The twisty roads winding through Appalachia can seem labyrinthine and intimidating to outsiders, but many residents spend an hour or more driving on them to get to work each day. As jobs and people have increasingly migrated to urban areas, those who remain in the many rural localities of Appalachia […]
Read More
Virginia will make history on Tuesday: For the first time, both of its political parties are holding concurrent primaries for governor, with two Democrats and three Republicans running for their party’s nomination. None of the five candidates are from the Appalachian part of the state, which is not necessarily surprising. […]
Read More
It’s mid-April, and the New River flows lazily past the town of Thurmond, West Virginia between ridges marked by the mix of leafless brown and electric green that signals the moment just before nature explodes and rafters return. Looking down from the Concho Rim high above the river, Haynes Mansfield […]
Read More
Donald Trump’s electoral domination in Appalachia—defeating Hillary Clinton 63 percent to 33 percent and winning more than 90 percent of its counties—marked an exclamation point on two decades of regional drift from Democrats to Republicans. The power shift includes not just presidential votes and congressional delegations, but state legislatures and […]
Read More