I saw this book in a bookstore in the past two or three months. It was a travelogue/photo essay type book, sort of what you’d expect from Charles Kuralt.
All were little back-road type towns, well off the beaten path. A representative photo of the town, accompanied by a little blurb. And it seemed that it was compiled by a newscaster type like Charles Osgood or Bill Kurtis–but I can’t be sure on that. I do think it was a recent publication, though.
Any ideas???
OK, I’m blowing the tanks on this because I didn’t get jack-beans for a response. Anyone else see this book? I think one of the backwoods towns they visited was Boring, OR.
Possibly “Blue Highways” by William Least Heat Moon
I vaguely recall seeing something like that in the time frame you suggest, Earl, but I can’t remember anything else about it.
–Cliffy
In the event that Palikia is correct, here is the book you are looking for.
It’s definitely not Blue Highways, which, IIRC, has no pictures in it and isn’t about “little weird towns” as much as it’s an introspective prose travelogue.
This is another shot in the dark, but could it be “Weird U.S.”? There were huge displays of them in stores a few months ago.
Nope, not that, either, but thanks. This wasn’t a book about weird stuff, just small (and i do mean small towns, highlighting one or two of the residents. I very vividly remember one woman, who was a postmaster in some Appalachian town who was definitely a candidate for gastric bypass surgery.
Reader’s Digest has a neat photo book called The Most Scenic Drives in America. I gave it to my grandparents one year and they loved it. I see they also have a book called Off the Beaten Path: A Travel Guide to More Than 1,000 Scenic and Interesting Places Still Uncrowded and Inviting. Anyway, if neither one of those are it, maybe one of the “also browsed” books might be…
Well, this one isn’t “recent,” but it may be what you’re looking for. “Our Smallest Towns: Big Falls, Blue Eye, Bonanza, and Beyond,” by Dennis Kitchen. The author/photographer went to the smallest incorporated town in each of the fifty states, took a picture of the inhabitants, and collected some quotations and other information. The larger towns in the book have populations of 200 or more, but most of them are less than fifty and quite a few are less than 20. The stories from the locals are interesting-- you’ll read about how ordinary folks deal with civic and social matters in a town where the term “everybody knows everybody” is taken to a literal extreme. There is also a brief foreword by Garrison Keillor. In my travels I have tried to visit some of the towns in his book and spot the locations where the author took the pictures. I even sent some post cards from the smallest town in America with a post office: Lost Springs, Wyoming, elevation 4996, population 4.
It’s a fascinating book. More information here.
A few months back, maybe as long as a year, while I was moving the Jock Sturges books to the"Illustrated Children" shelves at the local B&N I saw a photographic collection of small-town people. The closest I can find on Amazon is titled Passing Gas and although the excerpts do not show the photos it may be what you’re thinking of.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1580084567/qid=1100912984/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/104-2606480-5802307?v=glance&s=books (No, I DON’T know how to make neat links, and I am too damn old to start learning.)
Earl, Boring, OR is on page 57
the chair-filling Only, TN, postmistress is on page 115
some others):
Crapo, MD
Purgatory, ME
Zip City, AL
Boogertown & Toast, NC (he missed Lizard Lick)
Nice, CA (been there)
Toad Suck, ARK
Intercourse, AL (been to the one in PA, between Ectasy and Blue Ball)
Panic, PA
Dull, OH
Ding Dong, TX
Hell (MI) (have seen a picture of a town name sign of this with icicles hanging from it) (When Hell Freezes Over?)
Odd, WV
Zero, MT
Suck-Egg Hollow, TN
Zap, ND
and not quite at the end-Gas, KS.
DrFidelius was correct-They are in “Passing Gas And Other Towns Along the American Highway”, by Mary Gladstone, Ten Speed Press, Berkeley/Toronto’, 2003, paperback, $19.95. It says, “To purchase fine art prints of subjects from this book visit http://www.passing-gas.com”
It’s a gas!
Many thanks, Doc!