Excellent overview of Appalachian region
Our Southern Highlanders is Kephart's masterpiece. For anyone interested in Southern Appalachia, this book is a must. It is full of rich narratives on his personal experiences in the Great Smoky Mountains, and gives an in-depth look at mountain customs, beliefs, and vernacular. Although some anthropologists and historians have issues with a few generalizations and stereotypes, it is beside the point. Our Southern Highlanders is one of very few primary sources about the region that are reliable, and though it may have flaws, is the closest insight modern readers have to 19th and early 20th century Appalachia.

A view of the people of the Smokey Mountains
My favorite book of the past ten years. The view of the mountain people of North Carolina and Tennessee is somewhat dated, but many of the human chacteristics of the people are true to this day. If you want to know about the Scotch-Irish of the mountains in the early part of the 20th century, this is your book.

Western North Carolina
I believe that the author, Horace Kephart, gave a very vivid and true descripiton of life in the western part of North Carolina in the Great Smokies during the early 1900's. I live in Asheville, NC and was raised here, as was my ancestors as far as I can remember or have been told. My grandmother and great grandmother often told stories of their childhoods living next to laurel thickets and getting their water from the springs. The mountains here are so beautiful and haunting and Mr. Kephart apparently found this as he says in one section of his book "the richness of the Great Smoky Forest has been the wonder and the admiration of everyone who has traversed it". This book was a pleasure to read and would recommend it highly.

Eye Opener
We northeasterners have little knowledge of our Southern highlanders or the reasons for their unique lifestyle. This book, written by a participant, is a real eye opener, and a fascinating one. The subject area may as well be the moon for all we know. I couldn't put this down. Especially good was the discussion of how these people came to live where they do, where they came from and why. Enjoy this look at a life we seldom think about and know so little of.

Prejudice, and nonsense
Don't buy this book. My family has lived in the heart of Appalachia 200 years and these quaint stereotype are just not true. We are, and have always been, much like Scotch-Irish people anywhere else in America, (after all, they came from us). Ohhh, O.K., maybe we're a teensy bit better.