Some residents have held small demonstrations or are speaking against the project at government meetings.

I live in Big Stone Gap, Virginia, where coal and timber once drove much of our local economy. Last weekend, our town hosted its fifth annual Blue Highway Fest, and Thursday's opening performance sold out. Overall ticket sales were reportedly running about 35% ahead of last year.

What interests me isn't just the bluegrass music. It's what happens when a small Appalachian town starts treating its own culture and heritage as something worth investing in.

For generations, we shipped coal, timber, and eventually too many of our young people out of these mountains. Now we're bringing visitors in to experience something that's been here all along.

I wrote about the festival, the people behind it, and the volunteers who travel hundreds of miles to help make it happen.

Here's the article if you're interested:

https://pickup-trucks-progress.ghost.io/sold-out/

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver is incredible but Demon goes through so many foster homes, schools and social circles that the side characters stack up fast. Foster parents, social workers, teammates, girlfriends... I keep having to pause and think "wait, who was Tommy again?"
What do u guys use when a book has 30+ recurring side characters??

Visited today. Very interesting! Worth the stop for sure.
Never knew there was a movie let alone a Richard Gere/Laura Liney movie! Watched it on Netflix thinking it would be horrible and it wasn’t bad!
Anyways, If your around Point Pleasant West Virginia check it out!

Red Bull Chariot Race is hitting High Street on October 24th where 24 teams will be racing homemade chariots !
Free and open to the public at 1:00pm!

https://www.redbull.com/us-en/events/red-bull-chariot-race-west-virginia

Appalachia edition!

THIS WEEKEND: Remote Area Medical (RAM) will be in Grundy, Virginia! A free RAM Clinic will be held at Riverview Elementary/Middle School on October 17-18, offering dental, vision, and medical care at no cost to anyone in need.

Learn more about the clinic and stay up to date using the link below.

https://www.ramusa.org/events/grundy-virginia/?occurrence=2026-10-17&utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=post

The Smoky Mountain Twins was a pseudonym used for recordings by two prominent blind musicians of the early country music era:

​George Reneau (often called "The Blind Minstrel of the Smoky Mountains") was born in East Tennessee and was one of early country music's true pioneers, recording blues, traditional folk, and gospel material even before the famous 1927 Bristol Sessions.

​Lester McFarland (often paired with Robert Gardner as "Mac and Bob") was a multi-instrumentalist from Kentucky. McFarland and Reneau occasionally teamed up in the mid-1920s under various pseudonyms—including the Smoky Mountain Twins, the Collins Brothers, and the Cramer Brothers—to record for labels like Vocalion, Brunswick, and Conqueror.

Before radio networks and professional Nashville studios dominated the genre, local traditions were commercialized by capturing street performers, blind minstrels, and regional duos who blended traditional Appalachian vocal harmonizing with sentimental parlor and gospel tunes.

tazewell county [OC]

For example I did not grow up fat but I did end up athletic later in life only from extensive self guided research and trial and error never once did I play on a sports team and I really feel like I shouldn’t be treated like an authority on anything because I’m not formally trained to be this way I have no business looking like this i know no one in my circle who knows how this shits supposed to be done but people assume i know what im doing

Another example i grew up In a rural area and i had a MySpace when i was 14 got into scene and emo culture (a subculture that didnt exist in my town) I found a local boy who lived in a trailer park down the street his father was a biker and he dressed a little like the pictures id seen on the internet. I befriend him not knowing any better simply being attracted to his look, told me he’s a devil worshiper i thought hell yeah that’s pretty cool (I did not believe in the devil)
I turned 19 and I moved to the city head full of knowledge of ghost hunting and ancient texts

The city is very different ngl… i can’t seem to find anyone with even a remotely similar experience…