Well, I tell you what, this conversation has done me a world of good. I guess there is something to having a—professional person—tell you what to do about your problems. Course I don't know if I can do what you would do. I know I should dump Hubert, but, well, we been married a right long time. And, I know I should tell Imogene to jump right on that express train to the lower regions, but, you know, we been friends since we been in diapers.
Anyway, I know I don't need to come back here no more. I reckon I'll live through this, and Hubert will, too, if I don't kill him. But, let me tell you, you really ought to get you a nice couch for in here—you know, for your real patients.
GLORIA HOUSTON
Children's author and educator Gloria Houston is a native of Marion, North Carolina. Her parents ran a country store near Spruce Pine, North Carolina, and, Houston says, she was “saturated with language, almost from birth. I heard the language of every stratum of society as customers came and went.”
By the age of seven, she knew she wanted to be a writer, but an aptitude for music led to a bachelor's degree in music education from Appalachian State University in 1963, and a subsequent series of teaching positions. Houston earned an M.Ed. in curriculum and instruction in English education in 1983 and a Ph.D. in curriculum and instruction in interdisciplinary studies in 1989, both from the University of South Florida. The emphasis in each graduate degree was on writing and children's literature.
Houston's first book, My Brother Joey Died, was rejected fifty-four times before its publication. It went on to win numerous awards, including an American Library Association (ALA) Notable Book citation. “Life is revision,” says Houston. “You do it until you get it right. I learned to revise sitting at the piano. The toughest part of writing is putting your fanny on the chair and keeping it there.”
Houston's other books have won awards as well, including an ALA designation as a Best Book of the Decade for The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree and an ALA Notable Book Award for My Great-Aunt Arizona.
“I believe that children are the most important audience for which to write,” says Houston. “No book will influence the adult reader as profoundly as the right book at the right time when read by a child reader.” Houston says she hopes to “provide a mirror for the children of Appalachia to help them see the beauties of their culture and way of life.”
Since 1994, Houston has been on the faculty of Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, North Carolina, as Author-in-Residence.
What follows is excerpted from Houston's picture book My Great-Aunt Arizona, which portrays the life of a dedicated teacher in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
OTHER SOURCES TO EXPLORE
PRIMARY
Books for children: Bright Freedom's Song: A Story of the Underground Railroad (1998), Littlejim's Dreams (1997), Littlejim's Gift: An Appalachian Christmas Story (1994), Mountain Valor (1994), My Great-Aunt Arizona (1992), But No Candy (1992), Littlejim (1990), The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree (1988), My Brother Joey Died (1982).
SECONDARY
Contemporary Authors (2000), New Revision Series, Vol. 86, 130–33. Roberta Herrin, “Gloria Houston and the Burden of the ‘Old Culture’,” Appalachian Journal 24:1 (fall 1996), 31–44. Rob Newfeld, “Gloria Houston's Avery County Universe,” Asheville [NC] Citizen-Times (3 February 2002), B4. “Sunny Brook Store,” [web site] www.sunnybrookstore.com
FROM MY GREAT-AUNT ARIZONA (1992)
My great-aunt Arizona
was born in a log cabin
her papa built
in the meadow
on Henson Creek
in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
When she was born,
the mailman rode
across the bridge
on his big bay horse
with a letter.
…
Arizona had a little brother, Jim.
They played together on the farm.
In summer they went barefoot
and caught tadpoles in the creek.
In the fall
they climbed the mountains
searching for galax and ginseng roots.
In the winter they made snow cream
with sugar, snow, and sweet cream
from Mama's cows.
When spring came,
they helped Papa tap
the maple trees
and catch sap in buckets.
Then they made maple syrup
and maple-sugar candy.
Arizona and her brother Jim
walked up the road
that wound by the creek
to the one-room school.
All the students
in all the grades
were there,
together
in one room.
All the students
read their lessons
aloud
at the same time.
They made
a great deal of noise,
so
the room was called
a blab school.
When Arizona's mother died,
Arizona had to leave school
and stay home to care for Papa
and her brother Jim.
But she still loved to read—
and dream
about the faraway places
she would visit one day.
So she read and she dreamed,
and she took care of Papa
and Jim.
Then one day
Papa brought home a new wife.
Arizona could go away to school,
where she could learn to be a teacher.
Aunt Suzie invited Arizona
to live at her house
and help with the chores.
Aunt Suzie made her work very hard.
But at night Arizona could study—
and dream of all the faraway places
she would visit one day.
Finally, Arizona returned
to her home on Henson Creek.
She was a teacher at last.
She taught in the one-room school
where she and Jim had sat.
…
She grew flowers in every window.
She taught students about words
and numbers
and the faraway places
they would visit someday.
“Have you been there?”
the students asked.
“Only in my mind,” she answered.
“But someday you will go.”
Arizona married the carpenter
who helped to build the new Riverside School
down where Henson Creek joins the river.
So Miss Arizona became Mrs. Hughes,
and for the rest of her days
she taught fourth-grade students
who called her “Miz Shoes.”
…
The boys and girls
who were students in her class
had boys and girls
who were students in her class.
And they had boys and girls
who were students in her class.
For fifty-seven years
my great-aunt Arizona
hugged her students.
She hugged them
when their work was good,
and she hugged them
when it was not.
She taught them words
and numbers,
and about the faraway places
they would visit someday.
“Have you been there?”
the students asked.
“Only in my mind,”
she answered.
“But someday you will go.”
…
My great-aunt Arizona died
on her ninety-third birthday.
But she goes with me
in my mind—
A very tall lady,
in a long full dress,
and a pretty white apron,
with her high-button shoes,
and her many petticoats, too.
She's always there,
in a sunny room
with many flowers
in every window,
and a hug for me every day.
Did she ever go
to the faraway places
she taught us about? No.
But my great-aunt Arizona
travels with me
and with those of us
whose lives she touched….
She goes with us
in our minds.
LEE HOWARD
(January 30, 1952– April 25, 2003)
Eastern Kentucky native Lee Howard was a poet and short story author. “My mountain voice is my first and true voice,” wrote Howard. “The thing I tell people after giving my name, is that I'm from the mountains in East Kentucky.”
Howard's ancestors arrived in Kentucky even earlier than Daniel Boone, and have lived there ever since. Howard, who spent the last years of her life in the Pacific Northwest, noted wryly, “I am the only member of my clan living on the other side of the continent. Much of my family believes I've moved to Japan.”
Howard earned a B.A. in sociology from George Washington University in 1976 and an M.A. in comparative religion from Marylhurst University in Oregon in 1999.
Although she lived in Oregon for years, Howard observed that “my poetry and stories are in the narrative voices and narrative style of Appalachia. It is the particular voice that allows me a specific means to say what is universally true for many. I cannot imagine how I would write or what I might say if I came from anywhere else.”
OTHER SOURCES TO EXPLORE
PRIMARY
Poetry: The Last Unmined Vein (1980).
SECONDARY
George Ella Lyon, “The Poet's Job,” Appalachian Journal 8:3 (spring 1981), 217–23.
MOMMA'S LETTER
from The Last Unmined Vein (1980)
Not much to say
Orville and Neva put out their garden
well at least the onions and tater part of it
and it only the first of March
I hope and pray it does not freeze
but you can't count on March
anymore than you can on a man
Might do it—might not
Of course John and Re are just the same
John a spewing over
Re spending time with Ruth
and mind you she's there at Ruth's gas station
most ever’ night
not to mention all day Sunday
and so she's been doing for years
and John has been fussin’ just that long
It's raining on today of all days
You know of course it is Mammy's birthday
She's laid dead now these last 5 years
and I cannot say that it seems
like more than yesterday
that I saw her
rocking on the front porch
round evening time
and complaining about
how fast George Cope's boys drive
like the devil by
I wished I had made more time to be with her
You don't realize what your mother means to you
til there's no one there
to call you home
But I was married
and full of being so
and of course you children
did need so much watching after
May she be in God's Glory
and waiting for me
Your Daddy is fine
and working sun up to down
and quite happy doing so
His little church is not setting the world on fire
but then he had no mind for it to
I suppose 25 or 30 counting children
come for Sunday morning
and then about ½ that at night
And he preaches just like it were a whole tent full
and he was Billy Graham
Well I am at the beauty shop
and my hair is about dry
So I will close
This finds me well and happy
and missing you
Count the mistakes as love
THE LAST UNMINED VEIN
from The Last Unmined Vein (1980)
Now it's neither here nor there
to most folks
but then I've never figured myself
to be like many
much less most
I know what they do
no matter what they say
I know how they come
with trucks bigger than ary road
can hold
and drive her through yer yard
and right up on the porch
and park her next to yer rocking chair
and you ain't got a howdy-do
to say about it neither
once you put yer name
to that paper
that's it
Now my daddy and me
we used to dig a little coal
out of that vein across the bottom
Just a pick and shovel
and what could be wheelbarrowed
out of there
was all that was took
and didn't hurt nothing
and kept a fire real good
and that's it
but that ain't what they got in mind
They wanting to make steel in Ohio,
turn on the lights in New York City
and heat houses in Detroit
Shoot—I don't know a soul
in the whole state of Michigan
but that ain't really it
It ain't my business what they do with it
but this farm and everything that's in it
is plenty my concern
and I know how they come
with their mouths full of promises
and leaving with every one
of your fields full of ruts
and the mud sliding down the hillside
right onto your back steps
and there ain't a creek left
what would hold a living thing
and that's it
and the money
just don't mean that much to me
I done seen all I need to see
about where that money goes
and what's got with it
Last thing this county needs
is another new mobile home
with a four-wheel drive truck
parked on a mudbank in front of it
and that's it
and not another thing to show
for where and what your mammy and pappy
and their mammy and pappy
not to mention your own self and family
always had
So when that man in his new suit
and smooth as silk talking
came to my door
I didn't even ask him in
Said I wasn't interested
He laughed and said he wasn't selling
Said I didn't figure I was either
and that was it
Of course, I know he'll be back
but probably after I'm dead and gone
and if the children want to be so foolish
as to put an end
to what came long before them
ain't nothing I can do about it then
but I been laying plans
to remind them
of what it's gonna cost them
I done got my marker
and laid out the lines for my grave
right smack in the middle
of that vein
They gonna have to chip out the coal 6 foot by 6
and then put her right back on top of me
and that will be the end of that
MARY JOHNSTON
(November 21, 1870–May 9, 1936)
Mary Johnston was born in Buchanan, Virginia, the daughter
of a Confederate veteran. The eldest of six children, she was schooled at home until the age of sixteen, when her mother's death forced her to take over the management of the Johnston household. The family moved to New York City for a time, and though Johnston later traveled extensively in Europe and the Middle East, western Virginia remained her home for most of her life.
Johnston published poetry, short stories, a drama, and even a volume of history, but she was best known as a historical novelist. Her most popular novel, To Have and to Hold, set in colonial Jamestown, Virginia, was the country's number one best-seller in 1900. Profits from the book enabled her to build a large country home in Warm Springs, Virginia. In her later years, Johnston turned from writing historical fiction to writing novels that highlighted her feminist and suffragist views.
Critics disagree on the quality of Johnston's work. Some call her plots melodramatic and her characters limited, but others praise her narrative power, as well as her attention to historical detail. Battle descriptions in her Civil War novels are so accurate that one reviewer referred to them as “military history,” rather than fiction.
In this scene from The Long Roll, Johnston describes General Stonewall Jackson on the eve of his 1861 campaign in the Shenandoah Valley. In a note to her readers, Johnston explained that the incidents in the book “were actual happenings,” adding that she had “changed the manner but not the substance.”
OTHER SOURCES TO EXPLORE
PRIMARY
Fiction: Drury Randall (1934), Miss Delicia Allen (1933), Hunting Shirt (1931), The Exile (1927), The Great Valley (1926), The Slave Ship (1924), Croatoan (1923), 1492 (1922), Silver Cross (1922), Sweet Rocket (1920), Michael Forth (1919), Foes (1918), Pioneers of the Old South: A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings (1918), The Wanderers (1917), The Fortunes of Garin (1915), The Witch (1914), Hagar (1913), Cease Firing (1912), The Long Roll (1911), Lewis Rand (1908), The Goddess of Reason (1907), Sir Mortimer (1904), Audrey (1902), To Have and To Hold (1900), Prisoners of Hope, A Tale of Colonial Virginia (1898).
SECONDARY
Dorothy M. Scura, “Mary Johnston,” American Women Authors, Vol. 3 (1980), 416–19. Cratis Williams, “The Southern Mountaineer in Fact and Fiction,” abridged in Appalachian Journal 3:3 (spring 1976), 236.
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