Qualla: Kentucky Appalachians https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:06 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/v/0/kentucky-appalachians-wk/hero-small.webp Qualla: Kentucky Appalachians https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians Kentucky Appalachians: Introduction https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians/ Photo credit W.marsh, CC BY-SA 3.0. Loretta Lynn was born in a cabin in Butcher Hollow. Naomi Judd raised her daughters in the hills near Ashland. Ricky Skaggs grew up in Cordell, Chris Stapleton near Paintsville, Keith Whitley in Sandy Hook - and the writers, Robert Penn Warren and Jesse Stuart, walked these same ridges and tried to put what they saw into prose. Whatever you call this corner of Kentucky - the state markets it as the Kentucky Appalachians, locals just call it Eastern Kentucky or the Eastern Coalfield - it has produced more enduring American voices per square mile than almost anywhere else in the country. The mountains insist on being heard.

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Image: W.marsh | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/v/0/kentucky-appalachians-wk/dnv0-kentucky-appalachians-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Kentucky Appalachians: Where Kentucky Gets Country https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians/ Photo credit J654567, CC BY-SA 3.0. Kentucky is a country state by reputation, but Eastern Kentucky is where that reputation lives in the land itself. The terrain looks more like West Virginia than the rolling pastures and white-fenced horse farms most people picture when they hear the state's name. Ridges fold int...

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Image: J654567 | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/v/0/kentucky-appalachians-wk/dnv0-kentucky-appalachians-where-kentucky-gets-country.mp3 0:06 2 full Kentucky Appalachians: The Voices the Hills Made https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians/ Photo credit Tim Kiser (w:User:Malepheasant), CC BY-SA 3.0 us. Robert Penn Warren, who won three Pulitzers and became America's first official Poet Laureate, came from a Kentucky that bordered this country and absorbed its rhythms. Jesse Stuart, born in W-Hollow in Greenup County, wrote thousands of poems and stories about these specific rid...

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Image: Tim Kiser (w:User:Malepheasant) | CC BY-SA 3.0 us

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/v/0/kentucky-appalachians-wk/dnv0-kentucky-appalachians-the-voices-the-hills-made.mp3 0:06 3 full Kentucky Appalachians: The Coalfield Underneath https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians/ Photo credit Tim Kiser (w:User:Malepheasant), CC BY-SA 3.0 us. The state government calls this the Kentucky Appalachians for tourism brochures. Locals know it as the Eastern Coalfield - a name that explains both the prosperity and the hardship. Coal built the towns, paid the wages, and shaped the politics. Coal also hollowed mountains, foule...

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]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/v/0/kentucky-appalachians-wk/dnv0-kentucky-appalachians-the-coalfield-underneath.mp3 0:06 4 full Kentucky Appalachians: The Knobs and the Edges https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians/ Photo credit Publichall, Public domain. Mount Sterling marks an interesting boundary. The state map places it inside the Kentucky Appalachians, but locals consider it part of the Bluegrass - that older, locally-defined Bluegrass rimmed by a circular chain of hills called The Knobs. Mount Sterling sits west of the easte...

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Image: Publichall | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/v/0/kentucky-appalachians-wk/dnv0-kentucky-appalachians-the-knobs-and-the-edges.mp3 0:06 5 full Kentucky Appalachians: Reading the Land from Above https://qualla.com/kentucky-appalachians/ Photo credit Tim Kiser (w:User:Malepheasant), CC BY-SA 3.0 us. From cruising altitude, the Kentucky Appalachians read as a vast textured carpet of ridges running roughly northeast to southwest - the trailing edge of the same Appalachian mass that defines West Virginia and eastern Tennessee. River valleys cut white scars through the green. St...

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]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/v/0/kentucky-appalachians-wk/dnv0-kentucky-appalachians-reading-the-land-from-above.mp3 0:06 6 full