Appalshop at MoMA

Posted in Art & Lit on January 31st, 2010 by marklynn
The folks at Appalshop are getting high falutin in February. To celebrate 40 years of Appalachian film, they’re packing up their reels and heading to New York City. The Kentucky based film and culture center will have a three day showcase, February 19-21, at MoMA’s Documentary Fortnight 2010. On the bill are The Ralph Stanley story (always a crowd pleaser) and Stranger with a Camera, a documentary that follows the 1967 murder of Can Read More »


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Popcorn Sutton

Posted in Food, History & Culture on January 27th, 2010 by marklynn
Popcorn Sutton
If you’re from the mountains of Tennessee or North Carolina, go ahead and stop reading. You surely know all about Popcorn Sutton. He’s dead now, but until last year he was a gun totin’, model T driving, quick witted, self promoting one man tourist attraction on the Tennessee side of the state line. He was also a moonshiner. Read More »


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Share Your Parkway Memories

Posted in History & Culture, Outdoors & Travel on January 24th, 2010 by marklynn
Share Your Parkway Memories
Photo Credit: John Hamill The Blue Ridge Parkway turns 75 year. For those raised near this canopied roadway, it’s hard to imagine life before it. Where did you take Sunday drives? Hike? Make out? Originally a public works project during the Great Depression, the 355 mile Parkway has become the gateway to the Blue Ridge for millions of visitors and an easy retreat for locals. Read More »


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Moonshine-Blue Ridge Style

Posted in Food, History & Culture on January 23rd, 2010 by marklynn
Moonshine-Blue Ridge Style
Photo Credit: Blue Ridge Institute and Museum of Ferrum College With Moonshine – Blue Ridge Style, the folks at the Blue Ridge Institute have broken the seal on home brew. Get your recipe, learn your jargon, and figure out which type of still is going to fit in your backyard, basement, or holler. All the secrets are here, along with historic info and images. For instance, did you know that the last big bust ended just nine years ago in Fran Read More »


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Hunting Shiners

Posted in History & Culture on January 19th, 2010 by marklynn
Put down that fiddle and pass the jar! Don’t be shy. It’s your heritage. Without moonshine, there’d be no NASCAR, no Dukes of Hazzard, and no liquor for the thirteen years of prohibition. It was an economic mainstay for centuries in the Appalachian mountains. Some think that it can be an economic force today. Can’t tell a steam still from a turnip still at this point? That’s okay. Stick with this series, and you& Read More »


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National Parks at a Price

Posted in History & Culture, Outdoors & Travel on January 16th, 2010 by marklynn
National Parks at a Price
In Appalachia, we cherish our national parks — Great Smoky Mountains and Shenandoah — but they came at a cost. Families were moved, homesteads taken, and communities broken when the parks were created. The Knoxville News Sentinel shares the perspective of two elderly cousins on all of this — Alie Newman Maples, 89, and Cleo Newman, 91: “‘They always talk about the little children who gave their nickels and dimes to b Read More »


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Appalachian or Haitian: We’re All Mountain People

Posted in History & Culture on January 13th, 2010 by marklynn
Since last night’s earthquake, images of ruin have poured in from Haiti. Poverty stricken and mountainous, this island nation bears more than glancing resemblance to our homeland. The region’s papers have featured local connections. Readers of Asheville’s Mountain Express can assist Haitian’s through a locally based charity. The Roanoke Times reports on Virginia Tech and UVA students who were visiting Haiti when the earthquake struc Read More »


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Unidentified Flying Egg

Posted in Art & Lit, History & Culture on January 10th, 2010 by marklynn
Unidentified Flying Egg
My sighting was in third grade. Somewhere east of Sunrise Avenue, an egg shaped object hovered in the sky. It was overcast. I stood in the middle of road holding my breath, watching the egg drift left then right, slower than the clouds themselves. It was an impossible white, a white that should have burned my eyes. It didn’t. Read More »


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2010 Best of the Outdoors

Posted in Outdoors & Travel on January 10th, 2010 by marklynn
2010 Best of the Outdoors
Have faith. We will swim again. When we do, the folks at Blue Ridge Outdoors have already found the best swim hole. Their exhaustive 2010 list also includes more timely leads. They’ve combed the Blue Ridge for the best ski runs, snowboard events, and terrain parks. If only they’d add “best lodge fireplace beside which you might swill bourbon,” then I’d be set. Read More »


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Peaks for Roanoke Peeps

Posted in Outdoors & Travel on January 8th, 2010 by marklynn
Wanna’ watch hawks near Roanoke? Tell time like the slaves? Hike a peak that resembles a corpse? Well then, The Roanoke Times has an interactive feature for you! Read More »


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