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Joseph Mackereth
Guardians of the Blooms
Helen and Julia Smith spent a quarter century documenting the wildflowers along the Blue Ridge Parkway on slides and in notebooks, eventually influencing the Parkway to change its mowing practices to preserve the blooms. Read more
Su Clauson
Ray Hicks: America's Premiere Storyman
Beech Mountain Native Says it "Comes Natural" Read more
Courtesy Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT), Lynchburg District.
The Storm That Swallowed a County
In late August, 1969, Hurricane Camille produced a once-in-10,000-years inland storm with the strength of a 40,000-megaton nuclear bomb that nearly destroyed Nelson County, Va. Read more
The Blue Ridge Mountain Frescoes of Ashe County, N.C.
It's Not Just Their Subjects That Are The Stuff Of Miracles Read more
Courtesy of Steve Brooks, Maxine Kenny
Figuring Out the Forever Forest
What if every county in the Blue Ridge region were home to at least one 500-year forest? The foundation carrying that name has already helped several property owners toward taking part in that effort. The result could be magnificent. Read more
The Carter Family Lives On...
Janette Carter Extends A 60-Year Tradition That Began With The Birth Of Country Music Read more
Randy Johnson
Should We Save the Vanishing Balds? The Forest Service Says "Yes"
The Southern Appalachian regions of North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia contain about 2,500 acres of "balds"-high, open meadows along the ridges of mountain peaks. How they got there and how to keep them there have become hot topics. Read more
Brown Mountain Lights
Cherokee maidens in search of fallen warriors? The souls of a slain mother and child? A war hero in search of his family? Let's go find out. Read more
Mabry Mill: The History of A Twice Saved Beauty On The Parkway
The most-photographed spot along the 470 miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway was nearly lost before the roadway was built. And then again even after it was decided to save it. Old Ed Mabry would sure stand proud at what's happened to his mill. Read more
From The Archive: The Day They Hanged an Elephant in East Tennessee
In 1916 World War I raged in Europe. Dadaism, ripe with comic derision and irrationality, took hold in artistic circles. Margaret Sanger opened the first birth-control clinic. It was a good year for scapegoats. It was a good year to hang an elephant. Read more
Pike County KY Tourism Commission
Reader Favorites - Hatfields & McCoys: Roseanna, Don't You Cry
Roseanna McCoy's tale is a classic story of a girl who loved too much. Little did she know how completely her happiness was doomed. Nor that she would become fuel in America's most famous, brutal feud. Read more
Reader Favorites: A Love Affair With Mimi
The initial goal was to return the little deer as soon as possible to the wild. But the deer, and the couple it adopted, did not seem to want that to occur... Read more
Pat and Chuck Blackley
40 Reasons We Love the Blue Ridge Region
40 Reasons We Love the Blue Ridge Region Read more
Courtesy Gary Powers Jr / Cold War Museum
Francis Gary Powers: The Virginia Boy Who Spied On Russia And Came Home To Tell About It
Summer, 1943 Princeton, W.Va. "I left my heart up there, Pap, and I'm goin' back to get it," 14-year-old Francis Gary Powers told his father, Oliver, after his first plane ride - in a Piper Cub... Read more
Mountain Monster: The Snallygaster
More than 100 years ago, this razor-beaked, lethal-clawed, high-screech creature roamed the western Maryland mountains. Or did it? Read more
Denise J. Mathews
Tiny Lake, Big Save
A one-acre lake that had been tended to for more than a decade by a group of Virginia high school students was about to lose its caretakers when their school fell victim to consolidation. Read more
The Round Barns of Madison County
Circular barns, popular a century ago for their efficiencies of materials, labor and use, have largely left the landscape. One, in the foothills of Virginia, has recently been re-upped for the next 100 years. Read more
Climbing the Family Tree: Mountain Genealogy
Genealogy. The word conjures up images of dusty libraries, dry courthouse records, endless hours with microfilm and crumbling documents. But talk to anyone researching his or her family and you’ll find an excitement that suggests otherwise. Read more
The Crafty Halfback
A look at several phenomena in genuine need of a closer look: Florida immigrants, the use of perfectly good raw materials to create something often less useful than the materials, and the state of the modern American novel. Read more