Missionaries, such as the late Jack Weller, have called them "yesterday's people," fundraisers seeking charity from outside the region have demeaned them as "our contemporary ancestors;" and, sociologists have called their folkways an "analgesic subculture" wedded to fatalistic ways. Refreshingly, "Appalachia," code for we're-poor-help-us, never appears on these pages.

In this shining tapestry of remembrances, facile generalization so common to much of the writing about the region gives way to a finely woven and warm description of living, loving, and toiling in the coal fields at the very nadir of the Depression. A son and daughter-in-law tell the story of "Squire," a coal miner paralyzed by a slate fall, and his family as they scratched a living from an environment that sapped the souls of all but the hardiest. Tempered by tough times, character emerges from these pages as rock-hard and lustrous as the coal they mined. The White's accomplish in 300 pages what William Bennett has not yet done in two tomes on the subject.