When May Kennedy McCord died in Springfield, Mo., in February 1979, a local newspaper had this to say under the headline "The Queen Is Dead": "We called her Queen of the Hillbillies. Not out of disrespect. Quite to the contrary, we called her Queen of the Hillbillies because of affection that bordered on the downright worshipful at times. She belonged to all of us in the Ozarks.
When May Kennedy McCord died in Springfield, Mo., in February 1979, a local newspaper had this to say under the headline "The Queen Is Dead": "We called her Queen of the Hillbillies. Not out of disrespect. Quite to the contrary, we called her Queen of the Hillbillies because of affection that bordered on the downright worshipful at times. She belonged to all of us in the Ozarks.
After finishing "A History of the Ozarks: The Ozarkers," Brooks Blevins' magisterial history of the region, I decided to read some of the work of the late Otto Ernest Rayburn. As luck would have it, a new edition of Rayburn's 1941 book "Ozark Country" was released last year by the University of Arkansas Press, complete with an introduction by Blevins.
I've used quotes from Brooks Blevins' book "A History of the Ozarks: The Ozarkers" a lot in recent columns. Rarely have I run across anything that does such a good job explaining a region and its people.
I've used quotes from Brooks Blevins' book "A History of the Ozarks: The Ozarkers" a lot in recent columns. Rarely have I run across anything that does such a good job explaining a region and its people.