Migration, Population, Urban Appalachians

Primarily studies of out-migration to cities such as Cincinnati, Detroit, Chicago, Akron, and Baltimore, especially post-World War II; treatment of those populations as an underclass. Also in-migration (e.g., Florida retirees) to Appalachia.

For Latino Studies, see: Ethnicity and Race. 
For Immigrants, see also: Coal, Industry; and Ethnicity and Race

Byer, Alan.  2015.  “Swiss Family Balli: The Movie.”  Goldenseal: West Virginia Traditional Life 41, no. 4 (Winter): 56-63.  A new documentary film, Swiss Family Balli, highlights the story of the family who settled on Balli Ridge, Webster Co., in the 1890s.  See also: Gerald Milnes’s 1993 film, Helvetia: The Swiss of West Virginia.

Childers, Barb.  2015.  “My Appalachian Memory: A Word Quilt Created by Cincinnati’s Urban Appalachians.”  UACC Blog, 9 April.  Urban Appalachian Community Coalition.  626 words, plus illustrations.   http://uacvoice.org/2015/04/my-appalachian-memory-a-word-quilt-created-by-cincinnatis-urban-appalachians/.

Conn, Steven.  2014.  “Looking for Alternatives to the City.”  Chap. 5 in Americans against the City: Anti-Urbanism in the Twentieth Century, ed S. Conn, 114-147.  New York: Oxford University Press.  Chapter subsections: Anti-Urbanism, Mountain Style: The Invention of Appalachia | Linking New England Towns and Appalachia: Anti-Urbanism and the Appalachian Trail | A New Deal New Town in Appalachia.  Phillip J. Obermiller states in his review of the book, “Conn’s book is relevant to Appalachian studies—it describes the development of American attitudes toward both urban and rural places, and there’s an abundance of Appalachians in both” (Journal of Appalachian Studies 21, no. 2 (Fall 2015): 277).

Deblasio, Donna M., and Martha I. Pallante.  2014.  “Memories of Work and the Definition of Community: The Making of Italian Americans in the Mahoning Valley.”  Ohio History 121: 89-111.  From oral histories, first half of 20th-century, from Smoky Hollow in Youngstown and the east side of Niles (Mahoning and Trumbull counties).  Employers included iron and steel industries and Niles Fire Brick manufacturer, and Italian grocers are named.

Fesperman, William “Preacherman.”  2015.  “Young Patriots at the United Front against Fascism Conference.”  Viewpoint Magazine, 10 August.  8,500 words.  Includes the author’s speech originally published in The Black Panther, 26 July, 1969.  Fesperman, a former theology student, was the field secretary of the Young Patriots Organization.  “The YPO was  a Chicago-based group of poor, white, and revolutionary southern transplants. They played a crucial role in founding the original 1969 Rainbow Coalition, a groundbreaking alliance initiated by the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party, which also formally included the Puerto Rican street gang-turned-political organization, the Young Lords, as well as informal members such as the Chicano-American Brown Berets and Rising Up Angry, another group that appealed to working class white youth. The Young Patriots are also, because of their explicit identification as ‘hillbilly nationalists’ and symbolic adoption of the Confederate flag, one of the most fascinating, controversial, and understudied organizations to emerge from the intersection of the New Left student movement, civil rights, Black Power struggles, and new forms of community organizing that unfolded over the course of the 1960s in urban neighborhoods across the United States.”  https://viewpointmag.com/2015/08/10/young-patriots-at-the-united-front-against-facsism-conference/#rf2-4728.  See also: “The Young Patriots & The Original Rainbow Coalition,” http://www.youngpatriots-rainbowcoalition.org/.

Johnson, Floyd B.  2013.  “Coming and Going in Opposite Directions: Cumberland, Maryland, and Winchester, Virginia.”  Now & Then: The Appalachian Magazine 29, no. 1 (Summer): 40-42, with Census chart comparing population in 1940, 1970, and 2010.  Established respectively in 1787 and 1752, Cumberland and Winchester are only fifty miles apart “as the crow flies, yet the divide is much wider.”

Kratzer, Nate W.  2015.  “Coal Mining and Population Loss in Appalachia.”  Journal of Appalachian Studies 21, no. 2 (Fall): 173-188.  Tables; figures.  Uses 2000-2010 Census data for 410 Appalachian counties.  “By starting with the work of Wendell Berry, this paper draws in another dimension to the economic and environmental debate over natural resource extraction.”

Laird, Steve.  2015.  “The Six Senses of Growing Up in Price Hill” [Cincinnati].  UACC Blog, 12 March.  Urban Appalachian Community Coalition.  954 words.  “I was born Dec. 9, 1943 at 704 Mt. Hope Road. We lived in a 5 family apartment building; my great aunt, Emma Brannigan, owned the building”: Sights; Sounds; Smells; Taste; Touch; Sixth Sense.   http://uacvoice.org/2015/03/the-six-senses-of-growing-up-in-price-hill/.

Lilly, Jessica, and Roxy Todd.  2015.  “A Population in Flux: Immigration & Migration Inside Appalachia” [podcast].  Inside Appalachia, series.  West Virginia Public Broadcasting, 25 November.  53:55 min.  http://www.tinyurl.com/nztsxvo.

Ludke, Robert L., and Phillip J. Obermiller.  2014.  “Recent Trends in Appalachian Migration, 2005-2009.”  Journal of Appalachian Studies 20, no. 1 (Spring): 24-42.  American Community Survey data indicates: “the Appalachian region is now in a period of relative population stability with low turnover rates .... among international movers to Appalachia, Asians far surpass Central American immigrants, and that the number of European immigrants to the region is on a par with that of Central American immigrants.”

Maloney, Michael E.  2013.  “Fifty Years of Appalachian Advocacy: An Interview with Mike Maloney.”  By Thomas E. Wagner, Phillip J. Obermiller, and Melinda B. Wagner.  Appalachian Journal 40, no. 3-4 (Spring-Summer): 174-218.

Morrow, Lynn.  2013.  The Ozarks in Missouri History: Discoveries in an American Region.   Columbia, Mo.: University of Missouri Press.  305 pp.

Muhire, Olivier.  2013.  “Rwanda and the Appalachian Region” [Tenn.].  Now & Then: The Appalachian Magazine 28, no. 2 (Winter): 4-5.  Special issue, “Global Appalachia.”

Pehl, Matthew.  2016.  “Discovering Working-Class Religion in a 1950s Auto Plant” [Detroit; 1950s-60s].  Chap. 4 in The Pew and the Picket Line: Christianity and the American Working Class, ed. C. Cantwell, H. Carter, and J. Drake, 96-114.
Russo, Richard A.  2015.  “Appalachian Cities at the Beginning of the Twenty-First Century.”  Journal of Appalachian Studies 21, no. 2 (Fall): 157-172.  “...investigates the socio-demographic trends of Appalachia’s twenty-five most populous cities...2000 to 2010.”

Shackel, Paul A.  2016.  “The Meaning of Place in the Anthracite Region of Northeastern Pennsylvania.”  International Journal of Heritage Studies 22, no. 3 (March): 200-213.  “The Anthracite Heritage Project was founded to uncover one of the most tragic incidents in US labour history, the Lattimer Massacre .... Recently, a new immigrant population has entered the region, and they are facing many of the prejudices and xenophobic fears that the European immigrants faced several generations ago.”

St. Clair, Christina.  2013.  “Tea Time.”  Now & Then: The Appalachian Magazine 28, no. 2 (Winter): 9-10.  Special issue, “Global Appalachia.”  Article on the English Club, a group of women in Ashland, Ky., who have been meeting regularly since WWI.

Sullivan, Maureen.  2015.  “Community Education in Appalachian Cincinnati.”  UACC Blog, 7 August.  Urban Appalachian Community Coalition.  1,025 words.  “The schools were uniquely successful with the students getting ‘a second chance’ at education .... The relationship between the students and the staff was close and personal .... Another factor...was their utilization of strong family and kinship networks.”  http://uacvoice.org/2015/08/community-education-in-appalachian-cincinnati/.

Sullivan, Maureen, and Mike Maloney.  2015.  “The Urban Appalachian Community Coalition (UACC).”  UACC Blog, 18 February.  Urban Appalachian Community Coalition.  336 words.  “In 1974, a group of Appalachians and their allies organized the Urban Appalachian Council (UAC) in Cincinnati. For the past 40 years, UAC has served urban Appalachians through a program of research, cultural expression, social services, education and advocacy for recognition and inclusion. When the Urban Appalachian Council closed its doors in January 2014, a group of us met to assess what we had lost and what we needed to keep going. We agreed to organize a new and more sustainable effort–the Urban Appalachian Community Coalition (UACC)–to connect urban Appalachians in the Cincinnati – Dayton – Northern Kentucky regions to work on areas of common interest .... We want to know how you want to become involved in this movement.”   http://uacvoice.org/2015/02/the-urban-appalachian-community-coalition-uacc/.

Tyler, Robert Llewellyn.  2016.  “Occupational Mobility and Social Status: The Welsh Experience in Sharon, Pennsylvania, 1880-1930” [Mercer Co.].  Pennsylvania History 83, no. 1 (Winter): 1-27.

Urban Appalachian Community Coalition (website).  2015.  http://uacvoice.org/.  “The Urban Appalachian Community Coalition’s (UACC) work draws on an over-40-year heritage of Appalachian advocacy in the Greater Cincinnati area .... This website was the web space for the former Urban Appalachian Council (UAC). The UAC had to close its doors in January 2014 due to financial difficulty but the new UACC is continuing the work of advocating for, working with, and giving voice to urban Appalachian communities.”  Website TABS include UACC Blog, and Research: Bibliography of Appalachian Resources; Migration; Research Committee Minutes (and Newsletter) Archives; and Working Paper Index.

Williams, Ethel.  2015.  “Reflections on the Inner City” [poem; Cincinnati], posted with introduction and commentary by Phil Obermiller.  UACC Blog, 9 September.  Urban Appalachian Community Coalition.  577 words.

Wilson, Reid.  2013.  “Which of the 11 American Nations Do You Live In?”  Washington Post, 8 November.  812 words, plus map.  Overview of Colin Woodard’s vast map in his new book, American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America (2011), which includes “Greater Appalachia: Extending from West Virginia through the Great Smoky Mountains and into Northwest Texas.”  http://wpo.st/ZSo71.  (Link to map: http://www.tufts.edu/alumni/magazine/fall2013/images/features/upinarms-map-large.jpg).

Withrow, Dolly.  2013.  “Ali Morad’s Mountain Home.”  Now & Then: The Appalachian Magazine 28, no. 2 (Winter): 11-12.  Special issue, “Global Appalachia.”  Dr. Morad’s career took him from the University of Tehran, Iran, to Ripley, W. Va.

Woodard, Colin.  2016.  “How Cincinnati Salvaged the Nation’s Most Dangerous Neighborhood” [Over-the-Rhine].  Politico Magazine, 16 June.  5,800 words; numerous photos.  “Leaning on the power of local corporations, officials engineered a renaissance in the city’s heart.”  http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/06/what-works-cincinnati-ohio-over-the-rhine-crime-neighborhood-turnaround-city-urban-revitalization-213969.

Zaring, Aimee.  2015.  Flavors from Home: Refugees in Kentucky Share Their Stories and Comfort Foods.  Lexington: University Press of Kentucky.  280 pp.

Zaring, Aimee.  2015.  “Interview with Aimee Zaring.”  Still: The Journal, no. 18 (Summer).  2,678 words.  Zaring teaches ESOL (English for Students of Other Languages) and is author of Flavors from Home: Refugees in Kentucky Share Their Stories and Comfort Foods (University Press of Kentucky, 2015).  http://www.stilljournal.net/interview-aimeezaring.php.