Noodling for Flatheads - Moonshine, Monster Catfish and Other Southern Comforts (Electronic book text)

Though satellite dishes outnumber banjo players a thousand-to-one, the old Southern traditions haven't died, they've just gone into hiding. Cockfighting is illegal in forty-eight states, yet there are three national cockfighting magazines and cockpits in even the most tranquil, law-abiding communities. Homemade liquor has been outlawed for more than a century, yet moonshiners in a single Virginia county ship out nearly half a million gallons of corn liquor a year. Noodling for Flatheads explores these and other clandestine worlds and shows us that the weeds growing between the cracks of American culture are some of its most vital signs of life.

An exceptionally eloquent observer as well as occasional participant, Burkhard Bilger dissects the history and practice of eight bizarre Southern pastimes. He introduces us to the people whose spirit of individualism keeps these traditions alive, from the fifty-something female coonhunter who spends 350 nights a year in the woods, to a man whose arms are scarred by the 80-pound catfish he catches by hand. A fluid combination of adventure, history, and humor, Noodling for Flatheads is absorbing, evocative, intelligent, and wonderfully weird -- a splendid antidote to the sameness of today's popular culture.