Out of the black patch: the autobiography of Effie Marquess Carmack, folk musician, artist, and writer

"Effie Carmack's memoir emphasizes her vibrant childhood on a poor tobacco farm. She describes a wide variety of folk practices, from healing and crafts to children's games and amusements. Her family's life included the backbreaking labor and economic trials of raising tobacco but was enriched by a web of relatives, a deep familial heritage, communal music, creative play, and many other traditional activities. The Marquesses' baptism as Mormons added another important dimension to Effie's life. Her account of turn-of-the-century Mormon missionaries adds to the record of Latter-day Saint attempts to establish a presence in the South. But it is the articulate, observant, vernacular voice of a turn-of-the-century woman from rural Kentucky that is most evident in her narrative."--BOOK JACKET.