By Guess and by Gosh, He Preserves Ozark Life

In the summer of 1970, Roy Thomas decided it would be good to preserve the memories of the “old-timers” in the Southern mountains. In all, he has compiled nearly 1,400 interviews.

With his portable cassette tape recorder, Thomas traveled to Dixie’s small mountain towns to find people who remembered life before World War I.

“I’d stop at a country store or post office or courthouse or see an old man sitting on the porch,” said Thomas, who is 82 now.

“Very few declined to talk to me. I asked them to talk about . . . people and events--before TV, radio and cars.”

The accounts ranged from stories about moonshine to a recollection of a public hanging at Mountain View. Some people talked about their memories of a vigilante group, the Baldknobbers. Folks recalled digging mussels in the White River, the Ozarks’ major stream. They ate the meat and made buttons out of the shells.

A 94-year-old man named Bert Tennyson told Thomas a tale of caves near his boyhood home and of an unusual neighbor. Thomas recorded it just the way it was spoken:

“An he come from Tennessee a wa-a-ay back. An he settled in that cave. He never did build a barn. That cave was big enough . . . he barned in it. . . . He could drive a waggin up there, an turn an come around with th’ team. An he used it fer a barn . . . fer ye-e-ears.”

After 30 years it is hard for Thomas to pick a favorite interview, but stories about the Civil War--told by very old people recalling fathers who had fought--are especially interesting to him.

Thomas said he was inspired to preserve details about daily life in rural mountain regions because of his roots in the small community of Bee Branch on the edge of the Ozarks in northern Arkansas.

“I grew up on a farm, plowed with mules,” he said.

The people of the Ozarks should be proud of their heritage, he said. Too often, he said, Arkansas evokes an image of overall-wearing, teeth-lacking hillbillies.

“Everybody seems to be ashamed of our culture,” he said.

His interviews reminded him how wrong that attitude is, and they did more, he said. “I learned about me. These old people helped me understand who I am.”

Of his 1,365 taped interviews, he has only transcribed about one-third--”about 1,200 hours of conversation,” he said.

Besides interviews with people in the Ozarks of southern Missouri and northern Arkansas, he has some from the southern Appalachians.

People living in the rural areas tell of growing their own food and making crafts such as baskets and musical instruments. Some sold animal pelts for extra money.

“There were so few opportunities to earn cash,” Thomas said.

Thomas has written books on the mountain people and compiled a dictionary documenting phrases--such as “by guess and by gosh,” meaning by trial and error--that are common in the Ozark dialect.

Robert Cochran, director of the Center for Arkansas and Regional Studies at the University of Arkansas, gave credit to Thomas. “He’s definitely done some good work,” Cochran said. “He’s spent countless hours interviewing people.”

Thomas’ collection fits into a long tradition of chronicling the region, he said, adding, “The Ozarks is one of the best-researched areas.”

Nowadays, Thomas’ collection of tapes is stored in a closet, and he lives in a retirement home. It’s been five years since he asked people about the old times.

Well, not quite. These days he enjoys talking to fellow residents. “It’s a little bit of everything they could remember,” he said. “Only a few times did they start talking about their grandchildren.”