This week, the film adaptation of J.D. Vance’s controversial memoir, Hillbilly Elegy hits Netflix. For the most part, reviewers’ reactions range from scathingly critical to merely disappointed. But even as critics argue that Vance’s memoir mischaracterizes Appalachia, the fate of the film adaptation need not be representative of rural entertainment in general. As Daily Yonder […]
Posted inFood
In a Pinch for Pie This Thanksgiving? Try This Rural Recipe from Lost Creek Farm.
Amy Dawson of Lost Creek Farm first came upon Old Fashioned Vinegar Pie in a handed-down collection of family recipes. This recipe in particular was clipped from the pages of a local newspaper in the early 1900s. The concept of Vinegar Pie might sound a bit strange to modern sensibilities, but make it yourself and […]
Posted inCoronavirus
Commentary: How To Spread Holiday Cheer During a Covid Winter
After eight weeks as a rural Covid-19 red zone, my community’s Homecoming was canceled: A positive test on our two-district combined high school football squad quarantined some players, and there weren’t enough left to field a team. It wasn’t the first and won’t be the last disappointment in this crazy Covid year. But it has […]
Posted inFrom Our Team
The Daily Yonder brings me closer to home
In recent weeks, I’ve been on the hunt for a new home. I’ve learned a lot as an aspiring first-time homebuyer, but I’ve got to come clean, Daily Yonder readers: the houses I’ve been touring, making offers on, and imagining as my own are not in a rural zip code. In my time working for […]
Posted inCoronavirus
In the Columbia River Gorge, a Local Program Adapts to Serve the Community Through Covid-19
When Cindy decided to pursue a college degree after getting out of prison, she faced several obstacles. She needed a place to live, school supplies, and new prescription glasses, among other things. In September of 2018, Cindy’s student support-services coordinator at Columbia Gorge Community College referred her to the Bridges to Health program. She was […]
Posted inCoronavirus
Nine out of 10 Rural Counties Are in the Covid-19 Red Zone
The wave of Covid-19 infections that began nearly two months ago in rural counties continued to generate a record number of new infections and deaths last week, in both rural and metropolitan counties alike. New Covid-19 related deaths in rural counties totaled 2,448 last week, an increase of 20%. In the past nine months, just […]
Posted inMedia
Opinion — What Kind of Work Do the Characters in ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ Do?
Ron Howard’s Hillbilly Elegy has invited another round of warnings about poverty porn, but the film version of J.D. Vance’s 2016 best-seller deserves a fresh appreciation. Yes, it lacks sociological and cultural nuance, but it’s the kind of movie a lot of Americans will love, and its cinematic incarnation of the rural economy, and work, […]
Posted inMedia
Opinion — Ron Howard’s Film to Appalachia: ‘Get a Job’
When I was about 12 years old, I told my dad, “I don’t want to be Appalachian.” I remember it was just the two of us. We were driving back from soccer practice in the family van, peeling past the old trailer park and onto the wooded highway that winds toward my childhood home in […]
Posted inHealth
Opinion: Rural Healthcare Must Use This Moment to Create Something Better
EDITOR’S NOTE: Eyal Kedar, M.D. is a rheumatologist in the rural North Country of New York. He is part of a small group of physicians who treat all the Covid-19 patients in his rural health system. He is also one of the people who helps develop Covid-19 clinical trial opportunities for his health system. This […]
Posted inGrowth and Development
In Manatee County, Surburbia Consumes Farmland, Spreading Affluence and Hardship
Parrish General Supply has been selling everything from vegetable seed to horse feed to customers in Manatee County, Florida, for decades. These days though, an increasing number of customers are shopping not for tools to maintain their farms, but for fittings and washers and clamps that suburban types need to fix plumbing and repair lawnmowers. […]
