Series Information

#103
As the 20th century begins, the phonograph and the radio expose the mountain people to new influences and take mountain music across America. But times are hard, and Appalachia falls into an economic depression even before the rest of the country. President Roosevelt's New Deal brings electricity, WPA and CCC jobs, and new infrastructure, and FDR becomes a hero in Appalachia. Then World War II begins taking many young people away from the mountains, and postwar mechanization replaces coal miners and sends more people to Northern cities in search of jobs. For those who try to stay home, it becomes harder to hold onto land as state and federal governments claim property for dams and family farmsteads are flooded. The 1960s War on Poverty again sends federal aid into Appalachia, but television and magazines show painful images of hunger and poverty, reinforcing the stereotype of the poor hillbilly.

• KETKY Saturday, November 21 at 10:00 pm EST

#101
When the first European settlers arrive in the Allegheny, Cumberland, and Blue Ridge mountains in the 17th century, they trade and intermarry with the Shawnee, Choctaw, Creek, and Cherokee who have lived there for centuries. But by the mid-18th century, the swelling pioneer population leads to decades of combat on the Appalachian frontier that eventually forces the natives out. As the Scotch-Irish and other immigrants settle in, the isolation of the mountains helps preserve the cultural traditions they have brought with them. The men of Appalachia fight bravely in the American Revolution, but then rail at taxes and regulations imposed by the new American government. Evangelical revivals sweep the region in the 18th and early 19th centuries, and traditional music mingles with the rhythms used by African slaves to form a glorious new gospel music.

• KET1 Sunday, November 29 at 11:00 am EST
• KETKY Tuesday, December 1 at 8:30 am EST
• KETKY Friday, December 4 at 8:00 pm EST