In the spring of 1895, a sudden wage cut swept through the Flat Top-Pocahontas coal fields along the Virginia/West Virginia border, touching off one of the earliest large-scale labor confrontations in that part of Appalachia. What began as a wildcat strike quickly shut down mines along the Norfolk and Western Railroad, disrupted coal shipments to Norfolk, and brought state militia into the company town of Pocahontas.

Today we tell the story of the Flat Top miners’ strike of 1895.

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Born aboard a ship of immigrants in the Atlantic Ocean, Kasper Mansker became a longhunter, venturing out to explore the wilderness of Kentucky and Tennessee from his home in what’s now West Virginia. From those longhunts to building Mansker’s Station and helping shape the Cumberland frontier, his life is part of the story of those who moved west on the Appalachian frontier.
 
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Daniel Ellis of Carter County, Tennessee was a wagon maker who became one of the most successful guides of the Civil War. Living behind Confederate lines in East Tennessee, Ellis created a secret route through the Appalachian Mountains to Union territory at Cumberland Gap.

Traveling mostly at night and avoiding Confederate patrols, Ellis made about twenty journeys through East Tennessee and Southwest Virginia, guiding roughly four thousand Union supporters to safety. About two thousand of them later joined the Union Army.

Join us as we tell the story of the man Confederate soldiers called “The Old Red Fox” for his ability to escape capture, another one of the Stories of Appalachia.

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This week, Rod and Steve tell the story of Ray Vaughn Shores, better known as Von Shores, an Appalachian aviator and popular aerial daredevil in Southwest Virginia and Eastern Kentucky during the 1920s and ’30s, who, it’s said, once crashed his airplane near Pound, Virginia

He was a favorite at local airshows and fairs and it’s also said he ran whiskey for Al Capone during prohibition.

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This week, we tell a story from the lawless mountain border between western North Carolina and east Tennessee during the Civil War. As great battles raged elsewhere, outlaws and deserters came to the mountains to hide, to rob and to turn old trails and creek crossings into killing grounds.

At the center of this story is John Jackson Kirkland and his gang, whose violence touched soldiers, civilians, rivals, and even their own kin. This is a story of a war without sides, and justice that never came.

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This week, Steve and Rod tell the story of Granville “Stick” McGhee and Walter “Brownie” McGhee, two brothers from East Tennessee whose music helped shape American blues and early rock ’n’ roll. Born in Knoxville, the McGhee brothers took the music they heard growing up and used it to launch themselves onto the national stage.

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In 1730, seven Cherokee leaders traveled from their Appalachian home to the heart of London. Hand-picked by a Scottish adventurer named Alexander Cumming, they were presented to King George II as "Kings" of a new empire. Today we tell the story of that voyage and how these Native Americans navigated their way through the streets of the city at the center of the British Empire, all while securing an alliance on their own terms. 

It’s another one of the Stories of Appalachia.

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The Big Bull Tunnel in Wise County, Virginia looks like any other railroad tunnel, just a simple cut through a hillside.  Looks, though, can be deceiving, as the tunnel’s history is packed with accidents, strange noises, deaths, and a chilling encounter that turned a routine inspection into a bit of Appalachian folklore. In this episode, Steve and Rod tell the story of the tunnel’s difficult construction, the tragedies that followed, and the story that convinced railroad officials something inside the mountain was best avoided.

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Today we tell not one but two stories, both involving the same community in Fannin County, Georgia. 

In 1864 two men, brothers-in-law Elisha Stanley and Evan Hughes, became the victims of a gang of violent bushwhackers who terrorized the area during the Civil War, leaving their families to pick up the pieces. Forty years later, in 1906, the Tilley Bend massacre occurred in the same area, causing a local woman, Elizabeth Bradley, known as a "Granny Woman" and healer, to place a curse on the community, in the process creating what may be the most well-known bit of Appalachian folklore in that part of Georgia. 

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This week Rod and Steve tell the story of a gang of robbers who cast a long shadow over Ashe County, North Carolina in the unsettled years after the Civil War. One by one they fell, until only Linville Eller remained. He, too, met his fate in 1890 after a massive manhunt.
 
This is the story of the Eller Gang, led by brothers Linville and Henry Eller, the North Carolina high country’s most notorious 19th-century outlaws, another one of the Stories of Appalachia.
 
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This week’s story is the bizarre true tale of Leila Davidson Hansell, known as "The Sunshine Woman," and the controversy surrounding her final resting place in Hendersonville, NC.

Leila's final wish upon her death in 1915 was to be buried above ground in a unique mausoleum topped with 147 squares of prism glass, designed to let the sun shine down on her remains. For over two decades, her glass-topped tomb became a must-see tourist attraction, fueled by a 1926 newspaper article that confirmed the skeleton could, indeed, be seen through the glass, contrary to the designer’s adamant denials. 

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