Museum of Appalachia

 
 
 
  We are camped at the Escapee membership campground (Raccoon Valley) outside Knoxville TN. Today we visited the Museum of Appalachia, a living history museum. It is on 65 acres, includes dozens of authentic log structures -- barns, log houses, from fairly large two story to a tiny cabin with one window. There are also several large display buildings filled with interesting primitive items from the remote hills and isolated hollows of Southern Appalachia. The first building had a wall of photos -- most were candid portraits of rugged mountain men and women. These faces showed hard work and also humor - toothless old men in tattered overalls on porches, women working in vegetable gardens, all full of character. Looking at these photos, I wish I could have a conversation with these no-nonsense hard working folks. They surely didn't have an easy life, but I think they also knew how to entertain themselves. Certainly they only had what they made themselves. We saw many handmade items, from toys to tools, and lots of home-made music instruments.
This was the off season, so most of the buildings did not have interpreters present. The weaving shed and blacksmith shop were vacant. In one old house there were two musicians "picking guitar" by the fire - they were pretty good and we bought their CD. In another small cabin, a woman dressed in period costume was sitting by the fire making a quilt.
Outside, there were sheep and goats running around, and chickens in a coop. There was an old whiskey still.
There is so much history here -- we stayed three hours and did not see it all.