When I was a little girl

[cyclonefence]

in Hinton WV, where almost all the men worked for the mighty C&O (and thus were union members), everyone knew that the only Republicans in town were Mrs. Mary Anderson and her son Nathan.

And nobody was mean to them, either.

Just a memory that brings a smile to my face.

[biophile]

1. I remember a WV that was reliably blue

Good union state. Until religion and guns stole the souls of many.
Faith is a wonderful thing- it’s religion that steals your soul.
The WV of my youth 😟

[Silent Type]

2. Sorry, meant to respond to OP.

[Silent Type]

3. +1. Same in Georgia. But the Dixiecrats weren't anywhere near being like national Democrats. Dixiecrats were mostly

racists who were glad their elderly small farm parents got Social Security. That's not to say GOPers were any better.

[cyclonefence]

4. Oh, you're absolutely right

Hinton voted Democratic, but it was Dixiecrat Democratic, which it took me till my latter years to understand. My grandmother's family were intensely D's, naming my great-uncles Grover Cleveland Allen and Tilden Hendricks Allen (Tilden and Hendricks were the Dems from whom Rutherford B. Hayes stole the election). My other grandfather actually joined the Socialist Party but refused to vote to allow Black men to join the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers.

I have an old Hinton High School Yearbook--from 1924--sponsored by the KKK. There they are, in their robes, in the frontispiece of the damn yearbook. My father says everybody made fun of them when they marched through town (well, I bet not *everybody* made fun of them) and called out their names as they strutted by. But he was born in 1921, so what would he know?