Appalachia Project: Proposal for Category Structure [closed]

Question

Appalachia Project: Proposal for Category Structure [closed]

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The Appalachia Project would like to respectfully submit the proposal of the Project’s category structure for Initial G2G Review. The purpose of this post is to allow WikiTree Members a chance to review and provide feedback on the proposed structure.

The following is a proposed category mapping of the regional structure for Appalachia. The intent is to clearly outline the hierarchy of the Appalachian Region (as defined by the US Federal Agency - Appalachia Regional Commission) of where people of Appalachia were born and lived.

Please review the proposal here:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Appalachia_Project_Index#Categorization_Hierarchy

closed with the note: Strayed off-topic

asked Dec 22, 2022 in Policy and Style by Sandy Patak G2G6 Pilot (238k points)
closed Dec 25, 2022 by Mindy Silva

14 Answers

Answer 1 · 2022-12-22T17:56:26+0000

Thanks Natalie for your feedback. You have been a tremendous help with our categorization.

I agree with you on Rose Maddox. (Actually, I am combing through our Notables list this week and next to remove ones that some have added that just don't quite fit.)

But, there are some rare Notables to Appalachia, that while they are Notable for their music or writing, etc the topic is strongly Appalachian that it would, to me, override the Notable Musician or Notable Writer. Examples would be Olive Campbell or her husband John Campbell who both are known more as Appalachians than the State they hail from or their Occupation. Hopefully, there is some way to have Appalachian Notables even though the quanitity would remain low.

commented Dec 22, 2022 by Sandy Patak G2G6 Pilot (238k points)

Natalie, I think your statement is specifically about the use of the category, not that the category exists. On that category page, it even says NOT to use it just for being from Appalachia, but they should be notable BECAUSE of Appalachia:

A Notable of Appalachia is a person whose work/life was specifically remarkable and pertaining to Appalachia. Example: John M Ehle Jr.

A Notable just being born or lived in Appalachia does not necessarily qualify as an Appalachian Notable.

I think it still makes sense to have that option if you wanted to categorize people from all of Appalachia who were notable, and not have to search each sub-category of the state notables.

However, perhaps that one profile should have a decision made whether it should be Notable for the music or the culture, and (maybe) not have both. I could see wanting to find all Appalachian notables, and then feeling like you are missing some because they are Notable but aren't in the Appalachian category.

commented Dec 22, 2022 by Jonathan Crawford G2G6 Pilot (281k points)

@Natalie You are right. The basic structure of our categories was put in place the first or second week after I created the initial Space Page for Appalachia. Stickers too. That was six months ago.

It was not until last week-ish that I was told the Project needed to have the categories discussed with the Community. As I researched G2G for other Project's Categorization posts, I noticed I was not alone in not knowing about this procedure. But, I hope by posting now we can rectify the situation. I am hopeful and believe it can. :)

While my ignorance of the procedure does not excuse me (or the Project) perhaps a "New Project Checklist" could be educational to those that create new Projects on WT. If one already exists, I would love to use it. As a rule follower, I know it would have helped me tremendously.

commented Dec 24, 2022 by Sandy Patak G2G6 Pilot (238k points)
edited Dec 24, 2022 by Sandy Patak

Answer 2 · 2022-12-22T19:13:30+0000

I have quite a few concerns with this proposal.

Categories such as "Alabama Appalachians" and "Mississippi Appalachians" appear to be redundant with existing categories. The objective to "categorize by the where they were born, lived and/or died" scenario is already covered in much greater detail using the approved Categorization structure for this same area.

If the only benefit of these categories is to look at numbers that may fall under the scope of Appalachia, this can already be accomplished in a very simple structure by looking at this Appalachia Counties report which contains the same information with only one (1) category needed.

For example, a person born in Spartanburg County, South Carolina would already be better categorized at "Category:Spartanburg County, South Carolina" or at a city/town level if known. Spartanburg County is nested under Appalachia Counties - and you are done.

This method is further supported by the guideline to categorize profiles at the narrowest applicable category. Is this structure were to remain, we would now have profiles at multiple levels of the same structure.

In addition, I think there will be concerns with how profiles are being categorized as Appalachian with no indication of how they were determined to be Appalachian. What criteria is being used to determine if someone was, is, or ever identified as Appalachian? I have family who were born and lived most of their lives in areas covered under the ARC's boundaries of Appalachia - but they were not Appalachian.

answered Dec 22, 2022 by Steven Harris G2G6 Pilot (756k points)

You asked how it was being determined. I was just pointing out that the method had already been given. Whether that's acceptable to WT, or not, is another matter.

While it may not be an "administrative" region, there is a governmental entity that has designated it as a geographical region. I agree that in some places what constitutes a county as part of "Appalachia" seem a bit arbitrary. But at least an outside source is used for determination.

The comparisons don't hold. There is no governmental entity that determines where the "Bible Belt" is, or where the "Pretzel Belt" is, or where the "Mormon corridor" is. Whereas ARC.gov has defined it for Appalachia. Saying that it is only a cultural definition is not correct.

commented Dec 23, 2022 by Eric Weddington G2G6 Pilot (522k points)

@Steven Saying Appalachia is only a cultural region is inaccurate, as I have stated many times. Yes, it definitely has the cultural aspect but it is also clearly defined by the United States Governmental Agency, ARC. Every University that has an Appalachian Studies program (ask me for the list) uses ARC as their source for teaching and certifying their classwork for degrees.

Also, comparing Utah only to the religion, Morman, as an example is not quite the same as a person born in Appalachia being an Appalachian or a person born in Virginia being a Virginian which the State stickers indicate. BUT, again, I have no problem changing the wording to exclude being called an Appalachian if someone (or WT) prefers it to be removed. Born or Lived in Appalachia is a fact based on source documents along with the US Govt Designation of where Appalachia is located (the actual land, not culture).

I understand your thinking but I would ask, respectfully, that Appalachia not be characterized especially as one of the "Belts". Most of us that are Appalachian find that to be not kind.

Thank you for the thoughtful discussion.

commented Dec 23, 2022 by Sandy Patak G2G6 Pilot (238k points)
edited Dec 23, 2022 by Sandy Patak

The definition of "Appalachia" is one aspect of the Appalachia project that led me to express concerns when the project proposal was first communicated to me.

I am not of Appalachia and I don't care about its genealogy, but I live in Appalachia, as narrowly defined historically, and I believe it is a special place. This region is associated geographically with the Appalachian mountain range. It is mountainous, the topography is rugged, and it has a history of isolation (largely related to the rugged mountain topography). A good bit of the culture of the region is special to Appalachia, due both to preservation of old culture that has largely been lost elsewhere and also due to creation of cultural traditions that are uniquely associated with the region. And for reasons related to physical and cultural isolation, poverty has long been a hallmark of the region.

The region served by the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) is much larger than the region historically thought of as Appalachia. Appalachia got a lot of attention in the early 1960s "War on Poverty," and ARC was created as a government program to provide economic development and related assistance to the impoverished region. The traditional boundaries of Appalachia were expanded to include other mostly-high-poverty areas (contiguous with the region) where political leaders wanted to offer the same program benefits. I think the original ARC region included some areas near or adjacent to traditional Appalachia where there was interest in economic development tie-ins. Beyond that, it is worth noting that the original ARC boundaries did not include any parts of New York and Mississippi, but the original law (1965) provided for the possible addition of New York counties (13 counties in New York were added as a result) and in 1967 the law was amended to add 18 counties in Mississippi (not in mountains, but very poor), and two additional counties in Alabama, one additional county in New York, and one additional county in New York. These expansions were related to giving these places access to economic development programs, and had nothing to do with shared history or cultural identity. Read the intro to the academic journal article "Does the Appalachian Regional Commission Really Represent a Region?" at https://muse.jhu.edu/article/430823 if you don't believe me (I know that some project members don't). EDITED: The full article is on JSTOR (where I have access) at https://www.jstor.org/stable/44370668

I can see some merit in having a project for genealogy that is related to Appalachia (and I suggested that Appalachia-related topics such as Melungeon genealogy and the Hatfield-McCoy feud were waiting for a project like this...), but I don't see a benefit in attempting to make "Appalachia" a primary organizing theme for characterizing or categorizing all people who once lived within the boundaries of the ARC region.

commented Dec 23, 2022 by Ellen Smith G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
edited Dec 23, 2022 by Ellen Smith

Answer 3 · 2022-12-23T08:35:25+0000

@ Linda... most state-level categories are top-level categories & should have no people profiles categorized to them.

The Appalachians categorization hierarchy was to serve the project/project members (and also help people find ancestors known to have lived in Appalachia).

The profiles in, say, Category: Maryland Appalachians, should all also have the appropriate location categories. The Appalachians hierarchy feeds to the project & is usually added by the Appalachia Sticker; the location categories are a different hierachy. For example,

[[Category: Washington County, Maryland]]
== Biography ==
{{Appalachia Sticker|born|state=Maryland}}

Category: Washington County, Maryland has two parents: Category: Appalachia Counties & Category: Maryland.

commented Dec 24, 2022 by Liz Shifflett G2G6 Pilot (638k points)

Answer 4 · 2022-12-23T18:15:03+0000

Danielle: The name Appalachia has never been applied to the entire extent of the mountain range. I think the name was applied mostly to mountainous areas within the Appalachian mountain range south of the Mason-Dixon Line, in western Virginia, West Virginia, western Maryland, Kentucky, Tennessee, western North Carolina, northern Alabama, northern Georgia, and a bit of northwestern South Carolina. Also, I think some parts of Ohio and Pennsylvania are considered to be arguably part of the cultural region traditionally known as Appalachia.

EDITED: And as I noted in another comment in this thread, there areas covered by the Appalachian Regional Commission (including all parts of the ARC region in the state of Mississippi) that are not in any way part of the physiographic Appalachian mountain range.

commented Dec 23, 2022 by Ellen Smith G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
edited Dec 23, 2022 by Ellen Smith

Answer 5 · 2022-12-24T01:36:55+0000

I have read and reread this thread and was not going to comment because I am bias. I was not born in Appalachia however I was raised Appalachian and so were my children and my grandchildren were born here in Appalachia. The project was created to help get rid of the stereotype that we as Appalachian have been given. I am not poverty stricken (Never was) My mother worked and retired from the IRS. My Stepfather was an engineer. Both sets of my grandparents owned hundreds of acres of land. My 4th great grandfather who was an immigrant by the way owned an entire mountain! My Appalachian ancestors taught me to be proud, hardworking and dependable. They taught me to love my neighbor like they are family and to never look down on anyone. unless you are lending them a hand to pull them up. Yes, Appalachia is a place, Yes, it is a culture and yes it is my heritage.

I’m an Appalachian, born in the non Appalachian part of Ohio, Raised in the Appalachian, Tobacco region of Kentucky and I will be here in the Appalachian Mountains of Tennessee until my time here on earth is done.

Answer 6 · 2022-12-24T04:39:21+0000

Apology for delay in commenting: I was mostly offline for much of the last due due to lack of electric power, so when I posted earlier I had not looked at the proposed category structure.

I have a top-level concern with the name of the proposed top-level category: Category: Appalachians. In my experience, the word "Appalachian" is an adjective (as in Appalachian Mountains, Appalachian region, Appalachian Trail, Appalachian music, Appalachian people, Appalachian literature, or Appalachian studies), not a noun. And as Danielle's comments here have highlighted, in conventional parlance the term "Appalachians" is a shorthand reference to the Appalachian Mountains (just as "Rockies" refers to the Rocky Mountains), which is a mountain range that extends from Alabama to easternmost Canada (and actually continues in Scotland under a different name). I don't like the idea of a WikiTree project converting this word into a noun that means "Person of Appalachia," and I think that "Category: Appalachians" will be misinterpreted by people who reasonably think that it's a reference to the mountain range. (I probably would look in it for pages and categories about topics like the White Mountains of New Hampshire, the Blue Ridge of Virginia, and the Appalachian Trail.) The fact that we refer to Acadian people as Acadians does not mean that the same construction can apply to the people of Appalachia -- the word Acadians (and its variant Cajuns) is widely used in that context; it wasn't invented by WikiTree.

Within your parent category called "Appalachia," I would prefer to see the people of Appalachia placed in a category with a name like "Appalachian People" that uses Appalachian as a adjective. This would be comparable to the subcategories Palatine Migrants and "Palatine Migrants' Children" in Category: Palatine Migration. Similarly, the names of sub-categories within that people category (such as Category:New_York_Appalachians -- where, by the way, I might expect to find a page for the Catskills or the Adirondacks) should use a noun other than Appalachians.

And regarding those subcategories, I am frankly unimpressed with the apparent plan for subcategorizing people by state and possibly also county within Appalachia. County categories (and town and city categories, when towns and cities are identified in the records) can have value for people's profiles because they may help us associate them with cemeteries or churches, or connect with pages for local history or information on finding vital records, or perhaps help us identify a person's spouses relatives. Counties exist in the context of states, so county categories are housed in the context of state categories, but we don't also categorize all of the individual people in a state in the state category because the category would be much too large to manage and would not create value. Similarly, I see no useful purpose served by populating a category like Category: Tennessee Appalachians with profiles for every person who once lived in a county of that state that is now included in Appalachian Regional Commission region. The profiles I randomly sampled from categories like that one did not show me any indication of why the profile is of interest to Project: Appalachia. Maybe that is supposed to come later, but at the moment I can't see what value is being provided by the geographic categorization aspect of the Appalachia sticker. If people are categorized by county and we know which counties are in the ARC region, what value is added by a category for all of the people in a particular state who live(d) in one of the ARC counties?

Also, if categories like Category:New_York_Appalachians are going to exist, they need to include state categories like Category:New_York as parent categories.

answered Dec 24, 2022 by Ellen Smith G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)

@Ellen This particular profile was left in the Appalachia Project Notables because it is privacy locked. The PM is not a member of the Project so I could not remove it immediately.

I 100% agree with your comment about Appalachia content and appreciate your idea.

Our members have beautifully written biographies on Profiles and wonderful sub projects that detail their Appalachia heritage, work in/for specifically the Appalachian region.

We have MANY Profiles and Content related to, specifically of, Appalachia but prefer to categorize them as Notables instead of the dozens and dozens of Appalachia xxx categories (crafts, musicians, singers, poets, authors, entrepreneurs and SO much more). It might be too much duplication with other WT categories and definitely would be too much to keep track of for accuracy. I also fear members would start an Appalachian category rodeo.

But without a Project # we can't have an Appalachia Project Box. We can have no Notables. Based on Steven's and Natalie's comments above, it is clear they would not approve of the idea of the Appalachia Project having Notables so all but the one was removed from the category. (If a Project Box were to be approved for the Project, I could add them back. So much content that are fabulous reads. )

commented Dec 24, 2022 by Sandy Patak G2G6 Pilot (238k points)
edited Dec 24, 2022 by Sandy Patak

OK, I have now seen evidence that, while "Appalachian" has a secondary definition as a noun identifying a person of Appalachia, first used in that sense in 1965 (the year that the U.S. Congress created the Appalachian Regional Commission). So if WikiTree uses it in that sense in category names, WikiTree will not have invented the usage, but it would confuse and mislead the myriad people who understand the word in terms of its primary definition that goes back a couple of centuries and is known and used in parts of the world where people have never heard of "Appalachia." I do think it behooves us to use a term that does not bewilder people like Danielle, who is familiar with the Appalachian Mountains.

Below are some items I found on the Internet.

Britannica.com says "Appalachian" is a proper noun for the mountains:

:the Appalachian Mountains; also the Appalachians

: mountains in North America

Vocabulary.com has:

Appalachians
nouna mountain range in the eastern United States extending from Quebec to the Gulf of Mexico; a historic barrier to early westward expansion of the United States
synonyms:Appalachian Mountains
see less
example of:
chain, chain of mountains, mountain chain, mountain range, range, range of mountains
a series of hills or mountains

Dictionary.com has:

Appalachian

[ ap-uh-ley-chuhn, lach-uhn, -ley-chee-uhn, -lach-ee-uhn ]

adjective

1. of or relating to the Appalachian Mountains.

2. of or relating to the region of Appalachia, its inhabitants, or their culture.

3. Geology. of or relating to the orogeny and accompanying intrusion that occurred in eastern North America during the Pennsylvanian and Permian periods.

noun

4. a native or inhabitant of Appalachia, especially one of predominantly Scotch-Irish, English, or German ancestry who exemplifies the characteristic cultural traditions of this region.

Dictionary.com also has a British definition that only has the adjective:

Appalachian

/ (ˌæpəˈleɪtʃɪən) /

adjective

of, from, or relating to the Appalachian Mountains

geology of or relating to an episode of mountain building in the late Palaeozoic era during which the Appalachian Mountains were formed

Merriam-Webster's word history has:

Appalachian

noun

Ap·pa·la·chian ˌa-pə-ˈlā-ch(ē-)ən

-ˈla-

-sh(ē-)ən

: a native or resident of the Appalachian mountain area

First Known Use: 1965, in the meaning defined above

commented Dec 25, 2022 by Ellen Smith G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)

But it will make sense. As I said, the chosen terminology can be explained on the project pages. There is already a US Southern Colonies Project. As an Australian, I have only a vague idea of what that means, but I can easily find from the relevant page that the range is the colonies of Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia prior to 1776.

People don't have to know what the Appalachian Project covers in advance, nor should they rely on preconceptions. Instead, they can go to the project page and read about the scope which the Appalachian members of the project define. There's a very nice map there which gives the geographical coverage, as well as a description of the region in words, and the goal of the project is stated as collaborative work on profiles of Appalachian people. I don't see why anyone who reads that will be confused or bewildered, or think it doesn't make sense. It is clear what "Appalachian" means in the context of the project, even if dictionaries give multiple uses for the word.

Beyond that, as I indicated above, the feelings of the project members involved are an important consideration.

commented Dec 25, 2022 by Jim Richardson G2G Astronaut (1.0m points)

Answer 7 · 2022-12-24T05:15:25+0000

Defining any region is always difficult. Human beings move back and forth over established borders, blurring them. Plus no area is homogeneous. People of all types, rich and poor, Black, White, Native American, Latino and others, intermingle throughout these United States. And places change over time. Academic geographers struggle to define regions for all of these reasons.

Yet regions clearly exist. The fact that we know the difference between the Midwest and Northeastern US demonstrates that, even if we might quibble about where the boundaries of either might be. Appalachia is no different. It is an evolving, blurry, heterogeneous place. If you were standing in Bryson City, NC (where my people are from) you would know you were in Appalachia, even if you weren’t sure exactly where on the road between Charlotte and Asheville you crossed its borders. The messiness of ALL regions makes definition difficult, but there is quite clearly a place called Appalachia and if you are blessed to be from there, you know it. Using the ARC list of counties may not be perfect, but that is because no description is perfect of any region. The ARC definition gives us something to work with that has some standing.

I think it’s also important to understand that if you live in Appalachia, you are Appalachian. Since all regions are heterogeneous, there will be variety in the ways of life of different people in a region. The Cherokee are as Appalachian as can be and so are the mountain men my White family descends from. The cultures and the region are interrelated without being identical. To call someone Appalachian is not to say they live in one particular way — mining coal and playing banjos, for example. You don’t choose to be an Appalachian like you might choose to join a church. (There was mention of the Latter Day Saints in this discussion.). You are an Appalachian and contribute to what that means just by being a part of Appalachia.

Yet with all the variety, there are many common threads — a family resemblance, as it were. As those of us in the project chat about genealogy and biscuits or crafts and music, it becomes clear that the variety is like a harmony of related tones. There is something distinctive about being an Appalachian.

As has been pointed out, this cannot be equated with a state. Folks in Savannah have a different ethos than people in Gilmer County, though both are in Georgia. To bring things to their smallest category would be to say Tennessee Appalachian (or whichever state in the region). That’s a smaller category than either Tennessee or Appalachian.

So there is a region. It’s hard to define, but we have a government entity that gives us an approximation. It has a distinctive, if complex, culture. The project and its categories mark that. Individuals who make significant contributions to that culture should be celebrated as Appalachian notables. Refinement and improvement for categories or criteria for notables would be awesome, but the basic idea of having the project and categories for it is, I believe, important and a valuable contribution to WikiTree.

Answer 8 · 2022-12-24T13:24:02+0000

To be clear, this post is about the Categorization of the Appalachia Project and I would love to not get sidetracked but ..

To be clear, I find it 100% offensive to be told that I am an "adjective". I am not a noun or an adjective but a real live person that identifies as an Appalachian.

To be clear, WikiTree did not make up the "Tennessee Appalachians" (or other State) as was noted in @Ellen's reply.

It is disturbing, to me, to see that certain groups can be identified by their culture or region but suggested that WT made up the term Appalachians. So to understand that reply, Arcadians are "allowed" to be identified as such but Appalachians are not allowed to be identified. Shall we go down a long list of identities to determine what is allowed or made up by WT? Scots? Virginians? Indians?

Also, we Appalachians are so tired and weary of people coming into our culture to tell us that Appalachia is only defined or known as the Appalachian Mountains and/or the Appalachian Trail. This is 100% false. The argument is that people don't relate the term "Appalachian" to people but mountains, etc. WHY are people outside of Appalachia the ones allowed to define Appalachian??? THIS is one of the reasons this Project was created...to change the narrative on Appalachia. There are thousands of us on the "change the narrative train", how about joining us, learn about us, and help us. We welcome all!

I am sorry that this original post has gotten to the point of insulting a culture and region. The amount of inaccuracies and amount of pure false definitions of Appalachia is astonishingly heartbreaking. Isn't WikiTree suppose to be a place of sources and education and collaboration?

Answer 9 · 2022-12-24T16:13:55+0000

As a co-leader of the project, I think it is past time that I posted an answer. But I'm still abiding by DWWA. The answer I crafted shortly after Sandy's original post was quickly made obsolete by negative posts, and the negativity has spiraled since then.

To say I'm disheartened is a gross understatement. Since that first aborted attempt, I have crafted close to a score of answers. Perhaps when I calm down a bit more, I'll post some of the salient points from them that are still relevant.

Until then, please re-read Pam's answer and Sandy's. They are spot on. And have a Merry Christmas (or a Merry whatever you may be celebrating this holiday season).

Answer 10 · 2022-12-24T16:55:04+0000

About a point that Ellen raised:

Also, if categories like Category:New_York_Appalachians are going to exist, they need to include state categories like Category:New_York as parent categories.

This was an error on my part. I had looked at some of the state-level categories and did not see other such categories. However, I should have looked at the Colonists categorization hierarchy of the US Southern Colonies Project, which the Appalachians categorization hierarchy was patterned after (both intended to primarily serve the needs of the project, with appropriate location categories primarily serving other categorization purposes).

All of the state-level Colonists categories are under both Category: US Southern Colonists and the appropriate colony-level category (which is why I didn't see them when I was spot-checking state-level categories - d'oh).

Ellen also said that the state-level Appalachians categories would be too large to be useful... The same can be said of the Colonists categories just mentioned - or any other project-specific collection of profiles, such as Category: Acadians.

As I said in another comment:

The profiles in, say, Category: Maryland Appalachians, should all also have the appropriate location categories. The Appalachians hierarchy feeds to the project & is usually added by the Appalachia Sticker; the location categories are a different hierarchy.

I apologize for my error in not cross-categorizing the state-level Appalachians categories under the appropriate state category. I'll correct that.

Answer 11 · 2022-12-25T02:28:55+0000

From one of my aborted attempts at an answer...

I thought the Appalachia Project was doing great - as Sandy recently summarized for me & Mindy (the three of us are the project's co-leaders), "we have an awesome membership that has been highly engaged and good WT Citizens. In six months, the Project added over 130 members, had a highly viewed presentation [see this writeup of it], added over 28k stickers on profiles, and brought new people to WikiTree."

And, I might add, has published six issues of the "Appalachian News" (see the current issue & the archive). We also had our {{Member|Appalachia}} sticker.

When Steven suggested project-specific modules for the new WikiTree Academy, Mindy began to work on one for the Appalachia Project.

And when Steven called for projects to run challenges, Sandy did. The November Challenge was to add stickers to Northern Appalachia Region profiles. I had already "adopted" Washington County, Maryland (birthplace of my first husband). So I spent the month (plus some) working on profiles in Category: Washington County, Maryland. And thought to expand into profiles who were born in or lived in Washington County found through a WikiTree+ ACK! Thousands! So I narrowed the search to those tagged Maryland Appalachians -

https://wikitree.sdms.si/default.htm?report=srch1&Query=Maryland+Appalachians+Washington&MaxProfiles=500

Just 174 returns. Much more manageable. But then I got sidetracked when Steven posted to the project's Categorization Guidance page, which led to Sandy posting this G2G question.

I am proud of my work on behalf of the project on Washington County, and think it showcases the benefit of the project, and its categorization hierarchies. Please check out profiles in the category. See also the Space page for Washington County - which did not exist before I created it on behalf of the Appalachia Project. I have also seen synergy with other state projects with Appalachian counties. I am project leader "go-to" for the Tennessee Project and have seen a lot of great cross-collaboration between the Tennessee and Appalachia Projects.

I have been excited for the Appalachia Project since I first found it shortly after Sandy created it. I saw - and still see - its potential. I am appalled by the apparent anti-Appalachia attitude of WikiTree's leadership, as voiced in this discussion.

Answer 12 · 2022-12-25T04:58:14+0000

Ladies and gentlemen, I suggest that one and all should leave this discussion for the next two days, and spend time with your loved ones, whether you celebrate Christmas or Hanukkah or the winter Solstice or whatever you like. Step back and give it a rest. This discussion has verged into subjects other than categorization, which is what the question is about in the first place. My apologies for my own diversion on the matter.

Have a happy holiday.

Answer 13 · 2022-12-25T15:23:37+0000

The total number of counties for each of the 13 states with counties in Appalachia has been added to https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Counties_of_Appalachia in response to Lindy's post to that page... here's Maryland's entry as an example of what you'll find on that page:

Maryland

Of Maryland's 24 counties,^[9] 3 are in Appalachia.^[1]

Maryland Appalachians

return to Regional Teams list

3^[1] out of 24^[9] Maryland County Categories
Allegany	Garrett	Washington

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Appalachia Project: Proposal for Category Structure [closed]

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Maryland

Of Maryland's 24 counties,^[9] 3 are in Appalachia.^[1]

Maryland Appalachians

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Appalachia Project: Proposal for Category Structure [closed]

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Appalachians

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Maryland

Of Maryland's 24 counties,[9] 3 are in Appalachia.[1]

Maryland Appalachians

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Related questions

Of Maryland's 24 counties,^[9] 3 are in Appalachia.^[1]