Depicts the exploitation of eastern Kentucky by a group of coal moguls, including Morgan, Rockefeller, Roosevelt, Forbes, Mellon, and Delano

Theirs be the Power: The Moguls of Eastern Kentucky

Business & Money

Caudill, Harry M.

Finance

University of Illinois Press

Harry M. Caudill's explosive novel tells the story of Appalachia's shrewdest, most powerful political boss, Dr. Tom Bonhom. Educated well beyond his fellow mountaineers, Doc Bonhom started out as a well-paid coal company doctor.  He ran for office only once-as a reform candidate-and lost.  His defeat turned him to gathering political power from the influential rich instead of from the voters and he built a political machine that controlled Slaughter County for over three decades.  He brought jobs, schools, roads, and millions of state and federal dollars into his county.  At the same time, he unwittingly brought his people to complete dependency on government aid and unthinkingly encouraged the destruction of the countryside through strip mining.  His critics claimed that Doc Bonham was an opportunist who rose as his community sank.  Yet through it all, he remained as American as apple pie, and when the governor appointed him to fill an unexpired term in the U.S. Senate, he went there a hero. This book contains some adult language and may not be suitable for younger readers.

The Senator From Slaughter County

Little,Brown

In 1963, Harry M. Caudill published his now classic account of the reckless, deliberate despoliation of the Appalachian Plateau, "Night Comes to the Cumberlands." Thirteen years later, in "The Watches of the Night," Caudill continued the heartbreaking story of an incredibly rich land inhabited by a grindingly poor people whose problems, despite state and local aid and an unprecedented boom in coal, had worsened: the land was being stripped more rapidly than ever; the people's traditional relationship with the land was being uprooted, and their old customs eliminated by standardization. Both a narrative history and a polemic against greed and waste, "The Watches of the Night" hammers at "the profligacy growing out of the persistent myth of superabundance." The author ponders an even darker future if the cycle of boom and bust is not broken. He writes: "Americans have never understood or respected the finely textured, little-hill terrain of the Cumberland Plateau." Neither the farmers nor the miners who followed the early pioneers saw it as a place to cherish. Through decades that have lengthened to nearly two centuries the land has fought back, sometimes with savage floods and always with persistent efforts to reforest. "But now time runs out and our 'inexhaustible' resources have turned finite....The Kentucky Cumberlands are many things, but most of all they are are a warning.

The watches of the night

Economics

In 1963, Harry M. Caudill published his now classic account of the reckless, deliberate despoliation of the Appalachian Plateau, "Night Comes to the Cumberlands." Thirteen years later, in "The Watches of the Night," Caudill continued the heartbreaking story of an incredibly rich land inhabited by a grindingly poor people whose problems, despite state and local aid and an unprecedented boom in coal, had worsened: the land was being stripped more rapidly than ever; the people's traditional relationship with the land was being uprooted, and their old customs eliminated by standardization.  Both a narrative history and a polemic against greed and waste, "The Watches of the Night" hammers at "the profligacy growing out of the persistent myth of superabundance." The author ponders an even darker future if the cycle of boom and bust is not broken. He writes: "Americans have never understood or respected the finely textured, little-hill terrain of the Cumberland Plateau." Neither the farmers nor the miners who followed the early pioneers saw it as a place to cherish. Through decades that have lengthened to nearly two centuries the land has fought back, sometimes with savage floods and always with persistent efforts to reforest. "But now time runs out and our 'inexhaustible' resources have turned finite....The Kentucky Cumberlands are many things, but most of all they are are a warning.

The Watches of the Night

Little Brown & Co (Pap)

The Mountain, the Miner, and the Lord and Other Tales from a Country Law Office

This book of stories celebrates people who have a magnetism, a tenacity, a personal vision, an independence, and a self-sufficiency that elude most of us today.

Biographies & Memoirs

Professionals & Academics

University Press of Kentucky

A Darkness at Dawn: Appalachian Kentucky and the Future

In a supplement to his The American Language, H.L. Mencken encapsulated the early history of Kentucky: "What is now Kentucky was the first region beyond the mountains to be settled. Pioneers began to invade it before the Revolution, and by 1782 it had more than 30,000 population. It was originally a part of Virginia, and the effort to organize it as an independent state took a great deal of politicking." Kentuckian and lawyer Harry M. Caudill grew up in the coal fields of Letcher County. His book Slender is the Thread reflects the history of a state whose citizens had to labor for their sustenance. Caudill's chapters reflect the mighty story of poor European immigrants struggling on primitive land and in wild mountains to survive, reproduce, and find sustenance for themselves and their households. Their frontier experience attuned the people to weak governments, self-help, quick wrath, and long memories, and revealed the influences that gave the state and its people their reputation for contented ignorance, colorful individualism, crankiness, self-reliance, contempt for court decisions, deadliness with gun and knife, and quirky and corrupt politics. Spun from the experiences of his law office, Caudill was one of the great storytellers with a keen eye for the unexpected detail and ear for the unique turn of phrase. He denounced scoundrels, praised courage and justice wherever he found it, and celebrated the frailty of the human condition. Time goes on and stories of Kentucky and its people accumulate, and Caudill's stories help shape the thoughts and inspire the actions of the Kentuckians of tomorrow.

Slender Is The Thread: Tales from a Country Law Office

Reference

This book of stories celebrates people who have a magnetism, a tenacity, a personal vision, an independence, and a self-sufficiency that elude most of us today.

The mountain, the miner, and the Lord, and other tales from a country law office

The University Press of Kentucky

Outspoken Appalachian writer Harry M. Caudill analyzes the exploitation and decline of the eastern Kentucky mountain lands, which have rendered "no people in the nation...more forlorn than the Appalachian highlanders in our time." Frontier attitudes, a strong attachment to the land, and isolation have produced in Appalachia a backwoods culture which made its people susceptible to an outside exploitation of their resources that has perpetrated on them a passive society largely dependant on relief. But the times, says Mr. Caudill, are changing. A growing world population and global industrialization have created a drastically altered situation in eastern Kentucky. The area's resources of energy are essential to the progress and well-being not only of the nation but also of the world; and the world is prepared to court the favor of the people who control these resources and is prepared to pay the price demanded by those owners. Mr. Caudill makes an eloquent plea for Kentuckians to reclaim the resources that lie in their mountains and to demand their fair share of the wealth generated by those resources. If they are willing to do this, the state and especially the people in eastern Kentucky can have a bright and prosperous future. But they can delay no longer. They must break the mold of passivity and take destiny into their own hands. An attorney in Whitesburg, Kentucky, Harry M. Caudill is the author of such well-known books as Night Comes to the Cumberlands, Dark Hills to Westward, and My Land is Dying. The Kentucky Bicentennial Bookshelf is a celebration of two centuries of the history and culture of the Commonwealth.

A Darkness at Dawn: Appalachian Kentucky and the Future (Kentucky Bicentennial Bookshelf)

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Caudill, Harry M.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Caudill, Harry M.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Caudill, Harry M.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Theirs be the Power: The Moguls of Eastern Kentucky

The Senator From Slaughter County

The watches of the night

The Watches of the Night

The Mountain, the Miner, and the Lord and Other Tales from a Country Law Office

A Darkness at Dawn: Appalachian Kentucky and the Future

Slender Is The Thread: Tales from a Country Law Office

The mountain, the miner, and the Lord, and other tales from a country law office

The Mountain, the Miner, and the Lord and Other Tales from a Country Law Office

A Darkness at Dawn: Appalachian Kentucky and the Future (Kentucky Bicentennial Bookshelf)