Rating: 
Summary: Shows HOPE in the midst of adversity
Review:
Carl Mays writes, "Like us, the settlers of Appalachia's Southern Highlands were far from perfect, but beautiful, inspiring stories have come from their experiences as they adapted to the struggle for survival and sought to find meaning and fulfillment in life." What I like most about this book is that it shows the HOPE in the lives of a group of people who carved out individual, family, and community niches in a new country full of hardships and peril. Mays refers to this hope as "faith and determination."
Originating with interviews from the 1970s, Mays presents 200 years of history as told through stories handed down from parents and grandparents. He describes the subjects of these accounts as "...good-hearted people with faith in God, nature, themselves, and their neighbors." He goes on to share 48 stories that "demonstrate the principles, the spirit, and the character of the people upon which our nation has been built."
The author does a great job in presenting the years between 1765-1965 in a balanced manner. He deals with the positives and negatives in chronicling the lives of mountaineers, highlanders, and Cherokees. And, it is significant to me that there are as many accounts of females as males in this book. Often, such books seem to fault in this area. Also, even though the book features strong, individualistic, fallible people, it gives credit to these individuals for working together to help establish a backbone in the Southern Highlands.
In the early days of our country, everyone had to "fight," so to speak. Mays writes of this. At the same time, unlike some books that deal with the history of this area of the country, the people used more more than guns and knives to bring civilization to a wild frontier. For example, Mays shows how John Ross, who was 7/8 Scots-Irish, 1/8 Cherokee, a graduate of private schools and college, was the main Cherokee chief for almost 40 years. He worked tirelessly for their freedom. This refutes claims that all the early people of the Southern Highlands were uneducated and imperialistic.
In a book that is sometimes humorous, sometimes heartrending, and always inspirational, Carl Mays does a great job in presenting these Southern Appalachian pioneers through short personal episodes, along with additional historical research. I highly recommend PEOPLE OF PASSION to both adults and students.
Rating:
Summary: A History Book That Reads Like A Novel
Review:
I read the other reviews, and it seems that I am the first teenager to review this book.
People of Passion caught my eye. It was lying on a table at home. My mother brought it back from a conference she attended in Gatlinburg. The title, the painting on the cover, and the Stories of Faith & Determination appealed to me. I picked it up, flipped through it, and read one of the stories. Then I read another, and then another - until I finished the entire book!
Each story in this book about the early inhabitants of the Great Smoky Mountains and the Southern Appalachia Highlands runs three to four pages, with some a little longer, some a little shorter. Since I flipped open to a story and didn't start at the beginning, at first I didn't realize the personal stories are in historical order, covering 200 years. After realizing this, I went back and read the Introduction and then proceeded to read the rest of the book in order. This made the reading even more interesting and helped me better understand the feelings and actions of the people during the periods they lived.
I noticed that none of the other reviewers mentioned The Acknowledgments & Notes in the back of the book. I found this section also to be very interesting and informative.
I've already decided that this book will be the basis of my research paper in school this year. I was intrigued by the way the author mixed the history of the area with the inhabitants' personal stories. You don't really realize it's a history book since it reads like a novel - or a group of short stories, which it is.
Rating:
Summary: Great Mother's Day Gift!
Review: "People Of Passion" was an attractive Mother's Day gift from my son and daughter-in-law. (Click on the cover to enlarge it and you will see what I mean.) The original art by Vern Hippensteal whetted my appetite to savor the stories inside by Carl Mays. They certainly did not disappoint. They are outstanding, presenting word pictures of 200 years of Southern Appalachian history told through personal stories. I have many favorites among them, but since the book was given to me when it was, I must say that "The Mother's Day Gift" set in the 1930s was special. It reminded me so much of a similar event that happened when I was a child. My son and daughter-in-law got the book when they were on vacation in The Great Smoky Mountains, and I have enjoyed it even more than the delicious mountain-made candy they combined with it!From Amazon, I have ordered 3 more copies of the book to give as gifts. So, needless to say, I highly recommend this collection of 48 stories. Some will make you laugh; others will bring tears; all will give you a greater appreciation for and understanding of the Cherokees, mountaineers and highlanders who settled the Southern Appalachians and to whom this book is dedicated.
Rating:
Summary: Great Mother's Day Gift!
Review: "People Of Passion" was an attractive Mother's Day gift from my son and daughter-in-law. (Click on the cover to enlarge it and you will see what I mean.) The original art by Vern Hippensteal whetted my appetite to savor the stories inside by Carl Mays. They certainly did not disappoint. They are outstanding, presenting word pictures of 200 years of Southern Appalachian history told through personal stories. I have many favorites among them, but since the book was given to me when it was, I must say that "The Mother's Day Gift" set in the 1930s was special. It reminded me so much of a similar event that happened when I was a child. My son and daughter-in-law got the book when they were on vacation in The Great Smoky Mountains, and I have enjoyed it even more than the delicious mountain-made candy they combined with it! From Amazon, I have ordered 3 more copies of the book to give as gifts. So, needless to say, I highly recommend this collection of 48 stories. Some will make you laugh; others will bring tears; all will give you a greater appreciation for and understanding of the Cherokees, mountaineers and highlanders who settled the Southern Appalachians and to whom this book is dedicated.
Rating:
Summary: Informative and Uplifting Book!
Review: 200 years of history told through these 48 short personal stories makes great reading. Some of the stories almost tore my heart out, but the encouraging message of "Our good will find us out" resonates throughout the book. Beginning in the 1760s, the author presents stories of a wide gamut of people who carved out niches for themselves and their families in the Southern Appalachian Highlands. Mays includes stories of European-Americans, Cherokees, African-Americans, and people of unknown origins such as the Melungeons, as he presents a body of work that honestly reveals both the kindness and cruelty of humanity.
Some of the personalities in the book are well known, but most of them are unknown to all but a relatively few people. And it is the accounts of mostly-unknown people such as Caleb Porter, White Fawn, Hattie Whaley, Charles Cansler, Tom Walker, Mahala Mullins, Marjorie Chalmers, and Nero and Jethro that captured my heart and soul. Mays writes, "Basically, these were simple, good-hearted people with faith in God, nature, themselves, and their neighbors. Though their legacy lives on, many of their stores are almost forgotten. That's why I wanted to reopen my files and revive some of their accounts in this book, a book I began over a quarter of a century ago."
Having been born and reared in Western North Carolina, and having a Scots-Irish Cherokee heritage, I can especially relate to this informative and uplifting book. And there is no doubt about its entertainment value. As I was reading (and re-reading) it, I thought, "What a great TV series this would make!" I highly recommend People Of Passion for a wide age span of readers. Older folks will appreciate it as it connects them with yesterday, and students can learn much about not only the heritage of the Southern Appalachian Highlands but also about American courage and spirit.
Rating:
Summary: Female Ingenuity!
Review: I can relate to this book. "People of Passion" contains stories so very much like the stories my grandmother used to tell me. Today, with all of our conveniences, it is good to read these accounts and see what our ancestors went through during "the good old days." The stories are varied, of course, since they span 200 years. I appreciate them all, and the brevity with which they are told. But I especially liked the one titled "Female Ingenuity." It's about about Ella, whose inflammatory rheumatism kept her in bed one winter for many weeks. But that didn't stop her. One of the things she did was ask her husband Jacob to get some eggs from neighbors who had chickens. He got two dozen, and Ella put them in bed with her. Keeping the eggs under the quilt and close to her body, Ella turned and shifted them as carefully as a mother hen. Twenty-three fluffy yellow chicks were hatched. And by that time, Ella was improved enough to get up and care for her brood. I would like to tell Ella, "You go, girl!" And I would like to thank Carl Mays for gathering and sharing these wonderful stories, which should be saved and passed along...
Rating:
Summary: Female Ingenuity!
Review: I can relate to this book. "People of Passion" contains stories so very much like the stories my grandmother used to tell me. Today, with all of our conveniences, it is good to read these accounts and see what our ancestors went through during "the good old days." The stories are varied, of course, since they span 200 years. I appreciate them all, and the brevity with which they are told. But I especially liked the one titled "Female Ingenuity." It's about about Ella, whose inflammatory rheumatism kept her in bed one winter for many weeks. But that didn't stop her. One of the things she did was ask her husband Jacob to get some eggs from neighbors who had chickens. He got two dozen, and Ella put them in bed with her. Keeping the eggs under the quilt and close to her body, Ella turned and shifted them as carefully as a mother hen. Twenty-three fluffy yellow chicks were hatched. And by that time, Ella was improved enough to get up and care for her brood. I would like to tell Ella, "You go, girl!" And I would like to thank Carl Mays for gathering and sharing these wonderful stories, which should be saved and passed along...
Rating:
Summary: Early Emancipators in Southern Appalachia
Review: It surprised me - and I'm quite sure that many people are unaware of the leadership provided by Southern Appalachia settlers in abolishing slavery in America long before the Emancipation Proclamation issued by Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863. I enjoyed the 48 stories in this book about these settlers, but I especially appreciated the one titled "Freedom For All." It describes how early America, much like Europe, primarily had two classes of people: (1) the aristocratic land and business owners, and (2) the menial working class. The middle class had not yet been established. The aristocrats grabbed up the fertile lands near the east coast; in the South, the system of large plantations limited the number of Americans who could prosper. Seeking opportunities, hardy colonists accepted the challenge of the high mountain ranges. Scotch-Irish and Germans, along with Huguenots (French protestants), Quakers, and poor English who had been indentured servants in the East made the trek. Many settled in the mountainous regions of Pennsylvania and Maryland. Later, they moved on down to Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. Eventually, the Shenandoah Valley became a channel for a continuous stream of people passing through, moving south into the Carolinas, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Georgia. The process accelerated as eastern aristocrats decided that enslaving Africans was more profitable and productive than the European indentured servitude system. As black slavery increased, more and more indentured servants were freed to find independence to the south and beyond the mountains. An antislavery sentiment grew among the mountaineers who came from the indentured culture and struggled to establish an individualistic way of life. Whites whose families had personally experienced the effects of servitude formed antislavery groups. One such group was the North Carolina Manumission (set free) Society. This society denounced the importation and exportation of slaves, and they provided for the purchase of slave contracts to help them gain freedom. Through their efforts, over 2,000 slaves in North Carolina were freed between 1824-1826. Between 1817-1830, Baptist ministers in the mountains of Tennessee and Kentucky joined forces to promote and encourage emancipation. Earlier efforts by a group of Scotch-Irish immigrants led by Presbyterian minister David Rice paved the way for this work. As early as 1792, when Kentucky penned a state constitution, Rice led a group to push for excluding slavery in the state. The Friends of Humanity was formed in Kentucky in 1807. Led by 11 ministers and 13 laymen of several denominations, the group promoted freedom for all humans. Leaders in East Tennessee pushed for providing education for slaves. Groups were formed in Maryville and Knoxville to spotlight the plight of slaves and take steps to assist them. The "Presbyterian Witness," published in Knoxville, ran an editorial that claimed there was not a solitary argument in favor of educating a white person that could not be used in educating a black person. The editor wrote: "If one has a soul that will never die, so has the other. If one has the susceptibilities of improvement - mentally, socially, and morally - so has the other. If one is bound by the laws of God to improve the talents he has received from the Creator's hands, so is the other." Through the years it has been said that the people of Southern Appalachia are withdrawn and "hard to get to know." To a degree this may be true. A large part of this has had to do with the fact that they are very protective of their individuality. At the same time they have always tried to assist others in acquiring the opportunity to express individuality. No place has this been better shown in Southern Appalachian history than in their support to help all creatures of God experience freedom. Good reading, good information, well presented.
Rating:
Summary: Brief stories and snapshots of the lives of great figures
Review: People Of Passion is an anthology of brief stories and snapshots of the lives of great figures from American history, with especial focus upon Southern Appalachia. The common theme of the vignettes is an emotional drive that nourishes the soul, as individuals labored to fulfill their dreams, bring good works, or just understand themselves and others better. The short tales, usually no more than four pages, span history from the 1700's to the mid-1900's and bring the can-do spirit of America to the page in a burst of impressions and sensations.
Rating:
Summary: Valuable to Teachers and Students!
Review: The 48 stories that Carl Mays collected and wrote, along with his historical research of the Southern Highlands, provide an exceptional resource for teachers and students. And a person does not have to be from Southern Appalachia in order to appreciate this book. As the cover material indicates, it spotlights Southern Appalachia and represents America.
Quite frankly, I acquired it after I read the Amazon review by the teacher who moved from New York to Atlanta, and got it when she vacationed in the Great Smoky Mountains. (So I guess this shows the value of reader reviews on Amazon. The book, "The First Days of School: How To Be An Effective Teacher," led me to "People of Passion." Then the teacher's review led me to purchase the book.)
I enjoyed and appreciated the entire collection. However, being a classroom teacher, I was especially moved by the story from the 1950s about "Nero and Jethro." An excerpt from that account reads: "Soon, all the teachers began to walk the extra mile to help the twins and encourage them. If they happened to get two of ten test questions correct, more than likely the teacher would write on the paper, 'Good! You got two of them right,' rather than focusing on the ones they missed... A teacher found one of Jethro's papers with her written comment neatly removed. She questioned him about it. 'We'uns saves 'em,' Jethro said shyly. 'Mama pastes 'em in a big book. She's awful proud of all the nice things written to us.'"
William Arthur Ward wrote: "The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires." Carl Mays' book falls under the category of "Great." I highly recommend it as both a personal and classroom read.
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