History Happy Hour: Julie Dixon

Join us for an evening as Julie Dixon shows and discusses her film, "Melungeon Voices". Melungeon is one of the names given to a group of people who were first documented living in the mountains of east Tennessee and southwest Virginia in the early 1800s. They were surrounded with an almost mythic lore, and often described as a people “who kept to themselves.”   Academics declared them a tri-racial isolate. Families of mixed ancestry were also prevalent in northwestern North Carolina. Combining interview footage with many leading Melungeon researchers, as well as direct descendants from the earliest documented Melungeons, this one hour documentary film offers a rich and well-rounded look at this controversial subject. The filmmakers traveled up the ridges, and back into the ‘hollers,’ meeting the Melungeons on their own ground.  Along with modern day Melungeons talking on the porch of a cabin, at their kitchen tables, or out front of local…