Appalachian Figures
A voice from Knott County
Verna Mae Slone was born in Knott County, Kentucky, on October 9, 1914, and died in Hindman on January 5, 2009. She and her husband, Willie Slone, raised five sons. In addition to writing, she became known across Eastern Kentucky for her quilts and cloth dolls.
“What My Heart Wants to Tell”
Slone’s best-known book began as a family history honoring her father, Isom “Kitteneye” Slone. The first editionappeared with New Republic Books in 1979; the University Press of Kentucky later reissued it as a 160-page paperback in 1988.
A short courtship episode from the memoir, plain-spoken and funny, was published separately by Appalachian History, capturing the cadence of Knott County talk.
How she documented “how we talked”
Slone didn’t stop with storytelling. She set out to preserve Caney Creek speech, idioms, and children’s rhymes in How We Talked, first printed by Pippa Valley Printing (Pippa Passes, KY) in the early 1980s. In 2009, the University Press of Kentucky gathered How We Talked together with Common Folks in a 328-page combined edition with scholarly forewords by linguist Michael Montgomery and Sidney Saylor Reynolds. The volume is still used in Appalachian-studies and linguistics classrooms as a primary window on southeastern Kentucky language.
Fiction drawn from life
Slone also wrote fiction. Rennie’s Way (University Press of Kentucky, 1994) is set in an eastern Kentucky community in the 1920s–1930s and reads like family stories woven into a single arc.
Quilts, dolls, and campus displays
By all accounts, Slone’s hands were rarely idle. Sources credit her with more than 1,800 quilts and thousands of cloth dolls, with fifteen quilts currently displayed on the walls of the Hindman Settlement School. Hindman has repeatedly exhibited her work, including quilt displays during the Winter Burrow literary gathering.
Hear her tell it yourself
Primary sources let readers hear Slone’s voice. The Nunn Center at the University of Kentucky holds an oral-history interview (Accession 1993oh322_app391) in which she talks about family life, coal’s impact, and her writing. Western Kentucky University’s TopSCHOLAR finding aid documents additional interviews conducted by Dianne Watkins Winkler. And flood-recovery work after 2022 has brought Appalshop Archive’s YouTube postings of flood-salvaged tapes recorded at Hindman—informal campus sessions that include Slone and relatives.
Why it matters
Taken together, Slone’s memoir, dialect notes, and interviews form a compact, ground-level record of everyday Appalachian life by a woman who spent nearly a century in the same hills. Scholars still point students to How We Talked, teachers still assign chapters to counter stereotypes by letting mountain women speak for themselves, and Hindman continues to host a Verna Mae Slone Keynote Address at its Winter Burrow conference—linking page, voice, and place.
Sources & further reading
University Press of Kentucky pages for What My Heart Wants to Tell (1988 pbk., 160 pp.) and How We Talked & Common Folks (2009, 328 pp.). The University Press of Kentucky+1
First edition of What My Heart Wants to Tell (New Republic Books, 1979) on Google Books. Google Books
USC Southern Appalachian English bibliography entries for How We Talked (Pippa Valley Printing, 1982/1983). appalachian-english.library.sc.edu
Rennie’s Way publisher page (UPK, 1994). The University Press of Kentucky
Obituaries and family details (Hindman Funeral Services; Lexington Herald-Leader via Legacy.com). hindmanfuneralservices.com+1
Quilts and dolls figures; Hindman displays (Kentucky Women’s History Project). kywomenshistoryproject.com
Appalachian History excerpt from What My Heart Wants to Tell. Appalachian History
Nunn Center interview accession record; WKU TopSCHOLAR finding aid. kentuckyoralhistory.org+1
Appalshop Archive flood-salvage update about YouTube postings. Appalshop
Hindman Settlement School Winter Burrow posts confirming the Verna Mae Slone Keynote Address and quilt displays. Hindman Settlement School+1