Music

Take Two, They're Small

Yesterday I posted one of my tongue-in-cheek “WonTone Records” write-ups about Losing Her By Fractions (One Fifth at a Time). My dad commented that it reminded him of a song my grandfather, Lee Jackson Cooper, wrote with Dalton Roberts. So of course I went digging—and in mere minutes stumbled

Quillbilly News

Waffle House Unveils New Logo

ATLANTA—Fresh off Cracker Barrel’s much-debated branding shakeup, another Southern institution has announced a rebrand that may finally align its public image with the reality inside its dining rooms. Waffle House, that fluorescent cathedral of eggs and altercations, revealed Thursday that its famous yellow block letters will be retired

Music

Losing Her By Fractions - Del Ray Hillian

Del Ray Hillian was born and raised on Sand Mountain, Alabama, a hard plateau where the air is thick with both history and humidity. His reputation as a songwriter was always for lyrics that cut straight to the bone. A former gospel tenor who fell in with the barroom circuit

Books

Book Excerpt: Iron in the Blood: How the Alabama vs. Auburn Rivalry Shaped the Soul of the South

Iron in the Blood: How the Alabama vs. Auburn Rivalry Shaped the Soul of the South By Jay Busbee Published by Matt Holt Books/BenBella Books Hardcover Introduction There’s a small square of turf in the north corner of Auburn’s Jordan-Hare Stadium that’s some of the most

Quillbilly News

Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture Unveils New Trump-Approved Exhibit: Kanye

QUILLBILLY NEWS WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a sweeping redesign praised by former President Donald Trump, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture announced Tuesday that it has eliminated all previous exhibits and now consists solely of Kanye West, seated in the middle of the building. Louis

History

The Boy Fiend & The Blame Game

In March of 1874, Bostoners began whispering about a missing girl. Her name was Katie Mary Curran, just ten years old, daughter of John and Mary. She'd left home one morning to buy a school notebook and never came back. Posters went up. A $500 reward was offered

Books

Coming Soon To A Bookstore Near You (August 19, 2025)

All book descriptions provided by the publisher. Pig Latin: A Seriously Funny True Story of a Former Police Officer By Eric Tansey and Nick Palmisciano Atria Books Available in Hardcover, ebook, audio download Eric Tansey, a former Army scout and Special Operations military veteran, joined the police force with a

History

Sgt. George Jordan — Buffalo Soldier

I’m working on a couple of podcast episodes about the Buffalo Soldiers, the Black cavalrymen who rode for the U.S. Army after the Civil War. One of them tells the story of Sergeant George Jordan. Jordan was born enslaved in Williamson County, Tennessee, just southwest of Nashville. He

Food and Drink

A Succulent Chinese Meal

The other day a new restaurant opened in Chattanooga. Ox2 Buns & Noodles. It’s wedged between Best Buy, Hamilton Liquor, and Fresh Market, out near Hamilton Place. I’d eaten there back when it was one of those Chinese places indistinguishable from the next, the kind with laminated menus,

History

Will Rogers Was America(n)

Will Rogers, who died on this day in 1935, was the very definition of American. Born to a Cherokee Nation family in Oologah, Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), Rogers joked that though his ancestors didn't come over on the Mayflower, they "met the boat." Dog Iron Ranch,

Politics

Scandal? What Scandal?

Scandal: a circumstance or action that offends propriety or established moral conceptions or disgraces those associated with it. -Merriam Webster Dictionary Prior to the modern era, Presidential scandals didn’t really exist, at least not to the point of capsizing an administration.  Oh, there was lasciviousness, political malfeasance, and financial

Book Excerpt: MARINOVICH: Outside the Lines in Football, Art, and Addiction

MARINOVICH: Outside the Lines in Football, Art, and Addiction By Todd Marinovich with Lizzy Wright Published by Matt Holt Books/BenBella Books Hardcover Prologue If you could be anyone in Los Angeles, who would you be? It wasn’t a complicated poll — classic fodder for the Mark & Brian Show.

Chattanooga

After the Flood

Yesterday, Chattanooga hit a high water mark you don’t want to brag about—6.37 inches of rain in a single day. The airport logged it. The videos told the rest of the story: I-24 under water. East Brainerd a river. East Ridge and Gunbarrel swallowed up. And if

History

Little Miss Sure Shot and the Great Cocaine Pants Heist

I bet you didn't learn this one in school. During the sweltering August heat of the summer of 1903, Annie Oakley—"Little Miss Sure Shot" herself—stole the pants of a black man and sold them for a few cents at a Chicago pawnshop. Oakley had

No More AP Book Reviews

One of the hardest things to do, especially as a new author, is to convince a reader to take a chance—spend their hard-earned money and their even harder-earned free time—on your book. Book reviews have always been one of the best ways to get in front of potential

Books

Coming Soon To A Bookstore Near You (August 12, 2025)

All book descriptions provided by the publisher. Anonymous Male: A Life Among Spies By Christopher Whitcomb Random House Available in Hardcover, ebook, audiobook In September 2001, Christopher Whitcomb was the most visible FBI agent in the world. His bestselling memoir, Cold Zero, had led to novels, articles in GQ, and

Music

Albums I Like — Sophisticated Giant by Dexter Gordon

Dexter Gordon had been gone for a long time—14 years in Europe, mostly in Copenhagen and Paris. So when he finally came back to the States in the mid-1970s, it wasn’t just a return—it was a homecoming. Live sets of his triumphant return to the Village Vanguard

I'm Fine, How Are You?

Letters are now emails. Phone calls are now texts. Snark is the new smile. You are now more likely to sue your neighbor in court than you are to talk to them over the shared fence. Plenty of sociologists have written papers on the dangers of social media.   Our news

The South

A Little Thing Happened In Bledsoe County

If you don’t live in Southeast Tennessee, maybe this sounds like one of those “only in the South” deals—part county fair, part spectacle, part mystery as to how exactly we all ended up here. But if you’ve spent any time in these parts, you know the fair

Personal

The Ballad of James Killingsworth

Back in the early Aughts, I worked for a company called ARS, and Brad York was my right-hand man. Brad and I sat across from each other with four or five other people in a dingy little office that had once been the card room of a golf course clubhouse,

Personal

A Eulogy For Si

It’s been a year since the death of my grandmother, Si. A whole year without her laugh, her smile, her stubbornness, and her stories—and somehow, she’s still with me. I was honored to speak at her funeral. This is what I said that day. Ladies and gentlemen,

Books

For Your TBR Stack (Aug 5, 2025)

This week’s suggestions include the FBI looking for crooks at McDonalds, the inside story of the making of a classic rock album, and the untold story of the true relationship between Elvis Presley and his misunderstood manager Col. Tom Parker.  And, Khadijah Queen exposes life at sea as a

Music

Prologue / The Sperm Hits Egg

Ike Turner wasn’t sure about the crazy white man on the other side of the glass.  He sat on his piano stool, a lit Chesterfield loose between his long fingers, and studied the crazy white man, Sam Phillips, as he flailed around the control room, spooling tape from reel

Sports

Baseball Doesn't Love Me Back

When I was ten-years-old, just after the dinosaurs had disappeared, it was still a normal thing in the summer for neighborhood kids to get together and play baseball.  The neighbors directly across the street from my boyhood home had two sons around my age, and, more importantly, a large enough

Food

NO TUNA. CHEESEBURGER?

I am not a foodie; not even close. But living on the road as I do, I no longer have a kitchen of my own, so I eat out a lot.  And I have noticed some new trends in restaurants that I do not like very much.  I say these