Someone once said that more is known that is untrue about Appalachia than about any other region of the country. For many people, Appalachia is the homeland of the bumbling "Beverly Hillbillies," the crazed Deliverance hillbillies, or the cartoon hillbillies of Snuffy Smith and Li'l Abner. It's a strange place with peculiar people who talk funny, in which none-too-smart, lazy men wear battered hats, tote guns, and make and drink moonshine whiskey, and women are either blonde, buxom, and dumb, or gaunt, toothless grannies with lots of home remedies and recipes for cooking roadkill. These images, created by generations of writers, journalists, filmmakers, comedians, and cartoonists, have shaped popular opinion of Appalachia as home to a culture that is homogeneous, white, poor, ignorant, violent, and unproductive. In truth, Appalachia is not a monolithic culture--and not the one depicted in the stereotypes--but a patchwork quilt of rich traditions that form the vivid patterns of Appalachian experience.