Our Stories
jasperconner July 20th, 2010
Stories from Members of the Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards
Story telling is an important part of how we communicate as Appalachian people, so SAMS is dedicated to getting our stories out to the community and to the world.
Below is the first project that the SAMS Story Telling Internship produced, called It Takes Unity, a pamphlet as well as an online publication of the stories of a few members of the Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards. Click through each member’s story below to hear about why they joined the fight and what they think it will take to win.
It Takes Unity
Bob Mullins, “third generation deep-miner, member of SAMS, former Union miner.”
Judi Clark, “lifetime resident of the area, board member of SAMS, resident of Big Stone Gap, VA”
Judy Needham, “board member of SAMS, resident of Andover, VA.”
Mike Clark, “board member of SAMS, resident of Big Stone Gap, VA”
Sam Broach, “third generation deep-miner, president of SAMS.”
Tug Smith, “SAMS member, resident of Exeter, VA”
Stop by our office at 301 Wood Avenue(old Westmoreland building) in Big Stone Gap for a printed copy of It Takes Unity. Click the link here for the PDF version of It Takes Unity.
Thank you to our funders The Heartwood Council and Appalachian Voices.
We’d like to thank Emily Currier, who collected and edited these interviews to create this publication. We’d also like to thank Patrick St. John for volunteering his time to lay out the pamphlet version of It Takes Unity. We’d like to thank the RReNEW Collective who spent countless hours on this project and others supporting SAMS And lastly and most importantly, we’d like to thank the members of The Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards for lending their time, and sharing their stories.
We are getting ready for our second Story Telling Project, so give us a call down at the office, 276-565-2073, if you’d like to contribute your story.