[crowd clamoring] [dramatic music] ♪ ♪ - oh, yeah, this place was a-booming. you couldn't get through this town down there, but it's dead now. we had eight or ten coal mines go down at one time. - come on, everybody in here! have a seat! let's go! - it's the same halftime speech every single week.

♪ ♪ - there's so much negativity surrounding this place that no one ever focuses on the positive. they see us as ignorant or hillbillies. - overdose capital of the east coast. - there's really more here than just poverty and illiteracy and drugs. there's a lot of good people here. - when you walk on this field, you better have tunnel vision. don't look left. don't look right. you look at that scoreboard, and that shit burn in your heart, you understand me? we got some ground to make up, but once we make that ground up, we'll take off. let's go! [applause, cheers] [upbeat rock music] both: ♪ i took a walk through this ♪ ♪ beautiful world ♪ ♪ felt the cool rain on my shoulder ♪ ♪ found something good in this ♪ ♪ beautiful world ♪ ♪ i felt the rain getting colder ♪ - ♪ la, la ♪ - ♪ sha la, la, la, la ♪

♪ sha la, la, la, la ♪ - ♪ sha la, la, la ♪ - sha la, la, la, la ♪ ♪ sha la, la, la, la, la ♪ [instrumental music] ♪ ♪ new york city, where i live. and it's easy to think, having lived here nearly all my life, that this what america looks like, thinks like, that the things that are important to me are important to everybody. that every place else is "out there." unthinkable. maybe even unknowable. ♪ ♪ [birds chirping] 600 miles away from midtown manhattan is mcdowell county, west virginia.

another america. in the mind of many of my fellow new yorkers, the heart of god, guns and trump country. the existential enemy. [twangy guitar music] ♪ ♪ - ♪ there is a place on god's creation ♪ ♪ a place of beauty beyond compare ♪ ♪ some people say it's almost heaven ♪ ♪ look for me and you'll find me there ♪ my daddy always told me, you know, those tornados and hurricanes, they can't get to us. we're way down in these mountains, down in the holler, and these mountains protect us. here, if you gonna see the sky, you got to look up. ♪ you can find me on the highest mountain ♪ ♪ you can find me in the black coal mines ♪

- to think about, much less emphasize, with somebody who comes from five generations of coal miners in a place that looks like this is, to our enduring shame, unthinkable. why can't these coal miners get retrained? maybe put up solar panels for a living. why would these conservative, deeply religious people vote for a thrice married billionaire new yorker? well, i went to west virginia and, you know what, screw you. [disconcerting music] here, in the heart of every belief system i've ever mocked or fought against, i was welcomed with open arms by everyone. i found a place both heartbreaking and beautiful, a place that symbolizes and contains everything wrong and everything wonderful and hopeful about america. [twangy guitar music] the town of welch, known in its glory days as little new york. ♪ ♪

- welch is a very rural area. i mean, it's an hour away from walmart, i mean, if that tells you anything. it's a real old, historic town built in the 1800s. - the american dream in miniature. a place where generations of immigrants and dreamers could work and lift up their family. - the town of welch, when it was booming, the sidewalks were so crowded there would be traffic backed up, like, a mile. you couldn't find a place to park. - the rest of the country took a lot of money out of these hills over the decades, billions and billions of dollars, and when it became cheaper or more convenient to pull the coal we needed to power our electrical grids and to make our steel elsewhere, this is what was left behind. but this is not a poverty porn show. do not pity the people here,

who, despite what you may think, are not unrealistic about a return to the glory days of coal and better times. - i drank coffee from the time i could walk. they put coffee in your bottle, coffee or wine. [laughs] - linda mckinney is a true daughter of appalachia. she raised her children here. linda's husband, bob mckinney, is a longtime mine safety inspector. now, your family's originally from naples? is that right? naples area? - yes. yes. came here in 1923 trying to strike it rich in the coal mines. my mother died when i was five, so we went to live with my nonna, and the first day i was there, she pulled me up to a cook stove. - dinner is a not untypical expression of hardscrabble appalachian practicality... - now, i don't measure anything, so nothing has a recipe here. - and neapolitan roots. - this my dad would call piselles; it's peas. ooh, making mama dance. [laughs] now, this is what i'm famous for in these parts.

have you ever had spaghetti pizza? - wow. - no, you haven't. don't say you have. [laughter] nearby, joel runs an organic hydroponic farm that supplies the local school system. [atmospheric music] - most of you have all got your potatoes, right? - linda runs five loaves and two fishes, a food bank that holds many of the lives here together during tough times. - god, we just thank you for this day that we're able to give food out again. this is not a regular give out. watch over us. protect us. help us to keep cool heads. [instrumental music] ♪ ♪ - father, we pray over the food we're about to eat for the nourishment of our body. just bless it in the name of christ. amen. all: amen. ♪ ♪ - the coal that came out of this area built america, right? - yes. - mcdowell county alone was called

a billion-dollar coal field. the last coal mines i worked at, i made-- base salary was $94,000 a year. i also taught vocational school, and most of the kids that i had said, "well, i don't need this. i'm gonna go in the coal mines." - there's just an education piece there now that we're trying to instill in some of the people that still have that mentality that coal was king, and, you know, we don't doubt that, but we try to think outside the box and look at some other-- some other opportunities that might be there. - get more physical! let's go. run! - the mountview golden knights have long carried the mantle of the town as perpetual underdogs. mostly the children of miners, many from very difficult situations at home. - why you walking? hurry up! - this week, it's homecoming. - whistle! - coach larry thomson has, of late, imposed some order and higher academic standards on the knights. there are high hopes. ♪ ♪

- lord, thank you for this food we're about to receive, and bless these young men and these young women as they cheer and as they play on the field. in jesus name i pray, amen. all: amen. - let's go eat, man. these kids, you know, they got long days. they wake up 4:45 or 5:00, and they don't leave off the hill with us until about 7:00 after practice, so, no, they go through a lot. - how many generations of coal in your family? - at least five. - wow. coach mike anderson is second in command. coal in anybody else's family? yeah? - like, trash man, that's a real common job in my family. - don't feel bad; trash men make more money than teachers do, chavo. [laughter] - fred "fatback" minko, micah "woody" mclaughlin, and cole "chavo" anderson are in many ways typical mountview players and students with the hopes and dreams of, well, any other high school students. homecoming. - it is. - how big a deal is football in general, and this game, and what you guys do? - you know, a lot of these kids, they understand

that there's not a lot of resources here, and before, you can kind of feel the dreariness that kind of lingered around the community, but now, you know, with these boys winning, with the worth ethic they're putting in, you can feel the support, and they feel it. they feel that sense of pride. - how has this football program changed your life? - it gives me something to do, stay out of trouble. - some of these guys have changed 100%. they had no guidance, no discipline. and as a team in here relying on each other, their limits are out of this world. - now, in the past, you could've made big money in--you know, working in coal. you don't have that kind of guarantee now. what do you see yourself doing in ten years? - journalism. - journalism. - i hope in ten years, i hope to be studying my phd and be a mechanical engineer. - mechanical engineer. - yes, sir. - i'm definitely gonna be a neuro psychologist. - neuro psychologist? - yep. - you know, what's tougher, life or football? - life. - life, definitely. - there's no halftime in life. there's no time outs in life. there's no none of that.

- that was a really good answer. [laughter] - "love thy brother" is one thing. that's all well and good, but these guys want to win. they need to win, and everyone will be watching. - ♪ appalachia is my name ♪ ♪ ♪

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it's tru. keytruda from merck. see all the types of cancer keytruda is known for at keytruda.com and ask your doctor if keytruda could be right for you. i brought in ensure max protein with 30g of protein. those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks. uh... here i'll take that. -everyone: woo hoo! ensure max protein with 30 grams of protein, one gram of sugar. enter the nourishing moments giveaway for a chance to win $10,000. [rock music] [upbeat guitar music] ♪ ♪ - west virginia was settled by people who were fleeing persecution, by homesteaders, people who just wanted to live their lives their own way, but the discovery of vast coal reserves and the big business that grew up around it changed everything. ♪ ♪ the town of war understands this dynamic well. it's a former coal and timber camp that has more than paid its dues.

♪ ♪ the war café is one of the few family owned businesses left in town. it's an obvious "new yorker arrives in town" first question: why no cell service? - i mean, the mountains, it's hard to get signals down into each individual valley. - nick mullins is a former coal miner turned writer, working in public outreach trying to help people transition away from fossil fuel. - try calling an ambulance here and getting to the closest hospital. they don't deliver babies at the hospital in this county anymore. - elaine mcmillan sheldon is an oscar nominated documentary filmmaker, born and raised in southern west virginia. if you were describing this area-- church going, gun rights, important. a lot of people of my ilk, that's not gonna resonate at all. in fact, it sounds threatening. - right, but both sides are saying the same thing. both sides feel threatened by each other. - right. - and i would say a majority of people that live in this region want to be left alone. the traditions of this place, the things that we value, whether that be family, interpersonal communication,

not having cell phone technology to distract us, those type of things sort of butt up against america's idea of progress, and it's why we've always been looked at as being backwards. [haunting music] ♪ ♪ being part of the media but living here is a really big challenge because rarely people like myself actually are the ones that control our narrative, that control our story. - it was always too easy to come gawk at west virginia, to make it the poster child for whatever the agenda of the moment was. lazy depictions of stereotypical west virginians, hillbillies and hicks tucked into isolated hollers to be pitied or made objects of laughter and derision. - if you google appalachia, to this day, you're gonna see dirty faced kids, barefoot on a front porch, shaking lyndon b. johnson's hand.

there's a lot more to appalachia than that. - in 1964, lyndon johnson declared his war on poverty. a good thing, yes? but the accompanying press tour portraying people here as an incapable and bewildered, helpless mass missed the basic essential character, the pride, and the self-reliant core of the people here. that damage is lasting. - when you come in and keep telling us how poor, fat, how all these things are, i think we've all felt it at some point: shame. - what should people know about this area that they don't know, that they're not getting? - it's just how much that people in this area have been exploited. [bell rings] [industrial music] the land agents who came in and bought up all the mineral rights. the coal and timber companies that started extracting and taking everybody's labor rights. - i can't fight a big coal company.

it's got too much money. - politicians from d.c. that could make a quick day trip down here and get a good sound bite. - who is a miner in this group? who is it? stand up. you're all standing up anyway. - the drug companies. - 9 million pills in kermit, west virginia over two years. one pharmacy, 9 million pills. - one pharmacy in a town of 372 people. - the other side of this is that democrats, they don't take a lot of time to understand the problems here. - i just want to know how you can say you're gonna put a lot of coal miners out of jobs, and then come in here and tell us how you're gonna be our friend. - i don't think people understand just how genuine and wonderful the people are in these mountains, people who have just worked all their lives and who've sacrificed so much for their families. [relaxed rock music] ♪ ♪ - you cannot talk about west virginia without talking about coal, and coal is a complex issue here, tied into the cell tissue and the family pride of the people

who have worked in the mines for generations. ♪ ♪ - yeah, man, that coal mines is something else, you know, boy, you got to take care of yourself in there. - that fan is blowing about 200,000 cubic feet of air into the mine--fresh air. - when you go in that mine, you don't know whether you're gonna live to see the outside again. ♪ ♪ [indistinct radio chatter] [pensive music] - today we're going about 5,000 feet. - 5,000 feet deep? - yeah, oh, yeah. - pat graham is the foreman at the pay car mine in kimball. ♪ ♪

this is full of steel? - yes. the average wage of a miner is 60% greater than the average wage of all laborers in the united states. - wow. - that's pretty phenomenal. it's easy to see why people in mcdowell county want mining jobs. [tense percussive music] ♪ ♪ - i was staying in a town nearby, welch. there's no bar. [laughter] [laughter] - wow. - heavenly father, we'd like to gather here to thank you for this opportunity to support our families. please watch after us and keep us safe while we're underground working. amen. all: amen. ♪ ♪ - what do you got? - bear meat and chicken. - oh, damn. - i may just put my sandwich back here if you got bear meat.

♪ ♪ - that's delicious. do you think the country as a whole, do you think they understand the coal business at all, what coal mining's about? - no. - no. - they don't really understand at all. - when you travel from new york to here, whether you're on a boat, plane, train, or in the sky or driving on a car, it's because of a mine. - mining causes damage to the environment. of this there is no doubt, but what cannot be grown must be mined. there ain't no cell phones, for instance, without mines somewhere. does anybody think it's gonna come back big time, like 30 years ago or... - my personal opinion, every time a republican is in there, it goes up. [laughter] - this used to be a solidly democratic state. what do you think made trump attractive? - hillary shows up here, and she openly said she's gonna put a lot of coal miners out of work. wrong answer. - how many kids you got? - six. - four. - if you saw your kids had other options, would you recommend that they join the family business?

- no, sir, no. - i would about guarantee if everybody here, their dad who worked in the coal mines probably told their son, "don't go into the coal mines." - that's what i was told. - that's what i told mine. - yeah. - i mean, you're gonna tell them, "no, don't do it," but you know, if they do, you're gonna be proud. i'm proud. from the stickers we put on our buckets, from the stickers we put on our hats, to my coffee mug there, passed down. i don't mess that thing up, my son goes into the mines, that's gonna be his. [light guitar music] ♪ ♪ - ♪ i'm a stone's throw from the mill ♪ ♪ and i'm a good walk to the river ♪ ♪ but my working day is over ♪ ♪ we'll go swim our cares away ♪ - it's so easy from afar to say that coal's time here has come and gone, that we should let the miners move, find some other work.

what other work? this state's biggest employer is now walmart. - ♪ i've seen my share of trouble ♪ ♪ and i've held my weight in shame ♪ - whatever your views, respect these people, what they do and what they've paid. - ladies and gentlemen... [speaks indistinctly] [crowd cheering] lowe's knows you never come in for just one thing. so we've got to know a lot of things about a lot of things. like which mower makes the cut. the mulch that finishes the look. and picking a color that pops. you got this. we got you.

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eva's about to learn her fear of missing out leads to overeating. i totally eat stuff to not miss out. and that's just a bit of psychology eva learned from noom weight. sign up now at noom.com at pnc bank, you can find us in big cities and small towns across the us, where our focus is to always support the people who live and work there. because you call these communities home, and we do too. pnc bank. we moved out of the city so our little sophie could appreciate nature. but then he got us t-mobile home internet. i was just trying to improve our signal, so some of the trees had to go. i might've taken it a step too far. (chainsaw revs) (tree crashes) (chainsaw continues) (daughter screams)

let's pretend for a second that you didn't let down your entire family. what would that reality look like? well i guess i would've gotten us xfinity... and we'd have a better view. do you need mulch? what, we have a ton of mulch. [rock music] [ominous music]

♪ ♪ - ready, set, go! [crowd cheering] [bluesy guitar music] ♪ ♪ - ♪ early in the morning when the sun does rise ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ laying in the bed with bloodshot eyes ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ get me drinking that moonshine ♪ ♪ get me higher than the grocery bill ♪ ♪ take my troubles to the high wall ♪ ♪ throw them in the river and get your fill ♪ ♪ lord it's a mighty hard living ♪ ♪ but it's damn good feeling to run these roads ♪ - so these things have to be durable, to say the least? i mean, you're pounding the hell out of them. - they're actually built to be indestructible. - indestructible. - yeah, that's the plan. ♪ ♪ - yeah! - well, i guess we broke it. - [laughs]

- this bat-shit crazy, vertical, mad max drag race come demolition derby is called rock bouncing. keep my neck from bouncing around too much? - yeah, and what they're actually designed for is major collisions, and it keeps your head from tearing off your body. - adam ringer is a native son, jack of many trades, and a man who's all too happy to spend the day trashing some hills just to show me a good time. - ♪ get me drinking that moonshine ♪ ♪ get me higher than the grocery bill ♪ ♪ lord it's a mighty hard living ♪ ♪ but a damn good feeling to run these roads ♪ ♪ ♪ - so that was pretty badass. - [laughing] yeah. ♪ ♪ [rock music] ♪ ♪ - all right, you got your frog legs, turtle patties. - eric williams is a hunter and trapper who caught most of this meal wading waist deep in the swamp on his property. - you ever ate snapping turtle? - oh, i'm definite--

i'm not missing that. - small mouth bass, catfish, barbecued and fried. - wow, what a spread. ♪ ♪ - we actually climb stuff that's vertical. - straight up? - yep. yeah, this race this weekend, the last 30 feet of the hill, the second hill, was actually vertical. you had to hit it with enough momentum to skip up over it and land on top. - wow. - yeah. that's why you got to have a lot of horsepower. - but too much power can get you in a lot of trouble also. - oh, really? - oh, yeah. - exactly right. - horsepower's not always the key to success, but it's always a lot of fun. - hopefully, you can come back and try the barbie jeep thing. [laughter] [dynamic music] ♪ ♪ - guns are a fact of life around here. whether as a means to defend your isolated home, get yourself dinner when

there's no place else to get it, or just for the fun of shooting stuff, the feeling that gun ownership is an absolute right, and non-negotiable, runs deep here. everybody's backyard look like this? - uh... - ours does. justin and ashley mcmillion are the nice couple next door... [rapid gunfire] if unusually heavily armed. - yeah! [laughs] - our muzzle brakes are the only kind that actually reduce recoil, muzzle rise, and flash. - they own jmac customs, a home business that designs and builds custom weapons and parts. - so this keeps you on target and makes sure that you're safe while you're shooting. - three, two, one. - now, to be clear, these are fully automatic firearms. they cannot be purchased legally by individuals anywhere, but as they're in the business, these guys could apply for special, highly vetted atf licenses for purposes of product development and testing.

that was just really-- that was a lot of fun. i'm a child. what can i say? - who wants to blow up pumpkins? [bluesy harmonica music] - just mixed up a binary explosive. ♪ ♪ - three, two, one. [lively music] - whatever you feel about gun rights, there is an undeniable, visceral thrill to blowing shit up. people who like guns like them for a reason. - that's a whole lot of america right there. - yeah, not mine. [laughter] ♪ ♪ - two choices: venison or beef, with or without cheese. - venison and cheese. - yeah. - wow, a nice selection. - the only way to go. - that's what i'll have. - so everybody born and bred here, or... - i lived in canada for a long time. stayed in england for quite a while. no matter how long i'm gone, i always come back. you can't just load the jeep up with a bunch of guns

and stay out there for seven days and, you know-- you can't really do that anywhere else. - that's probably one of the greatest things about west virginia. you know, we can enjoy whatever we want to enjoy. i'm not trying to force my opinions on anybody else. that being said, we will defend ours. - yeah. - i was guessing. - yeah. - look, i grew up in an environment, you see somebody at the supermarket carrying a handgun, that would be cause for red alert. do you think there can be common ground between somebody who grew up absolutely thinking guns are a bad thing? - i say no. - okay, you're an honest man, and i appreciate it. why do you-- - i'm a responsible gun owner. why should i be crippled in what i'm able to do as far as protecting my family? - look, i hear you, but there's a fair number of people in this world who are just, you know, too dumb to pour piss out of a boot. you know, 90-year-old drivers in florida, they still got their license, but should they be driving? - right. - a few years ago,

my father was involved in a shooting at his pharmacy that he works at. a man came in. he had a weapon. my dad conceal carries. he drew his weapon and fired. if they take guns away from law-abiding citizens, then it's just gonna be the criminals that have it. [dark music] - it should be pointed out-- it has to be pointed out, faced head-on-- that shortly after we filmed here, a gunman in las vegas, with a perfectly legal weapon, fired off 1,100 rounds in ten minutes, wounding 422 people and killing 58. shortly after that, 17 students were murdered in parkland, florida, with a legally purchased semi-automatic rifle, and the list goes on, with victims of mass shootings that have happened since this conversation measured in the hundreds, so there is that to think about too. i don't know whether the founding fathers anticipated the kind of firepower that we played with today. we live in a different world. there are the nice people who live next door who like guns,

and, unfortunately, there seem to be a whole lot of people who aren't nice at all. [crowd clamoring] - [screams] - get behind cover! - oh, my god, oh, my god! - go back, go back! [people screaming] lowe's knows you want to make the most of your summer. that's why we're offering the hottest deals of the seaso. so your summer is full of fun and savings. shop top 4th of july deals now. in-store or online. ♪ should i be selling right now? ♪ let me take a look at the numbers for you. ♪

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because breathing should be beautiful. welcome friends, to the middle of everything! friends that bike together. hike together! with goats. can't wait to see what tomorrow brings, here in the middle of everything!

[rock music] [light guitar music]

♪ ♪ - lola kline is a single mother of four children, and, in many ways, emblematic of both the difficulties and inherent strengths of people around here. where do you find them? in the trees or on the ground? - trees. - mostly up the trees? - squirrels are more like-- it's a waiting game. find us a place to sit and watch for movement. - she and her best friend, lashawna huff, hunt together, raise kids together, and do their best to get by in a changing world that can get very hard. when you'd first go hunting, how old were you? - my grandpa took me when i was about six. i just love this place. [organ music] ♪ ♪

[distant gunshot] [gunshots] - my mom, she used to cook it and fix squirrel gravy. - lola's neighbor's name may be drana lester, but everybody here calls her mom. - 58 years. i was born and raised here. - do you ever think about leaving? - no. - biscuit? - homemade biscuits. homemade gravy. - fried taters. - fried potatoes, excellent. - dear lord, we come to you this day. thank you for this food and bless the hands that fixed this food. thank you for each and every living day. amen. - amen, and thank you for letting us make more friends. - yes. - thank you for having me.

- mmm. - are you working on a farm nearby, is that right? - yes. after strip mines are done here, the land's usually- i mean, it's just useless. so we're trying to make a purpose. pumpkins, watermelon. we're just trying to figure out what will grow on it. - so there's life after coal? - there's life after coal. so what do you think about that squirrel? - oh, man, it's good. - good, ain't it? - thank you. - they call it wild and wonderful west virginia. - it is. and your girls are how old? - my girls are nine, eight, six, and three. - you taught any of them to shoot yet? - yeah, all of them can shoot. - all of them? - all of them. they think their mommy's a big hero too because she killed that big buck last year. - yeah, how big was this thing? - 250. weighed 250 pounds. - yeah. you drag that thing out of the woods yourself? - mm-hmm. - dress it? - yes. - cook it? - yep. - we don't rely on nobody. - yeah, there ain't nothing i can't do, and if i don't know how to do it, i'll learn. we're not a bunch of pregnant women, barefooted with no teeth. i got all of mine, you see?

[laughter] - what's the best thing about living in this area, and what's the-- what's the worst thing? - the best thing is the people here. - there's probably nobody in these hollers that i couldn't go say, "hey, i need--i'm hungry. would you fix me a sandwich?" - and the worst thing? - see somebody that's on pills, or drunk, or out here just fighting. - what can you do? - pray for them. that's all we can do. - ♪ oh little liza ♪ ♪ oh little liza ♪ ♪ little liza jane ♪ [harmonica music]

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- these right here, they're called wood nettle. they've got a really nice kind of aromatic quality to them. ♪ ♪ with the pawpaws, it's better if you can kind of, like, feel them, see if they're ripe. - america's forgotten fruit: the pawpaw. forgotten when most americans stopped going to the forest for their food, but in west virginia, they were never forgotten. - so that's a pawpaw ice cream with some candied wildflowers, and then this is an old-fashioned vinegar pie. it's in a class of pies called desperation pies that try to create something like a lemon pie and you don't have lemon juice. what do you do? put some vinegar and some nutmeg together and give it that same kind of tang. - appalachia has a rich and deep culinary culture, increasingly fetishized, riffed on, appropriated for the genteel tastes of a hipster elite willing to pay big bucks for what used to be, and still is in many cases, the food of poverty. - we see that ramps are selling for $30 a pound

in new york city that were harvested in west virginia, and what's west virginia seeing from that? probably a guy that got about 2 bucks a pound. - it becomes just another extractive industry. - right. - like coal or timber. and you sort of start to see that with foods. - that's the story of west virginia. - yeah. - chef mike costello and partner amy dawson are looking to keep that culture alive and appreciated and paying off locally for the region it originated in. [upbeat music] lost creek farm is their place. ♪ ♪ and the nucleus of that effort is the garden. ♪ ♪ [pensive music] - we have two different varieties that we're picking today. the one are the logan giants. - this seed is logan giant seed, and they're an heirloom strain of bean, and i've saved these for 40 years. - this guy down at the end of the table, lou,

he said it's important for somebody to carry on these traditions and gave me his stock of heirloom beans this year. - this is what heirloom looks like outside of holy foods. fat horse beans, candy roaster squash, and homer fike's yellow ox heart tomatoes. - nice and soft, and it's like a really sweet green tomato. - these ingredients define a near-lost time and flavor. - we've got some sweet corn chowder. we've got these crackers. they're broken communion wafers. you know, the way that appalachian food has always worked is you work with within your means, and you create something pretty special out of what you have at your disposal, and we've kind of suffered from this in a way. it created this sort of rush towards the middle class and a rush towards the perception that we're better than the foods that we used to have to eat. - mm-hmm. - yeah, i think we were taught a lot to be embarrassed of our, you know, hillbilly past, you know? - oh, absolutely. - right. - i remember coming home from school and my dad having hog's head on the kitchen table making head cheese and sauce, like, i'd been mortified if somebody came over and saw that.

- yeah, a friend of mine's grandmother once told me, "we used to make this because we were poor. now we make it because it's effing good." [laughter] - ooh, what's that? - this is some buttermilk fried rabbit, rabbit that we raise here on the farm. - oh, yes. - a little bit of chowchow, some fresh maple syrup. [fiddle music] ♪ ♪ is it gross that we slaughter rabbits right behind us? - yeah. [laughter] - which we've been drinking here, the young or the old school cider? - we actually came across a recipe from 1822 with elderberry and cider, and it's a native plant here, so we put a little bit in there to see what it would do, and it came out wonderful. - you're using only west virginia apples? - i am only using west virginia apples. - that can't be cost effective. - it can and can't be. - nobody's talking about money at this table though. [laughter]

- this is another thing for me. we're often talked about as being this impoverished state. we are rich, i mean, as can be, in food and the things that we make as a culture and as a community. - you know, you look at something as simple as these pole beans. it took our community to save that seed, and every time we put food on the plate, there's a story about the way that people have always kind of bound together to survive.

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[rock music] [atmospheric music] - lord, bless everybody that's going to the game. bless these young men and these young women as they cheer and as they play on the field. - it's friday night. homecoming. the summers county bobcats versus the mountview golden knights. - hey, i love you, man. - i love you too. [overlapping chatter] - and for the citizens of welch and mcdowell county, this is a very big deal, indeed. [laughter] ♪ ♪ - hi. - ♪ what so proudly we hailed ♪ - everybody knows everybody else's families,

asks after their kids by name. mixed couples are common. there's an easy familiarity between people here. - the 2017 mountview high school... - bang-bang on three. one, two, three. all: bang-bang! - get down! [dynamic music] ♪ ♪ - so very much a west virginia tradition, coal mining and the military. - yeah, here for 10 1/2 years. navy, but i've been around and back. - you've been around and end up back here. - back here. - monica barner is a mountview alum. her husband, sly, is a coach. her sons, elijah and eliffe, are on the team. her daughter, elisa, is a cheerleader. so it's personal for her. - born and raised here, went to school here. wouldn't have it no other way. [overlapping chatter] - a 78-yard run. [cheering]

- loose pigskin. - come on, boys, get your head in the game! - garnet edwards junior is a former mountview player who went on to play college ball. - in the state of west virginia, we got two things going on for us: that's church and sports. now, if we lose a game, it's like losing our best friend. [cheers and applause] ♪ ♪ - go, d! hey, you got it, you got it! - stop him, stop him! - oh, shucks. oh. - oh. - pass is complete. - come on, man. - fourscore. ♪ ♪ - [speaking indistinctly] the bobcats 20, the golden knights nothing. ♪ ♪ - fellas... i just want you to play hard. i just want you to play hard and make smart decisions. [guitar music] ♪ ♪

- ♪ daddy worked like a mule mining pike county coal ♪ ♪ he messed up his back and couldn't work anymore ♪ ♪ he said one of these days ♪ ♪ you'll get out of these hills ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ daddy i've been trying i just can't catch a break ♪ ♪ there's too much in this world ♪ ♪ i can't seem to shake ♪ ♪ ♪ [cheers and applause] - there you go. - let's go, let's go! ♪ ♪ - ♪ see the ways of this world ♪ ♪ will just bring you to tears ♪ ♪ keep the lord in your heart ♪ ♪ and you'll have nothing to fear ♪

♪ live the best that you can ♪ ♪ and don't lie and don't steal ♪ - it's time to turn up a whole nother level; it's time. - ♪ keep your nose on the grindstone ♪ ♪ and out of the pills ♪ [cheers and applause] - yeah! - ♪ daddy i've been trying ♪ ♪ i just can't catch a break ♪ ♪ there's too much in this world i can't seem to shake ♪ - there you go! - touchdown! - whoa! that's a good move! yeah! - clock! clock's running! ♪ ♪ [ominous music] - this is the game. we win or lose on this play. all: let's go, mountview! [cheers and applause] - oh, shit. [people shouting] [bell ringing] ♪ ♪

[dynamic music] ♪ ♪ - good job, young man! [cheers and applause] you're never gonna forget this ball game. whenever you're in a bind, you're stuck in a corner, you know what i'm saying, fight through it. fight your way out of it. in anything you do in life, in school, in football, as long as you've got me, and these coaches, this community, that's all you need. all: yeah! - i grew up here. got married here. it's home.

- oh, my goodness, there he is! oh, i'm so proud of you! - so proud, so proud. - what are any of our hopes and dreams? a roof over our heads, some security, maybe even some happiness for our children. we all have that in common. - i wish y'all could come down here and see us soon, and when y'all do, i hope y'all enjoy it. - this is america, and if you can't embrace it, no matter how bitterly and fiercely we may disagree, there is no hope for any of us. - i've been living here 65 years. i wouldn't trade it for nothing. i guess i'll be here till they cut the lights out. - family on three. one, two, three. all: family! [leaves rustling] bourdain: some people must live in great spaces...