Appalachian Folktales in Collections for Children and Adults

Compiled by Tina L. Hanlon

Appalachian Folktale Collections A - J	Appalachian Folktale Collections K - Z (by author/editor)
Folktales Reprinted in AppLit	Appalachian Folktales in General Collections, Journals, and Web Sites
AppLit Home	Back to Folktale Bibliography Index
Indicates books that are readily available and more accessible to children than others on this page.
Notes:  Many individual tales from some of these collections are described in AppLit's Annotated Index of Appalachian Tales. Supernatural Tales from the Appalachian Mountains may list some items not on this page although there is much overlap in the two bibliographies. The term folktale is used very broadly on these pages to include many kinds of folklore retellings or adaptations in books, recordings, dramas, and films. Some material on ballads and folk songs is included, but mostly prose narratives from folklore (see Complete List of AppLit Pages on Music).

Appalachian Folktale Collections A - J

Adams, James Taylor. Grandpap Told Me Tales: Memories of an Appalachian Childhood. Ed. Fletcher Dean. Big Stone Gap, VA: F. Dean, 1993. Introduction by Edward L. Henson. 240  pp. (Some tales collected by Adams are in AppLit's Fiction and Poetry section.) Reviewed by Charles Perdue Jr. in Appalachian Journal, vol. 21 (Spring 1994).

Adams, James Taylor, ed. Death in the Dark: A Collection of Factual Ballads of American Mine Disasters with Historical Notes by James Taylor Adams. Big Laurel, VA: Adams-Mullins Press, 1941. This collection of folk ballads is based on disastrous coal mine explosions in and around the Appalachian Mountains. All the ballads include historical accounts of the catastrophes being referred to, and the histories are written by Adams or taken directly from letters to him from correspondents. In the Foreword, Adams describes the process of collecting these ballads and shares his personal struggles endured while periodically working in the coal mines. Death in the Dark is a chilling collection of valuable folklore with an emphasis on real life in the coal mines. (Notes by Michelle Vincent)       

Awiakta, Marilou. Selu:  Seeking the Corn-Mother's Wisdom.  Golden, CO:  Fulcrum, 1993.  A blend of story, essay, and poetry by a Cherokee/Appalachian writer.  A retelling of "The Origin of Corn" (pp. 10-14) provides a spiritual "compass" in the book.

Barden, Thomas E., ed. Virginia Folk Legends. Charlottesville: Univ. Press of VA, 1991. A selection of 150 legends from the previously unpublished materials collected by the Virginia Writer's Project of the WPA from 1937 to 1942. See Molly Mulhollun.

Blanton, Curtis R.. Tales from the Porch: Tall Tales and Short Stories from the North Carolina Mountains. Illus. James C. Sellers. Norris, TN: Curtis R. Blanton, 2006.

Bradley, Ramona K. Weavers of Tales: A Collection of Cherokee Legends. Published by the author, 1967. Rpt. Cherokee, NC: Betty Dupree. No date given in book if this is a reprint later than 1967. With sepia drawings by the author, wife of an Eastern Cherokee, and several photos. Includes an introduction on prominent Cherokee storytellers (especially A'yn'ini or Swimmer, the main informant for Mooney's 19th-century records of tales), a Foreword on the land of the Cherokee and a page in the back called "Cherokee Sounds," for pronouncing Cherokee names. The 24 tales include creation tales on the world and the Indian, "Keepers of the Secrets" (about shamans and Little People), "Origin of Strawberries, "The First Fire," and "The Milky Way." Kanati appears in "The Four-footed Tribe." Some tales include historical figures such as Nancy Ward in "War-Women or Pretty-Women."

Brown, Stephen D. Haunted Houses of Harpers Ferry. Illus. Joseph D. Osmann. Harpers Ferry, WV: The Little Brown House, 1976. "It is said that ghosts and phantom figures roam where the gently rolling hills of Western Maryland and Northern Virginia meet West Virginia's craggy borders at Harpers Ferry. The area is rich in history with Civil War battlegrounds, old homes, and even older legends.  It is in this area that these tales of mysterious shadows, ghosts and haunted houses are told" (Introduction).

Brush, Frederic. Hill Doctor: Tells in Story and Ballads, Tales of the Appalachians. Selinsgrove, PA: Susquehanna University Press, 1956. 142 pp.

Burchill, James V., Linda J. Crider, Peggy Kendrick, and Marcia Wright Bonner. Ghosts and Haunts from the Appalachian Foothills. Nashville: Rutledge Hill Press, 1993. Scary tales collected by members of the First Draft Writers Group of rural North Georgia, with introduction but no specific source notes.

Campbell, Marie. Tales from the Cloud Walking Country. Indiana UP, 1958. Rpt. Athens: U of George Press, 2000. Seventy-eight tales collected by the author when she taught in a small eastern Kentucky settlement school and traveled in the area from 1926 into the 1940s.  B/W illustrations (one for each chapter) are by Clare Leighton. "Most of the tales [brought from Europe] are what folklorists call Marchen, a German word for what the ordinary reader or storyteller calls a 'fairy tale'. . . This book of tales, making up somewhat less than half of the total group of Marchen which I collected in Kentucky, were all told me by six 'right main tale-tellers' who not only had 'a fine sleight at tale-telling' but who also had 'a bigger store of olden tales for the telling.'" These tellers told Campbell that "Tale telling is nigh about faded out in the mountain country," that ghost stories and local legends were still told at parties or work gatherings, but Campbell was the sole audience for these tellings of the European tales. Older people usually felt that the folk tales or ballads "belonged to be told or sung, not put down in writing," but some tellers said it's better to write them down to preserve tradition than to forget them. These Appalachian tellers often express skepticism at magical or implausible elements in the tales. Campbell worked on organizing the tales with Stith Thompson at Indiana University in the 1950s (Introduction, 9, 14).  One chapter is devoted to each of the six tellers, with introductions to each one.  Notes with tale types and parallels are given for each tale. Cloud Walking  (Bloomington: Indiana Univ. Press, 1942) contains more realistic stories of mountain life in KY.

Carden, Gary, Nina Anderson (contributor), and Jerry Bledsoe, ed. Belled Buzzards, Hucksters & Grieving Spectres: Strange & True Tales of the Appalachian Mountains. Asheboro, NC: Down Home Press, 1994. "Quirky" and "bizarre" tales heard by storyteller/playwright Gary Carden in childhood.

Carden, Gary. Mason Jars in the Flood and Other Stories. Boone, NC: Parkway Publishers, 2000. Most are realistic and personal stories by a NC storyteller, but some are based on folklore, especially in the section called "The Granny Stories." See review, cover and ordering information at Tannery Whistle.Com. The title story is at http://tannerywhistle.com/story.html.

Carden, Gary. Tannery Whistle.Com: Folk Stories in Words and in Paint. Includes Carden's versions of some Cherokee Myths and Legends. Also contains information on books, videos, plays and narrative folk paintings by this North Carolina storyteller and playwright. http://tannerywhistle.com.

Cartmell, Connie. Ghosts of Marietta. Marietta, Ohio: Marty's Print Shop, 1996. Cartmell invites readers to "snuggle into your favorite chair in front of a crackling fire, lower the lights, and enjoy 15 strange, quirky, sometimes even chilling stories about people you know and places you may pass every day, places that are part of the rich and diverse fabric of historic Marietta" (Preface, p. 10).

Chappel, Louis. John Henry: A Folk-Lore Study. Jena, Germany: Frommer, 1933. Rpt. Port Washington, NY:  Kennikat Press, 1968.  A scholarly study with many versions of the ballad and hammer song (see also Guy Johnson below).

Chase, Richard. American Folk Tales and Songs, and Other Examples of English-American Tradition as Preserved in the Appalachian Mountains and Elsewhere in the United States.  Illus. Joshua Tolford.  New York:  Dover, 1956, rpt. 1971.  In the first half of the book are groups of Ancient Tales (including "Wicked John and the Devil" and "The Haunted House"), Five Jack Tales, The Foolish Irishman Tales (from southwestern Virginia), and Tall Tales. "Mister Fox" is a variant of "Pretty Polly."

Chase, Richard. Grandfather Tales. Illus. Berkeley Williams, Jr. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1948. Contains 25 tales and a few songs, with a frame story in which friends and family tell stories to each other and a visiting folklorist all night. This collection devotes almost as much attention to female storytellers and characters as to males. For more on these tales, see AppLit's Annotated Index of Folktales: Wicked John and the Devil, Mutsmag, Whitebear Whittington, Sody Sallyraytus, The Old Sow and the Three Shoats, How Bobtail Beat the Devil, Old Dry Frye, Catskins, Ashpet, Like Meat Loves Salt, Soap, Soap, Soap!, The Two Old Women's Bet, Old One-Eye (and others may be added later). See Appalachian Christmas Books for Children and Young Adults for more on the frame story set on Old Christmas-Eve.

Chase, Richard. The Jack Tales. Illus. Berkeley Williams, Jr. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1943. Chase heard the Jack tales first from the Ward family, descendants of the earliest settlers of NC, who told the tales among their family and friends for entertainment and for "keeping the kids on the job" during chores. Both Chase collections contain notes on sources and variants.  They made Appalachian folktales known to the rest of the country, and remain among the most popular folktale collections in America. For details on individual tales, see AppLit's Annotated Index of Folktales: Jack Tales. Photos of Richard Chase at Ferrum College. 

Cherokee Folk Tales. 3 vols. Tahlequah, OK: Cherokee Bilingual Education Program, 1973-1974. Listed in WorldCat as a bilingual illustrated children's book.

Chiltoskey, Mary Ulmer. Aunt Mary, Tell Me A Story: A Collection of Cherokee Legends and Tales. Ed. Mary Regina Ulmer Galloway. Illus. Lib Lambert, John Barton Galloway, and Goingback Chiltoskey. Cherokee, NC: Cherokee Communications, 1990. Mary Ulmer Chiltoskey went to Cherokee, NC as a teacher. In 1989 she became an honorary member of the Eastern Band of the Cherokee, after nearly 50 years in Cherokee as a history teacher, librarian, wife of artist Goingback Chiltoskey, beloved storyteller, community activist, and craftsperson. For this book, her niece retold the stories she loved best as a child, when Aunt Mary told the stories she learned from the Cherokee. The book contains background on the Cherokee and the nature of living myths and legends. The truths these stories contain "teach about the animals and men created by the Great One" (p. 2). Twenty-eight tales, including "The Legend of the Strawberries, "The Legend of the Cherokee Rose" and "The Legend of the Corn Beads," "How the Water Spider Captured Fire," "How the Bat and Flying Squirrel Got their Wings," and "The Legend of the Milky Way," are accompanied by drawings by several Cherokee artists.

Craig, Idell, ed. Cherokee Myths: Morals & Values. Illus. Catherine Pearson. 2 vols. Tulsa, OK: Envelopes Plus, 1991. "Reproduction of authentic traditional Cherokee myths from reports of the Bureau of American Ethnology" (WorldCat).

Credle, Ellis. Tall Tales From the High Hills. E. M. Hale, 1957.

Crites, Susan. Confederate Ghosts. Martinsburg, WV: Butternut, 1994. Stories based on recent sightings of ghosts, collected by a seventh-generation West Virginian.

Crites, Susan. Lively Ghosts of the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia. Martinsburg, WV: Butternut, 1991. Five tales selected from those collected throughout the eastern panhandle by the author, with line drawings and a map by the author, a seventh-generation West Virginian. The introduction comments on widespread beliefs in ghosts among West Virginians. Includes brief notes on the author's experiences with people and places involved in the tales.

Crites, Susan. More Lively Ghosts. Martinsburg, WV: Butternut, 1992. Stories based on recent sightings of ghosts, collected by a seventh-generation West Virginian.

Crites, Susan. Union Ghosts. Martinsburg, WV: Butternut, 1993. Stories based on recent sightings of ghosts, collected by a seventh-generation West Virginian.

Crockett, Davy. See AppLit bibliography Davy Crockett and Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett.

Cunningham, Maggi. The Cherokee Tale-Teller. Illus. Patrick DesJarlait. Minneapolis: Dillon Press, 1978. 158 pp. "Contents: Atagahi, the wonderful lake. - Selu Corn Woman and the crows. - Deer song. - Princess of the deer .- The monster utlunta. - Desata and the forever boy. - The fire watcher .- The red bird .- Tlanuwa, the great hawk. - The Nunnehi, the gentle people" (WorldCat). Cataloged as a juvenile book.

Dadisman, Kenny. Shooting the Bull: A Collection of Barbour County Folklore. Parsons, WV:  McClain Printing, 1996. During the Great Depression, the people of Barbour found ways to make life easier. "It was out of this necessity to laugh that some of the most exciting and funniest stories were born. Our intent in this book is to pass on and keep alive some of this Barbour County folklore, as it was passed down to us" (Introduction).

Davenport, Henry B. Tales of the Elk and Other Stories. Gauley Bridge, WV: Thomas Imprints, 1992. Originally published in 1942 as two volumes, the current book combines Parts I and II. "This book is a collection of short stories and anecdotes about the Elk River Valley and Clay County, West Virginia" ("About the Author").

Davenport, Tom, and Gary Carden. From the Brothers Grimm: A Contemporary Retelling of American Folktales and Classic Stories. Fort Atkinson, WI:  Highsmith, 1992. Stories with photographs from 10 fairy tale films set in Appalachia. See also Bibliography of Davenport Fairy Tale Films.

Davis, Donald. Jack Always Seeks His Fortune: Authentic Appalachian Jack Tales. Little Rock: August House, 1992. Also published by August House as Southern Jack Tales, 1997. With an Introduction by Joseph Daniel Sobol as well as "Foreword: I Grew Up Close to Jack," and brief introduction to each tale by Davis. On the thirteen Jack Tales in this collection, Davis writes, "Out of the nearly three dozen Jack tales which I can recall, most presented in this collection have, I believe, either not been published in their Appalachian manifestations or are so different from any extant version as to make comparison interesting rather than repetitious. The deliberate exception to this principle is 'The Time Jack Got His First Job,' a common tale included so that those acquainted with the genre may compare it and the 'Lazy Jack' versions they know" (Foreword, p. 27). "The First Time Jack Came to America" is reprinted at http://www.mwg.org. Other tales included: "I Grew up Close to Jack," "Time Jack Went to Seek his Fortune," "Time Jack Told a Big Tale," "Time Jack Got his First Job," "Time Jack Fooled the Miller," "Time Jack Cured the Doctor," "Time Jack Got the Silver Sword," "Time Jack Learned about Old and New," "Time Jack Stole the Cows," "Time Jack Helped the King Catch his Girls," "Time Jack Got the Wishing Ring," "Time Jack Solved the Hardest Riddle," "Time Jack Went up in the Big Tree." Davis has also produced oral recordings of some of his tales. See Jack and the Animals and The Pig Who Went Home on Sunday ("The Three Little Pigs") for notes on picture books and recordings by Davis.

Davis, Donald. Listening for the Crack of Dawn. Little Rock: August House, 1990. "A master storyteller recalls the Appalachia of the 50's and 60's" (front cover). A former Methodist minister and professional storyteller records his original stories based on his childhood in a small mountain town in NC. Includes a story of Christmas in Sulphur Springs.

Davis, Donald. My Lucky Day: Tales from a Southern Appalachian Story Teller. Illus. Rebekah Russell. Murfreesboro, NC: Johnson Pub., 1983. 112 pp.

Davis, Hubert J. 'Pon my honor, hit's the truth: Tall Tales from the Mountains. Illus. Carolee Jackson. Murfreesboro, NC: Johnson Pub., ?1973. Virginia folklore. 112. pp.

Deitz, Dennie. The Greenbrier Ghost and Other Strange Stories. South Charleston, WV:  Mountain Memories Books, 1997. Through Deitz's "travels around the state, as a West Virginia book distributor, observing and writing, he has periodically heard strange stories that he has instinctively known he does not want to recreate, but just record as close to the actual storytellers' versions as possible. Here Mr. Deitz has stepped beyond the realm of author into that of folklorist. These 'strange stories,' as he labels them, contain similar traits. They are not created through the storytellers' imaginations, but believed by the storytellers to be true. Usually, they are encounters that the storytellers have actually had with ghosts or other supernatural phenomena. The stories are direct, simplistic in structure, and localized in setting" (Introduction, Judy P. Byers, vii). See excerpt "The Greenbrier Ghost" with photos in Ghosts section of teaching unit West Virginia's Appalachian Music and Literature (now within AppLit).

Deitz, Dennie. The Greenbrier Ghost #2 and Other Strange Stories. South Charleston, WV: Mountain Memories Books, 1998. In the Introduction to the collection, Linda Good writes, "Travel now with Mr. Deitz on the wings of his written words to another exciting adventure in the world of premonitions, legends, the supernatural and ghosts" (vii).

Digital Library of Appalachia. Appalachian College Association. A collection of digital reproductions of print, visual, audio and video items from archives in colleges affiliated with ACA. Includes audio of storytellers such as Ray Hicks and Loyal Jones telling Jack Tales, audio versions of tales collected in 1949 and published by Leonard Roberts.

Duncan, Barbara R., ed. Living Stories of the Cherokee. Chapel Hill: Univ. of NC Press, 1998. Foreword by Joyce Conseen Dugan, Principal Chief, Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. With stories told by Davy Arch, Robert Bushyhead, Edna Chekelelee, Marie Junaluska, Kathi Smith Littlejohn, and Freeman Owle. Contains detailed introductions to each storyteller and Cherokee culture. The stories are transcribed in this book in a free verse form that represents the storytellers' "rhythmic style," using the "oral poetics" method developed in the 1970s. For details on some of the many tales in this volume, see Native American Tales from Appalachia.

Duncan, Barbara R., ed. Where It All Began: Cherokee Creation Stories in Art. Cherokee, NC: Museum of the Cherokee Indian, 2001. Companion book to a museum exhibit. Creation stories are retold throughout the book with photographs of art in different media by 14 Cherokee artists. Includes Swimmer's telling of "How the World Was Made," "The Origin of Strawberries" by Freeman Owle, Davy Arch's carved mask with his "The Old Man and the Birds—The Origin of the Blowgun," an Uktena story, a painting of Wild Boy from tales of Selu and Kana'ti, Freeman Owle's stone carvings with his remarks on storytelling at the exhibit's opening reception (Nov. 2000) and images of the water spider from The First Fire. Also includes overview of the museum by Museum Director Ken Blankenship, introduction to the exhibit by curator B. Lynne Harlan, "Storytelling Among the Contemporary Cherokee" by Duncan.

Foxfire. Magazines and books in which teachers and students have collected Appalachian folklore since 1966. Foxfire is also a play, a museum, and a center for materials on collaborative teaching and learning. Mountain City, GA.

Gates, Carmaletta Harris. Granny Stories: North Carolina Mountain Tales: A Collection of Stories. Sylva, NC: Carmaletta Gates, 2005. One tale from this book, "The Painter and the Spinnin' Wheel" is printed in Harris' web site. It tells about Grandma keeping a panther at bay during the night by making a strange noise with her spinning wheel.