James B Oliver

Personal Poems James B Oliver

I was born in a log cabin in the poor, rugged Appalachian, Mountains of eastern Kentucky in 1929, the year the cruel depression was born. I lived an estimated thirty miles north of where the now-famous Hatfield and McCoy feud started. Tug River was my swimming pool when I was a kid. The long, cruel depression was especially rough in the poor mountains. When I was eight years old, I was helping with the chores; by the time I was nine years old, I was helping my dad and brothers dig coal in the drift mines for winter's heat, and to pay the rent.