I talk about the stories that shape the Tri-State area—West Virginia, Kentucky, and Ohio.

From quirky family superstitions and mysterious urban legends like the Mothman to the way outsiders view Appalachia through the lens of stereotypes and headlines, I explore how stories not only entertain us but also define our communities and identities.

I share some personal reflections on Huntington, which touch on how popular culture has influenced perceptions of the region and challenge us all to preserve and share the real stories that matter.

If you have a memory you would want me to talk more about, just send me an email at [email protected]. Or post a comment on the Tri-State Machine FB Group page.

Welcome to the Tri-State Time Machine.

I'm your host Vanessa Hankins. This is a podcast where my guests and I share our memories and present day stories of the Tri-State Area. That's West Virginia, Kentucky, and Ohio.

Nothing too serious, no political views, and no ulterior motives.

We're just here to share our fun stories about this great area.

Whether you're a past resident or a current Tri-State resident, I think you're going to have fun with us.

So join in, press play on your podcast player, and welcome to the Tri-State Time Machine! 

https://ts-time-machine.captivate.fm/episode/the-stories-they-tell-about-us

Copyright 2026 Vanessa Hankins

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/

This is the Tri State Time Machine. Each week, your host, Vanessa

Hankins and her guests share memories and stories about the past,

present, and the future of the Tri State area. That's West

Virginia, Kentucky, and the Ohio areas. If you used to live

here or you currently live here, you're going to catch yourself saying out

loud, wow, I remember that. Now

here's Vanessa.

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Tri State Time Machine.

This week's gonna be a little different because it's just me.

And honestly, sometimes I think these end up becoming some of my favorite episodes

because I get to sit down, let my brain wander a little,

and talk about things that have genuinely just been sitting with me for a while.

And this topic, I've been thinking about

it more than I probably realized. Kind of one of those living rent

free in the back of your mind. I started thinking recently about stories.

Not books, necessarily, not movies, just

stories. The stories our families passed down, the

weird things your grandparents told you growing up

that somehow became absolutely law in your household.

And I hope you're thinking of a few off the top of your head, because

even just saying that out loud, they start popping into my head.

The strange little superstitions older generations believed so deeply

that you eventually started believing them, too, even though

nobody could ever explain why.

I mean, why? Why don't we

have answers? Anyways, I started realizing

something. If you grew up in Appalachia, especially

if you grew up here in the Tri State, our communities are built on

stories. Ghost stories, family

stories, urban legends, local

folklore. Weird superstitions that nobody

questions. Creepy stories older cousins told us

simply because apparently terrifying our younger family members was considered

quality Entertainment in the 90s. And

if your childhood looked anything like mine,

there were always. Or there was

always, you know, that one place. Every town had

one. The road everybody swore was haunted.

The abandoned building nobody wanted to drive past at night.

The old house somebody claimed had a woman standing in the upstairs window.

The cemetery everyone dared each other to visit.

But while I was thinking of all this, I

started realizing that stories do something much bigger than entertain us.

Stories shape places. Stories shape identity.

Stories shape how communities remember themselves.

But stories also shape how other people see us.

And I think Appalachia has spent a very long time having

stories told about us by people who do not actually

know us. And sometimes

those stories become the only thing outsiders think that they know

about places like West Virginia or communities like Huntington.

So today I kind of want to talk about both sides of that.

The weird stories we grew up hearing, but also the bigger stories, the

World has told about communities like ours, which

I know sounds a little deeper than my usual random historical

rabbit holes, but just stay with me

because I think this one is going somewhere interesting. Or I

hope so. So let's start

with the weird stuff first. The Mothman.

Alright, I feel like if you're from West Virginia, there is

absolutely no better place to begin than the fact that somehow

one of the most famous things our state has ever produced

is a giant flying creature with glowing red eyes.

Which honestly feels aggressively on brand for us.

For anybody listening who somehow has never heard the story of Mothman,

let me catch you up. Okay, the story starts

in November 1966 in

Point Pleasant. And first of all, if

you have never been to Point Pleasant, highly recommend it,

because I genuinely respect any town willing to fully embrace

weirdness. But back in 1966,

two young couples were driving around near what the locals had called the

TNT area, which was an old war to

Mushin site. I hope I'm saying that right. Basically

abandoned after the war. So already creepy

already. Not somewhere I personally want to be hanging out after dark.

But according to the reports, while driving through the area,

they spotted something standing near the road. And what they

described was a massive gray creature somewhere around

six or seven feet tall, huge wings that

folded behind its back and glowing

bright red eyes. That part's important, which.

No, absolutely not immediate, no.

According to the story, they got in the car and sped off.

But then the creature started following them,

flying overhead, keeping pace with the

vehicle, which I would personally describe

as the end of my life. But

here's where things become stranger. Over the next several months,

dozens of people in Point Pleasant begin reporting seeing the

exact same creature, same description.

Giant wings, tall figure,

bright glowing red eyes. Multiple sightings.

And naturally, once people start reporting the

same thing, rumors tend to spread.

But here is where the story became part of history.

About 13 months later, December of

1967, the Silver Bridge connecting Point Pleasant

to Ohio collapsed. 40 people were killed.

One of the worst bridge disasters in American history.

And suddenly people started connecting the sightings.

People began believing that Mothman had somehow been a warning.

Like people would witness something supernatural before the tragedy struck.

Now, personally, I have absolutely no

idea what these people saw. Maybe mass

hysteria. Maybe somebody saw a giant

bird and suddenly everybody started seeing giant birds. Maybe

something genuinely strange did happen. Who

knows? But I think what fascinates

me is what this says about Appalachia. We have

always been communities that tell stories to explain things that we

cannot explain. And sometimes those stories survive for

generations. Also,

somewhere in Another state, there's probably a person who hears West Virginia and

immediately thinks of a flying demon creature, which

feels unfair, but honestly, kind

of hilarious. I own it. I love it.

So, Appalachian superstitions. Let's go into that a little bit.

Honestly, as weird as Mothman is, I think one of the

strangest parts about growing up around here.

Was probably realizing later in life

just how many completely random things adults had convinced us

that were factual. And I swear every

grandmother in Appalachia somehow held four advanced degrees.

Medicine, weather forecasting,

spiritual protection, and death prediction.

Heavy on that last one, but think about how many of these

you heard growing up. Bird

hits the window, somebody's gonna die.

Why? Nobody knows. But suddenly, everybody in the

house feels uncomfortable. Do not

sweep over somebody's feet. Because now,

apparently, they will never get married. Which,

honestly, feels a little unnecessarily harsh.

Open an umbrella indoors. Bad luck.

Spill salt, better throw it over your shoulder.

Ears ringing, somebody's talking about you.

Palm itching, money's coming.

And although I still have no idea which hand meant good

money, I have heard 70 different versions of that

one. And then the one

that absolutely terrified me as a child. If somebody dies

in the house, cover the mirrors,

which, as a kid, nobody

explains. They just quietly cover every mirror in

the house. And now suddenly, you're eight years old wondering

if spirits are trapped in the bathroom. But what

makes Appalachian culture fascinating is where these

beliefs actually come from. A

lot of these traditions came from Irish settlers, so Scottish traditions,

religious beliefs, generational customs passed down over

a hundred years, which means, without

realizing it, we inherited pieces of history

through stories, which also means

half of us were raised somewhere between actual science

and complete supernatural chaos.

So haunted places. And I know this next part's universal.

Every town, every country, every community,

everybody had that place. And what fascinates me now

as an adult is realizing that nobody ever knew the entire

story. But somehow everyone agreed that it

was terrifying. Growing up,

every area had some abandoned place attached to rumors. Maybe an

old school, maybe an abandoned hospital, maybe some

creepy old house on a back road, maybe an old industrial

building that everybody swore was haunted.

And every older kid knew somebody who knew somebody

whose cousin had definitely seen something there.

But that's how these stories always worked. You know, it. It was

never firsthand. It was always, my friend's

brother saw it. My cousin heard something there.

Somebody saw lights in the windows. A woman in white

appears after midnight. We all know those stories.

And honestly, I really love that,

because long before the Internet, communities

entertained themselves by passing stories down and around

local folklore existed long before social media, before

podcasts, before documentaries.

Communities preserve stories simply

by talking to each other.

And that feels kind of beautiful when you think about it.

But while some stories stay local, some stories grow much bigger than

that. Because while ghost stories are harmless, there

are other stories. People have been telling about Appalachia for a very long time.

Stories about poverty, stories about intelligence,

stories about addiction, stories about education,

stories about culture.

And I think somewhere along the way,

people stop seeing Appalachia as a collection of deeply

complex communities and started reducing it to stereotypes.

And I want to talk about that next. So

before my little pause, I spent a lot of time talking about the

stories we grew up hearing here. Ghost stories,

family traditions, weird superstitions that nobody

questions, the folklore passed down from generation to

generation. And honestly, I think

there's something beautiful about communities preserving stories like that.

But while I was putting together this episode, I kept finding myself coming back

to a bigger thought, because stories do not just

shape how communities see themselves. Stories shape

how other people see communities as well.

And I think if you're from Appalachia, whether that's West Virginia, eastern

Kentucky, southern Ohio, Tennessee,

Virginia, anywhere in this region,

you know exactly what I mean when I say

people think that they know us, even when they

have never stepped foot here,

even when they've never lived here, even when everything

they think they know came from television,

movies, political conversations,

documentaries, or headlines.

And I started asking myself something while researching all of this.

When exactly did Appalachia become a stereotype?

Because somewhere along the way, this entire region

got turned into a character.

Hardship is real in Appalachia, but

it became the only story. So before I go any further, I want

to say something very clearly.

Appalachia has struggled. Economic

decline, coal industry collapse, generational poverty in some

communities, Limited job opportunities, addiction,

underfunded education systems, lack of investment.

Those things are real. And I'm not pretending

that these things do not exist, because they do. But I

think the problem starts when hardship becomes the only story that

people tell about a place.

Because eventually, people stop seeing human beings.

They stop seeing families, they stop seeing culture,

they stop seeing history, they stop seeing

complexity. And instead,

they begin seeing characters.

So let's talk about the stereotypes that we all know. And if you grew

up anywhere around here, I think we all know the stereotypes.

Tell somebody out west, you're from West Virginia, and suddenly the

jokes start missing. Teeth jokes, incest

jokes, education jokes, poverty jokes, the

barefoot hillbilly stereotype.

And I think what is strange to me

is that people say these Things so casually, like, somehow

entire communities are becoming the punchline,

and it's completely normal. But stereotypes do not

appear out of nowhere somewhere.

Those ideas had to be built into American culture.

I think, in my opinion, that Hollywood helped build

this narrative. And one thing I found fascinating while

researching was realizing just how

much film and television shaped public perception of Appalachia.

One of the biggest examples of that is the 1972 film

Deliverance. If you know, you know, cue the

banjos. Now, if

somehow you've never seen Deliverance, first of all,

congratulations, because I genuinely wish I could

say the same, because that movie is

deeply unsettling. But the basic story

follows four men from Atlanta

who go on this canoe trip in rural Georgia.

And during the trip, they encounter an isolated,

like, mountain men type situation who are portrayed as

violent, dangerous, uneducated, brutal,

primitive. And while technically the story

takes place in Georgia, the cultural impact spread

everywhere because suddenly

mountain people became a horror trope.

And I do not think people fully understand how deeply that

film shaped public perception. Entire

generations of Americans grew up seeing depictions of Appalachian

communities as backwards, dangerous,

isolated, uncivilized.

And movies have power. Once people see the same narrative enough time,

they start assuming the narrative reflects reality.

Imagine living in a region where millions of

people who have never met you have already decided

what kind of person you are because of a movie.

So a little personal reflection. And I think what bothers

me about that, the whole thing of all these

people that have never met us have already decided who we are,

is that people forget that this region or what this

region actually helped build Appalachia is not some

isolated footnote in American history. These communities were built

by miners, railroad workers, factory workers,

farmers, teachers, generations of people doing

fish, physically brutal work, just trying to build stable

lives for their families. But

somehow all of that gets erased,

and instead people hear

Appalachia and immediately picture

barefoot hillbillies sitting on porches playing banjos,

which, first of all, I would like to publicly defend

banjos because. Because banjos are fantastic. Seriously,

like, if you don't love a banjo,

whatever, have your opinion, but they're great.

But seriously, imagine

your entire region just becoming a punchline.

So I've tried to wrap my head around why

the world loves Appalachian struggle.

And another thing that I kept noticing while researching all this

is how often the rest of the country seems interested in Appalachia

only when suffering is involved, though. And honestly,

I find that incredibly frustrating because it feels like

outsiders become interested in places like ours only when tragedy

is attached. Think about

documentaries, think about

national media. Coverage, Think

about political conversations. How

often do you see stories celebrating Appalachian innovation,

Appalachian art, Appalachian architecture,

Appalachian music, Appalachian resilience,

Appalachian creativity, Appalachian culture?

Honestly, not very often. But the second

that there is poverty, addiction, unemployment,

disaster, suddenly cameras show up.

Another interesting example of this conversation is about

hillbilly elegy. And listen, I know people have very

mixed opinions about this book, and I'm not really here to

debate whether people love it or hate it.

But I do think the bigger conversation surrounding it matters, because for

many outsiders, books like that become confirmation.

They read one story and suddenly believe that they understand an entire

region. And I think that that's dangerous, because

no place should ever be reduced to one narrative. No community is one

thing. No city is one thing. No region is one

thing.

So reflect on that. And I think maybe

that is what bothers me the most. Not that people

acknowledge hardship. Hardships absolutely deserve discussion.

Poverty should be discussed. Addiction should be discussed. Economic

struggle should be discussed. But struggle

cannot become the entire identity for people

to assign to a place,

because when that happens, people stop seeing humanity,

and they stop believing communities are capable of becoming anything different.

And honestly, I do not think that I have had

that happen anywhere more personally than right here in

Huntington.

So throughout this episode, I've spent a lot of time talking about

stories, stories families tell, the folklore that communities

preserve, the stereotypes attached to Appalachia,

the way entire regions slowly become a character over time.

But I think if I'm going to talk about this honestly, I have to bring

this conversation closer to home, because I do not think that there is a city

in our immediate area that understands this conversation better than

Huntington. And I think sometimes

when you live somewhere your entire life, you forget that

people outside of your city often see a completely different

version of the place than you do. And I think Huntington may

be one of the clearest examples of that.

I think when most people listening know exactly what I mean when I say

there was a period where it felt like every single time Huntington

made national news, it was bad.

And I think one of the biggest shifts happened

right when the opioid epidemic became impossible to ignore.

Because suddenly, Huntington, it

became one of the places that national media repeatedly returned to

when they wanted to talk about addiction in America. And I

want to say this very clearly. Addiction,

it's real. Families here have suffered

tremendously, my family included.

Lives have been lost. Entire generations have

been affected. I know families

personally who have experienced that pain. I know my family has

personally experienced it. Most people listening right now probably

know somebody, too. And I'm not minimizing that.

I'm not pretending that it didn't happen. I'm not pretending that

communities here did not suffer. But I

remember watching national coverage over the years and thinking something

over and over again. This

is not the whole story.

So because every documentary,

every national news segment, every major headline

seemed to focus on one thing, the worst thing happening

here. And I understand why. Addiction's serious.

Communities needed help. Resources needed attention.

Conversations needed to happen.

I am not arguing against any of that. But

imagine living in a place where every single time outsiders hear your

city mentioned, it's connected to tragedy.

Imagine watching people around the country build their entire perception of your

hometown based entirely on pain.

Imagine realizing people have already decided that your community is broken

before they know anything else about it.

Here's some things that people outside of Huntington never

see. And I think this part

is another bit that frustrates me the

most. Because if all of you know about Huntington comes

from headlines, then you don't know Huntington at

all. What people outside this community do not see

is connection. They do not see how deeply people here

care about one another. They do not see the neighbors stepping in when

families struggle. They. They do not see the local organizations doing

impossible work with limited resources. They do

not see community members constantly trying to make this place better.

They do not see how unbelievably hard people here fight

for one another. I think

about places like the Keith Albee Performing Arts center,

and I think that building alone tells a completely different story about

Huntington than national media could ever. Here you have

this absolutely beautiful historic theater sitting in the middle of

downtown right here on 4th Avenue. I'm literally recording

in my office inside the Keith Albee right now.

Built in 1928, one of the last fully intact

atmospheric theaters still standing in America.

A building representing history, art,

preservation, architecture, community investment.

And I think about how easy it would have been for somebody outside the city

to never know places like this even exist here,

because nobody is putting that on national television.

I think a lot about Marshall University, too. And

no, I do not just mean football. Although,

let's be honest, football is basically a religion around here.

But Marshall represents something bigger. Education,

innovation, young people building futures, medical

advancement, economic development, community identity.

But somehow those stories never feel loud enough compared to

the headlines. And as locals, we know what

headlines that are that keep the people coming back. It's

not the good stuff. And maybe this is what

I appreciate most about communities like Huntington. We are resilient

in ways that people from outside places

like this often do not understand. Because

Smaller communities have no choice but to rely on each other.

I think people here know how to survive hard seasons. We know how to

rebuild. We know how to adapt. We know how to take care

of each other.

I think communities that. That have experienced struggles

often develop a kind of empathy

that you really do not find anywhere else.

Because when communities hurts together, people learn

how to carry one another. But I want to be careful here

because I do not want this episode to sound like I'm pretending that Huntington

does not have problems. We do. Poverty exists

here. Addiction exists here. Crime exists here.

Economic struggle exists here. There are families hurting every

single day. There are neighborhoods still fighting to recover.

Hell, if you've been paying attention to headlines, we have communities surrounding us

that don't even have drinkable water. I

know that everybody listening knows that. But

I think where I struggle is watching outsiders behave as their

struggle is all that we are. Because community

should never be defined solely on the hardest thing that they've gone through.

I think that every place has a difficult chapter

or difficult chapters. It may not even just one.

Every city, every community, every family even.

But imagine if somebody met you and decided your entire identity

once felt completely different. Stories preserve

memory. And without stories,

places disappear long before the buildings do.

And honestly, I think this is why I

have always cared so deeply about local

history, this history. It's not just

presidents, it's not just wars. It's not just

dates written inside textbooks.

History is communities. History is

families. History is neighborhoods.

History is traditions. History

is ordinary people quietly building lives.

History is local restaurants people will still miss 20 years later.

History is movie theaters that shaped our childhood memories.

History is family businesses. History is as

grandparents telling stories for younger generations.

That way they're not forgotten, and they

love when you ask about them. And I think sometimes people

forget. Preserving history

is really just preserving identity.

I think that kind of wraps us around the circle of why

this podcast exists.

I think writing this episode helped me understand something I had maybe

never fully put into words before and maybe hadn't

really formed full thoughts on it. Maybe

this is why WG started the Tri State Time Machine in the first place.

And I agree, because communities deserve to

remember themselves. I think places deserve to

be remembered for more than struggle. I think local

stories matter. I think preserving history matters.

I think communities like ours deserve to be seen as complicated,

beautiful, flawed, resilient,

evolving places, not stereotypes.

So let's talk about the human comparison a little bit. You know,

I kept thinking about something while writing all of this. Every single person

listening right now has probably Lived through a hard season.

Maybe grief, maybe addiction touched your family.

Maybe it touched your life. Maybe a financial struggle,

a divorce, maybe trauma,

maybe failure, loss.

Now imagine someone meeting you and deciding that that

that's all you were. Imagine the hardest chapter

of your life becoming your identity forever. You

would hate that. That would create its own trauma.

You would want people to understand that there is more to you than your hardest

season. So why would communities be any different?

So I'm going to try to wrap this up the best that I can.

Appalachia. It's not perfect, honey

Thin. It's not perfect. No community is.

But I think one of the most unfair things we can do is reduce people,

families, communities,

entire regions down to stereotypes and

headlines. Because

the truth is, some of the strongest people I've

ever known come from the places exactly like this.

Some of the hardest working people I know came from communities

exactly like this. Some of the most

compassionate, creative, resourceful,

resilient people I know were shaped by places

exactly like this.

And maybe that's the whole point. Places are complicated.

Communities are complicated. People are complicated.

And no place deserves to be remembered only for its hardest chapter.

So maybe next time somebody tries to tell a story about Appalachia or

Huntington or communities like ours,

maybe we make sure we are telling our own story first.

And maybe that's exactly why local history matters more than people

realize. It's why this podcast matters.

Thank you for hanging out with me on this one. I know the episode was

a little different and maybe a little heavier than normal,

but honestly, I keep saying

that, but I want people to really know. I

believe this in my heart. I think this may be one of my

favorite conversations I've ever had here. I would

genuinely love to hear what you think, what stories shaped where

you're from, and what do you wish more people understood

about communities like ours?

I love you guys. I love that you keep

joining me. This has been the

Tri State Shine Machine with Vanessa. We're out of here.

Thanks for listening to the Tri State Time Machine. If you have a

memory you want Vanessa to talk more about, just send her an

[email protected]

or post a comment on the Tri State Time Machine Facebook page. Did you

like the episode? Be sure to share it with friends and family. It's the only

way we can continue this fun work that we do. You can find a link

in the show notes that you can use to share it.