By Jeremy D. Wells
Carter County Times
Olive Hill Stories is a new event launched by author Willie Davis, with the inaugural event kicking off tomorrow (Thursday) at the Olive Hill Welcome Center (the Depot) as a warm-up to It’s Fall Y’all. The event, which runs from 6 – 7:30 p.m., will feature Davis and local poet, historian, and author Neal Salyers.
Davis said he envisions Olive Hill Stories as a “community forum where Olive Hill history is shared among interested Olive Hillians and Carter Countians,” both here at home and – via online media – “around the country.”
For Davis, who is an Appalachian raised in diaspora, after his family followed work to Mansfield, Ohio, sharing these stories with the outside world is an important part of the project. One way Davis envisions that is by pairing the live events with print and online media partnerships, by submitting articles to the Carter County Times and other local media. (See Davis’s submission, My Olive Hill story: I’m a proud Olive Hill hillbilly, on page A-?)
Davis, who has written a fictionalized history of Olive Hill’s firebrick legacy, said the community’s contribution to our nation’s industrial growth – the steel used in skyscrapers and battleships couldn’t have been smelted without firebrick for foundries – should be celebrated, and Welcome Center director Lisa Messer Conley agreed.
“Olive Hill has a great creation story that should make everyone proud,” she noted. “Olive Hill had an abundance of rare fireclay. Olive Hill also had people with the backbone to mine and convert this fireclay into special bricks that helped build a growing nation. More people should know this slice of Olive Hill’s history.”
Davis cited this conviction, that more people should know these stories, as the one that “birthed the idea behind Olive Hill Stories.”
There is no charge to attend this event, but space is limited. Please call or text (606)315-5787 to register and reserve a seat. All attendees will also receive a free e-book copy of Davis’s historical novel, Olive Hill.
Contact the writer at editor@cartercountytimes.com
