Journey to the gathering places where ideas melded and cultures were forged — ranging from dance halls and mill sites to churches and the hidden distilleries of “the moonshine capital of the world.”
BY JOSH BECKWORTH— The jam session has become a common event in modern Southwest Virginia. Community centers, general stores, and libraries regularly hold jam sessions as a way of both bringing together local musicians and …
BY JOSH BECKWORTH— Perhaps no town in the Southern Appalachian mountains is more unique than Fries, Virginia. In a region that has historically grown slowly from small settlements to more developed towns and communities, Fries …
A Store with History The Floyd Country Store has served the community of Floyd through most of the twentieth century. Although its origins are veiled in obscurity, it is known that in June 1910 a …
Soon after WSB took to the airwaves in 1922 in Atlanta, the radio station began broadcasting live old time fiddle music by the likes of Fiddlin’ John Carson and Gid Tanner among others. Across the …
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 …
BY KINNEY RORRER— The Wreck Though it was referred to as “Old 97”, the fast mail train that crashed into a ravine not far from the north bank of the Dan River in Danville, Virginia …
