Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 4.djvu/18

 2 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

It was from a desire to see something of this old frontier life that I recently undertook a very short journey in the mountains of eastern Kentucky. In this descriptive article I shall simply jot down certain impressions and indicate a few lines of investi- gation which this interesting social survival suggests. It is hardly necessary to say that I have attempted no sweeping gen- eralizations on the basis of a four-days' ride through parts of three counties.

Kentucky is divided into " Pennyroyal," " Bluegrass," and " Mountain." The boundaries of these popular provinces are somewhat vague ; but in general it is a division into western, central, and eastern sections. The mountain region is bounded on the east by the Big Sandy river and the Cumberland moun- tains, from which the hills, gradually descending, die away west- ward into the rolling Bluegrass country. This district of eastern Kentucky is drained by the Kentucky and Licking rivers and by tributary streams of the Big Sandy. The structure of the coun- try is such as to form many narrow, isolated valleys, communi- cating with each other only by means of wide detours along the water courses, or by sharp and difficult ascents of the steep divides. The drainage system, therefore, as in most hilly coun- try sides, creates social groupings, determines lines of travel, fixes the location of little settlements and county seats, and furnishes a means of local designation. There is an odd analogy between the address of the Londoner and that of the Kentucky mountaineer. Instead of the main thoroughfare, side street, and lane of the complex English description, we have the " fork," " creek," and "branch" of the Kentucky direction.

The region, originally well wooded, has in many places lost the most valuable of its trees, among which are poplar, oak, elm, ash, hickory, and walnut. Lumber companies and individ- uals are cutting timber rapidly and floating the logs down to the mills along the rivers. In many valleys whole mountain sides have been desolated by " girdling " the trees and leaving them to die and fall. Such areas are appropriately called " deaden- ing." But in spite of all this, there are large districts of beau- tiful forest land, made more delightful still by a dense