Appalachian Smiles

One of the fun things about researching my Appalachian books is reading about the mountaineer’s sense of humor. Since I’m working hard on edits on my work in progress that has a Monday deadline, I decided to share some of the jokes I’ve come across in reading Appalachian books. These are from a book my mother bought years ago — Laughter in Appalachia – A Festival of Southern Mountain Humor by Loyal Jones and Billy Edd Wheeler.  It’s even autographed by Loyal Jones.

Here are three of my favorites from their book. I’ve even been known to share a few at my book talks now and again.

A church was having its monthly business meeting. The treasury was in better shape than usual so the moderator asked if anybody knew of any special needs for the church building. One lady stood and said she felt the church needed a chandelier. A penny-pinching deacon jumped up and shouted, “I’m agin and for three reasons. Number one, nobody would know how to spell it. Number Two, nobody would know how to play it, and Number Three, what this church needs is more light.” (Loyal Jones)

A missionary came into the mountains to see how many people he could save for the Lord and from a way of life that he had read about in local color novels. He spied an old man sitting on his front porch enjoyng the afternoon sun. He went up in the man’s yard and without so much as a howdy said, “Brother, are you lost?”
“Why, no,” the man said. “I’ve been living here forty years.”
“I mean, have you found Jesus?”
“Now, I didn’t realize he was lost. The Bible says he’s in heaven until he comes again.”
“What I mean is, are you a menber of the Christian band?”
“No, but there is a Bill Christian who lives about five miles over the ridge.”
“My question is, are you ready for the Judgment Day?”
“When is it?”
“It may be next week or it may be next year. We just don’t know.”
“Well, when you find out, you let me know. The old woman might want to go both days.” (Loyal Jones)

Hope you’re smiling by now. Here’s one more that I like to tell when only a few people show up at one of my book talks.

A traveling preacher came a small country church to preach the Sunday sermon, and only one man showed up. The preacher looked at his watch, finally walked down to the man, and said, “Well, looks like we’re not going to have a large congregation today. Maybe, since there’s only one person here today, I won’t preach at all. What do you say?”
The farmer looked at him and said, “Preacher, if I go down to feed my cattle and just one shows up, I feed him. I don’t turn him away hungry.”
The preacher allowed as how the man was right, so he lit into a sermon wholeheartedly, and he preached for half an hour. Then he kept going for an hour. The man lookd at his watch but the preacher didn’t slow down. He preached for an hour and forty minutes!
After the sermon, he walked out to the man and said, “Well, what did you think of that?”
“Preacher,” the man replied, “like I said, if I go down to feed my cows and only one shows up, I don’t turn him away unfed. But then, I don’t dump out the whole durn bucket, either.” (Dr. Arthur M. Bannerman)

I always wish I could work more smiles into my stories. Then, sometimes when I think I haven’t, readers will say they did  find smiles in the story. That’s good. I love smiles.

I’m counting down for the release of  A Chance for Kallie Mae next Tuesday, but I’m hearing that readers who preordered the book are already getting copies in the mail. So yay! Some new reviews are showing up too. If you’ve read any of my books and left reviews, thank you so much.

Let me know if you find any hidden smiles. When I think about it, I can remember a few scattered here and there in the story.

Do you like humor in stories?

Oh, if you like audio books, AudioBooks.com is running a special promotion on The Pursuit of Elena Bradford to celebrate the book’s first birthday. For a limited time, they are offering the audio version of the book for 70% off the regular price. Here’s the link if you want to check it out.