Description: 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.
Brief description: Harry M. Caudill (1922-1990) grew up in the coal fields of Letcher County, Kentucky, with a zest for history and reading. After being seriously wounded in Italy during World War II, Caudill went to the University of Kentucky Law School and later practiced law in Whitesburg, in Letcher County. He held some local political offices, in addition to a seat in the Kentucky House of Representatives. Caudill's 1963 book, Night Comes to the Cumberlands: A Biography of a Depressed Area was and is a very influential work on Eastern Kentucky, affecting local and national government through individuals ranging from President Kennedy to Kentucky governors and Appalachian writers such as Denise Giardina. After retiring from practicing law, Caudill wrote 6 more books, more than 80 articles, and many editorials in the local Whitesburg paper, The Mountain Eagle. He delivered frequent speeches on strip mining and other Eastern Kentucky issues.
Review Quotes:
Storytellers are born, not made--although the stories they weave may not be at least partially "made" from their knowledge of the human character, their fertile imaginations, and their reach for hearty, unstinting healthy laughter. Harry Caudill was a storyteller. One of the best. He had a keen eye for the unexpected detail, and ear for the unique turn of phrase, and a flowing oratorical delivery. He denounced scoundrels of high and low station, praised courage and justice wherever he found it, and celebrated the ridiculous frailty of the human condition. The next best thing to hearing Harry tell these tales from his 'country law office' is to have them collected here for our perpetual enjoyment in Slender Is The Thread.
--Wilma Dykeman