A stingy man "won't drink branch water till there's a flood," and it is "a mighty triflin' sort o' man'd let either his dog or his woman starve." Some places are "so crowded you couldn't cuss a cat without gettin' fur in your mouth." For almost thirty years Horace Kephart collected sayings like these from his neighbors and friends in the area around Bryson City, North Carolina. Kephart, a librarian with an interest in languages and in the American Frontier, left his career and his family in midlife to settle in what was at the turn of the century the wilds of the Great Smokey Mountains. An assiduous collector and observer, he compiled twenty-six journals of notes on the folkways and speech of the Southern Appalachians at a time when the region was still largely isolated. Smokey Mountain Voices is a dictionary of Southern Appalachian speech based on Kephart's journals and publications; it is also a compendium of mountain lore. Harold Farwell and J. Karl Nicholas have compiled not only quaint and peculiar words, but jokes and comic exchanges. Many of the "ordinary" words that comprised an important part of the language of the mountaineers are preserved here thanks to Kephart's meticulous collecting. The editors have incorporated the original quotations with Kephart's definitions and explanations to create a rich source for the study of southern mountain speech. And within the echoes of these Smokey Mountain voices exists some of the joy and fullness of life that Horace Kephart shared and recorded. Smoky Mountain Voices will be of interest to dialectologists, historians of American English, students of regional literature, scholars of folk life, and laypersons interested in Southern Appalachia.

Oral histories capture vanishing lifestyles of Appalachian natives

Often considered merely a repository of archaic or even Elizabethan English, the language of southern Appalachia represents a distinctive American dialect that is both conservative and innovative. This dictionary marks the first comprehensive, historical record of the traditional speech of this region. Focusing on the Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee and western North Carolina, it features more than six thousand names, usages, meanings, and folk expressions that are found in the region, exemplified by more than fifteen thousand documented quotations.

Volume 2 of Voices of Our Mountain Kin, continues with more of the legends, folk tales and memories of our heritage in the Blue Ridge, Balsam and Great Smoky Mountains that you enjoyed reading in the first volume. You'll experience the hardships of pioneer living and the struggle to survive and prosper in the early days of the Southern Appalachia. Family stories will lead you through clearing virgin forest and breaking ground for the first homesteads, impacts of the Civil War, mountain medicines, midwives and healing, to more recent, modern times.

A creative non-fiction work built on stories about actual feuds, murder of individuals and disasters that occurred throughout Great Smoky Mountains prior to the area becoming a national park. The stories read like excerpts from a novel, but are based on true stories, some information taken from court documents and intervews. Reading these stories helps give the reader an image and a voice to those who used to live in the mountain areas of East Tennessee and Western North Carolina. "As usual, Dr. Palmer spins a good yarn in the style, and often in the vernacular, of her beloved Appalachian kin folks. Some of the accounts were familiar but others were new to me. All were captivating and entertaining. As the old adage goes, history is a compilation of rumor. However, via scholarly interpretations of the clues she had to go on, she skillfully breathed life into these tales." Allen R. Coggins, author and Smoky Mountain tour guide

Who wants Rachel Davenport dead? Seth Hammond won't stop until he gets answers. Tapped by the FBI to find out who's targeting the heiress gives the former Tennessee bad boy the chance to atone for his past sins. But it's his future he's worried about when Seth finds himself falling for Rachel…who's in graver danger than anyone in their small mountain town of Bitterwood realizes. Ever since she was named CEO of her family business, strange things have been happening—terrifying incidents that could be tied to Rachel's violence-shadowed past. Seth's the only one who doesn't think she's losing her mind. Her intense, rough-around-the-edges protector has blindsided her with his passion. But Rachel also believes in Seth—believes he's a good man looking for redemption…and possibly love?