Logs & Moonshine: Tales of Buffalo City, N.C. [Paperback]

Suzanne Tate (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2000

Interesting oral histories of residents of a logging community called Buffalo City.

Product Details

• Paperback: 48 pages
• Publisher: Nags Head Art, Inc; 1st edition (January 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1878405292
• ISBN-13: 978-1878405296
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 5.3 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #530,480 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Suzanne Tate, Logs & Moonshine: Tales of Buffalo City, N.C., April 24, 2005

By 

Samuel P. Menefee "Samuel Pyeatt Menefee" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Logs & Moonshine: Tales of Buffalo City, N.C. (Paperback)

Logs & Moonshine is the only one of Tate's four oral histories (see also Bring Me Duck, Memories of Manteo, and Whalehead) to be set on the North Carolina mainland. Over a third of the booklet's forty-eight pages are taken up with pictures showing Buffalo City in its heyday (at pp. 10, 14, 22, 26, and 32-45), as well as what now remains (at pp. 46-48). A map (at pp. 24-25) sketching one resident's memory of the city, circa 1929, is also of use.

Tate has interviewed six of Buffalo City's former residents to obtain a picture of community life in the first half of the 20th century. The ghost town, formerly christened "Moonshine Capitol of the World" (at p. 5) was located west of Manns Harbor, North Carolina (at p. 3). Not surprisingly, many of the reminiscences deal with the production and sale of illicit spirits (see pp. 8-9, 12, 15-16, 20, and 27). Some of the earliest inhabitants of the town were Russian lumber-workers, who were brought over on contract (at p. 6). The town was segregated, with blacks living in white houses and whites in red dwellings (at pp. 6, 31). Workers were paid in company coins, redeemable at the company store (at pp. 6, 31, 33). The reminiscences describe the removal of the town's only telephone line (at pp. 6-7), use of sugar sacks to make dresses and sheets (at p. 12), burning tires to discourage bugs (at p. 18), and the old pole road (at p. 19). Particularly interesting is the account of William Basnight's prediction of television and atomic power (at p. 31).

This is a useful account of a community that no longer exists, and Tate should be commended for her collection and preservation of this social history.

Samuel Pyeatt Menefee

5.0 out of 5 stars good book, November 3, 2007

By 

LeAnne Dutcher "Happy Momma" (NC United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Logs & Moonshine: Tales of Buffalo City, N.C. (Paperback)

Awesome book! If you ever have wondered about Buffalo City as you have traveled past the sign on 64 in NC check this out. Lots of Pictures & accounts from people who lived there. Very interesting look into the past of this area.