Kerisha Goode
Interview Project Essay
13 December 2016

Mrs. Stacey Dickerson, a Rockbridge County born, Appalachian native. After living within 10 miles of the same neighborhood her whole life she has been a witness to many changes both positive and negative. As an Affrilachian, an African American living in Appalachia, her experience has definitely been a unique one, however it has challenged many stereotypes I’ve learned about this semester. Throughout her 51 years here she’s been a part of the good, the better, and the ugly.
Growing up in Lexington during the early sixties and seventies was the “golden years” as Stacey describes them. The desegregation of schools, parks, and restaurants was long gone off the radar. No one in the community talked, active, or treated anyone else differently especially because of their skin color. I found that rather surprising given that the Civil Rights Movement had just ended less than a decade prior to this. However, Stacey says it came as no surprise to her at all. Growing up she only experienced two incidents having to do with someone’s skin color in high school. She says that no one tolerated it and in both cases the students were kicked out of school. For the most part, in the 80s, everyone got along. Inside of school minorities participated well with others students in things like Athletics and other clubs. Outside of school everyone else still maintained that same friendship. This challenged the stereotype about all Appalachian people being racist. Stacey says, she believes a man from the mountains would stop and help her before he would help a white male from the north, only because she is Appalachian.
Vocational school was highly encouraged for all kids during this time yet some did work while going to school as well. Stacy came from educated family background. She always knew that college was an option especially because of her mother, a Saint Paul College graduate. This is exactly what Todd Snyder describes in his The Rhetoric of Appalachian Identity book. When comparing first generation college students to those coming from an educated household in Appalachia, “15 out of 16 could specifically named an academic role model” (Synder 121), and these students were more likely to attend college because of that reason. Although, it was common for many kids in the region not go to school or even attend college, Stacey says, her high school graduating class consisted of 300 graduates, 100 of which were black. A decade later, Lexington High School closed and Rockbridge County High School was founded due to the increased number of students within the area. This included all of Rockbridge County, and the neighboring cities of Lexington, Natural Bridge, and Buena Vista (BV).
Over the years things continue to progress in every aspect of the community. Small businesses continued to be the center of the city, some of which failed and some survived. The idea of contributing to smaller businesses and seeing “mom and pop shops” thrive was what the region was about. The town continue to flourish bringing in more jobs due to the two local colleges, Washington and Lee and VMI. Many members of Mrs. Stacey family worked right here in Crozet as waiters. She describes her community as the hard working middle-class whose core values are centered around family, loved ones, and neighbors. This reminded me of the film Matewan, when the Mayor, police officer, and union workers all banned together to stand for the fight against the members of the coal company in the town. This feeling of brotherly love, that “inner-cities atmospheres are missing. Here we try and help each other or befriend one another” (Dickerson). This was one of the many things the media did not capture, the closeness of the smaller rural communities.
Between 1983 and 2016 the only major changes were said to be the relationships people in the community had with one another. “More people stopped going to check on their neighbors and to even say hello to someone passing by on the street” (Dickerson). Today the media is depicting these people as “low incoming having, drug using, hillbillies” says Mrs. Stacey, non of which are her or her people. Over the last eight years, she says she has had an incident with two different VMI cadets which she had to explain that, “my skin doesn’t wash off nor will it ever” as they proceeded to act in a negative manner in the VMI Barber shop. Even though it happens, this kind of stuff is rare around these parts and even when it does it’s kept on the down low. This is to ensure that the peace, love, and respect that has been established between the people, the minorities, and the elders remain consistent. That is one of the themes we covered in the first week of class when we read Harney’s, A Strange Land and a Peculiar People. This idea of beauty and his perception on the area around him is nothing but positive. He describes his home as a sweet rural mountainous area that is beautiful in every way. This is how I pictured Stacey’s views on the region and where she grew up as she explained it to me. The homelike atmosphere is one that is not glorified enough by the media nor do the stereotypes fit it.
Through all of that, I found most interesting that when I asked “who do you refer to as hillbillies and where do they reside”? Mrs. Stacey’s response was very similar to what we’ve read about in Back Talk and Unquiet Earth and discussed in class. When referring to “hill billies”, Stacey says “those aren’t us. Those are the people living over there on that side of the mountain”. This was most interesting because although they live in the region, the same county, and the same town only minutes up the road, she didn’t find them to be like her. More so, she didn’t see herself like them, “hill billy” like. This goes for a lot of stereotypes in many discourse communities. It is easier to stereotype a specific group that you don’t think you’re associated with, or possibly better than.