Research question: 1920s Appalachia, religion and race views

[Beorning]

Guys, I have a research question, if you don't mind.

I'm currently playing in a Call of Cthulhu game on another site. The specific setting is early 1920s, United States - specifically, a rural Appalachia region.

My character is a daughter of a Protestant pastor and lives in a small town. I'm wondering what social and religious views she might have? I'm specifically interested in three things:

1. What views on race might she have? How racist would her family and neighbours be? Is it possible that her father might be a pro-equality pastor, or did such pastors not exist in that time and area?

2. What views might she have on alcohol and prohibition? Were all 1920s religious people in favour of it?

3. Any other significant religious and social views my character might have due to growing up in that time and place?

I'd be grateful for your opinions!

[Skynet]

I won't be able to answer all of these questions and these aren't in-depth, but here's what I found via some Googling.

In the southern regions of the Appalachian Mountains, moonshining was both popular and tolerated by locals for being one of the primary means of bringing in money to towns. There was condemnation of the practice by religious authorities, and people didn't drink with each other as a social occasion instead doing it in private. Most communities were self-sufficient so weren't' in danger of starvation, so the money was used for buying luxury goods. It doesn't focus majorly on Prohibition, covering future decades as well, but it was a good read.

https://anthro.appstate.edu/research/field-schools/ethnographic-and-linguistic-field-schools/summer-2007-alleghany-county/its

So in the south it seems to be an "out of sight, out of mind" thing tolerated for the money it brings in.

There's a variety of denominations and traditions in the region, with Baptists, Presbyterians, Methodists, and Pentecostals being the more common ones. There's a Catholic minority in the far north around Pennsylvania. They're overall nonhierarchical, which makes sense as a lot of these towns were very isolated from each other.

[Beorning]

I won't be able to answer all of these questions and these aren't in-depth, but here's what I found via some Googling.

In the southern regions of the Appalachian Mountains, moonshining was both popular and tolerated by locals for being one of the primary means of bringing in money to towns. There was condemnation of the practice by religious authorities, and people didn't drink with each other as a social occasion instead doing it in private. Most communities were self-sufficient so weren't' in danger of starvation, so the money was used for buying luxury goods. It doesn't focus majorly on Prohibition, covering future decades as well, but it was a good read.

https://anthro.appstate.edu/research/field-schools/ethnographic-and-linguistic-field-schools/summer-2007-alleghany-county/its

So in the south it seems to be an "out of sight, out of mind" thing tolerated for the money it brings in.

Thanks! So, it's safe to assume that my character's pastor was firmly in favour of Prohibition? As he counts among religious authorities etc.

There's a variety of denominations and traditions in the region, with Baptists, Presbyterians, Methodists, and Pentecostals being the more common ones. There's a Catholic minority in the far north around Pennsylvania. They're overall nonhierarchical, which makes sense as a lot of these towns were very isolated from each other.
[/quote]

Have any of them been, historically, notably anti-racism?

[Annaamarth]

1920s were still pretty steeped in racism as I recall. That's when religious fundamentalism started to pick up, and the KKK marched on Washington in support of the "proper" heirarchy in America - a White, Protestant hegemony.

This wasn't all churchs and there were certainly exceptions, but the trends in America today kinda mirror some of the trends then.

You could easily play someone who was an exception, maybe someone whose parents and grandparents supported the Underground Railroad by sending money or other support. The US Civil War was *just* 55 years prior to 1920, so it was very much akin to WW2 in the zeitgeist at the time.

Whether you were in favornof prohibition may depend on whether you are an authoritarian pastor who believes morality should dictate law, or a pastor who believes free will is an important part of Gods message.  Take some extra philophophy skills or academic skills and look for some quotes to support either direction if you want to take the learned approach.

Protestantism was, at the time, very non-heirarchal as you said. I think being antiracist would be easy to justify, as well as being pro-, against or neutral to prohibition.

[Annaamarth]

Oh right, this was also the era of pseudoscientific eugenics, and immigration laws hadn't been reformed so citizenship to immigrants was covered by the naturalization act of 1790, which restricted citizenship to aliens of good character who were "White, free persons."

So yeah. That was cool.

[Oniya]

From personal experience with people that grew up in that region and around that time (great-grandpa was working the mines in 1907), there was very much a sense of 'our people' and 'other folks'.  The 'our people' could take a number of forms (mining families, church members,) as could the 'other folks' (city people, and yes, other races).  You might not see outright racial hatred, but you weren't going to see any form of social integration either. 

[Skynet]

Thanks! So, it's safe to assume that my character's pastor was firmly in favour of Prohibition? As he counts among religious authorities etc.

That's a possibility, yes.

Have any of them been, historically, notably anti-racism?

Pentecostal churches were notable for having racially integrated churches during the early 1900s, although this wasn't universal.

The crowds of African-Americans and whites worshiping together at William Seymour's Azusa Street Mission set the tone for much of the early Pentecostal movement. During the period of 1906–24, Pentecostals defied social, cultural and political norms of the time that called for racial segregation and the enactment of Jim Crow laws. The Church of God in Christ, the Church of God (Cleveland), the Pentecostal Holiness Church, and the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World were all interracial denominations before the 1920s. These groups, especially in the Jim Crow South were under great pressure to conform to segregation. Ultimately, North American Pentecostalism would divide into white and African-American branches. Though it never entirely disappeared, interracial worship within Pentecostalism would not reemerge as a widespread practice until after the civil rights movement.[31]

[Azy]

It depends on what part of Appalachia you're talking.  Here in southern PA there was some racism.  One of my grandmother's brothers used the N word freely, and my mother repeats things he used to say.  I'm sure the name has since changed, but there was an area nearby called N* Run.  It was mostly farming and mining communities around here.  Moonshine happened.  Pennsylvania Dutch farmers really love their liquor.  I'm a descendant of one of the leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion in the late 1700's.  Deeply religious people like ministers were probably anti moonshine though.  If you go farther south I'm sure there was more racism.  I can say that a lot of people my grandparents knew found it odd that my grandparents were not at all ashamed that one of their daughters married a black man. 

[Oniya]

I'm sure the name has since changed, but there was an area nearby called N* Run.

Not by much.  They use the more formal 'N'-descriptor now.

[gaggedLouise]

The famous Great Monkey Trial probably fits in here. The iconic confrontation about teaching Darwin's views on the descent of man from some other primates - and not literally those of the Bible - happened in Tennessee, but it could just as well have happened in Ohio, Carolina or West Virginia. (I've known since I was a little schoolgirl that the trial happened in Dayton, because it was described in the first band of an old encyclopedia which had been widely circulated around the country to promote subscription, including to my great-grandparents, under Ap-processen, but I thought until now that it was Dayton, Ohio. Just noticed that it was much further south...)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scopes_Trial

The belief that the accounts of Genesis were literally true, and that modern science and historical research would be a threat to the faith, were very widespread at the time.

[Oniya]

The belief that the accounts of Genesis were literally true, and that modern science and historical research would be a threat to the faith, were very widespread at the time.

So it was okay to be a monkey's uncle but not a monkey's nephew.   

[gaggedLouise]

So it was okay to be a monkey's uncle but not a monkey's nephew.   

Or, God forbid, a monkey's niece... :)