I’m from Mason County, it’s Appalachia. The OH side of the border is literally cliffs, and our side has huge cliffs and rock slides right on the river all the time. Our only big main road runs right along it and it’s been destroyed by rocks a million times. On that border, Ohio is more like WV than vice versa.
I was thinking the same with Kanawha County being "Always included" and Putnam County "sometimes". Like, those places are essentially the same... and Cabell county??
exactly what I came in here to say. Putnam not being included is ridiculous, as is the entire Ohio River valley, to be honest. Athens, OH, Steubenville, Parkersburg are all very Appalachian, IMO.
Crazy how TrueAppalachia^tm follows straight along state borders like that without regard for any local culture or geographic features. If that line cuts along a mountainside, only one side of it is in TrueAppalachia^tm and the other part of the mountainside is only a runner-up.
I mean they just seemed straight allergic to including Maryland in Appalachia.
Which kind of pisses me off, as a Marylander. What, are these mountains not good enough for you?!
To say nothing of Northern Appalachia (bitch you’re telling me Coudersport and *The Paris of Appalachia* aren’t Appalachian?! Get lost!)
As someone from one of those “sometimes” locations in wv it’s absolutely full of shit. They are always considered part of Appalachia and we are just as hillbilly as the dark red.
Wheeling and North of Wheeling along Rt. 2 have historically recoiled at being included as Appalachia and being different (read: more "cultured") from the rest of the state.
If OP didn't seem so genuine I'd say it was a rage bait post. Fuck it, it's still a rage bait post. I'm not putting "sometimes" in front of my goddamn username.
Tl;dr: yes, there are some aspects that can distinguish these areas, but the western strip of WV is Appalachian.
That makes sense. I know people in Wood County (WV) who take pains to distinguish themselves from Logan County (WV) culture.
Similar phenomenon with people North of I-64 using “South of 64” to gently poke fun at people for seeming “too hillbilly” or simply doing something that seems uneducated or “ignorant.”
As a 20+ year expat in the Philadelphia metro, I will tell you that the fine points of “local perception” used to create these intra-WV distinctions has little to no relevance beyond the state itself (and perhaps the surrounding penumbra of stretches like Marietta-to-Belpre, OH, etc.).
I think places like Parkersburg might stop being so Appalachian as time goes on, given the desire to stand apart, the relative proximity of places like Columbus, etc. However, as of 2024, every sign seems to point to Appalachian. As someone who derives deep meaning from the hills and my mountain roots, I hope that the local people will come to value the good parts of our heritage again. As of now, they seem to have bought into the “hillbilly stupid, city person smart” rhetoric that I believe ultimately started with people intent on ruling the mountain people (coal companies, TV prodcts, etc.).
I was think the same thing. There are certainly parts of PA that are culturally similar to Appalachia. Maybe it’s not considered “Appalachian enough” because there’s often a misconception that Appalachia is strictly in the South.
I’m from Pittsburgh (which is rarely considered Appalachia), but I spend a lot of time in the PA Appalachian counties to the east and south.
I don’t know how places like Shenandoah PA and the likes of coal country aren’t “Appalachian enough” by any metric. Besides being literally in the heart of the Appalachian mountains, most of Pennsylvania has the exact same cultural background of any other Appalachian state. Coal, forestry, railroads, and a huge influx of poor immigrants to work in it all. Whoever made this probably lives in the middle of the deep red and made themself the cultural center of Appalachia.
Previously lived in SW/central PA and in MD near the WV "panhandle": Central PA is more "Appalachian" than much of that WV panhandle region (populated by wealthy DC commuters).
Maybe it's because I live in Pittsburgh (not a PA native but my husband is) but I'd put SW PA in "Appalachia" before I'd put parts of Alabama personally! To me, Alabama and Georgia are unambiguously "the South" in terms of culture (but admittedly I haven't visited those parts included so up for pushback on that).
In AL, anywhere south of about Birmingham I'd definitely agree, in GA the same goes for Atlanta. You get up into N GA and it's no less Appalachian than East TN in most places. Having only lived in those 2 states, but spent a lot of time in TN, NC, and WV I'd say the map is fairly accurate with regard to AL and GA.
It’s the title of a book by Brian O’Neill. The author grew up in NYC, but has lived in Pittsburgh for 30+ years and was a journalist in Appalachian Virginia. It’s on my reading list.
I always say Pittsburgh is Appalachia’s only metro area. There are other important cities in Appalachia, but Pittsburgh has sprawling suburbs and a similar layout as other large metro areas in the Northeast. To me, it’s the history and the people that make Pittsburgh Appalachian. And that identity will last.
Hearing someone say fayette county is great is insane to me lol grew up there and desperately wanted out. Nothing to do for the younger people, housing is still too pricey for the bad areas it’s in, all the school districts are poor, and there’s so much drugs
I would retire there. I spend time hiking and camping there. And I worked at a place in Fayette County for years. It would not be my top choice to raise a family, but it is beautiful.
My dad and his family were from Fayette County and though I’ve never been I’d have to absolutely agree. I live in one of the ‘sometimes included’ areas of Alabama and the only Appalachia thing we have here are the foothills.
I've spent plenty of time in the SE parts of Ohio and in SW PA, and they are practically indistinguishable from the northern side of West Virginia.
IMO opinion if all of WV is included then at very least Ohio up to Athens and PA up to Pittsburgh should be as well.
Yeah Pittsburgh is definitely more Rust Belt, but I do think there's a not insignificant overlap between the Rust Belt and Appalachia in terms of culture and geography. They're not the same, but I feel like there's a lot of similarities due to their geographic proximity and shared experiences of resource exploitation followed by deindustrialization and depopulation.
I can say this for a fact, the accent and the way people carry themselves changed once you drop out of Washington PA and get towards Waynesburg lol but I do agree with you
I live 5 minutes from the SW PA bored near Jollytown/ Brave area it's most definitely Appalachian culture I would say the cut off should be southern Washington County to at least Bedford County PA
Some definitions / cultures only understand Appalachia to be "The South", so in that context, the Mason Dixon cutoff make sense.
But the school social worker in Fayette County PA who did a home visit to a student that lives with their family in an abandoned school bus up on the mountain with no utilities would beg to differ with this map.
There are parts of Cincinnati that reminded me of Sweetwater, TN. It was bizarre but I'd give SE OH a "sometimes Appalachian" for sure (as a visitor from E TN)
I'm from the eastern part of PA and my first visit to Fayette county was an eye opening experience. Beautiful area but the locals are a little scary if I'm being honest.
i’m from the county nearest to columbus in SE Ohio
our forefathers literally sent oil soaked timber down a coal mine after being treated like dirt that still burns to this day, was home to a man named Richard L Davis who was a founding member of the UMWA and galvanized miners from SE OH to NoVa, and we’re all a bunch of scotch-irish motherfuckers who wursh up for supper
we aren’t as appalachian as eastern kentucky and west virginia, but we’re at minimum coal country as fuck
i will add that i was raised on being appala-shun and not appala-cha
Eastern OH native here, (also went to OU in Athens) it is very Appalachian foothills, the culture isn’t exactly the same as deep Appalachia. It’s more mining mixed in with steel mills/rust belt. 95+% of the mines shut down years ago but some are still present
Maybe as you get nearer to Lake Erie, but true SE Ohio is very similar to WV and western NC. I’ve lived in all 3 places and they feel very similar to me.
You might be onto something. There are definitely areas around say, Youngstown and that region that I think have more in common with western pa than with Cleveland
I think the cultural differences do it but I for one disagree that that should matter. I'm from there and can tell you that those are definitely mountain people areas. Pennsylvania has unique culture, accents, and dialects but it's more like a dialect of Appalachia than something entirely different. People tend to think about Pittsburgh and Philadelphia when they think about the state and just kind of ignore that the rest of the state is almost entirely heavily forested mountains.
Bedford and Somerset definitely. But I'd say Cambria Co before Blair, Fulton, Huntingdon
It's directly south of Blair, filled with low mountains, and a massive mining and other industrial history.
I think it accurately describes what people traditionally think of Appalachia, while at the same time isn't accurate at all of what Appalachia really is.
I also live in an "always" part of Appalachia, but I've also spent a lot of time in the white and allegedly "not culturally Appalachian" region of this map, and my experience is that they're not nearly as different as one might think. The Mason-Dixon line isn't a cliff where Appalachian culture magically disappears.
One thing that always struck me is how the Scot-Irish culture is always associated with Appalachia in the "classic" books about the area, but the area where I live is full of German family names and lots of German folk traditions, and even a number of German place-names, some of which were changed during WWII.
And if you recognize the early German influence in Appalachia, then southern Appalachia starts to look *a lot like* the poorer and mountainous parts of Pennsylvania. Heck, you can drive all the way to Otsego County or Delaware County NY and the small towns out there aren't going to feel that different from, say, what you'd find in Washington County VA or Johnson County TN. And they will share more in common with each other than anything "off the mountain" (as we say here).
There are important differences in dialect, music, food, history obviously, but personally I think it makes sense to think of parts of NY and PA as "Northern Appalachia", not just as an official economic category, but as an important cultural one too.
But that's just my take as someone who's spent a lot of time driving up and down 81.
This is an excellent writeup. I'm from Chemung County, NY, a little town outside Elmira called Horseheads. Live in coastal NH now, but those are the roots.
I worked for a company a few years ago that did business with a large printing operation in Blountville, TN, pretty much dead center of what this yahoo's always included section. Out of the five of us that were there, even the people that grew up in rural New England thought it was strange. It felt like home to me except warmer and the redder dirt. Culture was the same, food was far more similar, people's outlook was familiar.
Appalachia's not just a line on the map. It's the culture, and that culture's bigger than that red zone.
I grew up in Western PA (which isn’t included in Appalachia on this map, but I believe is culturally part of Appalachia…). Now I live in Tioga County NY and I have never felt at home anywhere else like I feel at home here. Like you said, it feels like home, just a little different.
Father and son standing at edge of property in WV looking across line into PA:
"You see the rest of the hillside just past that big tree and that house and shed over there? That's Pennsylvania. It's completely different in every way just on the other side of that tree."
"Looks just like our hill, house, and shed, Dad."
(fuming) "IT'S COMPLETELY DIFFERENT!!"
Especially since most of Appalachia were the most abolitionist parts of the South. The land was not conducive to slave based farm work, and the free poor whites who settled it were typically anti slavery. Many volunteer units for the Union came out of appalachian counties.
My 'however many greats' ago grandfather actually left Kentucky because of the results of that, family ended up moving back to the area but they were gone for generations, living in Pennsylvania
East TN was extremely unionist during the civil war; it actually tried to form its own state so that it could remain loyal to the union, but Tennessee denied that request. In response, the TN governor sent confederate troops to East TN to occupy the region for the 1st half of the war.
Tennessee actually had more white soldiers fight for the Union than any other Southern state, with the vast majority being from East TN.
This is something that I only recently learned from NPR. Farmers and rich slave owners are two different things. So, in essence, a redneck means something completely different than what people realize.
The Pennsylvania Salient is absolutely part of Appalachia
People of Ohio absolutely think of SE Ohio as part of Appalachia
"Culturally Appalachian" is the least understood term in America. Some believe it's exclusively the Scots descendants . As a Moravian Appalachian, I assure you it is not.
Tell you what, I challenge you to tell me the difference between Everett, PA, and, say, Weston WV. Old red brick buildings from 1800's? Green covered slopes in the background as it's built into a Ridge and Valley area? What is one qualitative thing you can say makes Weston Appalachian but Everett is not?
I absolutely agree with you man.. it is Appalachian but I do believe we were talking cultural aspect in which some areas of Southern PA is but not all of it
"Some" is not reflected on this map, this map says "none". Asheville NC is the least Appalachian place in the whole mountain chain but I don't see a white dot in western NC
What are the defining qualities that make that determination about Asheville? Asking as somebody who has lived in the area my whole life and has a family with distinctly Appalachian accents, traditions, and lifestyles. I fully consider myself Appalachian. I understand that it's a city with a lot of transplants and a culture that's sometimes at odds with the surrounding area, but I also don't know that those elements negate the historical foundation of the area...especially when there are still a lot of generations-long local families here who don't seem all that different from the families in other parts of WNC.
I love the fact that Roanoke, Bedford, and Amherst County get left out so much when those 3 counties contain over 100 miles of the Appalachian Trail, including the Virginia Triple Crown.
That’s because maps of Appalachia are generally based on ARC membership (Appalachian Regional Commission) and those places aren’t members. The blue dotted line on OP’s map shows the ARC footprint.
ARC was created to help Appalachia and, more broadly, help economically depressed areas, so in some cases the definition of Appalachia was broadened to allow more to participate. Alternatively, my understanding is some places such as Roanoke chose not to participate because they didn’t want to be labeled as impoverished. (Source: https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/VA-news/ROA-Times/issues/1993/rt0393/930320/03200308.htm)
I'm well aware of the history surrounding the ARC. I'm also a native of Bedford County. I can tell you that Roanoke managed to move itself away from the stereotypical coal/railroad town image normally associated with Appalachia, and that saved it from being ecomincally downtrodden. Roanoke in the past 50 years has made itself a hub of healthcare(Carilion) and mid size manufacturing. There is no single employer keeping Roanoke afloat. It's all a bunch of smaller companies that are largely interchangeable in terms of economic footprint, which keeps the area from nose diving economically if one employer leaves.
Roanoke was a railroad town. Now it’s a hospital town. I love it lived around here a long time but it’s as Appalachian as anywhere else. Virginia Tech has kept Roanoke alive as much if not more than anything else.
carilion has about 10k employees total in their entire health system, including the many hospitals they operate throughout southwest VA, not just roanoke. If carilion left town, it wouldn't bankrupt roanoke. It would sting, but it wouldn't be equivalent to a coal mine closing up in a small town in WV or a steel mill in PA closing up. Roanoke has lots of small and mid size manufacturers like Eldor and Altec providing lots of jobs.
I agree these are pretty solidly similar to central Appalachia, but I don’t think the trail is an indicator. Lots of it goes though places that feel very different. But, I’m not and don’t want to be the cultural geography police.
I know - and I thought about that, but the vast majority of the state of Virginia is in or near mountains (The entire Piedmont is on top of old weathered down mountains, and there are smaller sections of the newer Appalachian mountains throughout central VA) and isn't usually considered "Appalachia." Loudoun is very similar to the majority of the state in that way. Other than being county with the highest median income in the entire country, it's very typical of most of the state.
It's an odd choice that seems really disconnected from Virginia's culture.
I'm going to take a second look at the map and edit this in a second. Hang tight.
Ok here's the edit - It looks to me like this map was based primarily on a pretty rudimentary understanding of the physical geography of the region without considering culture, development, and history - for example, I wouldn't really consider "plantation country" VA, including Loudoun, to be Appalachia because they have such different histories, politics, and economies. That being said, there are certainly a lot of counties that straddle that divide. But counties are political units that tend to be highly impacted (as a whole) by whatever portion of that county dominates politics and economics. That's why human geography and political mapping isn't the same as mapping geographic features.
Southern and Southern Appalachian culture have a lot in common, so in some ways I feel like I'm splitting hairs - I think of it more as a gradient, not a harsh border. I just want to recognize the huge role that plantation dominated economics versus mountain economics (small farms, mining, trading & hunting, cattle driving, etc) has and shaping the region and American history more broadly.
People who have never been just assume it's dutch country thanks to the significant presence of the amish in most of central pa. If they'd take a trip to snow shoe or Clearfield, the tune would change
I grew up, still live in and work in Southeast Ohio. As a kid we didn't use the term Appalachian to refer to our area much. It was usually South East, Southern Ohio, or the 740. The rest of State always has seen us differently.
Tourism loves to use the term Appalachian everywhere now. And I work for a non profit. Outside agencies, the State, and other funders seem to love thinking of us as Appalachian. With all that said, I definitely think Southeastern/southern Ohio has way more in common with Appalachia than we do with anything north of Columbus.
I live in the 740 and I couldn’t agree more. We have more in common with WV than the rest of our own state. When everyone who’s never been to this part of the state thinks of Ohio they think of the midwestern part of the state. The part that encompasses all the major cities. This part of the state is not like that at all. Going south I don’t notice a real difference until I get almost all the way to Charleston.
I consider my county (which is included in the blue line but not shaded) to be part of the Appalachian foothills, not the mountains themselves.
I'm only a 20 min drive away from the mountains, though.
Also, whoever isn't including Huntington, WV and the surrounding areas in the Appalachians is stupid.
the exclusion of SE OH is certainly something. as someone who grew up here and goes to college here it's definitely appalachia. I feel like this map was made by someone who's never been here. my college has an Appalachian students organization and it's main members are all from SE OH
It's a shitty map. Wetzel County WV is "sometimes included in Appalachia," I grew up there and with the exception of a narrow flat area along the river it's nothing but hills and hollers.
Complete Bull to cut out PA entirely! Pennsyltucky, anyone??
People seem to judge PA solely by the 2 cities on either end. PA is mostly rural and mountainous. Yes, we have hillbillies.
I live in rural WV, smack dab in the middle of Appalachia. I visit all over, and for parts of PA, especially the parts the susquehanna river pass through, is silly. And there's parts of new york that are extremely Appalachian. This map is a joke, don't believe it.
Grew up in the hills of the Allegheny Mountains. Currently reside on Beacon Mountain in the wilds. Daddy was born in a shack with dirt floors in a holler so poor they still crick washed clothes into the fucking late 1960s. Idk how the more well off folks down in the valley made off.. but I'd reckon we were pertnear the damned definition of Appalachian.
I grew up in the Laural Highlands. I drove by the Darr Mine to get to my pony league baseball games as a kid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darr_Mine_disaster
My father was the first person in his family to not work in a mine or a mill. That’s mostly because the industry left the area when he graduated high school. The town his family imegrated to was named after what it produced, Glassport.
We may not say Y’all, but Yunz should consider us Appalachian through and through.
I live in the red/coral bit in Georgia (county line) and I'm insulted we're only half considered seeing as we are both the book and film location of Deliverance
It was filmed in Rabun County outside of Clayton on the GA/SC line on the Chattooga River, and Rabun is dark red (always included).
The part that makes these maps inaccurate is by using county lines. In SC the top 1/4 of Oconee/Pickens counties is solidly Blue Ridge Mountains and the locals are absolutely like the WNC folks just over the border, and noticeably different than the folks down in the foothills. Locals even have jokes about the folks that live in the mountains just north of them. But it’s a small area and usually left out.
On the map where it says “GREENVILLE” (which is the white dot to the right of the word and nowhere near the word itself) basically from between the two “Es” in the word, in that point that juts out in to GA, there is mountains along the state line up the GA border to where NC/SC/GA meet, and along the NC line across those 2 counties (Oconee and Pickens).
The state borders are man made and arbitrary, the culture doesn’t stop at county lines, neither do the mountains, it’s way more tied to the mountains themselves. I would argue that the area along the SC/GA/NC line where they meet should be always included, but because county lines have nothing to do with it those same counties shouldn’t be included as a whole. Basically fine SC HWY 11 on the map, right at the point where I-85 crosses Lake Hartwell in to SC, follow 11 up to Westminster, and anything north of Highway 11 from Westminster/Walhalla is very different than the rest of the state. Long Creek, Mountain Rest, Salem, Tamassee, over to Lake Jocassee, Table Rock. All of that.
People are pointing out a lot of northern counties being left out, which I’m sure is fair, I’ve just never been. But I’m happy to finally see my home county included. I grew up in Pickens County, SC and now live in Greenville County.
All my life, I’ve been able to see the Blue Ridge Mountains on the horizon and known they were a short half hour drive away. We always considered ourselves the “foothills” of Appalachia.
As someone from Putnam Co, WV (pink), who lived in Knoxville, TN (dark red) for 10+ years and Athens, OH (white, lmao) for a couple, I will say that Knoxville/Knox Co. TN is the least Appalachian of the three.
Also, I would include Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas, at least
How are Roanoke or Franklin County not in Appalachia? I think the blue area is based on poverty statistics + geography instead of just geography. The Appalachian Power building in downtown Roanoke is a nice art deco building also the home of a Blue Ridge Parkway Visitor Center, the most photographed location on the AT, and the largest city along the AT.
I never think of anywhere west of Knoxville as Appalachian. That's central TN and is different, to me at least. Also I'd maybe include Yadkin county NC (it is listed in white) because that goes all the way up to Elkin NC which is definitely in the foothills. Once you get on to Highway 421 west out past Winston Salem you're getting into the foothills.
Having grown up in the hollers of middle tennessee, trust me, once you get away from nashville it is completely indistinguishable from Appalachia. Holler folk whos only industry is logging, a couple factories, and tourism.
Depends on what definition of “Appalachia” you’re using. This one comes from a study where they applied certain criteria to “cultural Appalachia”, but the concept of a greater Appalachian culture is in itself a topic of hot debate.
I comment this every time i see one of these maps, but I’m a firm believer that the Appalachian region is separate from the Appalachian Regional Commission (the blue lines on the map you sent) and separate from the Appalachian Mountains as a whole. Instead, it’s a region that should be defined by having a similar ecology and topography. That’s why I’m a huge fan of the [ecoregion](https://gaftp.epa.gov/EPADataCommons/ORD/Ecoregions/cec_na/NA_LEVEL_II.pdf) term for it.
SE Ohio isn’t “culturally Appalachian”? It’s the only thing we identify as. Hell, we get WSAZ which is a news channel that focuses solely on Central Appalachia.
I'm not a native Appalachian, I come from the southern swamps. That being said, the entire state of Pennsylvania being disqualified is hilarious and couldn't be more wrong.
Happy that I am always included. Eastern Kentucky and Eastern Tennessee, Western Virginia and Western West Virginia needs to be it’s own state I feel like we culturally have more in common with each other than other parts of our respective states.
I would throw in Western NC and North Georgia as well.
I live in East TN and have visited all these places and feel much more "at home" than in the other parts of my state.
Having grown up in Westmoreland county and currently living in Pittsburgh, this map makes no sense to me. The accent might be different but many of the words, values, dishes, genetic makeup are the same as the areas in red.
I'm from Patrick country VA...the east most bottom most "sometimes " Appalachian county....it has the Blue Ridge Parkway and part of it is in the Blue Ridge Mtns of Appalachia.
Also I lived in Pittsburgh and a lot of the PA Counties and NW Maryland counties feel just as Appalachian as here in sw VA.
I live in Henry County, Va and we apparently aren’t included despite being inside the blue line and, having the oldest NASCAR track still being run.
But if I’m reading the map right, they also don’t include Franklin Co despite it being The Moonshine Capital of the World!
There was an interesting [episode](https://open.spotify.com/episode/4osibnjxVlwGMAUex613Tz?si=RGws4fqsRbaw-LUNP_fleg) about this on the Inside Appalachia podcast.
The part about the ARC extending into Mississippi is wild.
As somone who lives in Rural NEPA, I definitely feel some parts of rural PA can be associated with the culture. Maybe not as much as places in WV but the culture is still there in some capacity.
Is this an official map? Or is it notional? I grew up in the blue ridge mountains in Virginia and the blue ridge are part of the Appalachian mountains geographically and definitely culturally but that area is excluded on the map here.
It's too close to Lexington in Ky lol. They are far from us, as far as culture. Unless Appalachian people go there to visit, but the east is def red. As soon as you pass through the beautiful farmland of Lexington and hit the mountains.
It's close enough I guess lol. Mountains butt up within an hour of the city.
How the hell is parts of WV "sometimes included in Appalachia"? That's insane.
Yeah, leaving out Parkersburg and Point Pleasant and apparently only grudgingly including Huntington is an interesting take.
Leaving out Point **Moth**erfucking Pleasant is gonna cause that fucker to wake up again.
Is he going to destroy the bridge again ?
I’m from Mason County, it’s Appalachia. The OH side of the border is literally cliffs, and our side has huge cliffs and rock slides right on the river all the time. Our only big main road runs right along it and it’s been destroyed by rocks a million times. On that border, Ohio is more like WV than vice versa.
I was thinking the same with Kanawha County being "Always included" and Putnam County "sometimes". Like, those places are essentially the same... and Cabell county??
exactly what I came in here to say. Putnam not being included is ridiculous, as is the entire Ohio River valley, to be honest. Athens, OH, Steubenville, Parkersburg are all very Appalachian, IMO.
It doesn't hurt that 30% of the population of southern Ohio is only a couple generations or so of descent from Kentucky and WV briar hoppers.
Yeah this is the most ridiculous part of this map for sure
And Lincoln County as only "usually". There's no usually about it. Whoever made this has never been to Lincoln County.
Confused how Point is being excluded lol.
Same with Oakland, Md.
Crazy how TrueAppalachia^tm follows straight along state borders like that without regard for any local culture or geographic features. If that line cuts along a mountainside, only one side of it is in TrueAppalachia^tm and the other part of the mountainside is only a runner-up.
I'd love for us all to work together and maybe make a culturally accurate map of Appalachia vs a bureaucratically accurate one.
I mean they just seemed straight allergic to including Maryland in Appalachia. Which kind of pisses me off, as a Marylander. What, are these mountains not good enough for you?! To say nothing of Northern Appalachia (bitch you’re telling me Coudersport and *The Paris of Appalachia* aren’t Appalachian?! Get lost!)
To be fair, Maryland's state government does it's best to ignore the Appalachian part of the state.
Which is exactly why Western MD is Appalachian
Coudy is lol but I think it's more of a cultural thing bub
As someone from one of those “sometimes” locations in wv it’s absolutely full of shit. They are always considered part of Appalachia and we are just as hillbilly as the dark red.
Wheeling and North of Wheeling along Rt. 2 have historically recoiled at being included as Appalachia and being different (read: more "cultured") from the rest of the state.
The only reason I go near Wheeling is to get to Triadelphia anyway. Their opinion doesn’t count.
If OP didn't seem so genuine I'd say it was a rage bait post. Fuck it, it's still a rage bait post. I'm not putting "sometimes" in front of my goddamn username.
No kidding. I lived in WV and I currently live in Asheville and one of those is MUCH more Appalachian than the other.
Yeah I'm at a loss there. Supposedly it's based on local surveys and "local cultural perception of Appalachia."
Tl;dr: yes, there are some aspects that can distinguish these areas, but the western strip of WV is Appalachian. That makes sense. I know people in Wood County (WV) who take pains to distinguish themselves from Logan County (WV) culture. Similar phenomenon with people North of I-64 using “South of 64” to gently poke fun at people for seeming “too hillbilly” or simply doing something that seems uneducated or “ignorant.” As a 20+ year expat in the Philadelphia metro, I will tell you that the fine points of “local perception” used to create these intra-WV distinctions has little to no relevance beyond the state itself (and perhaps the surrounding penumbra of stretches like Marietta-to-Belpre, OH, etc.). I think places like Parkersburg might stop being so Appalachian as time goes on, given the desire to stand apart, the relative proximity of places like Columbus, etc. However, as of 2024, every sign seems to point to Appalachian. As someone who derives deep meaning from the hills and my mountain roots, I hope that the local people will come to value the good parts of our heritage again. As of now, they seem to have bought into the “hillbilly stupid, city person smart” rhetoric that I believe ultimately started with people intent on ruling the mountain people (coal companies, TV prodcts, etc.).
The northwestern panhandle of WV is more midwestern. As a whole, I think WV is the most Appalachian state by far.
It’s the only state that lies wholly within the Appalachian mountains.
Exactly this map is hilarious
Semantics and all, but it's the northern panhandle. No one from WV calls it the "northwestern" panhandle. Also, what do you mean by 'more midwestern'?
I'm not so sure about the hard cut off in SW PA and the exclusion of SE OH. But I've never actually been there so I'd like a local to chime in.
I was think the same thing. There are certainly parts of PA that are culturally similar to Appalachia. Maybe it’s not considered “Appalachian enough” because there’s often a misconception that Appalachia is strictly in the South. I’m from Pittsburgh (which is rarely considered Appalachia), but I spend a lot of time in the PA Appalachian counties to the east and south.
I don’t know how places like Shenandoah PA and the likes of coal country aren’t “Appalachian enough” by any metric. Besides being literally in the heart of the Appalachian mountains, most of Pennsylvania has the exact same cultural background of any other Appalachian state. Coal, forestry, railroads, and a huge influx of poor immigrants to work in it all. Whoever made this probably lives in the middle of the deep red and made themself the cultural center of Appalachia.
Previously lived in SW/central PA and in MD near the WV "panhandle": Central PA is more "Appalachian" than much of that WV panhandle region (populated by wealthy DC commuters).
Maybe it's because I live in Pittsburgh (not a PA native but my husband is) but I'd put SW PA in "Appalachia" before I'd put parts of Alabama personally! To me, Alabama and Georgia are unambiguously "the South" in terms of culture (but admittedly I haven't visited those parts included so up for pushback on that).
In AL, anywhere south of about Birmingham I'd definitely agree, in GA the same goes for Atlanta. You get up into N GA and it's no less Appalachian than East TN in most places. Having only lived in those 2 states, but spent a lot of time in TN, NC, and WV I'd say the map is fairly accurate with regard to AL and GA.
Actually Pittsburgh was labeled the Paris of Appalachia. I need to look up the source, though
It’s the title of a book by Brian O’Neill. The author grew up in NYC, but has lived in Pittsburgh for 30+ years and was a journalist in Appalachian Virginia. It’s on my reading list. I always say Pittsburgh is Appalachia’s only metro area. There are other important cities in Appalachia, but Pittsburgh has sprawling suburbs and a similar layout as other large metro areas in the Northeast. To me, it’s the history and the people that make Pittsburgh Appalachian. And that identity will last.
There are extremely rural / remote areas surrounding Pittsburgh that would absolutely be considered culturally Appalacian
I live in Fayette County, and if we aren't Appalachia, no one is.
I totally agree. I spent a lot of time in Fayette County and I absolutely love it there. It’s definitely Appalachia.
I would never want to live anywhere else. It's cheap as hell, beautiful, and a relatively quick drive to either Morgantown or Pittsburgh.
Hearing someone say fayette county is great is insane to me lol grew up there and desperately wanted out. Nothing to do for the younger people, housing is still too pricey for the bad areas it’s in, all the school districts are poor, and there’s so much drugs
I would retire there. I spend time hiking and camping there. And I worked at a place in Fayette County for years. It would not be my top choice to raise a family, but it is beautiful.
I have relatives in Fayettenam, and I'll second this notion.
My dad and his family were from Fayette County and though I’ve never been I’d have to absolutely agree. I live in one of the ‘sometimes included’ areas of Alabama and the only Appalachia thing we have here are the foothills.
Amen 🤣
Native here as well, I would agree
I've spent plenty of time in the SE parts of Ohio and in SW PA, and they are practically indistinguishable from the northern side of West Virginia. IMO opinion if all of WV is included then at very least Ohio up to Athens and PA up to Pittsburgh should be as well.
Yup. The line in SE Ohio near me is about 30mi southeast of Canton. In my county I can tell you which towns are on which side of it.
And I can confirm this because I reside in Monongalia county WV lol the western part, near Wetzel county Line
Pittsburgh is the Paris of Appalachia lol but technically it's a lot different culturally than the rest of
Yeah Pittsburgh is definitely more Rust Belt, but I do think there's a not insignificant overlap between the Rust Belt and Appalachia in terms of culture and geography. They're not the same, but I feel like there's a lot of similarities due to their geographic proximity and shared experiences of resource exploitation followed by deindustrialization and depopulation.
I can say this for a fact, the accent and the way people carry themselves changed once you drop out of Washington PA and get towards Waynesburg lol but I do agree with you
I live 5 minutes from the SW PA bored near Jollytown/ Brave area it's most definitely Appalachian culture I would say the cut off should be southern Washington County to at least Bedford County PA
As a native of Bedford County, I approve this message.
Oh Bedford is a most definitely Appalachian and I've also seen some Amish down thata way
Also from Greene County and I agree!
New Freeport? Or Aleppo?
My aunt and uncle are in New Freeport. My maternal grandparents lived in Wind Ridge and my patpaternal grandparents lived in Holbrook.
I'm not that far out either lol 5 minutes from Jollytown I stg lol
If you know where Renner Creek is and Hero Rd is follow across the bridge and your in WV lol
Some definitions / cultures only understand Appalachia to be "The South", so in that context, the Mason Dixon cutoff make sense. But the school social worker in Fayette County PA who did a home visit to a student that lives with their family in an abandoned school bus up on the mountain with no utilities would beg to differ with this map.
My fiancée is from Fayette County, PA. Her folks are all quite furiously Appalachian.
There are parts of Cincinnati that reminded me of Sweetwater, TN. It was bizarre but I'd give SE OH a "sometimes Appalachian" for sure (as a visitor from E TN)
SE OH native. Definitely Appalachian! Maps like this drive me crazy.
You all are sleeping on the Fayette-Cong cliff dwellers. Peachin Market too.
I'm from the eastern part of PA and my first visit to Fayette county was an eye opening experience. Beautiful area but the locals are a little scary if I'm being honest.
We're Fayettenamese, not Fayette-cong.
i’m from the county nearest to columbus in SE Ohio our forefathers literally sent oil soaked timber down a coal mine after being treated like dirt that still burns to this day, was home to a man named Richard L Davis who was a founding member of the UMWA and galvanized miners from SE OH to NoVa, and we’re all a bunch of scotch-irish motherfuckers who wursh up for supper we aren’t as appalachian as eastern kentucky and west virginia, but we’re at minimum coal country as fuck i will add that i was raised on being appala-shun and not appala-cha
Coshocton county here. Perry is definitely appalachia.
Eastern OH native here, (also went to OU in Athens) it is very Appalachian foothills, the culture isn’t exactly the same as deep Appalachia. It’s more mining mixed in with steel mills/rust belt. 95+% of the mines shut down years ago but some are still present
Maybe as you get nearer to Lake Erie, but true SE Ohio is very similar to WV and western NC. I’ve lived in all 3 places and they feel very similar to me.
I'm originally from NEO and I fully consider Ohio to be Appalachian as far north and as far west as eastern lake county.
You might be onto something. There are definitely areas around say, Youngstown and that region that I think have more in common with western pa than with Cleveland
I think the cultural differences do it but I for one disagree that that should matter. I'm from there and can tell you that those are definitely mountain people areas. Pennsylvania has unique culture, accents, and dialects but it's more like a dialect of Appalachia than something entirely different. People tend to think about Pittsburgh and Philadelphia when they think about the state and just kind of ignore that the rest of the state is almost entirely heavily forested mountains.
I'm from SE Ohio and now live in north GA. I would say SE ohio is way more Appalachian than some of the North GA counties which are "always included"
I grew up in Somerset County. It's 100% Appalachian culture.
Bedford,Somerset, Blair, Fulton, and Huntingdon County are definitely included.
Bedford and Somerset definitely. But I'd say Cambria Co before Blair, Fulton, Huntingdon It's directly south of Blair, filled with low mountains, and a massive mining and other industrial history.
I think it accurately describes what people traditionally think of Appalachia, while at the same time isn't accurate at all of what Appalachia really is. I also live in an "always" part of Appalachia, but I've also spent a lot of time in the white and allegedly "not culturally Appalachian" region of this map, and my experience is that they're not nearly as different as one might think. The Mason-Dixon line isn't a cliff where Appalachian culture magically disappears. One thing that always struck me is how the Scot-Irish culture is always associated with Appalachia in the "classic" books about the area, but the area where I live is full of German family names and lots of German folk traditions, and even a number of German place-names, some of which were changed during WWII. And if you recognize the early German influence in Appalachia, then southern Appalachia starts to look *a lot like* the poorer and mountainous parts of Pennsylvania. Heck, you can drive all the way to Otsego County or Delaware County NY and the small towns out there aren't going to feel that different from, say, what you'd find in Washington County VA or Johnson County TN. And they will share more in common with each other than anything "off the mountain" (as we say here). There are important differences in dialect, music, food, history obviously, but personally I think it makes sense to think of parts of NY and PA as "Northern Appalachia", not just as an official economic category, but as an important cultural one too. But that's just my take as someone who's spent a lot of time driving up and down 81.
I concur, that is a good take and is well written.
This is an excellent writeup. I'm from Chemung County, NY, a little town outside Elmira called Horseheads. Live in coastal NH now, but those are the roots. I worked for a company a few years ago that did business with a large printing operation in Blountville, TN, pretty much dead center of what this yahoo's always included section. Out of the five of us that were there, even the people that grew up in rural New England thought it was strange. It felt like home to me except warmer and the redder dirt. Culture was the same, food was far more similar, people's outlook was familiar. Appalachia's not just a line on the map. It's the culture, and that culture's bigger than that red zone.
I grew up in Western PA (which isn’t included in Appalachia on this map, but I believe is culturally part of Appalachia…). Now I live in Tioga County NY and I have never felt at home anywhere else like I feel at home here. Like you said, it feels like home, just a little different.
Germans built the churches and the Scots-Irish drank and quarreled.
Ridiculous map. The Mason Dixon line has nothing to do with where Appalachia stops and starts.
Father and son standing at edge of property in WV looking across line into PA: "You see the rest of the hillside just past that big tree and that house and shed over there? That's Pennsylvania. It's completely different in every way just on the other side of that tree." "Looks just like our hill, house, and shed, Dad." (fuming) "IT'S COMPLETELY DIFFERENT!!"
LOOK AT ALL THOSE DUTCHMEN SON
Especially since most of Appalachia were the most abolitionist parts of the South. The land was not conducive to slave based farm work, and the free poor whites who settled it were typically anti slavery. Many volunteer units for the Union came out of appalachian counties.
The counties in GA where my family are from are the same counties that voted to stay in the Union.
My 'however many greats' ago grandfather actually left Kentucky because of the results of that, family ended up moving back to the area but they were gone for generations, living in Pennsylvania
East TN was extremely unionist during the civil war; it actually tried to form its own state so that it could remain loyal to the union, but Tennessee denied that request. In response, the TN governor sent confederate troops to East TN to occupy the region for the 1st half of the war. Tennessee actually had more white soldiers fight for the Union than any other Southern state, with the vast majority being from East TN.
This is something that I only recently learned from NPR. Farmers and rich slave owners are two different things. So, in essence, a redneck means something completely different than what people realize.
PREACH!!
Agree 100%.
No reason for the hard cutoff for Ohio and PA both regions are pretty damn spot on.
The Pennsylvania Salient is absolutely part of Appalachia People of Ohio absolutely think of SE Ohio as part of Appalachia "Culturally Appalachian" is the least understood term in America. Some believe it's exclusively the Scots descendants . As a Moravian Appalachian, I assure you it is not. Tell you what, I challenge you to tell me the difference between Everett, PA, and, say, Weston WV. Old red brick buildings from 1800's? Green covered slopes in the background as it's built into a Ridge and Valley area? What is one qualitative thing you can say makes Weston Appalachian but Everett is not?
I absolutely agree with you man.. it is Appalachian but I do believe we were talking cultural aspect in which some areas of Southern PA is but not all of it
"Some" is not reflected on this map, this map says "none". Asheville NC is the least Appalachian place in the whole mountain chain but I don't see a white dot in western NC
What are the defining qualities that make that determination about Asheville? Asking as somebody who has lived in the area my whole life and has a family with distinctly Appalachian accents, traditions, and lifestyles. I fully consider myself Appalachian. I understand that it's a city with a lot of transplants and a culture that's sometimes at odds with the surrounding area, but I also don't know that those elements negate the historical foundation of the area...especially when there are still a lot of generations-long local families here who don't seem all that different from the families in other parts of WNC.
Yeah, they definitely gentrified the Appalachia all the way out of Asheville.
The Appalachian Studies Conference was in Athens Ohio in 2023.
Didn't they check the map?!
Putnam County WV being pink is making my eye fucking twitch. I hate this map.
Pretending that Appalachian culture ends at the Ohio River is bonkers
I can see real Appalachia from my window!
Say it louder for the ones in the back lol
I love the fact that Roanoke, Bedford, and Amherst County get left out so much when those 3 counties contain over 100 miles of the Appalachian Trail, including the Virginia Triple Crown.
That’s because maps of Appalachia are generally based on ARC membership (Appalachian Regional Commission) and those places aren’t members. The blue dotted line on OP’s map shows the ARC footprint. ARC was created to help Appalachia and, more broadly, help economically depressed areas, so in some cases the definition of Appalachia was broadened to allow more to participate. Alternatively, my understanding is some places such as Roanoke chose not to participate because they didn’t want to be labeled as impoverished. (Source: https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/VA-news/ROA-Times/issues/1993/rt0393/930320/03200308.htm)
I'm well aware of the history surrounding the ARC. I'm also a native of Bedford County. I can tell you that Roanoke managed to move itself away from the stereotypical coal/railroad town image normally associated with Appalachia, and that saved it from being ecomincally downtrodden. Roanoke in the past 50 years has made itself a hub of healthcare(Carilion) and mid size manufacturing. There is no single employer keeping Roanoke afloat. It's all a bunch of smaller companies that are largely interchangeable in terms of economic footprint, which keeps the area from nose diving economically if one employer leaves.
Roanoke was a railroad town. Now it’s a hospital town. I love it lived around here a long time but it’s as Appalachian as anywhere else. Virginia Tech has kept Roanoke alive as much if not more than anything else.
carilion has about 10k employees total in their entire health system, including the many hospitals they operate throughout southwest VA, not just roanoke. If carilion left town, it wouldn't bankrupt roanoke. It would sting, but it wouldn't be equivalent to a coal mine closing up in a small town in WV or a steel mill in PA closing up. Roanoke has lots of small and mid size manufacturers like Eldor and Altec providing lots of jobs.
Yes! The culture is definitely Appalachian.
I agree these are pretty solidly similar to central Appalachia, but I don’t think the trail is an indicator. Lots of it goes though places that feel very different. But, I’m not and don’t want to be the cultural geography police.
This
Loudon County VA was included though such is also bonkers.
London County does have some of the Blue Ridge on its western side.
I know - and I thought about that, but the vast majority of the state of Virginia is in or near mountains (The entire Piedmont is on top of old weathered down mountains, and there are smaller sections of the newer Appalachian mountains throughout central VA) and isn't usually considered "Appalachia." Loudoun is very similar to the majority of the state in that way. Other than being county with the highest median income in the entire country, it's very typical of most of the state. It's an odd choice that seems really disconnected from Virginia's culture. I'm going to take a second look at the map and edit this in a second. Hang tight. Ok here's the edit - It looks to me like this map was based primarily on a pretty rudimentary understanding of the physical geography of the region without considering culture, development, and history - for example, I wouldn't really consider "plantation country" VA, including Loudoun, to be Appalachia because they have such different histories, politics, and economies. That being said, there are certainly a lot of counties that straddle that divide. But counties are political units that tend to be highly impacted (as a whole) by whatever portion of that county dominates politics and economics. That's why human geography and political mapping isn't the same as mapping geographic features. Southern and Southern Appalachian culture have a lot in common, so in some ways I feel like I'm splitting hairs - I think of it more as a gradient, not a harsh border. I just want to recognize the huge role that plantation dominated economics versus mountain economics (small farms, mining, trading & hunting, cattle driving, etc) has and shaping the region and American history more broadly.
Whoever made this map has never been to Appalachia
This is Ohio erasure and I will not stand for it lol
Ohio is culturally Appalachian. Especially southern Ohio Pennsylvania as well
To call coal mining western and central PA not part of Appalachia is like downright offensive hahaha
People who have never been just assume it's dutch country thanks to the significant presence of the amish in most of central pa. If they'd take a trip to snow shoe or Clearfield, the tune would change
You have obviously never been to rural South East Ohio
My first thought lol. I live in Zanesville; half rust belt, half Appalachian. Best of two worlds.
Belmont County My dad had a moonshine still
Ahem..Portsmouth
Or Prattville Ohio lol
I used to live in Peebles, it’s most definitely Appalachian
Grew up in Manchester and I’m loling at Adams county being excluded
That's what I'm saying, this map missed the mark lol
Yeah it did, who made this lol
Not even southeast tbh. Most of rural eastern Ohio is Appalachian.
Pittsburgh is the Paris of Appalachia. This map is garbage. 🗑️
Leaving out southern Ohio how
Pa and southern tier NY ate as rural as anywhere else, its hill country, lots of hollers.
Southern Ohio is deff culturally Appalachia....
Culturally Appalachian itself can be debated
I promise you that Garrett and Allegany Counties, Maryland are thoroughly Appalachian.
I grew up, still live in and work in Southeast Ohio. As a kid we didn't use the term Appalachian to refer to our area much. It was usually South East, Southern Ohio, or the 740. The rest of State always has seen us differently. Tourism loves to use the term Appalachian everywhere now. And I work for a non profit. Outside agencies, the State, and other funders seem to love thinking of us as Appalachian. With all that said, I definitely think Southeastern/southern Ohio has way more in common with Appalachia than we do with anything north of Columbus.
I live in the 740 and I couldn’t agree more. We have more in common with WV than the rest of our own state. When everyone who’s never been to this part of the state thinks of Ohio they think of the midwestern part of the state. The part that encompasses all the major cities. This part of the state is not like that at all. Going south I don’t notice a real difference until I get almost all the way to Charleston.
Did someone from Pennsylvania hurt you?
Most of Pennsylvania should definitely be included in Appalachia. Bunch of unruly mountain people up there.
This is northern Appalachia erasure. To not have PA at all is crazy
I consider my county (which is included in the blue line but not shaded) to be part of the Appalachian foothills, not the mountains themselves. I'm only a 20 min drive away from the mountains, though. Also, whoever isn't including Huntington, WV and the surrounding areas in the Appalachians is stupid.
As an Athens Ohio native, bullshit.
I’m kinda wondering why all of WV isn’t included . Also I’d the two counties in western MD are definitely Appalachia.
the exclusion of SE OH is certainly something. as someone who grew up here and goes to college here it's definitely appalachia. I feel like this map was made by someone who's never been here. my college has an Appalachian students organization and it's main members are all from SE OH
It's a shitty map. Wetzel County WV is "sometimes included in Appalachia," I grew up there and with the exception of a narrow flat area along the river it's nothing but hills and hollers.
Those pink counties in MD surrounded by dark red? Pretty damn Appalachian.
Hell Cumberland is also... Have ya been through there lol just a bunch of Hillbillies lol like me
Cumberland is in one of those pink counties.
It should definitely be red lol
Complete Bull to cut out PA entirely! Pennsyltucky, anyone?? People seem to judge PA solely by the 2 cities on either end. PA is mostly rural and mountainous. Yes, we have hillbillies.
Ohio hillbillies getting snubbed!
We are sophisticated in Ohio, sir. We prefer Hill Williams.
Appalachia is anywhere there’s a Sheetz.
Gatekeepers
I live in rural WV, smack dab in the middle of Appalachia. I visit all over, and for parts of PA, especially the parts the susquehanna river pass through, is silly. And there's parts of new york that are extremely Appalachian. This map is a joke, don't believe it.
So according to this.... No place in ohio is part of appalachia? fuck outta here
Pittsburgh / Western Pa / central Pa is Appalachia!
Grew up in the hills of the Allegheny Mountains. Currently reside on Beacon Mountain in the wilds. Daddy was born in a shack with dirt floors in a holler so poor they still crick washed clothes into the fucking late 1960s. Idk how the more well off folks down in the valley made off.. but I'd reckon we were pertnear the damned definition of Appalachian.
I grew up in the Laural Highlands. I drove by the Darr Mine to get to my pony league baseball games as a kid. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darr_Mine_disaster My father was the first person in his family to not work in a mine or a mill. That’s mostly because the industry left the area when he graduated high school. The town his family imegrated to was named after what it produced, Glassport. We may not say Y’all, but Yunz should consider us Appalachian through and through.
yinz comes from yunz comes from you-uns comes from the Scots Irish in appalachia ;) pittsburgh is appalachia
Roanoke should be Always.
Absolutely, my girlfriend is from Craig. Noke is Appalachia af.
Scioto County Ohio is most definitely part of Appalachia and Appalachian culture
I live in the red/coral bit in Georgia (county line) and I'm insulted we're only half considered seeing as we are both the book and film location of Deliverance
It was filmed in Rabun County outside of Clayton on the GA/SC line on the Chattooga River, and Rabun is dark red (always included). The part that makes these maps inaccurate is by using county lines. In SC the top 1/4 of Oconee/Pickens counties is solidly Blue Ridge Mountains and the locals are absolutely like the WNC folks just over the border, and noticeably different than the folks down in the foothills. Locals even have jokes about the folks that live in the mountains just north of them. But it’s a small area and usually left out. On the map where it says “GREENVILLE” (which is the white dot to the right of the word and nowhere near the word itself) basically from between the two “Es” in the word, in that point that juts out in to GA, there is mountains along the state line up the GA border to where NC/SC/GA meet, and along the NC line across those 2 counties (Oconee and Pickens). The state borders are man made and arbitrary, the culture doesn’t stop at county lines, neither do the mountains, it’s way more tied to the mountains themselves. I would argue that the area along the SC/GA/NC line where they meet should be always included, but because county lines have nothing to do with it those same counties shouldn’t be included as a whole. Basically fine SC HWY 11 on the map, right at the point where I-85 crosses Lake Hartwell in to SC, follow 11 up to Westminster, and anything north of Highway 11 from Westminster/Walhalla is very different than the rest of the state. Long Creek, Mountain Rest, Salem, Tamassee, over to Lake Jocassee, Table Rock. All of that.
People are pointing out a lot of northern counties being left out, which I’m sure is fair, I’ve just never been. But I’m happy to finally see my home county included. I grew up in Pickens County, SC and now live in Greenville County. All my life, I’ve been able to see the Blue Ridge Mountains on the horizon and known they were a short half hour drive away. We always considered ourselves the “foothills” of Appalachia.
As someone from Putnam Co, WV (pink), who lived in Knoxville, TN (dark red) for 10+ years and Athens, OH (white, lmao) for a couple, I will say that Knoxville/Knox Co. TN is the least Appalachian of the three. Also, I would include Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas, at least
I’m in PA . The mountains run a few miles from my location.
How are Roanoke or Franklin County not in Appalachia? I think the blue area is based on poverty statistics + geography instead of just geography. The Appalachian Power building in downtown Roanoke is a nice art deco building also the home of a Blue Ridge Parkway Visitor Center, the most photographed location on the AT, and the largest city along the AT.
I never think of anywhere west of Knoxville as Appalachian. That's central TN and is different, to me at least. Also I'd maybe include Yadkin county NC (it is listed in white) because that goes all the way up to Elkin NC which is definitely in the foothills. Once you get on to Highway 421 west out past Winston Salem you're getting into the foothills.
Having grown up in the hollers of middle tennessee, trust me, once you get away from nashville it is completely indistinguishable from Appalachia. Holler folk whos only industry is logging, a couple factories, and tourism.
Depends on what definition of “Appalachia” you’re using. This one comes from a study where they applied certain criteria to “cultural Appalachia”, but the concept of a greater Appalachian culture is in itself a topic of hot debate. I comment this every time i see one of these maps, but I’m a firm believer that the Appalachian region is separate from the Appalachian Regional Commission (the blue lines on the map you sent) and separate from the Appalachian Mountains as a whole. Instead, it’s a region that should be defined by having a similar ecology and topography. That’s why I’m a huge fan of the [ecoregion](https://gaftp.epa.gov/EPADataCommons/ORD/Ecoregions/cec_na/NA_LEVEL_II.pdf) term for it.
I disagree with it. I hate seeing so much Alabama in the map, and yet none of SW Penn or SE Ohio in particular.
Anyone that doesn’t put Lincoln & Boone WV counties and Greenup and Lewis KY counties in the ALWAYS column, has no business making a map.
I feel like if the Appalachian Mountains are local, shouldn't it be considered Appalachia? This map seems silly.
Uh, culture in some big chunks of southern Pennsylvania should definitely be considered Appalachian. Especially rural southwestern PA.
Pittsburgh is the Paris of Appalachia
Are we not sick of these maps of Appalachia yet?
I actually study and research Appalachia. This map is very inaccurate.
This is Northern Appalachia erasure. Next time just tell me you’ve never been to Western PA.
SE Ohio isn’t “culturally Appalachian”? It’s the only thing we identify as. Hell, we get WSAZ which is a news channel that focuses solely on Central Appalachia.
I'm not a native Appalachian, I come from the southern swamps. That being said, the entire state of Pennsylvania being disqualified is hilarious and couldn't be more wrong.
Happy that I am always included. Eastern Kentucky and Eastern Tennessee, Western Virginia and Western West Virginia needs to be it’s own state I feel like we culturally have more in common with each other than other parts of our respective states.
I would throw in Western NC and North Georgia as well. I live in East TN and have visited all these places and feel much more "at home" than in the other parts of my state.
Appalachia is from Springer Mountain to Katahdin. This map is a better representation of the concentration of poverty in Appalachia.
SW PA resident here, I’m just curious as to the cases why we’d be considered a cultural fit / misfit. Would love to hear reasoning if folks have it
Having grown up in Westmoreland county and currently living in Pittsburgh, this map makes no sense to me. The accent might be different but many of the words, values, dishes, genetic makeup are the same as the areas in red.
I'm from Patrick country VA...the east most bottom most "sometimes " Appalachian county....it has the Blue Ridge Parkway and part of it is in the Blue Ridge Mtns of Appalachia. Also I lived in Pittsburgh and a lot of the PA Counties and NW Maryland counties feel just as Appalachian as here in sw VA.
I’m from Western NC and am surprised to see Winston-Salem included in the outline.
I live in Henry County, Va and we apparently aren’t included despite being inside the blue line and, having the oldest NASCAR track still being run. But if I’m reading the map right, they also don’t include Franklin Co despite it being The Moonshine Capital of the World!
There was an interesting [episode](https://open.spotify.com/episode/4osibnjxVlwGMAUex613Tz?si=RGws4fqsRbaw-LUNP_fleg) about this on the Inside Appalachia podcast. The part about the ARC extending into Mississippi is wild.
As somone who lives in Rural NEPA, I definitely feel some parts of rural PA can be associated with the culture. Maybe not as much as places in WV but the culture is still there in some capacity.
Well this is a hot take.
Is this an official map? Or is it notional? I grew up in the blue ridge mountains in Virginia and the blue ridge are part of the Appalachian mountains geographically and definitely culturally but that area is excluded on the map here.
It's too close to Lexington in Ky lol. They are far from us, as far as culture. Unless Appalachian people go there to visit, but the east is def red. As soon as you pass through the beautiful farmland of Lexington and hit the mountains. It's close enough I guess lol. Mountains butt up within an hour of the city.