Hillbilly Culture Was First Identified in the 1800s
The idea of a backwoods, rustic culture traces back to authors in the 1800s, with “local color” writers giving readers a peek into the people living in rural areas. Stories like “The Yares of Black Mountain,” an 1875 tale by Rebecca Harding Davis a view of how different rural people were from the modern city dwellers. Lippencott’s Magazine published Davis’s story in 1875. Hers was a gentle view of the people of these regions. But this was a rarity. Writers outdid each other to pen the most dramatic, exaggerated conditions of rural characters. In 1900, the New York Journal wrote, “In short, a Hill-Billie is a free and untrammeled white citizen of Alabama, who lives in the hills, has no means to speak of, dresses as he can, talks as he pleases, drinks whiskey when he gets it, and fires of his revolver as the fancy takes him.”