Yesterday in the Hills recalls life in North Georgia from the 1890s until World War II and records vanished and vanishing folkways of the region. Here is folklore at its best—seen from the inside and mediated through the heart. Yesterday in the Hills is built upon the bedrock of experience and memory, but its sharply drawn characters and beautifully proportioned narrative transcend reminiscence and realistically depict hill-country life as it once was. “Authentic, flavorful chapters about old-time hill people of North Georgia, their backbreaking field work, their song and play, their courtship, their neighborly exchange of help with the chores, their homemade remedies for illness and homemade practically everything else, their humor and their individuality.”—Publishers Weekly “A gentle, humorous personal recollection of real people and the way they lived and worked.”—Celestine Sibley

Yesterday in the Hills recalls life in North Georgia from the 1890s until World War II and records vanished and vanishing folkways of the region. Here is folklore at its best--seen from the inside and mediated though the heart. Yesterday in the Hills is built upon the bedrock of experience and memory, but its sharply drawn characters and beautifully proportioned narrative transcend reminiscence and realistically depict hill country life as it once was.

Daily journals recount a scientific expedition's five-month trek into the Black Hills of the Dakotas to determine if rumors of gold were true, which the author describes as the most delightful summer of my life. He describes the natural landscape and its wildlife, eccentric characters, and politic