Inside Appalachia

Pandemic-Fueled Homebuyers Moving To Appalachia

The pandemic has caused a boom in the housing market across the country — and Appalachia is no exception. People have been spending more time inside their homes these days. This, coupled with an increased popularity in remote work, has had people rethinking their lives in big cities. Some have even bought houses in the region sight unseen.

We’ll also hear from some new residents who have moved to Appalachia during the pandemic. We’ll learn what inspired them to leave the cities and move to a rural region.

National Park Designation Has Some Worried

The New River Gorge has long been a destination for tourists and outdoor adventurers. The area was originally given federal protection as a National River in 1978. Late last year, it became West Virginia’s first national park.

The new designation will bring more people to the Gorge, and some new challenges, too. Less land will be open to hunting, while more visitors will place an additional burden on the infrastructure within the park, and in the communities around it.

Texas Tavern Celebrates 91st Birthday

While many businesses have struggled to stay afloat during the pandemic, the Texas Tavern in downtown Roanoke, Virginia has been a steadfast business in the area. The Star City institution recently celebrated its 91st birthday.

While they’ve had to make adjustments during the pandemic — including switching to take-out only — the restaurant continues to be a staple in the town. Roanoke continues to see new growth in the area, but the Texas Tavern remains the same. And that’s how customers like it.

Towns Face Expensive Flooding Threat

Kentucky and other parts of Appalachia were recently hit by severe floods — and are still recovering. Across the country, more than 4 million homes are at risk of major flood damage. Scientists say climate change is driving a lot of this flooding. And poorer people stand to lose the most.

NPR’s Rebecca Hersher reported on the recent flooding in Rainelle, West Virginia. Many are still recovering from the flooding in June 2016. Many have since left the area, which has only exacerbated the issues.

West Virginia Praised For Vaccine Rollout

West Virginia’s vaccine rollout has been called “a massive success” by political leaders. Per capita, the state has had one of the highest rates of vaccine distribution in the world. West Virginia was the first in the nation to complete its second round of COVID-19 vaccinations at all nursing homes and assisted living facilities statewide.

Compared to the rest of the world, West Virginia’s vaccine rollout is impressive. But when you look beneath the surface, it hasn’t been equitable. Black residents have been vaccinated at a significantly lower rate than white residents. Over the past month, West Virginia has worked to try to get more vaccines to Black residents, and to folks in poorer, more rural regions.

Appalachian Movement Press and Radical DIY Publishing

Also in this episode, Inside Appalachia co-host Mason Adams interviews Shaun Slifer, a Pittsburgh artist who recently published a book, “So Much to Be Angry About: Appalachian Movement Press and Radical DIY Publishing, 1969-1979.” Slifer discusses the Appalachian Movement Press, which began in the 1960s when a group of young people began printing pamphlets, with the aim of helping tell Appalachia’s story from the people, by the people.

Decades after HIV was first discovered, there’s still discrimination. In this week’s episode of Inside Appalachia, we hear from several people here in Appalachia who are living with HIV.  Elena Eimes recalled being harassed at Walmart, after a customer learned she has HIV. “That hurt so bad. [I was] So embarrassed. And that woman really thought she was warning everybody,” Eimes said.

“The biggest fear that someone with this infection has is doing it alone,” said Carl, who lives in Raleigh County, West Virginia. He said it’s been a struggle telling friends and family he has HIV because of the stigma against people with the disease.

We also look back at why a needle exchange program in Charleston, West Virginia, was shut down in 2018 amid public outcry. Three years later, the city is now at the center of the most alarming outbreak of HIV in the nation. 

Human beings are social creatures and the pandemic is taking a toll on all of us in one way or another. It’s also bringing to light just how important human connection is in our lives.

This week on Inside Appalachia, we’ll hear from folks who are overcoming these challenges on top of maintaining sobriety and staying on the path to recovery.

As we grapple with the immediate health emergency of the coronavirus pandemic -- and celebrate the hope found in vaccines and infections going down -- here in Appalachia we’re also struggling with two other public health crises: the opioid epidemic, and a large uptick in HIV cases. Researchers believe the crises are linked.

West Virginia’s capital city of Charleston is currently experiencing the nation’s worst outbreak of HIV linked to injected drug use, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

We’ll learn more about that next week, and hear from folks who worry that stigma and discrimination against people with substance use disorder is exacerbating the issue.

Get Help

If you, or a loved one, would like to talk with a professional counselor about recovery or addiction call 1-800-662-HELP or 1-800-662-4357. That’s the hotline for the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. They offer free, confidential counseling.

Finding Sobriety

Before Ryan Elkins, a recovery coach in southern West Virginia could help others, he had to find peace within himself.  “Which is something that I've lost along the way. So, it's really, really nice and comforting to know that I have this inner strength,” Elkins said.

His mother died when he was 11 years old, and as a child, his father abused him. For a time, he found love and support after he left the state to move in with his mother’s extended family. But he said he couldn’t accept that love at the time. “They were so loving and caring that it scared me. I tried to avoid people.”

Elkins is now a recovery coach in Lincoln County, West Virginia, and a student at Marshall University.

Making Connections

Fighting isolation is something that just about every human on the planet is struggling with right now. Some of the best tools for connecting are digital. For people in recovery, meetings on Zoom or Skype have become a lifeline to maintaining sobriety. With the digital format, there’s the opportunity to meet every day.

Ashley Temple is a single mother with three kids who lives in Charleston, West Virginia. She works full time at a hospital and she’s a single mom.

One of the communities hit hardest is Kermit, West Virginia. At the peak of the opioid crisis, drug companies sent 12 million hydrocodone pills to the town of about 350 people. Cars would line up at the one pharmacy with people waiting to pick up pain pills. The so-called pain clinics of a decade ago are gone. In their place, a continued need for addiction treatment and recovery resources.

Telling Difficult Stories

There are heroes among us who are trying to break down barriers. Several of them are featured in two Netflix documentaries, “Heroin(e)” and “Recovery Boys,” both directed by Elaine McMillion-Sheldon, and her husband Curren Sheldon. They are both West Virginia natives.

Back in 2018, just after the release of “Recovery Boys,” Elaine sat down with Sarah Smarsh, host of a podcast called The Homecomers, to talk about what drove her to devote her career to telling stories about both the difficult realities, and the resilience of Appalachians.

In this episode of Inside Appalachia, we’re sharing stories about people with passions like poetry, music, or making hot dogs, and have touched others with their dedication to their craft.

Punk Music And Banjos

In Harlan County, Kentucky, 20-year-old Bradford Harris plays in the punk band L.I.P.S. When in person shows were canceled because of the pandemic, Bradford began playing the banjo. Eventually, this led to a surprising new talent-- making banjos. Bradford even tracked down a 97-year-old instrument maker to learn the craft. 

To see some of Bradford’s banjos, search for Harris Banjo Works on Instagram. You can also find Bradford’s punk band L.I.P.S. on Bandcamp.

Poetry and Social Justice

Poet Nikki Giovanni says there are many reasons she loves Appalachia, the region where she was born. An activist for civil rights and social justice, Giovanni has been helping give voice to Black Appalachians for half a century.

Reporter Liz McCormick spoke with Nikki Giovanni back in 2015 about her love for Appalachia, and about growing up in Knoxville, Tennessee. 

Affrilachian Poet

Crystal Wilkinson grew up in Kentucky with her grandparents. She is one of the founding members of a group known as the Affrilachian poets. Wilkinson has a new book called “Perfect Black,” which is set to be released from the University of Kentucky Press in August. 

We’ll listen back to a 2019 interview Wilkinson recorded for Inside Appalachia back in 2019 about her experiences growing up in Appalachia influenced some of the stories in her books.  

Skiing In West Virginia

Skiing took off in West Virginia in the 1950s, when a ski area was developed on Cabin Mountain in Canaan Valley. Today there are six ski resorts.

John Lutz, a native of Parkersburg, was a huge part of developing the industry in the state. He’s been recognized as one of the country’s top ski instructors. He also developed one of the first blind skiing programs, brought a professional ski-racing series to West Virginia and created opportunities for thousands of people to ski in our region. He left West Virginia for a while, but as he told Inside Appalachia co-host Caitlin Tan, he found himself missing home. 

Old Man Winter-- Helvetia’s Annual Fasnacht Festival

Like most festivals and events, the annual Fasnacht celebration in Helvetia, West Virginia was canceled this year due to safety concerns from COVID-19. Normally, on the Saturday before Lent begins, hundreds of people gather in this tiny town to frighten away Old Man Winter. 

We listen back to a story about the annual Fasnacht Festival from back in 2014, when Inside Appalachia producer Roxy Todd was a fledgling radio reporter.

Friends And Family Remember Russell Yann

If you live in West Virginia and care about food, you probably know DiCarlo’s in Wheeling, where they serve pizzas topped with cold cheese. Maybe you’ve been to Richwood, a town that claims to be the ramp capital of the world. And you probably know that, when it comes to hotdogs joints, Yann’s Hotdogs in Fairmont is on a level all its own.

Russell Yann, the longtime owner of the iconic lunch spot, died on Jan. 15. Reporter Zack Harold spoke with Yann’s friends and family, and closes this episode with a remembrance of Yann’s life and legacy.

Valentine’s Day gets a lot of flack for being sappy, cliche or just a marketing ploy by card and chocolate companies. But we tend to think there is more to it than that. 

So, for this episode of Inside Appalachia, we asked our listeners for their best Appalachian love stories. 

We received more stories than we could include in a single show, but we included some of our favorites, including one couple who met on the Yahoo personals page, a grandmother’s surprising first love, a couple separated by international borders during a pandemic and the story of a couple who met through a Freedom of Information Act request. 

We’ll also talk with a biologist, and a philosopher, on whether animals can feel love.

Do Animals Feel Love? 

If you’ve ever watched animals interact, it seems like they feel love. Penguins mate for life. Elephants form a bond through wrapping their trunks together before they mate. Some types of wolves mate for life and help raise the wolf pups. So, do animals actually feel love? 

A few years back, our producer, Roxy Todd, saw an otter that got her thinking about this question.  

Unconditional Love For Animals

Dogs seem to accept us unconditionally, but we’ll hear from a young woman who feels the same about her dog. Ida Miller is the proud owner of Sephora, a black and brown german shepherd mix. 

Ida has had Sephora for three years -- she adopted her in college. Ida says she almost gave Sephora up because owning her first puppy was so overwhelming. But now she can’t imagine her life without her. 

Tweet Us!

Do you have a dog or a cat, an iguana or even a fish? We’d love to see all the animals out there who listen to Inside Appalachia with their human companions. Tweet us a photo, we’re @InAppalachia

Love And Loss

Every relationship goes through different stages. Life-long partners eventually face a difficult chapter. Danny McNeeley and Tim Albee talked about what it was like for each of them to lose their previous life partners. They recorded their conversation back in 2018 when the Storycorps mobile recording bus visited Charleston, West Virginia.

Love Of Nature

Cross country skiing can get you into the backcountry where you can see views that you’d normally hike to in the summer. Chip Chase is the owner of the White Grass Ski Touring Center, in Tucker County, West Virginia. He has a love for nature and the environment that surrounds him. 

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Our theme music is by Matt Jackfert. Other music this week was provided by Jake Xerxes Fussell, Dinosaur Burps, Podington Bear and Blue Dot Sessions. 

Roxy Todd is our producer. Eric Douglas is our associate producer. Our executive producer is Andrea Billups. Kelley Libby edited our show this week. Our audio mixer is Patrick Stephens. Zander Aloi also helped produce this episode. You can find us on Twitter @InAppalachia.

You can also send us an email to [email protected].

Inside Appalachia is a production of West Virginia Public Broadcasting.

The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed and exacerbated societal inequities. 

Black and Latino populations have suffered higher infection rates. People working low-income jobs are more likely to be considered essential — and therefore required to work in-person — while others have the luxury of working remotely. 

The pandemic has pushed many people who were already living paycheck to paycheck out of work. Despite programs to provide rental and utility relief, some have lost their homes. At one point last summer, 60 percent of people in West Virginia said they were at risk of being homeless, according to a study by the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy. 

And now, another divide is forming between those who have received the vaccine and those who are still waiting. 

This week’s episode of Inside Appalachia looks at some of the divides the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed, starting with how it’s affecting people without stable homes.

Seeking Shelter

The Harmony House in Huntington, West Virginia functions as a day shelter, but it also has an outreach team to find other homeless people who are still on the streets. Once they make contact, they offer supplies and other support.

Kyle Vass, a reporter with the Us and Them podcast, spent a day with Harmony’s outreach team, visiting sites where homeless people are gathering this winter.

In a separate story, Us & Them host Trey Kay spoke with Mitch Webb, the director of the Huntington City Mission, about how it’s changed to accommodate additional people in need, while still trying to follow pandemic protocols and keep everyone safe.

Vaccine Disparities

When news arrived last year that scientists had successfully formulated not one, but multiple vaccines for COVID-19, people across the globe were relieved to finally see a potential end to the pandemic. These scientific breakthroughs were achieved at a remarkable pace, but it soon became clear that distributing these vaccines would be a monumental undertaking. 

West Virginia has become a national leader in its vaccine rollout. So far, the state has delivered at least one shot to more than nine percent of the state’s residents, second in the nation, after Alaska, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But not everyone across West Virginia has had the same access to the vaccine. 

Reporter Lauren Peace investigated West Virginia’s vaccine rollout for Mountain State Spotlight, an online, nonprofit news site. Inside Appalachia co-host Mason Adams spoke with her recently about what she uncovered about where the vaccine’s available, and what that reveals about health disparities across Appalachia.  

Peace is a Report For America Fellow and the public health reporter for Mountain State Spotlight. Her story about vaccine distribution in West Virginia, co-written with Ian Hodgson, was published on Jan. 21. Eleven days later, in early February, West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice announced that free vaccination clinics will be held in all 55 West Virginia counties.

The vaccine is providing a ray of hope that the pandemic will end. But more people may lose their homes in the months ahead. President Joe Biden has extended the moratoriums on evictions, but only through March 31, 2021. Clearly, many challenges still lie ahead as Appalachia begins to emerge from the pandemic.

Us & Them is produced by West Virginia Public Broadcasting. In an upcoming show, Us & Them digs into the racial disparities that the pandemic has exposed and made worse. 

This week on Inside Appalachia, we’re revisiting a show that originally aired last fall, that prominently features bold mountain women who are making a difference in their communities.

We hear what happens when Abigail Washburn and Wu Fei combine Appalachian and Chinese folk music. We also meet the driving force behind a family-owned Black newspaper that’s been publishing since 1939. Claudia Whitworth began working there for her father in 1945, and three quarters of a century later still takes an active role as publisher of the Roanoke Tribune. And we’ll meet Rosemary Ketchum, a community activist who ran for city council in Wheeling, West Virginia. We’ll learn how she became West Virginia’s first transgender person to be elected to public office. 

Appalachia And China

Can you blend Appalachian and Chinese folk music successfully? Abigail Washburn and Wu Fei spoke with Lizzie Peabody, host of the Smithsonian Institution's podcast Sidedoor, about how they combined their two instruments — the banjo and the guzheng — to produce a sound that’s both timeless and also reflects thousands of years of history from different parts of the world.

Rosemary

When Rosemary Ketchum moves to Wheeling, West Virginia as a child, she remembers being struck by it's moniker, "The Friendly City." She saw residents struggling with food security and homelessness and decided to help. Her journey continued when she ran fo the Wheeling City Council, becoming the first transgender person in the state to be elected to office.

West Virginia Public Broadcasting Producers Corey Knollinger and Chuck Kleine followed Ketchum to produce a film about her year-long campaign. Check out the half-hour documentary here.

Roanoke Tribune

Claudia Whitworth has led the Roanoke Tribune, a family-owned, African American newspaper, through segregation, the destruction of its building during urban renewal, and now the pandemic and death of print newspapers. 

Yet Whitworth, now in her 90s, has never relented in the weekly newspaper’s mission, which appears in its masthead: “Making and Recording Black History since 1939!”

Whitworth told Inside Appalachia co-host Mason Adams that she believes her newspaper’s secret for success lies in her devotion to telling real stories from her community. Years back, at a gathering of Black publishers from across the country, Whitworth pushed back when a fellow publisher declared that “good news doesn’t sell.” After more than eight decades — and more than 75 years since she went to work there — her paper is still going strong.

Adams had this to say about fierce women of Appalachia:

“Growing up in the mountains, I saw fierce women everywhere I looked. From my great aunt Willie Sue, who served as a medic in World War II, to Ms. McGuire at Sharon Elementary School, who drilled a generation of Allegheny County kids in history and politics. They all show us that we don’t have to be mean or ornery to be fiercer. We can be kind, and listen to others, and reflect back what we see and hear. These women are making a stand for what they believe in — a long and rich tradition here, inside Appalachia.”

For some, winter can be a difficult time -- dark and cold. For others, time outside in the winter is a powerful experience. After everything we’ve been through in the past year, getting outside can be one way to help with the stress. Taking a break from social media and the news, getting bundled up and venturing out into nature, even just for five minutes, can help. 

In this episode of Inside Appalachia, we’ll go outside into a cold, crisp forest on a winter hike. We’ll hear why the winter months actually provide unique opportunities to hear birds. 

We’ll also learn about a group of Italian immigrants who escaped religious persecution and moved to the mountains of North Carolina. They brought cultural traditions, including winemaking, to this small pocket of Appalachia.  And we’ll also delight in one town's twist on the classic West Virginia slaw dog -- the “Marmet Yellow slaw dog.” The dish has been around since the 1930s but isn’t widely known outside this tiny Kanawha County town. 

Love Of Snow

A few years ago, Reid Frazier, a reporter with the Allegheny Front, wrote a story about his children’s love of snow, and what it taught him about embracing the simple joys of the new year. 

Birds Of Winter

Andy Kubis, a producer for The Allegheny Front headed out for a winter hike with Gabi Hughes, an environmental educator at Beechwood Farms Nature Reserve north of Pittsburgh. The reserve is run by the Audubon Society of Western Pennsylvania, Their aim was to find out what there is to see and hear in the coldest months of the year.

Blocking A Pipeline

Some of Appalachia’s most rugged and beautiful places are located along the Allegheny Mountains. Straddling Virginia and West Virginia, this stretch of mountains is the site of the 300-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline, a major natural gas pipeline project. But it’s still incomplete. 

This is partly because of activists. The Yellow Finch tree-sits have blocked the pipeline in Virginia for more than two years. In November, a judge ordered the protesters out, but the tree sitters are still there. Inside Appalachia co-host Mason Adams has been reporting on this issue for the last six years. He recently visited Yellow Finch, and brings us this update.

Using The Bright Sunshine

Companies and government officials are promising to use more renewable energy as a way to address climate change. One way to do that is to build solar farms, but a solar farm needs flat land. That’s something that’s in short supply in Appalachia.  

Developers have found some flat land in portions of Appalachia, including in Pennsylvania. StateImpact Pennsylvania’s Rachel McDevitt reports how the solar industry could take some communities by surprise. They might just push back.

Hot Dog!

Folkways reporter Zack Harold takes a long look into a hot dog slaw recipe that is being revived in a town near Charleston, West Virginia. He called up Inside Appalachia host Caitlin Tan to talk about this unique take on the iconic West Virginia hotdog.

Making Wine

In the 1890s, a few dozen Italian immigrants settled in Valdese, North Carolina. They built communal bread-baking ovens, they made a special type of sausage, played bocce ball and they made wine. Rebecca Williams of our Folkways Reporting Corps has the story. 

How can we hold onto traditions in a world that’s always changing? This week on Inside Appalachia, we explore stories about how our history and culture can help us find answers, and ask questions, about the types of future we want to build. Whether it’s learning the recipes of our ancestors, trying to bring back a heritage tree that was nearly wiped out, or rooting for the home team, our future won’t look exactly like the past. But some things can be preserved. We’ll meet people who are finding ways to adapt, and hold onto their roots, amidst challenges.

We’ll meet a young man from West Virginia’s Lebanese community, who says he’s determined to preserve its cultural traditions, including the smells and tastes of homemade Lebanese cooking, including making signature homemade dishes like kibbeh and tabbouleh.

Roosevelt’s ‘Tree Army’

And we’ll look back at the legacy of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps, or CCC. Known as “Roosevelt’s Tree Army,” it employed more than 3 million men and created thousands of parks across the country. Now, some are calling for a modern version of the CCC.

American Chestnut

American Chestnut trees provided food to early settlers and Native Americans, and was also used as livestock feed and by woodworkers. In the early 1900s, American Chestnuts were devastated by a blight that took down some 4 billion of these giants. Now researchers are moving forward with a genetically engineered tree that allows chestnuts to survive the blight. The Allegheny Front’s Julie Grant explains why the science is considered controversial, and why others say it’s necessary if we want to restore the American Chestnut.

And WUNC reporter Will Michaels takes us to the Black River in North Carolina, where scientists have discovered one of the oldest living trees in the world-- a cypress tree that is over 2,600 years old.

At The Ballpark?

The love of baseball attracts fans of all ages, including Rod Blackstone, aka “The Toastman,” who’s attended almost every minor league game in Charleston, West Virginia over the last 30 years. But Minor League Baseball is contracting, and some Appalachian towns are losing their teams. MLB threw the West Virginia Power a curveball when it announced it was not one of the teams that would be part of the 120-team minor league lineup next season. Three other squads from West Virginia were also thrown out. Of the 42 teams that will lose MLB affiliation, 18 are in the Appalachian region.

Timeless Ballads Preserved In New Book

Across Appalachia, there are countless ballads, stories in music and verse, that have been passed down from person to person. Katherine Jackson French was a folklorist who worked to document many of the ballads across Kentucky that were disappearing. Her attempt to publish her work failed, in part because she was a woman. Stephanie Wolf, of WFPL, reports that Jackson French's story is finally being told.

In this episode of Inside Appalachia, we’re revisiting some of the stories we have reported about economic development. We’ll hear how these projects are doing today, and how the pandemic has impacted these efforts.

Lavender

An economic development project in southern West Virginia, partly funded by a $1 million grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission, planned to grow lavender on former strip mines in West Virginia, and to employ former miners and veterans. After our first story aired in early 2018, we heard from students in the program who felt misled by the promises of the project, called Green Mining.

Roxy Todd revisited the site to find out what happened, in a story we originally aired later in 2018. Recently, we followed up with the CEO of the West Virginia Regional Technology Park to see how things turned out.

Apple Orchards

Another initiative to use abandoned mine land for economic development is being run by the West Virginia National Guard. In 2018, the guard received more than $5 million to grow apples in Nicholas County, West Virginia. We explore this project’s ambitious goals to create jobs through apple farming.

Farm Distribution

The Sprouting Farms project in Talcott, West Virginia connects farmers with customers throughout West Virginia.

In 2018, reporter Brittany Patterson visited the program. In the past year, Sprouting Farms has grown. As part of a collaborative project with other organizations, they’ve been selling more food through their online site, called Turnrow, where customers can purchase food directly from farmers and get the food delivered to their town the following week.

The pandemic has increased demand for local foods, said April Koenig, one of the managers at Sprouting Farms.  “The pandemic has absolutely highlighted how badly the West Virginia economy, the food sector, needs this,” Koenig said.

Working Together

The Sprouting Farms story highlights the need to work together. The West Virginia Community Development Hub works to connect initiatives statewide.

Researchers at The Hub spent more than a decade studying the success of economic development projects. They found that many one-off federal investments prove largely unsustainable, but when people collaborate, they tend to be more successful long term. Now, they’re encouraging groups and local governments to work together.

Roxy Todd interviewed Stephanie Tyree, executive director of The Hub,  in 2018, about why collaboration can help leverage federal investment for Appalachia. Tyree also points to Western Germany as a region that has found ways to jumpstart small business development, as they make the transition away from coal as a major economic driver.

Outdoor Tourism

Economic development in Appalachia was challenging before the pandemic. In some ways, it’s even tougher now. On the other hand, outdoor tourism is a natural growth industry in the region. We listen back to a story Emily Allen originally reported in 2019, about ATV tourism on the Hatfield and McCoy Trails in Southern West Virginia  —  another recipient of federal investment.

Emily is a Report for America Corps fellow.