Reflecting Our Culture of The High Country

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At Hump Mountain Produce in Elk Park, NC Brian does things just like his uncle, his great-uncle, and his dad did. In fact, Brian is well schooled in the art of peddling; his school bus dropped him off at his uncle’s roadside stand for advanced experience in peddling produce. Today, Brian farms and operates a produce market inside this brick building at the base of Hump Mountain located above Elk Park, NC itself. Since the year 2011, Brian has been making a comfortable living giving below-market prices to his customers.

Should you step inside his produce fortress and you will find shelves packed with blue-ribbon pickled creations that the big corporate grocery chains couldn't dare to consider stocking. And yes, that includes pickled corn. We have to ask why should cucumbers have all the fun? All our jarred goods are born in a state-certified kitchen. You know you are getting produce earning pure Appalachian gold medals; this is not a science experiment.

“Farming up here in the High Country is a brutal gig,” Brian admits. “The soil refuses to wake up until it hits a cozy sixty degrees. And just when you think you're safe, a rogue late frost swoops in to murder your crops, forcing you to start the whole agonizing process all over again.”

To understand how we got here, we have to travel back to around 1950, when Alton’s family decided to brave a road trip into the mountains. Mountain driving back then wasn't for the faint of heart. The roads didn't just curve; they twisted like an angry snake. We are talking about old-school hairpin turns so violent you could literally wave at your own taillights as you rounded the bend. Throw in a total lack of guardrails, and drivers were forced to crawl along at a snail's pace. Local farmers, spotting a captive audience of road weary motorists, wisely set up shop at the few safe pull-offs. They calmed rattled nerves with fresh veggies, warm apple pies, jars of jelly, and mountains of harvest corn.

Now, despite a lifetime of eating their way through local spots, Alton and Jason had never achieved the holy grail of agriculture. Thus "Same Day Corn". For the uninitiated, that means the corn was still hanging on the stalk that morning. When word leaked that Brian was staging a corn-pulling raid the next day, our production crew showed up at the crack of dawn to hijack thirty-six ears of that special gold. A porch party was immediately assembled, friends were handed ears to shuck, the grill was fired up, and everyone finally learned what real, ultra-fresh mountain corn tasted like.

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Matthew Hitechew is the Dean of Arts & Sciences at Mayland Community College in Spruce Pine, NC, and a historian of Appalachian Studies. Matthew speaks about the language, culture, and linguistics of Appalachia.

Matthew brings the unique perspective of an Appalachian native whose family has lived in these mountains since the 1750s. Matthew's students often hear him explain how isolated communities in the High Country retained dialect and customs from the old world longer than other parts of our young nation. For instance, elementary students in the High Country celebrated May Day by dancing around a traditional twenty-foot-tall Maypole until the 1970s.

YouTube Matthew Hitechew 750

If you eavesdropped on Matthew's classroom, you might hear the complex, rich regional dialect linguists call Appalachian English being spoken. This is far from "incorrect" grammar — it is a highly structured, rule-governed linguistic variety with deep historical roots. Just like the customs from the old world, historically isolated communities preserved the older features of their language while independently developing unique vocabulary and grammatical patterns: a-prefixing, as in "He went a-hunting," or the word-final "t" that transforms cliff into "clift" and twice into "twicet".

Some people say Appalachian English puts a little mountain step between syllables. Others claim it's mountain cadence perking up a sentence. Take this line: "Once he came down the ridge, things got better." Slip in some mountain cadence and it becomes: "Wunst he come down off'n that ridge, things got better by a mile."

While Matthew uses his podium so his students can occasionally experience Appalachian English, he explains that a linguistic process called dialect leveling has reduced the differences between dialects. When speakers of different dialects interact, distinctive local features fade, and the dialects grow more alike.

Matthew argues that when good roads, radio, and television reached the High Country, the leveling process extended to every part of mountain culture. He said, "My grandmother never went beyond second grade. But once she got a TV, it stayed on all day, every day — and I am convinced that is why she insisted I go to college."

Now go ahead, click on this link and watch the ride-about with Matthew.

Become a ride-about partner by subscribing to our channel. Think of it this way: subscribing puts you in our backseat on every ride-about.

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Watch Alton & Jason's ride-about With Kenny Lindahl, the Barbecue Man of Linville. Be Sure to: Like Us. Subscribe. Pass it Forward.

Meet Kenny Lindahl, The Yankee Who Cracked the Carolina BBQ Code (And Built a Smoker Bigger Than Your Truck)

If you grew up in Western North Carolina, you know our barbecue rules are sacred. You also know that anyone born north of the Mason-Dixon line trying to cook a pig is usually a recipe for disaster.

Enter Kenny Lindahl: Allentown, Pennsylvania native, motorcycle enthusiast, and the undisputed barbecue hero of the High Country. You can see this absolute madman and his legendary rig in action right here on Kenny's YouTube Video.

A Pennsylvania Boy Gets Dragged Down-East

Kenny spent his youth in commercial kitchens up north, but his real education started 25 years ago. That is when he married a girl from Whiteville, moved to traditional down-east country, and opened a restaurant.

Now, if you know anything about a coastal family reunion, you know it is legally mandatory to have a whole smoked pig waiting on a grill. If that pig hasn't been basted all night in a vinegar-and-pepper sauce until your eyes water, it’s not a reunion—it’s a crisis. Kenny quickly realized that if he wanted to survive his new in-laws, he had to master the art of the traditional low-and-slow smoke.

Running a restaurant is a brutal way to make a living. Whenever Kenny needed to clear his head, he’d jump on his motorcycle, ride up into the High Country, and hide out at the Pineola Inn. Eventually, the mountains called him home for good, and he brought his hard-earned BBQ wizardry with him.

The Double-Barrel Pig Chariot

You can’t roll into the High Country claiming you know pork without the hardware to back it up. Kenny’s smoker is an absolute unit. Most locals have seen plenty of pig cookers, but Kenny’s rig looks like it was engineered by NASA for maximum pork output.

This beast comfortably fits two entire hogs and features a mad-scientist design:

Dual Firebox Doors: Placed on opposite sides for ultimate access.
Twin Smokestacks: Drafts the air perfectly across the meat.
Zero Cold Spots: Because uneven cooking is a sin.

Kenny’s Laws of Smoke: Don't Kill the Pig Twice

The secret to Kenny's barbecue isn't just the vinegar; it is absolute, obsessive control over the temperature. He has one golden rule for anyone trying to cook a pig at home, and you should probably write it down:

The Two-Hour Window: The first two to three hours are strictly for flavor and smoke.
The Hard Drop: After that, back off the wood and drop the pit to a slow, low 225 degrees.
The Lock: Hold it right there until it’s done.
The Rookie Mistake: Do not keep feeding wood the whole time. If you over-smoke the meat, you turn it bitter, kill the flavor, and disrespect the animal.

Watch Alton & Jason's ride-about With Kenny Lindahl, the Barbecue Man of Linville. Be Sure to: Like Us. Subscribe. Pass it Forward.

Alton & Jason with their new YouTube Channel called, "Culture of the High Country" includes documentaries on people and places in western North Carolina, east Tennessee, and SW Virginia; also known as The Blue Ridge Mountains, Alton and Jason invite you to jump in your car, get on a bus, or call an Uber, but get yourself up to the High Country. We promise there is an empty rocking chair waiting for you. However, if your schedule or resources are so tight that you cannot work it out, no problem. You can join us as they document the rich culture and heritage of the Appalachian High Country during their ride-abouts. A ride-about is how they share their recent videos and posts of folks living in the Blue Ridge Mountains with outlanders.

blue ridge mountains looking at ridgeline behind ridgelines; very colorful sky

All right, for full disclosure, Alton and Jason know their ride-about banter can occasionally get corny.

But if you leave the video before it is completed, you will miss some awesome people being interviewed and a chance to learn so much about the people of the Blue Ridge Mountains. This spring of 2026, we interviewed individuals whose families have lived in these mountains for generations; along with people who recently retired here to escape the frustrations of urban life.

Hover your cursor over one of the stars in the photo of the high country and preview some of our interviews. Subscribe to their YouTube channel and become one of their ride-about partners. Being a ride-about partner is like riding in their back seat, and if a question pops into your mind, all you have to do is drop it in the comment box.

This blog section of our website is to follow and support Alton & Jason in their documentary series called "The Ride Abouts" as part of the new YouTube channel called, "The Culture of The High Country". Stay tuned for our soon-to-be released Pillar Structured Letter of Expertise. We claim to have experiences with local mountain folks who have an unbelievably vast amount of knowledge, experience, strength and hope regarding how to live in (what was once called, "The Lost Province") and how to thrive in these mountains through all four seasons of the year.