The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1910-12-15
The Mountain People and Their
Vilifiers.
Charlotte Chronicle, 5th.

With very great satisfaction The
Observer Is printing in another col
umn this morning reply which DIR. J.
B. Ewing of Yancey county makes to
some widely circulated ISLANDERS upon
the North Carolina mountain people.
1t ia a complete reiutation, as any
one acquainted with the facts will
recognize. It does not confine itself
to generalities but examines. analyses
and answers the particular state
ments made. And 1t comes upon
the authority of a man who has
spent thirty years OF his professional
life among the slandered people.
As DR.. Ewing testifies and amply
shows by example, Mitehella and Yam
cey counties. where the slanderer
adjourned, transact nearly all their
business by cash, not by barter. In
no case do they live in windowless
houses or baptize sick people as a
means OF treatment or drop a key
down the back to stop hemorrhages.
Children do not have to remain away
from school because families lack
enough clothes for all. Our cor
respondent, in all his experience. has
never witnessed any of these practices
or conditions. The people are not
dependent upon "herb doctors, hav-
ing good number of graduates
from representative medical colleges
In their midst. They do not practice
farming alone but have other impor-
tant resources in the form OF mica
mines, iron mines and numbering es-
Establishments. To the statement
most superlatively ridiculous OF all
that Mitchell and Yancey county
people are not aware that there is a
Federal government DR.. Ewing re-
plies by remarking upon the national
flags which fly from the public school
houses and upon the large number of
Federal and Confederate veterans
who make their homes here. AS
pertinent to the question of general
intelligence and also to the question
OF the offenders good faith, he points
out that there is circulating library
OF FIVE thousand volumes, owned by
Mitchell county, in the very village
where she lived.
1t is very interesting"to note DR..
Ewing's statement that "the little
woman" as he considerably calls
her-all his expressions are free from
bitterness-charged and received the
full remuneration usual among
trained nurses. She was not a char
itv-worker except in the manner that
nurses and doctors everywhere are
though possible she rendered such
service to an usually large extent.
DIR. Ewing presents no information
on this latter point. He does note
that she was indicted for practicing
medicine without license, the case
being nolle-prossed.
In conclusion, we can perhaps
classify. define and see in it's true re-
lations this performance at Philadel-
phia only by reference to DR.. EWING
observation that many like it have
gone before. People who may be
animated by curious mixture oil
morbid curiosity by desire to pat
ronize, by expectation of gain through
imposing upon philanthropists or
furnishing magazine sensation, and
by genuine benevolence-by any oil
these motives or by all OF them
come poking their cameras at every
humble home Or ill-clad child which
they can find. They seek out the
most backward and represent them
as typical OF conditions generally
Such exhibits could be gathered
| almost anywhere, but the COMPARE.
tive isolation OF the mountain people
and Northern ignorance concerning
their real status affords the muck
raker security which he could hard
~ find to the same extent anywhere
else in the United States. The noun
tain people have until lately Jagged
more or less behind progress, not
through their own fault but because
OF physical conditions to which any
one must have succumbed. This
result, demonstrably true within
limits, the muck-raker exaggerates
beyond all recognition. Far worse
he represents as degraded q people
who, whatever their faults or theil
misfortunes, are independent and
proud. He has had his reward, such
as it is, but if the mountain people
| take the advice which we here and
now offer he will find the facilities
for future exploits considerably cur