Stories-a History Of Appalachia, One Story At A Time

Today we tell the story of an East Tennessee man who realized after 20 years of marriage that he wasn't who he always thought he was. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, IHeart Radio, Audible or on your own favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening!

On April 11, 1946, Earl McFarland was captured by the FBI at the corner of Gay Street and Magnolia Avenue in Knoxville while waiting for a streetcar.    Why this happened to a Marine veteran of the Battle of Guadalcanal is the subject of our story today. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening to our stories of Appalachian history.

In 1925 the state of Tennessee passed the Butler Act, which made it illegal to teach the theory of evolution in public schools.  Today we tell part two of that story, the trial itself. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast in many ways: on our website, www.storiespodcast.net, at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, Audible, Player FM and many more. Thanks for listening!

In 1925 the state of Tennessee passed the Butler Act, which made it illegal to teach the theory of evolution in public schools. A group of men in Dayton, Tennessee, decided to challenge that law with the help of the ACLU, picking a high school teacher named John Scopes as their defendant. Today we tell part one of that story. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast in many ways: on our website, www.storiespodcast.net, at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, IHeart Radio, Audible, RadioPublic and many more. Thanks for listening!

Today we go back and retell one of our favorite stories, about a very odd occurrence at a farm in Kentucky in the 1870s that's still a mystery today. A tasty tale, indeed. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast on such fine podcast apps as Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Audible, IHeart Radio and more. Thanks for listening!

Prior to the Civil War the Clay family of Kentucky was one of the nation's most prominent political families, the most well-known of which was congressman, senator, speaker of the House and Secretary of State Henry Clay.  Today we tell not his story, but the story of another Clay, abolitionist Cassius Marcellus Clay, who also was the namesake of another well-known Kentucky native, the boxer who dropped that name for the name Mohammed Ali. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, RadioPublic, Audible, among other podcast apps. Thanks for listening!

After the French and Indian War the governor of Virginia awarded veterans land in the western part of the state in payment for their service to king and colony.  Among those vets receiving land was George Washington, who decided to set up a colony of settlers in what's now West Virginia.  Today we tell the story of that attempt to set up an early Appalachian settlement. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Audible, IHeart Radio, TuneIn, or on your own favorite podcast app.  We're also on YouTube, for those who like to watch us tell our stories. Thanks for listening!

In 1938 a family had an encounter with an Appalachian ghost when young Bertha Sybert's bed began to shake mysteriously every night. Soon people were coming from all over the country to witness the spirit, or demon or witch or whatever it was that was moving Bertha's bed around. Today we tell the story of Bouncing Bertha's ghost. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Amazon Music, Google Podcasts, IHeart Radio, among others. Thanks for listening!

In 1949 a gang robbed the Bank of Follansbee, near Weirton, West Virginia, of $5,400.00 and made their escape. Later that night two policemen pulled over a car they suspected belonged to those robbers. Things did not go as they planned, and we tell that story this week. Be sure to subscribe to the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Audible and on many other podcast apps.

November 14, 1970, is a date burned into the memories of the residents of Huntington, West Virginia.  That's the day Marshall University lost its football team in a terrible plane crash, and that's the story we tell today. Thank you for listening and for sharing our stories of Appalachian history with your friends.

New Straitsville, Ohio, was founded as a coal town in the Hocking Valley after the Civil War. Labor unrest happened in the 1880's, leading to the Great Hocking Valley coal strike. During that strike something unthinkable happened, and is still happening today. On this episode of the podcast we tell that story. Be sure to subscribe to the Stories podcast at our website, www.storiespodcast.net, at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Audible, Spotify, TuneIn, IHeart Radio or on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening...

In 1873 a wave of cholera swept across the southeastern U.S.  This epidemic hit the town of Greeneville, Tennessee, hard; so hard, in fact, that around 10% of the town's population was killed. Today we tell that story. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Audible, IHeart Radio, TuneIn, Amazon Music and more. Thanks for listening.

Loyalties were divided in Appalachia, from Kentucky to Tennessee to North Carolina. And it was in western North Carolina that a Confederate army unit committed an atrocity against Union sympathizers living in Madison County. Today we tell that story. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast on a ton of apps, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Audible, IHeart Radio, TuneIn, Amazon Music, Deezer and more. Thanks for listening and thanks for sharing our stories with your friends...

Wise County, Virginia, saw very little racial violence after the Civil War. In fact, up until 1927, there were only three known cases of death by lynching in this southwestern Virginia county. But those three, each one more violent than the one before, led to the passage in Virginia of the first anti-lynching law in the former Confederacy. Today we tell that story. Thanks for watching...

Firefighters responding to a house fire in Canton, Pennsylvania, in 1896 were stunned by what they found.   Today we tell that story. The Stories podcast is available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, IHeart Radio, Amazon Music, RadioPublic, Audible and more. Thanks for listening.  

Mason Evans was a schoolteacher and principal in McMinn County, in southeast Tennessee. After his one true love left him he made a fateful and life-changing decision to head to the Smoky Mountains. That's the story we tell you today. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Stitcher, Audible, IHeart Radio, TuneIn and more. Thanks for listening!

The bloody legacy of the Civil War lived on in Appalachia up until the beginning of the 20th century in the form of feuds and honor killings between those who once served the Union and those who did the same for the Confederacy.  Today we tell of one such example that arose along the Clinch River in East Tennessee and Southwest Virginia, the Wright-Templeton Gang. The Stories podcast is available on these fine podcast apps: Apple Podcast, Stitcher, Spotify, IHeart Radio, PlayerFM, RadioPublic, Amazon Music, Audible, as well as your own favorite app. Thanks for listening and sharing our stories with your friends.  

After World War II a young vet moves to Abingdon, Virginia, to take a teaching and coaching position in an area high school. And, being short on funds, he rents a room to live in from a widow. Things go down from there, eventually leading to a high profile murder trial. Today we tell you that story. Be sure to subscribe to the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, Libsyn, TuneIn, PlayerFM, or on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening!

Early on Christmas Eve, 1911, a 24 car coal train wrecked inside the Natural Tunnel in Scott County, Virginia. Today we tell that story. You can subscribe to the audio version of the Stories podcast at Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Spotify, RadioPublic, and more. Please subscribe to our YouTube channel and give us a thumbs-up, please. Thanks for listening/watching!

Ty Cobb was born in 1886 in Narrows, in north Georgia.  He became a baseball legend, known as much for his fierce competitiveness as for his athletic ability.  Today we tell the story of what happened when a fan decided it was a good idea to heckle Cobb during a game. You can subscribe to the Stories podcast on these podcast apps: Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music and many more. Thanks for listening.