In the years immediately preceding the founding of the American nation, the Blue Ridge region, which stretches through large sections of Virginia and North Carolina and parts of surrounding states along the Appalachian chain, was the American frontier.

The settlers who did not migrate to new lands became geographically isolated and politically and economically marginalized. Yet they created fulfilling lives for themselves by forging effective and oftentimes sophisticated folklife traditions, many of which endure in the region today.

In 1772 the Watauga Association, often cited as the first free and democratic non-native government on the American continent, was organized in the Blue Ridge area. In 1780 Blue Ridge pioneers helped win the Revolutionary War for the patriots by defeating Patrick Ferguson's army of British loyalists at the Battle of Kings Mountain.

Having been spared by the coincidence of geology and topography from the more environmentally damaging manifestations of industrialization, coal mining, and dam building, the Blue Ridge region still harbors scenic natural beauty as well as vestiges of the earliest cultures of Southern Appalachia. As it describes the most characteristic and significant traditions, this fascinating, fact-filled book traces the historical development of the region's distinctive folklife.