Appalachia in the postbellum era went through a lot of economic, social and industry related

changes. These changes influence the behavior of the people living in the region and also the
presentation of Appalachia through the local color movement, and hence, a lot of stereotypes
about the region had been formed during postbellum era. Industrialization has a big impact on
the region and it actually influences local color literature, lynching, feuding and to some
extent mine wars. Local color literature helped a lot in rationalizing and justifying the
exploitation of Appalachia lands from the industrialist because they promote the idea of the
white mans burden. The white mans burden is the obligation and the responsibility of
people to civilize others. This concept was used by imperialist to justify their exploitation of
the Appalachian area to seek for its natural recourses. Fox, who was a famous local color
writer, has a clear attitude toward imperialism which can be seen in his story Mountain
Europa. He considered mountain people as barbarian and Blacks as people with childish
behaviors, so he was trying in his story to rationalize the imperialism of the rich people by
saying that the current existing people in Appalachia need to be civilized and hence they
cannot make use of what they have in terms of natural resources. This idea was the
motivation for local color writers like Fox to write about the bad stereotypes of the mountain
people in order to establish a wrong picture of mountain people in the eyes of their audiences.
So in a nutshell, Fox and other local color writers were writing their stories and pretended
that they were documentary to serve their own agendas which were for the most part to
rationalize for the rich people their exploitation of the Appalachian areas.
The main reason for violence in Appalachia was the rapid changes that occur to the region
during the industrialization period. We can look at it in terms of compound effects that
accumulated to give raise to violence in Appalachia. For instance, industrialist brought to the
region unwelcomed immigrants and blacks that changed the racial distribution of the region
population add to that the rapid developments that occurred in some counties due to
modernization that swept those regions. These fast changes led to racial tensions between the
original residences of the region and the immigrants who transported to the area for industry
related jobs. Hence, the violence in Appalachia was a consequence of these rapid social and
economic developments. Residence of Appalachia tended to fear from industrialization
because they say that the inflow of labors especially blacks changed some of the social and
economic status that were well suited for those people. Many people in Appalachia have the
prospective that the new social behavior of blacks in the area was greatly disturbing and not
appealing at all because it posed threats on properties and social life. People complained
about the arrival of the rail road by saying along the tracks of the railroad there have
congregated ex-convicts robbers, cutthroats, and outlaws, the very scouring of the earth, until
life and property are not safe (Brundage 307). From this, we can see how industrialization
affects the violence and lynching that happened in Appalachia. But we have to be careful not
to assume that Appalachian people resist modernization or that their violence reaction was a
way to convey their intentions to stop industrialization from coming to the region. The reality
is that lynching wasnt a type of irrational process, it was a way to control the rapid social
changes in the area due to the large number of labors and immigrants who start to live and
work in the area. As a result, Appalachian people used violence and lynching as a form of
telling the Blacks what accepted social behaviors are in areas where white were dominants.
For many Appalachians this reaction was important because it helped reconstruct the social
traits that were on verge to be changed by the inflow of new immigrants to the area. Its
worth to notice that racial violence was not due to competition between white and black
workers, because if it were the case we then would expect that most lynching happened in
coal mine towns were these two races were side by side working at the same place. However,
lynching occurred mostly in cosmopolitan town in Appalachia in which transportation,

financial and administrative centers existed and hence lynching was concentrated in towns
that were the centers of rapid development and modernization. So the intensification of
industrialization and modernization in Appalachia was the main reason for lynching
movement.
Feuding in Appalachia happened for reasons that have nothing to do with the common
stereotypes about Appalachian people being irrational and genetically and inherently had lust
for blood and killing people. Feuding mainly happened because of economic and political
conflicts between local elites and their allies in the region. The New York Times claimed that
the poverty and isolation was the cause of feuding in the region and hence the region needed
the civilizing railroad and industrialization to stop feuding. The New York Times knew
precisely that feuding happened between elite people in the region who were highly educated
and wealth people with prominent political positions, and hence they were just spreading a
stereotype to justify the exploitation of the region from other industrialists who want to make
profit from Appalachia natural recourses. Those people suggests that industrialization will be
the solution for such regions in which feuding was an issue. In fact, counties like Clay which
had feuding activities exhibited industry during antebellum and hence it was already
industrialized county. Its clear then that industry will not be a solution to feuding as
suggested by some local color writers and other scholars, in fact, industrialization was a cause
that intensified feuding in Appalachia since the region elites fight with each other to control
the economic profits from industry to gain absolute advantage to themselves.
From the above, we can see the effects of industrialization and local color literature on
violence in Appalachia. Local color literature effects can be seen in terms of the
representation of lynching and feuding. In both cases, local writers conveyed to their
audiences wrong ideas about what actually happened in the region. These wrong
representations aimed to justify the ambitions of industrialist to take over the natural
resources of Appalachia. On the other hand, industrialization effects on feuding and lynching
were to fuel and intensify these two actions. In the case of lynching, its the rapid social
changes and the transportation of transient people associated industrialization that established
lynching in industrial towns. Industrialization affects feuding as well since local elites were
fighting with each other to gain political and economic benefits and to take over the rewards
of industrialization to one group without the other. And finally, Industrialization motivated
the local color writers because it gives the local writers new agendas and new topics to write
about.