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The (accidental) discovery of a lifetime
Leo Lambert (1895-1955), though trained as a chemist, was an avid cave enthusiast. He was the first person to explore the Tennessee Cave on Mount Aetna (now known as Raccoon Mountain Caverns), and at...
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Light up a Spud!
The pack was expensive at 20 cents, but you got the first menthol-infused cigarette, ancestor to “Kool,” “Salem” and others. Why was it called “Spuds?” Lloyd ‘Spud’ Hughes, 1928. Collection Mingo...
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Which of them REALLY invented ‘Dr Pepper’?
The town boomed when the railroad came through in 1856, and so in 1872 a former Confederate surgeon named Dr. Charles T. Pepper started a soon-to-be-thriving business dispensing patent medicines in a...
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Apple butter thick enough to slice
“Cider for apple butter must be perfectly new from the press, and the sweeter and mellower the apples are of which it is made, the better will the apple butter be. Boil the cider till recuded to one...
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White livered widders
People with an abnormally strong sex drive were said to suffer from white liver. The folk medicine record contains scant information on this folk illness, because openly talking about sex was taboo in...
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Yahoo— Mountain Dew!
There’s no dispute that a trademark application for a soda named Mountain Dew was filed on November 12, 1948 with the U.S. Patent Office by Hartman Beverage Co. of Knoxville, TN. After that the path of...
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Swift’s Silver Mine – lost or merely invented?
“I suppose there is no part of the mountains of Kentucky that has not had some experience in search for this silver mine. Last summer (1921) I was on the train going from Pineville to Harlan, when...
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Sad Sam, the cemetery man
Samuel ‘Sad Sam’ Pond Jones (1892-1966) reached the pinnacle of his major league pitching career on September 4, 1923 when he threw a no-hit, no-run game against the Philadelphia Athletics to lead the...
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Gloria Swanson on location in WV
On August 17, 1925, screen actress Gloria Swanson, her husband and her staff arrived on a special train from New York. They were in New Martinsville, WV to film “Stage Struck,” a movie about a...
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To understand the Parkers you have to understand their Church
The Parkers of Lawrence and Pike County Kentucky grew with a community obligated to raise up their children in the “good old fashioned way.” Walter Parker (1911-1986) was known for his no-nonsense...
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The SC house the old Confederate veterans called home
After her father died in 1904, Frances Miles Hagood (aka “Miss Queen”) inherited his house in Pickens, SC. That same year she married Judge Thomas J. Mauldin, and the two of them remodeled the Hagood...
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The Catawbas teach former enemy their pottery secrets
The Carolina coast was the site of the earliest evidence of pottery making in North America, with pieces dated 4,500 BC and tempered with Spanish moss. In 1540, when Hernando De Soto traveled through...
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Just passing through—the Scottish Travellers
Oh, Lady Margaret she sat in her high chambers. She was sewing her silken seams. She lookit east and she lookit west And she saw those woods grow green. So, picking up her petticoat Beneath her harlin...
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Cab Calloway plays Cumberland
Some of America’s most famous entertainers of the 1930s era, because they were African-Americans, were barred from staying in Cumberland, Maryland’s mainstream hotels. Such notable musicians as Duke...
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Al Capone comes to Appalachia
Did Chicago mobster Al Capone ever set foot in Johnson City, TN? During the 1920s the town was nicknamed Little Chicago. A reference acknowledging crime ties to the north? Or nothing more than an...
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Dining in style in the FFV
It was the Chesapeake & Ohio’s first luxury passenger train – the Fast Flying Virginian, or F.F.V. It debuted on May 11, 1889, shortly after the Ohio River Bridge between Covington, KY and...
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The real Johnny Appleseed
No more important fruit tree graces the homesteads, farms, and backyards of Appalachia than the apple. When early settlers headed west from the eastern seaboard, they took apple seeds because they...
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Let Sears, Roebuck & Co. be your architect
A headline on page 594 of the 1908 Sears Catalog probably startled readers used to page after page of plows, obesity powders, sewing machines, and cook stoves. It announced: “$100 set of building plans...
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Reviving the ancient art of tatting
If you’re anywhere near Knoxville, TN this weekend, head on over to the Museum of Appalachia for the Tennessee Fall Homecoming. Crafts and demonstrations include weaving, pottery making, grist milling,...
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Tricked into pushing one of the best mowers in the county
The LeaderOctober 4, 1917Meigs County OH SCRAP OF HISTORY From the Interesting and Eventful Life of T.H. Gold of Bedford By invitation the editor of The Leader was a guest Sunday of the venerable Mr....
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