Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This is not a book about the life and times of an Eastern Kentucky hillbilly. It is the story of a man who was born and reared in the northern state of Ohio, with ancestors who had roots in Eastern Kentucky. I was born and raised in Pike County, Kentucky, on Blackberry Creek, where most of the real events of the Hatfield and McCoy troubles transpired. Like Vance, I eventually found my way to the Ivy League, a generation before Vance was born, where I took a Masters Degree from Cornell. I was born before Pearl Harbor, which makes me of the same generation as Vance’s grandmother. I can assure readers that I never knew a woman of that generation who used the language he ascribes to his Granny. In fact, I never knew a man of that generation who talked like Granny Vance. Granny Vance uses the “F-word” more in this book than ALL the men I grew up among used it in the eighteen years before I left to go to college. I am not saying that Vance’s Granny did not use the language he ascribes to her, but I am saying that she was an anomaly. The title speaks of a “Culture in crisis,” when it is really about man whose mother was in perpetual personal crisis. The book tells us something about one of the hundreds of thousands of hillbillies who went north seeking employment, but it has nothing of value about the people of Eastern Kentucky. The author knows little about the real history of Breathitt County, as anyone who has read Professor Bob Hutton’s “Bloody Breathitt” knows. He knows even less about the rest of Eastern Kentucky. There are two approaches to an analysis of Eastern Kentucky. The “Deficiency” or “Culture of poverty” is the most widely used approach, and the title of this book tells us that this the author’s own approach. The other, and far more correct approach is the “Colonization” approach. Every book that takes the “Deficiency” approach mentions early on the Hatfield and McCoy feud. These authors present us as people wo are descended from ancestors who killed dozens of each other over a pig. The story of the Hatfields and McCoys, as it is presented in the mass media of books and film is a compendium of legends and lies, having only a slight resemblance to real history. This is shown clearly in my book, “The Hatfield and McCoy Feud after Kevin Costner: Rescuing History.” Mr. Vance tells us that he is a “distant relative” of Jim Vance, and he connects himself with the feud early on, telling us on page 24: “Papaw’s distant cousin—also Jim Vance—married into the Hatfield family and joined a group of former Confederate soldiers and sympathizers called the Wildcats. When Cousin Jim murdered former Union soldier Asa Harmon McCoy, he kicked off one of the most famous family feuds in American history.” Other than correctly naming two of the characters, everything in that section of the book is absolutely false—by the record. It is proven beyond question in my book, “Crazy Jim Vance and the Men Who Murdered Him.” Jim Vance did NOT “marry into the Hatfield family. Vance’s wife was Mary Collins Vance, one of the few people in Tug Valley who was NOT related to the Hatfields. There never was “a group of former Confederate soldiers and sympathizers called the Wildcats.” The Logan Wildcats were a militia group formed in Logan County, West Virginia in the 1850’s. When the War started, it became Company D of the 34th Virginia Infantry, and stayed in the regular Confederate Army for the duration of the war, disbanding when the South surrendered. Jim Vance was never a member of that unit, either before or during the War. By the sworn testimony of his widow, Harmon McCoy was NOT a FORMER Union soldier when he died. He had re-enlisted and, quoting his widow’s affidavit, “Was killed BY REBELS while on his way back to the regiment.” Jim Vance was not connected to the death of Harmon McCoy until after Vance was murdered on January 8, 1888. That story came from men who were under indictment for Vance’s murder! J.D. Vance, like far too many of my fellow contemporary hillbillies, takes great pride in being descended from a murderer, even though the claim that he was a murderer is a proven lie! Vance says that being descended from a murder makes him part of “Hillbilly Royalty.” He places himself in that exalted position by accepting a lie about his relative that came from the men who murdered that relative. In fact, Jim Vance was a justice of the peace, and an elected constable in Logan County West Virginia, and a deputy sheriff in Pike County, Kentucky. Jim Vance was the only man of his era who was a sworn law officer in BOTH West Virginia and Kentucky. He was appointed a deputy sheriff in Pike County by Sheriff Perry Cline, a brother in law of Harmon McCoy. When Perry Cline, brother to Harmon Mccoy’s widow, was sworn in as sheriff of Pike County, his bond was signed by Colonel John Dils, the richest man in Pike County AND by James Vance. In 1875, the eldest son of Harmon McCoy, Jacob McCoy, married Elizabeth Vance, daughter of Jim Vance. The nuptials were solemnized in the home of Jim Vance. That same year, Martha McCoy Daniels, daughter of Harmon McCoy sold a large tract of land to Jim Vance. She took a note from Vance for a third of the purchase price. Yet feud story writers, and descendants who wish to be descended from murderers, would have us believe that Perry Cline thought that Jim Vance murdered his brother in law, and Martha McCoy Daniels thought that Vance murdered her father. Of all the major characters in the Hatfield and McCoy story, Jim Vance was the ONLY one who was never accused of a crime—not even a misdemeanor—in his entire long life! Such is the extent to which some will go to establish their descent from murderers, because they think that makes them “Hillbilly Royalty.” Writers who employ the deficiency approach to my ancestors ALWAYS refer to the supersized feud yarn, which is at least 80% fiction, legends and lies. The history of Eastern Kentucky and Southern West Virginia can only be correctly analyzed using the colonization model. My ancestors were a hardy and peaceful people, who went into a barren land and built a culture that allowed them to live successfully and peacefully there. That culture was utterly destroyed by the entry of the land and coal barons, who invaded in the late 1880’s, grabbed up the land and mineral by hook or by crook, and utterly upended that culture. One may learn something about one family of out-migrants from the hills by reading “Hillbilly Elegy,” but a much better general understanding of our history can be had from reading “Colonialism in Modern American: The Appalachian Case,” by Linda Johnson, and Don Askins. Vance has written a good story, which may or may not accurately describe his family, but, by adopting the “Deficiency” approach to our history, he cannot give his reader a true understanding of the people he purports to describe.