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Author Lynn Coffey will discuss her legacy of documenting oral histories in Virginia on Oct. 21, from 2 to 4 p.m. at the Paxton House in Glen Maury Park. The program is sponsored by the Paxton House Historical Society.
Even as a child growing up in a modern home in Florida, Coffey dreamed of someday living a quiet, self-sufficient life in a log cabin in the mountains. In the summer of 1980 her dream came true, when she moved to the community of Love, Virginia, on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Her new neighbors, many of them in their 90s, welcomed her into their world. She asked them to teach her how to live in the mountains, and they generously shared their ways of life with her.
As Coffey’s relationships with her neighbors grew, she realized the culture of these elderly, hearty, Scots-Irish descendants, was in danger of being forgotten. She felt a calling to somehow preserve it. And so began Coffey’s life work.
With no experience or formal training in journalism, Coffey began documenting early Appalachian life and culture. She traveled the hills and hollers of Virginia, interviewing elders, documenting in photos and articles, their activities and handicrafts – ways of life handed down for generations. Her articles and photos were first published in 1981 in a monthly newspaper she co-created with her neighbor, Bunny Stein. Backroads, the name of the paper, would become Lynn’s solo project after the first year. She continued the newspaper series on her own for 24 more years.
In 2006, Coffey was encouraged to preserve and share her Backroads articles more broadly by compiling them into books. She ultimately would do just that, publishing a three volume Backroads series along with three additional books about Appalachian culture: “Backroads 1: Plain Folk and Simple Livin’” (2009), “Backroads 2: The Road to Chicken Holler” (2010), “Backroads 3: Faces of Appalachia” (2011), “Appalachian Heart” (2013), “Mountain Folk” (2015), and “Crazy Quilt” (2019). Even now, Coffey continues to do research and document local history, having logged over 40 years of work capturing the story of Virginia’s Appalachian people.
For more information about this program, call the Paxton House Historical Society at (540) 404-1081 or send email to BVpaxtonhouse@ gmail.com.
