FOLK MEDICINE TRADITIONS: How the sharing of folk medicine beliefs serves to build communities in Appalachia
Chuck Lott
November 26, 2012
Abstract
Folk Medicine is a topic that is frequently discussed among scholars and amateurs in the field of Folklife and Folklore. An integral aspect of community life is the sharing of this knowledge. Methods of treating common medical issues, such as were common in rural Carroll County, were passed down from one generation to the next, from neighbor to neighbor, and people constantly adapted these ideas to increase their effectiveness and to utilize the materials that were available. How were these folk medicine beliefs adapted and why do they continue to be used and shared? In this study, I will examine Folk Medicine customs and beliefs from the early nineteenth century to the present in the southern Appalachian region of North America. For the residents of that stretch of mountains and foothills that runs from West Virginia to Georgia, this system of beliefs evolved and continued because they help build and sustain communities.
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This study of Folk Medicine utilizes published oral histories and journals as well as secondary sources to contextualize the information. A thorough search was made of period online newspaper archives for articles relating to folk medicine in the area with little success, however, this remains a worthwhile avenue for future research. In this study, the primary sources examined are three distinct medical practitioners: A professionally educated medical doctor, a folk healer, and a rural nurse who made house calls in the subject area.
- Dr. Abraham Jobe, a rural doctor who lived in North Carolina, Tennessee, and North Carolina from 1817-1906.
- Arie Cabe Carpenter lived her entire ninety-two years in Macon County, North Carolina. In the course of her ninety-two years, she was both a repository and practitioner of folk medicine. Carpenter nursed the sick and passed folk medicine traditions to others in her community.
- Peggy Fisher is a Home Health Care Nurse from Glasgow, West Virginia who makes visits to patients in their homes and shares the remedies, cures, and folk medicine beliefs that she has acquired from her patients.
Folk medicine beliefs were practical ways of assigning causation to illness, sickness, or death that could not be explained in rational terms. According to folklorist Mary Butler Stone, “folk medicine is a system of healing made up of beliefs and practices that are transferred by oral tradition through families and communities. It was developed in response to a lack of access to modern medical care and combines homemade remedies with superstition and religious beliefs.”[2] Indeed, it is one of the more fascinating aspects of the genre; and may of the ‘cures’ seem to be ill advised, dangerous or non plausible as effective treatments to the etic observer.[3]
Folk medicine provided a means for concerned family to do something, even if my etic perspectives, the methods seem odd. For example, Colic, a common disorder that affected infants could be treated by ‘magical cures’ according tor Anthony Cavender, author of Folk Medicine in Southern Appalachia. “Passing an infant around a table leg from mother to father three times, were used to treat it.” Treatments seem odd as well. Cavender relates, one could “cut” (staunch) bleeding from a nosebleed by having a few drops of the blood fall on the blade of a knife.”[4]
Folk medicine beliefs crossed social boundaries in ways that many other specific beliefs and rituals did not. Native American and African American medicinal methods were incorporated into the white methodology and vice versa, but protestant whites cast a condemning eye on African and Native American religious practices that did not conform to the Christian norm. European immigrants learned from Native Americans which plants had medicinal value and how they could be applied to specific cases. All three of these groups held both similar and opposing views of the supernatural and how those unseen forces were both causers and cure for a variety of illness and maladies.
Southern Appalachia has been predominately inhabited by the decedents of the white Europeans who immigrated and settled in the region during the eighteenth century. Other minority racial groups make up the remainder. Pockets of African-Americans, Native-Americans, and Hispanics are scattered in the region. The study area experiences greater instances of unemployment and poverty for its citizens as compared to the nation at large, as recently as 1990, per capita income was no greater that 67 percent of the national average, and both poverty and unemployment levels at least 150 percent of United States levels.[5]
In spite of challenging living conditions where opportunities were sometimes scarce, Southern Appalachia has evolved a distinct character. John A. Burrison in his work, Roots of A Region, Southern Folk Culture, explains: “ The resulting limiting contact with neighbors and the outside world, fostered reliance on folklore as an inherited knowledge base for both livelihood and recreation, while heightening the importance of the family as the chief mechanism for passing on these traditions.”[6] Further examination of the culture of this region, however, reveals people who have a distinct character that places extraordinary value on God, their family, and their community.[7]
Recent studies, such as Anthony Cavender’s Folk Medicine in Southern Appalachia and Loch Haven University professor of history Sandra Lee Barney’s Authorized to Heal, Gender, Class, and the Transformation of Medicine in Appalachia 1880-1990, both examine the ways that folk medicine and modern medicine merged in the mountains and foothills of Appalachia. These comprehensive works define medicine beliefs in the region, but do not specifically focus on the subject of this paper; how these beliefs came to foster the sense of community in the area.
The classic Foxfire book series, a high school oral history project in rural north Georgia, brought new interest folk medicine. The class instructor and editor, Eliot Wiggington described the late 1960’s and early 1970’s project, “From the beginning, students have interviewed older community residents in an effort to document skills, traditions, experiences and the resulting perspectives” Wiggington adds, “ Through this, the students have presumably gained some appreciation for, and perspective on, the Appalachian experience they all share.” [8] Students interviewed residents of Raburn county and neighboring mountain comminutes. The interview subjects discussed nearly all aspects of rural mountain living, and through this process, many of the students gained new appreciations of the older generation of the community.
The Foxfire project, even if not intended, passed folk medicine to the next generation of their community, the students. It also generated an unprecedented interest in folklife among readers. The interaction of the older participants, some who considered themselves healers and some who did not, is folklife in action, the transfer of knowledge, orally transmitted or demonstrated to new participants and adherents in the belief system. These beliefs are passed down and endure because they are useful and because they are adapted when new methods and information are accumulated. Additionally, folk medicine offers hope in situations when modern ‘commercial’ was not available or could not offer ready or plausible explanations to the afflicted or their families. They reinforce the sense of community, bind the participants into a social group, and in the case of cross-cultural sharing of information, bind different ethnic groups together. Although these secondary sources each contain a component of how folk medicine beliefs were shared among people, this work differs in that it aims to add to the scholarship of folk medicine as a means of strengthen the community.
‘Aunt” Arie Carpenter, (1885-1978) a resident of Macon County North Carolina considered herself such a healer. The subject of extensive interviews in the Foxfire series and the Foxfire Intimate Portrait, Aunt Arie, the oral interviews conducted by Rabun County High School studentsdocuments the life and belief system of this remarkable woman. Carpenter incorporated the holistic aspect of Appalachian beliefs of religion, superstition, and accepted medical practices into her ideology and medical philosophy. “Aunt Arie,” as the students affectionately knew her, passed down all types of mountain life lore, and much of that lifetime of experience was her medical experience. Carpenter was taught ‘doctorin’ by her mother, but also had learned from members of her extended family and community. Carpenter felt that her service was her contribution to the community, and did not consider her contribution to the health of her neighbors to be a burden, nor did she particularly worry about her own exposure during her duties. She also helped with the preparation of the dead, as was the custom in her community. Carpenter described her medical ‘career’:
Waited on thirty-two sick people in my life, and dressed and laid out I don’t
know how many dead people. That’s th’kind a parties that I had. Enjoyed
th’last bit of it. I was a help t’somebody. I just enjoyed it. ‘Druther go into
sick rooms better than anything that I have ever done. Go and stay day and
night and never eat a bite and just keep a ‘goin on till I give plumb out.
Then of course I had to quit, but I’ve had to do it all my life. You do anything
for forty, fifty, you’re liable to keep on just because it’s a help to somebody.[9]
Carpenter had wanted to become a nurse. Apparently, her affinity to help the sick caught the attention of the local doctor, whom Carpenter references only as “Tom.” “He use t’be our doctor, and he wanted Mommy t’let me be a trained nurse. Why, she’d a went into a fit sure ‘nough if I did. She said that was disgraceful.” Carpenter does not explain why her mother was resistant to allowing Arie’s ambition. Perhaps the family considered it their duty to perform such functions for the community without charge, or it could be that Carpenter’s mother did not want to be without her personal caretaker. “Mommy” as Carpenter references her mother, was described by the daughter as having a continuous struggle with her health, and could not be “left alone by herself.” Although Carpenter had many suitors in the Macon County area, she did not marry until the death of her mother when Carpenter was thirty-eight years old.[10]
Carpenter was not the only member of her family that performed medical services- her medical knowledge came through both parents lineage. Her father, ‘Poppy’ as Carpenter references him during he interviews, brought knowledge of “bluestone”, a procedure passed down by his mother that Carpenter herself used to maintain her eyesight. When Carpenter tells the students about the ‘bluestone’ she cautions them about using the stone for medical purposes. “ I’m a goin to tell you’uns this now, too. I ain’t goin t’tell you’ uns to do it- you just do as you please about that.” Carpenter then described the procedure of how ‘Poppy’s” mother, (Carpenter’s grandmother) would make a tea with the stone and apply it to her eyes. Carpenter related that she “does her eyes that way now.” She credited the procedure to her life without glasses. Most likely, however, an eye care doctor probably never examined Carpenter, and her eyesight had declined with age, as is typical with most people.
Carpenter’s words of caution to the students, and thereby to others who may read the transcript of the interview, is insightful into how some folk remedies are perceived by their adherents. It was not necessary to understand how remedies ‘work’, but there have to be an understanding that just because a remedy is gathered from nature, does not imply that it was without risks.
In rural communities, folk medicine traditions were shared and performed at places other than in homes. Uncle Henson, one of Carpenter’s extended family, performed medical treatments for ‘thrash,’ a malady that Carpenter attributed to infants caused by breast-feeding. Thrash, “that’s blisters that get all round a nursing’ young’uns mouth.” Uncle Henson treated the affliction with mixed results with “so many leaves ‘a sage,” most likely rubbing the child’s affected area with the leaves of the herb that was common in gardens in the area. ‘Poppy,’ however had a different treatment that Carpenter described as always meeting with success. Poppy’s main qualification: He had never seen his father. His services were in high demand in the community. “I’ve seen him ‘hundreds of times” Carpenter relates. “He’d ‘rench out his mouth three or four times, take his two hands and open up the child’s mouth…hold it open and blow in. He’d blow three times and that’s all that was done.” Is particularly interesting that Carpenter did not consider the application of the herb leaves as viable as a cure as the method that ‘Poppy’ used, a treatment that was based on superstition and magic.[11] Conversely, Carpenter relates from first hand experience that the supernatural based remedy had a greater record of success.
Carpenter herself passed superstition based beliefs on to others as well. One of her medical success was her treatment that removed warts. “There was a whole crowd come Sunday last t’have me take off warts.” Her treatment: She bought them with cash. “We’ve got some warts we want you to buy.” Carpenter relates of her patients. “ I give ‘em a coin or two.” She then offered her services to the interviewers: “If any a’youn’s has any warts, I can take ‘m off for y.”[12]
Anthony Cavender writing in Folk Medicine in Southern Appalachia, traditionally “Folk Medicine has been organized into two knowledge domains, Natural and Supernatural.” These two very different systems of beliefs regarding the causes of sickness sheds light onto why the people of Appalachia have adapted and kept these beliefs through many generations. While the supernatural causation of illness may subside, many hold to mystical treatments for relief.[13]
Although Carpenter felt herself competent to treat most afflictions, Carpenter held the local doctor, Doc Nevilles in high esteem. Her comments reflect her respect and admiration for the local physician as she described the death of her mother from a wave of influenza that swept their mountain community. “ Well we ever’ one got over it ‘cept for mommy. If it hadn’t been for doc Nevilles ‘doctorin me, though, I’d a not been here.” Carpenter goes on to describe a local woman who almost died of pneumonia despite “what all of us, doctors and all could do.”[14]
In some ways, Carpenter felt herself a partner to the local medical professionals. She realized that many afflictions were beyond her ability and knowledge, but in some instances, she felt her folk medicine methods as preferential treatments over ‘modern’ medicine. Her folk treatments continue even in the era when most people have access to professional medical care. She strengthened the community with her concern for her fellow citizens. In her Foxfire interviews, she not only passed down her knowledge of medicine to a new generation, she also forwarded the accumulated beliefs and methods of previous generations of which she had become the repository.
Aunt Arie Carpenter’s story provides interesting background references for the observations of Peggy S. Fisher, a registered nurse who made home visits to the people of the Appalachian region. She observed, “ As a whole, these were superstitious people who held great value in weather signs and natural lore, remedies, omens, and family lore.” Even today, Fisher relates, “many health care professionals have difficulty treating rural West Virginians due to the old beliefs that occasionally conflict with modern science.” [15] In reality, however, these people have struck a balance of medical treatment that reinforce their community beliefs and add to the support system that they provide for one another when professional medical treatment is not desired, unaffordable, or unavailable.
Folk Medicine transcended the social bounds of communities that did not ordinarily cross in Appalachia. Fisher related the influence of Native American medical theories and practice and how these were incorporated into the mainstream Appalachian medical ideology. In order to be useful, folk beliefs have to constantly adapt, and by bringing in other culture’s beliefs and practices, folk medicine both adapted and proved useful to both cultures. “The American experience is deeply rooted in the lore of Native Indians,” Fisher writes. “My mother remembers an old woman who lived way up in one of the hollows from her family’s farm. Prudy White was a full blooded Blackfoot Indian who ‘doctored’ the people who lived nearby.” Fisher’s grandmother passed down the story of the family sending to get the Blackfoot ‘doctor’. “My Grandmother sent my Grandfather to get old Purdy. My mother was scared to death of Old Purdy particularly since local legend had it she was a witch and could put a spell on you and make you die.” [16] In this case, the Indian healer made a tea that provided relief to the afflicted child and the child was healed.
Folk medicine beliefs were shared by the European and Native American community, primarily because the geographical closeness of the two cultures. Charles Hudson describes the effect of Native Americans upon the medicinal beliefs among white settlers in the Appalachian region.
The folk medicine used by Southerners was a mixture of Indian
herbalism along with elements of European and American Culture.
They got from the Indians the use of such herbs as ginseng, wild cherry bark,
poplar bark, lady’s slipper, poke leaves, poke root, pokeberries, sassafras,
yellow root, chestnut leaves, boneset, pine needles, ferns, horsemint,
peppermint, snakeroot, and pennyroyal. Other elements are clearly European
and American, such as using a magnet to draw out arthritis, a poultice of
turpentine and brown sugar to stop bleeding, raw honey and vinegar for a
cough, a Bible under the pillow for nightmares, and “moonshine” whisky
for practically everything.[17]
Not all beliefs migrated between these cultures, however. “As smallpox spread among the Cherokee Indians in the Carolinas, Thomas Dale, a Charlestown physician, was sent to inoculate the Indians” wrote David Dary in Frontier Medicine, “but many Cherokee suspicious of any offer of help from the whites refused inoculations. As a result, perhaps half of the Cherokee population in the Carolinas died from Smallpox.”[18]
Fisher’s experiences in the homes of her patients included the transfer of remedies both ways: her patients offered advice and treatment methods to her. As in the case of folk remedies that outsiders pass on, the most bizarre or implausible merits conversation. Some of the more noteworthy that Fisher has been told:
- An iron key pressed on the back of the neck will cure a nosebleed.[19]
- A dirty sock worn around the neck will cure a cold.
- To stop a toothache, tie a string around the little toe of the right foot.
What is important to realize is that the Fisher’s patients who passed this information to her was so that she could incorporate the methods in her practice. For Fisher, the transfer of her methods of healing and the recrpitication of her patients offering of their remedies, Fisher became part of their community, and the patient part of hers.[20]
For residents of Southern Appalachia, it was (and is) possible to have folk medicine beliefs along with reliance with trained medical professionals. These two genres of health care have coexisted in Appalachia since the advent of medical colleges in the nineteenth century when formal education for doctors began. Dr. Abraham Jobe, (1817-1906) details in his memoir, A Mountaineer in Motion, described lay medical practitioners in the North Carolina Mountains in the 19th century. Dr. Jobe was skeptical of folk doctors and described one such individual of which he had firsthand knowledge of. “Dr. Lloyd lived with the family. He was called a self made doctor, that is a doctor without reading” Jobe continues, “He simply took up the practice without any preparation whatsoever.” Jobe described the incident where the lay doctor’s prescription, according to Jobe, caused the patients death. [21] Other professional medical personnel distrusted the folk doctor, and vice-versa. David Dary describes the lay medical person as a “Quack” and writes, “Quacks claim to have medical knowledge but usually peddle unproven and sometimes dangerous medicines, cures, or treatments.” Dary continues, “it was not, however, until the middle of the 19th century that that they gradually became a problem in the eyes of physicians trying to make medicine a respectable profession whose practitioners were professionally trained, educated, and certified.”[22] It is unclear if the ‘quack’ healers were folk healers that had professional aspirations or were charlatans who preyed on the sick and their families.
As shown in Aunt Arie Carpenter’s interviews and Peggy Fisher’s experiences, not all mountain people felt that “trained” doctors held more of a chance to heal them than using their folk remedies that had been handed down through their community. Many would call the physician only in the case of immanent death or when the prospect for recovery had became all but lost. “Just as Typhoid Mary Mallon rejected physician’s claims that she was ill even though she felt well, some Appalachian people distrusted the unknowable, mysterious agents that doctors increasingly blames for illness” wrote Sandra Lee Barney in Authorized to Heal, Gender, Class, and the Transformation of Medicine in Appalachia, 1880-1930. “Unprepared by education or training to comprehend the principles on which the new remedies were based” Barney continues, “ resistant mountaineers took refuge in traditional cures.” Some rejected all treatments and fell back on a religious fatalism that fostered an overly simplistic stereotype of Appalachian as opponents to progress.”[23]
Dr. Abraham Jobe’s diary documents his sharing of knowledge in the community in which he lived, but he reserved medical advice to his trained peers. Jobe makes mention frequently of other doctors that he knew, and how his methods compared with others. Typhoid fever, as Carpenter documented, on several occasions made appearances through the Appalachian region. When Jobe became ill from the fever after treating many afflicted patients, Jobe only mentions in his diary of the colleague that provided his treatment and that the doctors collaborated on the treatment. Although Jobe did not solicit his neighbor’s advice in medical matters, his house calls certainly made his membership in the community valued. Jobe’s extensive journal entries does show that in most other matters, such as business and farming, Jobe valued the input and opinions of his fellow citizens. Since Jobe well documents his disdain for untrained or ‘folk’ healers, his contributions to the community were by passing his professional methods to the community.
In order for folk traditions to continue, they must be useful and constantly adapted. Different factors among community contribute to folk beliefs regarding medicine and healing, but as George Schoemaker explained in The Emergence of Folklore in Everyday Life, “The term ‘Folk’ can refer to any group of people whatsoever who share at least one common factor.” [24] In the case of the people of southern Appalachia, sickness, injury, death, and the prevention of these daily aspects of life were a constant among whites, Native Americans, as well as African Americans. “Social interactions among people with differing (and occasionally opposing) social identities and role relationships can actually provide situations where folklore is produced and disseminated.”[25] Shoemaker continues to describe interactions among differing social groups and makes the conclusion, “ folklore may be the only reason that people interact with each other.”[26]
When situations pass the realm of human control, supernatural cause and effects are frequently brought into play. When doctors were either not trusted or not available, superstition beliefs provided a way to explain what logic simply could not. Even when modern medical treatment was available, folk beliefs provided ways for people to deal with sickness and death. It was (and is) a mechanism to do something to alleviate pain and suffering. It also provided a way to ward off illness by following taboo restrictions of human behavior. These beliefs were passed down either orally, by demonstration, or by observation. In some cases, folk medicine beliefs were passed between cultures and the result, one of the keys of folk beliefs, adaptation, occurred and the ideology changed.
It would not be a gross overstatement to say that all people have folk medicine beliefs and rituals. Many beliefs regarding prevention of illness have adapted and still are popular; such as ‘bundling up so a person doesn’t catch a cold’ although modern medicine shows that exposure to cold weather is not a factor in these cases. These beliefs are passed down and endure because they are and because they offer hope in ways that modern medical practice and philosophy simply cannot provide. Participants reinforce the sense of community by sharing information that is considered valuable to the group; and by these contributions establish their worth as contributing to the community’s wellbeing and survival.
Primary Sources
Carpenter, Arie, Linda Garland Page, and Eliot Wigginton. “Mommy lernt me lots about ‘th doctorin’ business.” In Aunt Arie: a Foxfire portrait. New York: Dutton, 1983.
Jobe, Abraham, and David C. Hsiung. “Medicine in the Mountains.” In A mountaineer in motion: the memoir of Dr. Abraham Jobe, 1817-1906. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2009.
Fisher, Peggy S.. “Folk Medicine.” West Virginia Division of Culture and History. http://www.wvculture.org/history/wvhs1041.html (accessed October 30, 2012).
Secondary Sources
Barney, Sandra. “Introduction.” In Authorized to heal: gender, class, and the transformation of medicine in Appalachia, 1880-1930. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000.
Burrison, John A.. “The core of culture.” In Roots of a region Southern folk culture. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2007.
Butler-Stone, Mary . “Appalachian Folk Medicine.” Appalachian Folk Medicine. home.wlu.edu/~lubint/touchstone/AppalachianFolkMed-Stone.htm (accessed October 27, 2012).
Cavender, Anthony P. “The Folk Medical Belief System.” In Folk medicine in southern Appalachia. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003.
Dary, David. “Quacks.” In Frontier medicine: from the Atlantic to the Pacific, 1492-1941. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2008.
Hudson, Charles M. “A conquered people.” In The Southeastern Indians. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1976.
Pollard, Kelvin M. “A New Diversity: Race and Ethnicity in the Appalachian Region”
Population Reference Bureau. Atlanta Regional Commission. 2004 accessed
November 26, 2012 at http://www.prb.org/pdf04/anewdiversityappal.pdf
Richmond, Nancy, and Misty Murray Walkup. “Superstitions.” In Appalachian folklore: omens, signs and superstitions. S.l.: s.n., 2011.
Schoemaker, George H.. “Introduction.” In The Emergence of folklore in everyday life: a fieldguide and sourcebook. Bloomington, Ind.: Trickster Press, 1990.
Wigginton, Eliot. “Introduction.” In Foxfire: 25 years. New York: Anchor Books, 1991.
[2] Mary Butler Stone. “Appalachian Folk Medicine.” West Virginia Historical Society Quarterly. Vol X No.4.http://home.wlu.edu/lubint/touchstone/ApplalachainFolkMed-Stone.htm (accessed October 29, 2012)
[3] Opinion of the author
[4] Cavender 37
[5] Kelvin M. Pollard. A “New Diversity: Race and Ethnicity in the Appalachian Region” Population Reference Bureau. Atlanta Regional Commission. 2004 accessed November 26, 2012 at http://www.prb.org/pdf04/anewdiversityappal.pdf
[6] John A. Burrison, Roots of a Region, Southern Folk Culture. (JacksonUniversity of Mississippi press 2007),29
[7] Personal opinion of the Author
[8] Eliot Wiggington and his Students, Ed, Foxfire 25 Years. (New York: Doubleday, 1991), X
[9] Arie Carpenter, Aunt Arie, A Foxfire Portrait. Linda Garland Price and Eliot Wiggington, Eds. (New York: .P. Dutton, Inc.1983), 143.
[10] Carpenter. 9
[11] Carpenter 132
[12] ibid, 133
[13] Carpenter, 36
[14] Carpenter, 135.
[15] Peggy S. Fisher. “Folk Medicine” The West Virginia Historical Society Quarterly. Volume X, No. 4. and Volume XI, No.1. January 1997.
[16] Fisher, 2
[17] Charles Hudson. The Southeastern Indians. 1976. The University of Tennessee Press. Knoxville. 499
[18] Dary, 26
[19] This is similar to Anthony Cavender’s description of stopping a nosebleed by placing a knife blade on the back of the neck and probably is a regional variation of the same practice.
[20] Fisher. 3
[21] David C. Huiung, A Mountaineer in Motion, The Memoir of Dr. Abraham Jobe 1807-1906. 2009. (Knoxville. The University of Tennessee press), 47
[22] Dary, 273
[23] Sandra Lee Barney, Authorized to Heal, Gender, Class, and the Transformation of Medicine in Appalachia, 1880-1930. (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press. 2000), 8
[24] George H. Schoemaker, The Emergence of Folklore in Everyday Life. 1990 Trickster Press. Bloomington, IN. 4
[25] ibid 4
[26] Schoemaker 4
Chuck Lott Publications 