Remembering the 40's in the Heart of Appalachia - Softcover

Fields, Truman

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1438997825 ISBN 13: 9781438997827

Publisher: AuthorHouse, 2009

Synopsis

I've often heard it said that everybody has a story to tell, and I know this is true, but I have found also that we all have a yearning to tell our story. Also, we have numerous ways to do it: through voice, writing instruments and machines, through photographic and digital images that we make or assemble, and also through the pattern of our living, and in the things that we create. Truman Fields is a many-faceted person, and he has left plenty of evidence of his interesting story to supplement what he tells us in this book. He has been a persistent student, teacher and craftsman, a successful businessman, and an award-winning tennis player, a superb craftsman, and a public servant. He was born in the center of the Appalachian coal fields, where he attended local schools until his father, perceived that Truman had a desire to learn more than might be possible locally, sent his reluctant son to Berea Foundation High School at the age of sixteen. There, in addition to the usual academic subjects, he began probing the complexities of electronics, metal-and-wood, and of course basketball and tennis. Without money, he was a half-day student, meaning he took classes for half the day and worked in the rest of the day for his room and board. Thus it would have taken him five years to complete high school, so ever restless and inquisitive, he decided at the age of twenty, to join the Navy for four years. The Navy sent him to electronic school before assigning him to a destroyer tender. On this ship, he saw a great deal of the world. At age 24, he re-entered the Foundation School for a semester to finish high school, and then enrolled at Berea College. There he majored in Industrial Arts and played tennis so well that he was a finalist in several tournaments. In college, he met Joyce Barnes from Tennessee, and they were married. After graduation Truman taught in Louisville and then moved to Cleveland, Ohio, where he and Joy

About this title

About the Author:

Truman Fields was born and raised on a farm in Perry County Kentucky. Big Creek, his home place, is located in the very heart of Appalachia. Although this is his first book, he has published many articles and stories about the region. The chapter entitled STRIPMINING COMES TO BIG CREEK won the Plattner Award for Berea College's Appalachian Heritage Magazine. The chapter on MOUNTAIN DAY won first place in the Louisville Senior Writers contest.

About this edition

• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 1438997825
• ISBN 13: 9781438997827
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 348