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There are two roads which lead into Harlan County. There is the road 1
"which winds monotonously between brown hills, with squalor.and untidiness- gd
the squalor of the very poor? Then there is the road called "Rhododendron ,
Highway" because of the profusion of this evergreen along the right-of—way, ’
that winds like a wide,white ribbon between towering mountains and beside r
green, turbulent Gumberland River. ‘ dvi
h It is the same road, but all depends upon the viewpoint of the travel-;
er. I have traveled this road on the right hand side and have seen the thingsv
that have given it it's name "Rhododendron Highway? I also have traveled it I
ion the other side and have seen its it in its more sombre aspects. Zmzthis I»€
will endeavor now to travel this same highway straight down the middle, hop- g
ing that out_of the cross fire of opinion that has put Harlan County on the lg
front pages of American newspapers during the last year will come a view of. d
the real conditions in the mountains of Sgutheastern Kentucky. t
First let us travel the left side of the road with Margaret Lane,
feature writer for the London Daily Express, who came to Harlan a few weeks
ago to get the inside facts onsthe Exextxsxtnaxtnnizx Kentucky coal field
disorders. “ _ . V
. l (Take in Lane f*·rticle,in part)       éémb gg
Let us begin again at Pineville and arrwsecatrv sewer -;\roa through
Harlan{County. Ehexeanaratezhtghwayzhegtnsxaxfxwxmikasxfxemzhtmextkka On the
right ixzxznemzhzxzk side of the road, a bare two miles from Pineville, one,
Lsees a handsome new brick consolidated high school where several hundred boys
and girls of Bell County go to school. A few hundred yards and the road
dips into a valley and joins Cumberland Hiver. Then for miles we travel
along this winding stream. Now it is a broad river, stately under the_shadow
of "The Seven Sisters", seven amtxzappimgxzaf rock pillars which attract
tourists from all parts of theJcountry. The roadside is a mass of rhododen—
I dron and mountain laurel. In the springtime a laurel festival is held in