College Hill Farm

  Harlan County is not owned by the people who live there. I know some will argue with this but it is true. My home county is actually 80% owned by absentee land owners. Many are large coal or gas corporations sitting on the land waiting for a time when it would be economically feasible to get at the minerals below. Even some of the folks that own the land don’t even own the minerals nor timber on it. At one time people could purchase your rights to minerals or timber and leave you the land. This practice lead to all sorts of strife in the Appalachian Mountains. But, that is not what this piece is about. It is about the abundance left behind by these absentee land owners. My great grandmother was a granny doctor of sorts. She was an herbalist that knew an herb for every human frailty. Some called them Granny Women, Granny Doctors, Granny Witches, or Granny Sages. She didn’t know about herbs grown in China or Russia or the far flung places in the world. She knew about the herbs that g