'Back in the bad times,' said Bongalis, 'I seen people go out, be snow on the ground. During what Mae Bongalis called 'the Hoover times,' reliance on wild foods minimized dependency on the company store. Viewed historically, knowledge of the mixed mesophytic has aided physical and cultural survival over the past century. Nor does it separate woods from people: 'They're taking away our dignity by destroying our forest,' wrote Vernon Williams on a recently circulated petition to study and protect the forest.

Local historical discourse does not separate the woods from the mountains, for to do so literally would be disastrous: 'What's holding up the mountains? Trees!' as Jerry Bone, thirty-eight, of Dry Creek put it. Authenticating their relationship to the land, such talk defends against the cultural disappearance (via stereotyping) that operates in tandem with literal removal. Through sayings, place name etymologies, genealogical digressions, local anecdotes, and historical recollections, speakers challenge a historical process that separates people from their land and resources. History is, as Henry Glassie writes, 'a prime mode of cultural construction…a way people organize reality to investigate truth to survive in their own terms.' 12 On Coal River, historical discourse renders coherent a struggle to maintain 'place' on land that has shifted over that past century into the control of absentee owners. 11 Constructing history, people relate themselves to their surroundings and position that relationship in time. As talk about change, forest talk is part of a larger effort to construct local history through historical discourse.

How are you holding up