiced for the first time without having their beliefs about the subject change in some way.  Not everyone who sees a service comes away with a positive impression.  Not everyone comes away believing it is a legitimate religious practice. Most importantly, not everyone comes away with the same negative opinions with which they arrived.  But everyone who actually sees a serpent handling service comes away with more accurate information and some easily discernible change in their previously held concepts.  I was better informed, somewhat enlightened and most importantly knew that I had been correct in my first impressions of Dennis Covington's book. I came away with absolutely no doubt that serpent handling is a legitimate religious practice.   I also came away with understanding and respect for these often maligned people and their beliefs. 

Additionally, I came away from that first weekend with them with a deep seated desire to know more about them and a hope to write a book about them which could counter the many misconceptions and myths.  I began to spend a great deal of time visiting serpent handling churches in several states.  Yes, there are serpent handlers in several states.  They are not as widespread as they were thirty or forty years ago; but, there are serpent handling believers who actively practice their faith in every state in Central or Southern Appalachia and most of the Midwestern states which were affected by the Great Migration. I have personally attended services in the five states I mentioned earlier.  I have seen several dozen believers take up serpents, handle fire, speak in tongues, lay hands on the sick, and fall out in the spirit.  The one practice which is often spoken of with regard to these people that I have not seen is drinking poison.  But I have met several people who have drunk poison in the past and know even more who are related to those who have done this.  All these practices have a Biblical basis, primarily from the sixteenth chapter of the Gospel of Mark.  Some of them are also seen in the Book of Acts and the other Gospels.  Serpent handling is mentioned in one other place, the 28th Chapter of the Book of Acts.  It is my belief that the Biblical basis for these practices is at least as solidly founded as many other more conventional religious practices such as the washing of feet by believers.  It is also my belief that the handling of serpents, as it is practiced in most of these churches, constitutes a sacrament just as legitimate as baptism or the administration of last rites. 

At this point, I think it is appropriate that I should state that I am not a particularly religious person.  I definitely believe in a benevolent God and I am intelligent enough to know that I have no idea what that God thinks, believes, prefers, or wants me to do other than a common sense list of do's and don'ts such as 1) do practice charity; and 2) don't harm others.  I also have strongly held beliefs about the separation of church and state and I quickly shake the dust of any place off my feet when its inhabitants begin telling me they have absolute answers about right and wrong.  I have never felt the need to shake the dust of any serpent handling church off my feet.  I have never felt that these people wanted to control me, demean me, or protect me from the error of my ways.  I have universally received respect, non-judgmental love, and acceptance from these people.  I will firmly state that no such church I have ever attended was a cult or cult-like.  The great majority of serpent handling believers I have known have simply been good, honest, hard working, God fearing Appalachians just like their non-serpent handling neighbors with that one exception of practicing a minority interpretation of the Bible.  At no time have I ever felt endangered while I was in their presence.  They absolutely will not force or try to coerce anyone into handling serpents.  As funny as the well known Windy Bagwell comedy routine is, it does not represent any of these people accurately and it has done a great deal of harm to them over the years just as has the Covington book. 

It seems appropriate to list several of the contradictions to the common myths about these people which I found in their presence:

1. They are not members of a cult.
2. The serpents they handle are real and, to my knowledge, never have their fangs removed.
3. These people are Christians just as much as any other Methodist, Baptist, or Episcopalian in their vicinity.
4. They will not force anyone to handle a serpent nor will they try to force any other belief or practice on anyone.
5. They are rational, intelligent members of their community.  They are not mentally ill.
6. They are not exhibitionists and do not seek publicity with a few individual exceptions.
7. They are practicing what they believe to be a directive from the God they worship and they are not the children of Satan.

 At times in this little church in North Carolina, I have heard stories of the deaths of friends and family members due to serpent bite or the ingestion of poison.  I have seen the walls literally vibrate from the music, dancing, and enthusiastic worship.  I have heard personal stories from believers who have survived untreated serpent bites. I have seen cynics and doubters changer their minds in the presence of these people.  I have sat in that church on one occasion and counted 28 attendees and more than 20 of those people I knew to have lost at least one relative due to the practice.  And in the face of all this, I have never seen doubt in these people's eyes about the correctness of their beliefs and practices.  I often ask people who believe the common myths about serpent handlers if they can name five of their acquaintances who are willing to die for any particular belief they may hold.  Rarely are any of these people able to give me five such names.  I always respond that I have known dozens of serpent handling believers who have clearly demonstrated in my presence a willingness to die, if that should be their fate, for their particular interpretation of the scriptures. 

They are a unique, honest, God-loving and God-fearing group of people.  Whether they are absolutely right or wrong matters little to me.  My respect for their unshakeable beliefs keeps them in my mind at times when I am nowhere near them.  I think of them often and I am often reminded of an e-mail I received from a college professor who had studied them at length in which he said "I wish I could be in a spirit filled service with them again."  I know at least a half dozen doctoral level professionals who have attended such services and hold the same feelings for these people.  That little church in North Carolina will always be one of my favorite places in Appalachia. 

Relocated Cemeteries In Appalachia

A recent posting by my blogging friend the Wayfarin' Stranger on his blog which was actually about an old one room school prompted this post. The post and his wonderful blog can be found at: http://cumberlandvistas.blogspot.com/2012/05/one-room-school.html  I responded to his discussion of the movement of the school for the creation of Cave Run Lake near his native Morehead, KY,  with an e-mail about the need for both of us to examine and blog about the movement of family cemeteries to facilitate the construction of these flood control projects all over Appalachia.  He responded with the idea that we both write about it and cross link our articles which was his way to get me reactivated in blogging since I had done nothing since the March 2, 2011, tornado devastated my home town of West Liberty, KY.  That is a topic which I will approach sometime soon.  It is still a bit too fresh in most of our minds.

But, to get back to the real topic of this article, there are several federally funded flood control lakes in every state in the Central Appalachian Region.  Within easy driving distance of me, there are Cave Run Lake, Paintsville Lake, Yatesville Lake, Dewey Lake, and Buckhorn Lake.  All were built after World War II, funded by federal dollars, and in whole or in part managed by the US Army Corps of Engineers.  There are actually 18 such lakes in the entire state of Kentucky, 10 throughout West Virginia, 5 in Tennessee, 6 in Virginia, 4 in North Carolina, and 10 in Georgia.  Each of these states may also have one or more river drainages which are overseen by the Corps of Engineers.  There are also several other lakes in each of the states which is partially contained in the greater Appalachian area but outside Central or Southern Appalachia.  I am concerned only with the cemeteries which have been affected by the construction of lakes in the Central Appalachian Region.  But within the states named, there are more than 50 such lakes. I also note for the record that all of the above states territory does not lie in Central Appalachia and neither do all of the 53 lakes. 

The Corps of Engineers actually controls more than 400 lakes in 43 states.  Nearly every one of these man made lakes required the movement of grave sites and cemeteries.  A few may have also affected or destroyed Native American archaeological sites including grave sites. A fairly good, but relatively non-disclosive and primarily tourism oriented page about the lakes can be found at:  http://corpslakes.usace.army.mil/visitors/visitors.cfm

Each of these lakes is entirely man made and their construction mandated the removal and relocation of several and perhaps dozens of small, family cemeteries.  In each case, the government purchased title to the land involved whenever possible and paid contractors to excavate and relocate all known graves which would be in the flood plain of the lakes. Whenever opposition to the individual purchases was encountered, the government began adverse legal proceedings under the legal doctrine known as eminent domain and seized the land.  In either case, the government paid for the purchase of land near the lake for the construction of a merged cemetery which would contain most or all of the relocated graves.  So far as I know, in each case, the cemeteries were also built large enough to allow for the burial of future dead in the locale.  Whenever descendants objected to relocation of graves to the merged cemetery, they were generally given the option of moving them to a site of their own choosing although this relocation may not have been at government expense. And one of the other real tragedies of this whole relocation effort lies in the fact that many of the older cemeteries would have also contained poorly marked or even totally unmarked graves which were never found and are flooded today.  In many of these cases, no living human remained who even remembered the exact location of these graves or the names of the individuals buried in them. 

Each of these merged cemeteries is operated by a manager under the laws of the state and federal governments. Most, if not all, of these cemeteries are managed in an efficient and ethical fashion.  This article is intended to be a non-biased look at the cultural issues involved in relocation of graves in Appalachia and not intended as any negative assessment of the processes involved in the management of the new cemeteries.  I will leave readers to draw their own conclusions about how this massive relocation of graves has affected the descendants of the dead in each case, both in and outside Central Appalachia. 

I have not visited most of the cemeteries involved in Central Appalachia.  But I have visited several in both Kentucky and West Virginia.  I am more concerned with the general cultural issues involved and limit specific references to those lakes and cemeteries with which I am most familiar.  I have also sought to gain first hand information from one or more of the managers involved in the process.  However, an initial attempt to gain previously publicly released information about the cemeteries from a Corps of Engineers employee was less than openly addressed.  I suspect that, in many cases, relocation of graves has been a touchy subject in Central Appalachia.  I can only vaguely remember the construction of Carr Fork Lake in my native Knott County Kentucky.  But I do recall that my neighbors who were often unemployed avoided applying for the jobs available as laborers in the relocation process.  Contractors were generally not local but did advertise and hire local people when they would accept the work.    However, most local males would not apply for and would not have accepted jobs whose sole purpose was the excavation of graves and relocation of the dead.

Culturally speaking, three major aspects and key values of Appalachian Culture collide with the process of relocating cemeteries. These values are Love of Place, Familism, and Religion.  These relocated graves and cemeteries were most often located on old family home places and considered sacred to the descendants.  The two most important institutions in Appalachian Culture are family and church.  The three most important physical locations to the average Appalachian are the old home place, the family cemetery, and the church which the family usually attended.  In many cases, the construction of these lakes and the relocation of graves would have destroyed all three of these important locations and dealt serious damage to the two institutions as well. In all cases of property transfers for these lakes, the property would have been appraised at actual market value if sold.  Many of these older churches, especially Old Regular Baptist, United Baptist, Holiness, and Pentecostal churches would have been simple wood frame buildings with little monetary value in relation to their religious and cultural value. These congregations would have often been tasked with buying land and building new buildings in an area where land was now more valuable both because of the tourism potential and the increased scarcity due to flooding. More often than not, these small congregations would have been placed in a position of great monetary stress due to the much larger cost of replacement compared to the market value of buildings that were small, cheaply built, and of advanced age.

Although I do not generally believe that feuding was as common an occurrence in Appalachia as various forms of media have described it, disagreements between neighboring families occur in all locales across the world as a part of normal daily life.  Relocating several small family cemeteries in a relatively constricted locale, usually one creek or river valley, would have often resulted in members of several families being buried in close proximity to people with whom they had disagreed in life.  Descendants would not have forgotten those disagreements and would have been upset by the idea of having family members buried in the same cemetery with "them Hicks'" for example. 

But the real opposition to moving graves lay in the idea that graves are sacred and the dead should remain in the original grave until the resurrection. This is a topic which I did not address adequately in my earlier posting about family cemeteries.  It was an idea I should have addressed more thoroughly at the time.  Most graves in Appalachia, especially if they are more than 40 or 50 years old, nearly always face the rising sun due to the belief that the resurrection will happen in the early morning at or near sunrise.  This positioning of the graves is intended to guarantee that the people interred will be oriented toward the coming Jesus in order to be one of the first to rise from the grave. The relocated cemeteries almost never made a point of facing graves toward the rising sun and usually located the orientation in the manner most likely to maximize the use of the land.  This point alone would be upsetting to descendants of the dead who had been raised to practice this religious based custom. 

Whenever I discuss the issues of death and burial in Appalachia, I generally refer to two books: "Death And Dying In Central Appalachia" by James K. Crissman and "Coal Camp Kids" by Barbara Ford Ritch.  "Faith And Meaning In The Southern Uplands" by Loyal Jones, whose work I often mention, also contains material pertinent to this discussion. The Crissman book is a somewhat dated but classic discussion of nearly every aspect of death and dying in Appalachia. It is in every way a masterpiece.  The Ritch book is a large oral history of the coal camps on Beaver Creek in Floyd County Kentucky which contains a large chapter on death, dying, and burial customs which contains many vintage photographs of graves, tomb stones, caskets, and dead bodies.  It is somewhat deficient in expository writing but the photos and first person transcriptions are quite informative.  For those readers who are interested in further information on the topic of death in Appalachia, I would also refer you to any or all available copies of "The Minutes" of any of the various associations of the Old Regular Baptist Church in Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, Tennessee, and several of the northern states affected by the Great Migration.  Individual obituaries are generally contained in most associations minutes and are written by either ministers or family members who knew the deceased individuals.  Although they may appear to follow a stock and rather staid format, individual obituaries may contain real gems of cultural information and these gems may often be found only by browsing dozens of "Minutes".  I refer to one such obituary in my post on "Visiting The Urban Appalachians In Kendallville Indiana".  Although I have never done research there, it is my understanding that the University of Pikeville library in Pikeville Kentucky has a nearly complete collection of these minutes from several of the associations.  Each of these "Minutes" is an annual report of events in a particular association of Old Regular Baptist Churches and, in addition to the obituaries, contains statistical reports of the churches.  They are a wealth of information for researchers and the simply curious in Appalachia.  In particular, the statistics are often far more complete than other enumerations of any kind at the same time in Appalachia. 

There have also been numerous cultural collisions between coal and other mineral extraction companies and the local populace concerning attempts to relocate cemeteries in order to facilitate strip mines, oil wells, gas wells, and rock quarries.  One such battle is currently ongoing at Carcassone in Letcher County Kentucky.  I have no direct personal knowledge of the conflict other than what I have seen in the media. But a local couple whose family members are buried on a small, mountaintop cemetery are involved in an ongoing battle with a coal company which wants to move the cemetery more than twenty miles away, which is a massive distance by Appalachian mountain standards.  Newspaper accounts can be found at the Mountain Eagle , the local newspaper in Whitesburg, KY. I will attempt to directly contact the people involved in the conflict and gain more information which is certainly pertinent to this discussion.

 

This article will not be complete until I have managed to interview at least a couple of the cemetery managers involved about policies and procedures involved in the relocation of these graves.  I will also try to take the time to do some research in the Floyd, Rowan, and Johnson County Kentucky Libraries and newspaper morgues from the time period involved in the construction of Dewey Lake and Paintsville Lake in order to search for information about current events and opinions at the time the lakes were created.  Please feel free to insert your own personal information about this process and to make suggestions of ways to obtain more accurate information about the processes involved.  I would also love to interview any former employees who may have worked in the relocations. 

Some More Reflections On Gun Control, The Gun Culture, And The Underground Economy

Today, January 8, 2013, I had two brief encounters less than an hour apart which showed me a great deal about the gun culture in both America and Appalachia and also about the underground economy and how deeply it is involved in the sale and transport of guns all across the country.  It is also significant that these encounters happened on the second anniversary of the shooting in Arizona which severely wounded former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and killed six others.  Giffords and her husband also announced ongoing efforts with their non-profit corporation Americans For Responsible Solutions to raise money and take part in the effort to bring about changes in American gun laws.

I was in a business meeting with an individual who asked me if I ever get guns in my practice as an auctioneer.  He loves to buy and collect guns and made the statement that he never sells a gun if he buys it unless he finds a "better one just like it".  I do not sell guns as a part of my practice as an auctioneer unless I know that I am in strict compliance with federal law and told the man so. Here is a link to great article about federal law and how it applys to auctioneers . A few minutes later I left that meeting and drove about 6 miles down the road where I saw two people I know selling merchandise by the side of the road which is common today all across Appalachia.  I stopped to talk to the two and actually bought an item from one of them, a "smalls box", to be used in my practice to display small, valuable items.  The man had one single shot 12 gauge shotgun displayed on the ground outside his van.  I picked it up, asked the price, and talked about it briefly.  The man then said "I've got a whole van full of guns if you want to look at them." Then he turned, opened the back door of his van and showed me more than a dozen guns of all shapes, sizes, and descriptions including several automatic weapons.  He also made a statement that he had more at his home for sale.  But what was most significant about this encounter is that only a few months ago this man's brother was sentenced to life without parole for killing the man's daughter and son-in-law in the presence of four of their children.  The man who was selling the guns is now attempting to earn money to raise his six orphaned grandchildren whose parents died by gunfire in the presence of most of those children.  This encounter obviously has a lot to say about the gun culture in general, attitudes about guns in this family and about how the underground economy plays a significant role in the sale, transport, and use of guns all across the country.  It is also very significant that the person I was dealing with in the earlier business meeting was a licensed professional and a key player in the investigation of the murder and the burial of the childrens parents. 

Gun use and gun ownership have become so widespread in this region and the country as a whole that this man apparently sees nothing wrong in the continued presence of large numbers of guns in the home in which he is raising grandchildren who have been orphaned and traumatized by the murder of their parents in the presence of most of the children.  Admittedly, this man is poorly educated and of what I would believe is low normal intelligence based on my knowledge of him and my training and experience as a mental health professional.  But, I have no doubt that his intelligence is high enough to understand at least the basic implications of such a trauma on the children. 

I have known about the underground economy most of my life since I grew up in a country store, sold door to door for years, and now work as a self-employed auctioneer in Kentucky and Indiana.  All across the country, hundreds of thousands of people make at least part of their living from the underground economy, that part of the overall economy which functions outside the normal bounds of taxation and regulation such as yard sales, flea markets, illegal auctions, gambling, prostitution, drug dealing, and other forms of crime. A relatively good discussion of the underground economy can be found here: What Is The Underground Economy? .  Gun sales to shadow buyers is a very large part of the underground economy and generally operates totally outside the ability of law enforcement or taxation agencies to measure, monitor, or control it.  Anyone with any kind of criminal record, criminal intent, mental condition or combination of the three can go to the average gun show,  flea market, or roadside sale and find hundreds of guns for sale for cash without a single question being asked. Here is link to a somewhat dated, but very well researched and written article about guns and the underground economy . The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms attempts to intervene in at least a portion of these illegal sales, primarily bulk sales, but is generally far too overloaded to effectively control the sale and transport of guns in this manner. 

The underground economy, especially as it relates to criminal enterprises, moves and sells hundreds of thousands of guns every year in this country.  A large portion of these sales are facilitated by gangs and criminal syndicates and for years it has been common for major northeastern groups to buy guns in states with little or no state regulation and transport them to cities along the eastern seaboard for sale on the street.  Untold millions of dollars of guns are transported and sold in this manner.  This is one of the primary areas in which stricter gun control laws, better regulation, and improved funding for the ATF and other law enforcement agencies could stop, or at least slow, the flow of guns to criminals and criminal groups. 

My encounters with these two men on the second anniversary of the Tucson mass murder was significant to me in my reactions to the underground economy, the gun culture, and the need for strict gun control laws and adequate funding for the enforcement of those laws.  I hope it is to you also.

One Appalachian Man's Opinion Of Gun Control

I received my first gun, a 20 gauge shotgun from my parents as a Christmas gift when I was about 10 or 12 years old.  I grew up in a family where we ate nearly all wild game common to the area in which we lived and nearly ever male in the family hunted.  We learned to shoot and handle guns in childhood and many of my relatives and neighbors received their first firearm at ages somewhat younger than I.  As a part of this common, every day usage of guns, we all learned gun safety; rules about handling, cleaning, and transporting guns; and, a set of common sayings which I still practice to this day.  Among those sayings were these:

1) assume that every gun is loaded until you have checked it yourself and know otherwise;

2) never point a gun at anything you don't intend to kill;

3) never kill anything you don't intend to eat;

4) always keep guns clean and well cared for.

I grew up in a family where my most distant known ancestor, the Reverend Aulse Hicks, travelled from Western Virginia to the area around Prestonsburg, Kentucky, sometime between the 1790 census and the 1810 census.  I am sure one of the things he felt was necessary for such a trip in that time period was a long rifle and he probably owned a pistol as well.  I could, if I stretched, justify owning a pistol, a 22 rifle, a shotgun, and a heavy rifle for deer hunting.  I do not bother to stretch that far since I have not hunted since a detached retina in my right eye more than twenty years ago.  I have perfect vision in my left eye and could, with some work, retrain myself to shoot effectively enough to hunt with a rifle using a left hand grip and my left eye.  I do not bother to do that.  I can see well enough to shoot an occasional varmint around my house or an intruder, if necessary.    That is all I need guns for and I do not need an arsenal.  Times are very different than they were when Aulse Hicks travelled from Western Virginia two hundred years ago.  Hungry mountain lions, angry native Americans, angry Frenchmen, and angry British holdouts do not roam the hills of Eastern Kentucky.  A plethora of drug addicted thieves do roam these hills; but, it is not necessary for me to be able to kill them all.  I do not need an arsenal.  I do not need fully automatic assault rifles, or high volume clips, or armor piercing ammunition.  I do not need a concealed carry permit.  I do not need the National Rifle Association to assume it has the right to speak on behalf of me and every other American.  What I need in today's world, is a national legislature with enough courage and wisdom to pass an effective, broad ranging, and constitutional ban on fully automatic weapons, assault rifles, armor piercing ammunition, clips which hold over five rounds, purchases of firearms at gun shows without background checks, and purchases of firearms across state lines.

We live in a world today in which the gun culture has become so rampant that most people are being led to believe that unlimited access to all firearms and ammunition is a constitutional right guaranteed by the Second Amendment.  This is the text of the Second Amendment:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

The Founding Fathers were very wise in many ways and on many occasions as they began this country.  One of the wisest acts in which they took part was the creation and inclusion of the phrase "well regulated militia".  That phrase gives the legislative, judicial, and executive branches of government all the power necessary to fully regulate firearms and all appurtenances connected to them.  Additionally, the common welfare has always been seen by the courts as being sacrosanct in comparison to the limited desires of the few whether it be the desire of a few to drive drunk or own an arsenal of automatic weapons.  As our society and culture have changed over the years, events such as Columbine, Newtown, and a dozen other mass murders along with many assassinations of public figures have clearly pointed out the need to protect the common welfare despite the desire of the National Rifle Association and its followers to own unnecessary and dangerous weapons in an unrestricted manner.  Today's NRA is just as out of step and out of date as the Ku Klux Klan of the 1960's.  Their beliefs and desires are contrary to the public welfare and immediate, decisive action needs to take place place in order to control access to weapons of mass destruction.  We can no longer allow events such as Newtown to take place without making a concerted national effort to stop future such events. 

Happy New Year To My Readers!!!

I would like to wish all of you who read this blog from time to time a very happy and productive New Year.  I have not posted on this venue in several  months and yet, somehow, the three largest months of readership in the history of the blog have been the past three months.  I have reasoned from that fact that some of the things I have said have been pertinent and interesting to my regular readers and, more importantly, to individuals who have not been regular readers.  Without having fresh posts to read, even those who have been most impressed by the content or writing would not return repeatedly to peruse it over and over.  I am not deluded into believing that it is great writing.  It has to be the content, the things I say, the stories I tell, the views I express, the culture I try to protect and propagate.  I have also been very heavily involved in a relatively new consignment auction business over the past several months which roughly coincides with the lengthy gap in my blogging.  I recently found a quote in the Bible which I must have read numerous times but never grasped before:

Ecclesiastes 9:10 states "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest."

While I read the Bible regularly and generally read it cover to cover at least twice a year, I almost never quote it and read it more as an exercise in self discipline than as a religious act.  But this quote applies so thoroughly to both my auction business and to this blog that I had to take it to heart.  To use a frequently used, abused, and overused term, I am "rededicating my life" to try to practice the wisdom contained in the verse.  If we all apply that concept to our works and our lives, we will find that we have produced far more in any given time period than if we had not done so. I will work to write on this blog more regularly and to make my business more productive by first being more productive myself.  At times, I have been able to hold two jobs and work 75 hours a week for more than two consecutive years.  I also completed two college degrees while working full time and driving two hundred miles a day to and from work.  Productivity, whether in physical or intellectual labor, is rooted in a mindset.  With the right mindset, most of us are capable of "doing it with our might" as the verse says.  It is simply a matter of seven day a week productivity at the rate of about 12-18 hours a day.  It does not require brilliance, great physical ability, or divine purpose.  It requires work on a daily basis.  I will try to invest some of that work in this blog in the year to come.  And let me say that I have never made a practice of making new year's resolutions and this is not one.  It is simply a decision prompted by a pertinent piece of writing which I happened to grasp near the end of the previous year.  Happy New Year, and please consider coming back to read more of this blog from time to time.

Appalachian Patriotism And The Role Models Who Explained It To Me

A few recent events have led me to speculate and ruminate on what patriotism means and the role models in my life who taught me about patriotism. 

Firstly, a Facebook exchange with a former teacher prompted me to think about patriotism, politics, and the importance of our right to free speech and its free exercise. This woman taught me in two math courses in high school and we were not particularly close in that time period.  But recently, we have connected on Facebook, as millions do, and have not just re-established our relationship but it seems to be growing.  We share some basic ideas politically, morally, and ethically about, good, evil, right, wrong, and the responsibility of those who have more to protect and care for those who have less. I express my political opinions freely and often.  My former teacher has often, so she says, bitten her tongue in the company of others rather than give herself free expression. I said to her that, in my opinion, anytime we allow those who are misinformed or just plain wrong to go without benefit of further information and even confrontation we do both themselves and ourselves a disservice. She responded that I have begun to help her develop the courage to speak more freely and more often.

 Secondly, the recent decision of the US Supreme Court to uphold the Affordable Health Care Act showed me how important a single individual can be and how monumental a change can be brought about when that individual does the right thing.  Chief Justice John Roberts showed the judgment and courage to step outside the persona and mold, or, more appropriately, cage which many of his alleged supporters have tried to build around him in order to use him to achieve their own objectives.  And he proved that, beyond a shadow of a doubt, he has read voluminously and understood well the US  Constitution and prior case law.  Chief Justice Roberts stepped out on his own, in the right, and became the key vote and opinion writer of the most important decision the Supreme Court has handed down since the errant and egregious decision in the Gore v. Bush case of 2000.  With a single vote, Roberts proved that he is truly an independent and intelligent jurist.  He also established a new and expandable legacy for himself in the mold of prior Chief Justice Earl Warren and retired Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.  All three have shown the courage to take the right action despite any preconcieved notions.  Chief Justice Roberts has opened the door through which he can pass to become a  historically great Chief Justice.

Thirdly, the 4th of July is approaching. It is nearly Independence Day and deserves some discussion.  Also, my earlier post on "Patriotism An Appalachian Value" has consistently been one of my most frequently viewed and best received writings on this blog. It can't hurt to discuss patriotism and the men who showed me what patriotism should be in Appalachia.  I was very lucky to have three men in my life, all now deceased, who showed me from the time I born until I was past forty exactly what patritotism is and how it should be utilized to protect the rights of all. 

The first of these men was my father, Ballard Hicks, who lived from 1887 until 1971.  He was past 60 when I was born but managed to live until I was 20.  He was born to Charles and Elizabeth Carpenter Hicks in the Head of Bruce at Mousie Kentucky at a time when Grover Cleveland was President and died during the term of Richard M. Nixon.  He was a devout Democrat all his life.  He had lost his life savings in the Bank of Wayland at Wayland, Kentucky when the stock market crashed at the start of the Great Depression.  He rebuilt his life and died after nearly 30 years of self employment as the owner of a country grocery store. He and many of his friends never voted a Republican vote in their lives and they were correct in doing so.  He had a third grade education but was one of the most intelligent men I have ever known.  He read regularly and I knew from the time I was old enough to understand that I would go to college.  He taught me about the importance of free speech, separation of church and state, union labor, the minimum wage, and the programs of the New Deal, the Fair Deal, and the Great Society.  He taught me to think on my own, form my own opinions, express them freely, and defend them vigorously.

Ballard Hicks, 1887-1971

Ballard Hicks was a shining example of a man with little formal education who had studied enough on his own to be well versed in many of the most important topics of his time.  He bought and urged me to read everything from "Boy's Life" to "The American Farm Journal" and "The Courier Journal".  But the most important thing he taught me was to think on my own.  It is interesting that I have a 97 year old half sister who is still outspoken, intelligent, and opinionated.  I see several of the same qualities in her of which I am most proud in myself.  I am convinced that it is no accident that we both grew up in the same man's home. 

Shortly after my father's death, I became exposed to Appalachian writer, professor, preacher, union organizer, and community activist Don West.  I have mentioned Don in several of my blog postings but have still never written the long Appalachian Hero piece which I intend to do about him.  Don was born in a poor Appalachian working family in North Georgia and lived from 1906 to 1992.  I knew him from 1973 to his death.  While my father taught me to think about democracy and patriotism in many important ways and set me on the right path, Don West expanded my vision of democracy and patriotism from two different perspectives.  He was both a member of the working class as was my father and also a member of the educated Appalachian social activists who have been my colleagues and friends since a few years before I met Don.  Don had worked in mills, mines, cotton fields, and log woods.  He worked his way through both Lincoln Memorial University and Vanderbilt University Graduate School.   He never ceased to be a member of the working class and loved physical labor better than any other human I have ever known while maintaining his status as a genuine intellectual. 

Don was absolutely unflinching in his adherence to the values and beliefs which his experiences had taught him were right.  He believed that no workers rights were ever less important than the corporation by which that worker might be employed.  He also taught me that core beliefs should always be spoken and defended; and,  if necessary, those beliefs were worth suffering for.  Don West was beaten and left for dead while organizing miners in Harlan County Kentucky.  He was fired by Oglethorpe University for expressing his beliefs.  He had two homes burned because of objections to his beliefs.  He was hauled in front of the House Unamerican Activities Committee of Senator Joe McCarthy and flatly refused to bend about his beliefs.  

I learned many things from Don West.  But the most important of those include the need for trade unionism for all workers, the rights of all people to a decent standard of life (including affordable health care), the importance of the separation of church and state, and the inviolable right to free speech. 

Don West, 1906-1992

  I was very lucky to have known Don West for nearly 20 years.  I have been affected by his example in a multitude of ways.  His collected writings are published under the name "No Lonesome Road" and an excellent biography called "A Hard Journey: The Life of Don West" was written by James Lorence. 

I met the third person who taught me about democracy and patriotism about 1984 in Chapmanville, West Virginia.  He was James G. "Jim" Ferrell and was the closest and best friend I ever had.  Jim was the son of devoutly Irish Catholic parents and was raised to believe many of the same concepts as Don West and Ballard Hicks.  I have written a longer Appalachian Hero posting about Jim on this blog.  He was a major influence on my life.  He left WVU law school to join the Army during WWII and never returned to study law as he had dreamed he would.  That is a shame because he would have made a fine attorney.  Instead, he ran a country store, worked in a food stamp office, and acted a wage bond enforcement officer for the West Virginia Department of Labor.  He believed firmly in the duty of the well off to assist the needy and practiced it to the point that he sometimes even gave away more than he kept.  He fought for worker's rights his entire life and was a life long Democrat just as my father had been.  I have to say they were alike in many ways.  Jim Ferrell believed that government should meet the needs of the people, all the people.  He was also outspoken and unflinching in his defense of his convictions.  He was one of the finest human beings I have ever known.  Jim lived from 1924 to 2004. 

All three of these role models lived in roughly the same time period in Appalachia.  My father was the earliest  born of the three and was grown before Don and Jim were born.  But their life times overlapped significantly. It is interesting that they never met and yet each of them influenced me tremendously.  I would have loved to have heard those conversations if they had ever been in the same room.  Individually and collectively they taught me many of the core concepts on which I still base my life.  Democracy and patriotism for them were not about a little person who simply served a large government or country.  It was about a government and country which also was able to adequately serve the needs of every little person who comprised part of that country.  They did not believe in a world in which individuals might be forced to unquestioningly adhere to the rules of government.  They believed that right and good required that all individuals must be free to live life as they wished so long as that did not harm others.  They believed in fair wages, equal rights, equal health care, and equal opportunity for all.  And so do I.  Thank you Daddy, Jim, and Don!  And also, thank you John Roberts!  And Happy Birthday, America!