Spangler and Pearson
Because of his radio broadcasts over WRVA between 1926 and 1931, John Wallace “Babe” Spangler was one of his era’s most influential fiddlers. Born in Meadows of Dan in Patrick County, Virginia on November 15, …
Elder Golden P. Harris
Golden Pierce Harris was born in Indian Valley (Floyd County) on May 5, 1897. This was an area rich in string band music and from an early age Golden played old-time dance music on the …
Alex “Uncle Eck” Dunford
BY CHARLES K. WOLFE— Although he appeared at the Bristol sessions as a member of Ernest Stoneman’s assembly of musicians, Alex Dunford (1878-1953) was a remarkable fiddler, singer, and comedian in his own right. A …
Fields Ward
BY MARTY McGEE— Old-time singer and guitarist Fields Mac Ward was born January 23, 1911, in Buck Mountain, Grayson County, Virginia. Fields was influenced by a musically rich family: Father Crockett (ca. early 1880s—mid—1960s) was …
The Hill Billies
BY MARTY McGEE— The Hill Billies, an early old-time string band, radio and vaudeville act, was organized in Galax, Virginia, in the mid-1920s. The bands’ original members were fiddler Alonzo Elvis “Tony” Alderman of Carroll …
A Mixed Multitude of all Classes and Complexions
BY PHIL JAMISON— Since the late nineteenth century, when local-color writers first popularized many of the common stereotypes now associated with the southern mountains, Appalachia has been perceived as an isolated and backward place that …
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The Myth of Appalachian Isolation & The Back Door to Appalachia
BY PHIL JAMISON— The Myth of Appalachian Isolation The local-color writers of the nineteenth century portrayed Appalachia as a remote and isolated place, and Frost and Semple, who suggested that the retention of eighteenth-century British …
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African American Southern Appalachian Music
Southern Appalachian mountain music has transcended time and location, standing as a root to many music genres, such as the blues, jazz, bluegrass, country, gospel, and American folk. It is a fusion of culture that …
Shootin’ Creek
BY KINNEY RORRER— “Going up Shootin’ Creek, going in a runGoing up Shootin’ Creek, have a little fun” —Charlie Poole “SHOOTIN’ CREEK” 1928 If Franklin County, Virginia was the so-called “Moonshine Capital” of the world …
Posey Rorer
BY KINNEY RORRER— When the highly influential Anthology of American Folk Music was released in 1952, the acclaimed producer Harry Smith selected what he considered the best representations of commercially recorded folk music that appeared …
Holland Puckett
BY MARTY McGEE— Holland Puckett was born July 15, 1899, on a farm in The Hollows, Patrick County, Virginia. He lived between Ararat, Virginia, and nearby Mount Airy, North Carolina. Puckett had strong ties to …
Wade Ward
BY MARTY McGEE— Benjamin “Uncle” Wade Ward, born on October 15, 1892, near the town of Independence in Grayson County, Virginia, was known for his frailing or clawhammer style of banjo playing. He also had …