Oh, and they had blue skin. Stacys son has built a modern house next door, but the old logger wont hear of leaving the cabin he built with timber he personally cut and hewed for Luna and their 13 children. The company's filing status is listed as Revoked (Failure To File Annual Report) and its File Number is 45369. She was a sister to one of the Fugate women. About this same time, another of the blue Combses, named Luke, had taken his sick wife up to the clinic at Lexington. Some say 99%. This small enclave was no longer isolated and they began to disperse and marry outside of their little clan diminishing the effect of the "blue" gene. Blue skin. There was always speculation in the hollows about what made the blue people blue: heart disease, a lung disorder, the possibility proposed by one old-timer that their blood is just a little closer to their skin. But no one knew for sure, and doctors rarely paid visits to the remote creekside settlements where most of the blue Fugates lived until well into the 1950s. She remembers the story very easily, most often humorously, because she remembers the manner in which her brother told her. Stumped, the doctor turned to the medical literature for a clue. Research on intrafamilial marriage in such enclaves is slim. Book is out of print, borrowed from Special Collections at the St. Louis County Library, St. Louis, MO. Lunas father, Levy Fugate, was one of Zachariah Fugates sons. Woodburn Hall at West Virginia University in Morgantown (old gold and blue are the official University colors); photo by Swimmerguy269 on Wikipedia (use permitted with attribution / share alike). West Virginia's House congressional districts run from east to west, creating a three-way split that fractures pockets of blue support in the far northern and southwestern parts of the state . Elizabeth had pale white skin, almost translucent. Those who are otherwise healthy with levels under 15% may exhibit minor symptoms or none at all. The antidote worked quickly but patients were required to take daily doses as it passed quickly through the urine. Methemoglobinemia can also be caused by reactions to certain topical pain relievers like benzocaine and xylocaine. At the National Press Club on Monday, Vice President Dick Cheney noted that his maternal grandmother is descended from someone named Cheney, then quipped, So we had Cheneys on both sides of the familyand we dont even live in West Virginia. (Click here for a video.) What he got from Martin Fugate was dark blue skin. Published November 21, 2021 Updated November 29, 2021 For nearly 200 years, the Fugates known as the blue people of Kentucky remained largely sealed off from the outside world as they passed their blue skin from generation to generation. While in the hills, Cawein drove over to see Zach (Big Man) Fugate, the 76-year-old patriarch of the clan on Troublesome Creek. In another neighborhood of this rust-belt city of 46,000, Pam and Ted Keesee have their own. Some sources claim their are no blue . The last known "blue" Fugate descendant was born in 1975. One came from a blue Flugate whod joined the Army and been sent to Panama, where his son was born bright blue. It was hard to get out, so they intermarried, says Dennis Stacy, a 51-year-old coal miner and amateur genealogist who has filled a loose-leaf notebook with the laboriously traced blood lines of several local families. Google Maps, Cowboy Up Bar, Bluefield, WV. The area was never. Howells Pawn and Guns, New Martinsville, WV. Definitely not a poaching bunch, these Hurricane rednecks. Martin and Elizabeth set up housekeeping on the banks of Troublesome and began a family. The Fugate family of Kentucky has been known for their blue skin color for generations. Well, as you can imagine, I really examined them. Where people have deer horns on their hoods. According to the official dictionary definition of a redneck, and based on stereotypes that the internet says are true, using science to determine the most redneck cities in a state cant be too far off. "Within a few minutes. The drugs effects are temporary, as methylene blue is normally excreted in the urine. The Fugate family intermarried with a neighbouring family for generations, which led to a relatively pure gene pool, often including the met-H gene. One look at Luke was enough to get those doctors down here in a hurry, says Pendergrass, who joined Cawein to look for more blue people. He knew the same thing was happening in this secluded corner of Appalachia. It was later discovered ascorbic acid can do this, as well. If theyd immigrated to other areas, even other areas of Kentucky, they likely would have married non-relatives, and the condition would have faded out of the family long before it did. All lived in isolation from the world, bunched in log cabins up and down the hollows, and so it was only natural that a boy married the girl next door, even if she had the same last name. Set in West Virginia, it features cannibalistic mountain men, horribly disfigured from generations of incest. So, hold our beers and watch this. "She had been out in the cold and she was just blue!" recalls Pendergrass, who is now 69 and retired from nursing. The following piece was collected at a dinner table with a group of girls out celebrating a friends birthday. Add to calendar. He married a red-haired American named Elizabeth Smith who had a very pale complexion and their union formed a genetic mutation that resulted in their descendants being born with blue skin. This publication also contains information on state and federal agencies; postal information; the Constitutions of the United States and West Virginia; and, considerable information on counties, municipalities and various organizations. But as Kentucky became more populated and more genes came into the Fugate family tree, there were far fewer children born blue. Cawein was determined to find a cause and possibly a solution to help this small group of isolated Appalachian people. Inbreeding in eastern Kentucky has been turning offspring blue since the early 1880s. Some of us finished high school and became the "dreaded wife and mother"-as society portrays it. She told me that her family was the blue Combses who lived up on Ball Creek. Born Jan. 16, 1869, in Marion County, Ephraim Franklin Morgan went on to become one of West Virginia's governors. T he West Virginia senator Joe Manchin has emerged as one of the biggest stumbling blocks to the passing of Joe Biden's ambitious domestic agenda, declaring he will vote against a key voting. The railroad didnt come through eastern Kentucky until the coal mines were developed around 1912, and it took another 30 or 40 years to lay down roads along the local creeks. Sometimes they married first cousins. Google Maps. Cawein is no stranger to eccentricities of the body. "The True Story of the Blue People of Kentucky" Feeder food: Grain and birdseed. Where people wear camo to church. Theyre known simply as the blue people in the hills and hollows around Troublesome and Ball Creeks. The solution, oddly enough, was a commonly used dye called methylene blue. When he was born with dark purple skin but healthy vital signs, his grandmother revealed the origins of their genetics. The Fugate familys condition caused the blue members to be missing that enzyme; because their methemoglobin couldnt be converted, large amounts of it built up in the blue Fugates, even before birth, causing a very obvious blue tone to their skin. Exhibitions in the McGee Gallery bring ideas and objects together in new ways, highlighting the breadth and depth of the Art Museum's permanent collection: In/Humanity: Combat and War in Art, an . They sing in the Stacy Family Gospel Band and have provided their children with a beautiful home and a menagerie of pets, including horses. We used science and data to determine which cities in WV are redneck heaven. Before people knew what was going on they described the Fugates and others like them as looking: like anybody else, cept they had the blue color, Bluern hell, indigo blue, almost purple, bluish all over, dark as a bruise, and as blue a woman as I ever saw.. Admitted to the union as the 35th state in 1863, it is a relatively small state. Cawein needed fresh blood to do an enzyme assay. Population: 5,373Tobacco stores per capita: 5th in West VirginiaGun stores per capita: 2ndFishing/bait shops per capita: 2nd. Bessie had an iron pot of clothes boiling in her front yard, but she graciously allowed the doctor to draw some of her blood. "The beginning of this story is so wild because Martin moved to Kentucky from Europe and married a complete stranger, a nonrelative who just happened to have the same mutation," says Lewis. The boy inherited his fathers lankiness and his mothers slightly nasal way of speaking. Stacy recalls that his father-inlaw, Levy Fugate, was part of the family that showed blue. The distinct gold-and-blue color scheme and Flying WV logo we've come to adore did not exist at that point. The search for blue people ensued. 2 All Rights ReservedPrivacy Policy |Terms of Use, Baltimore, Chicago, and St. Louis, 1870 Census Index, North Carolina and South Carolina, 1870 Census Index, Virginia and West Virginia, 1870 Census Index, Margaret Christine Otis Baker: A Colonial Woman with an Incredible Story, Carter Braxton: The Signers of the Declaration of Independence, Josiah Bartlett: The Signers of the Declaration of Independence, Everything You Need to Know About the 1890 US Federal Census, The Real Truth Behind Coats of Arms and Family Crests, Curtis King: Unsung Heroes of the Civil War. Trudging up and down the hollows, fending off the two mean dogs that everyone had in their front yard, the doctor and the nurse would spot someone at the top of a hill who looked blue and take off in wild pursuit. Give the gift of knowledge with our official 'did you know' book. I just knew that patient was going to die right there in the health department, but she wasnt atall alarmed. Note: In this instance the reason for cyanosis was not methemoglobinemia but Rh incompatibility. In normal people hemoglobin is converted to methemoglobin at a very slow rate. Researchers believe this to truly be the case, a result of the family suffering from a genetic condition called methemoglobinemia, which is an excess of methemoglobin in the red blood cells of the body. Cut off from contact with the wider population, they married cousins, aunts and other closely related kin, which greatly increased the odds of inheriting the condition. What is a redneck anyways? Mountain People. Generations later, a descendant of Martin Fugate, Benjy Stacy, would be born "blue". Zach took the doctor even farther up Copperhead Hollow to see his Aunt Bessie Fugate, who was blue. He injected the Ritchie siblings with 100 milligrams of the blue dye and didn't have to wait long to see results. The first known ancestor was David Wilson, who was born in Scotland about 1650; he had a son David, born about . He left the Fugates with a supply of the methylene blue in pill form, as it must be taken regularly to keep the skin a normal color, by continually eliminating the mis-colored hemoglobin. Cawein advised giving the child methylene blue and not worrying about it. Have you ever heard of the blue people of Kentucky? valley in the mountains in West Virginia with a barn and cows visible West Virginia Mountains Fall Foliage The Mountain Spruce Fall Colors Beautiful Pictures So you can tell if someone is a product of incest if their skin is blue! You know theres lots of rednecks here when you look at the numbers. In the isolated hollows of rural Kentucky, they were known as the blue Fugates and the blue Combses. How far from Flatwoods , ky? My first reaction to this story was wondering whether there was a scientific reason, or condition perhaps, that acted as a precursor to this belief of a skin condition that was a result of incest. Called methaemoglobinaemia (commonly known as met-H), the condition reduces the individuals ability to carry oxygen in their blood. Dern it, Princeton. One of em I remember seeing him when I was just a boy Blue Anze, they called him. Lappat, Hereditary Methemoglobinemia in Hemoglobin, Its Precursors and Metabolites, ed. What Happened to the Blue People? Princeton is located down on I-77, before you make the climb into Virginia. Population: 9,277High school graduation rate 73%Chew factor: 3Gun stores: 5th. Somebody with only one gene would not have the condition but could pass the gene to a child. Levels at or above 70% are considered life-threatening and are accompanied by erratic heartbeats and circulatory problems. It is almost certain that Martin was a descendant of the Fugate family of Russell County, Virginia and probably of French origin. More than a cent. While not every Fugate child was born with the condition, as genes express themselves differently in different people, enough were that locals began to take notice. Martin Fugate carried the recessive gene and the odds that he could have married a woman with the same recessive gene were overwhelming - but that is exactly what happened. They were poor people, concurs Nurse Pendergrass, but they were good.References1. Inbreeding in eastern Kentucky has been turning offspring blue since the early 1880s. Major Occupational Groups in West Virginia ( Note --clicking a link will scroll the page to the occupational group): 00-0000 All Occupations 11-0000 Management Occupations 13-0000 Business and Financial Operations Occupations 15-0000 Computer and Mathematical Occupations 17-0000 Architecture and Engineering Occupations He came from where the sun don't shine. Population: 6,306Walmart rank: 2ndMobile home parks: 5th in the stateBars per person: 5th in West Virginia. And unleash your spirit. He recounted how, after hearing the story for the first time, he and his roommates would make a show of continuously checking to see if their other friends lips or skin ever looked blue. West Virginia History Timeline. Its post office is closed in 1935. Written family records do not indicate Martin's skin color, but family legend says he was blue. Please copy/paste the following text to properly cite this HowStuffWorks.com article: Dave Roos The 76-year-old diva used the less than divine choice of words for the Mountain State in a Twitter against Sen. Joe Manchin torpedoing President Biden's multitrillion-dollar spending plans. ( Returnto the corrected sentence.). This is a map of the Appalachian mountains Source: Encyclopedia Britannica As you can see, they start in northern Georgia, continuing through most of the Eastern seaboard all the way up to New Brunswick, Canada. It's also, in part, out of fear. In 1980, a counter-intuitive solution was discovered where the blue person drinks a chemical-filled solution that is itself blue. Plus, we thought why not add in a few stereotypes? Most of them old people went by that name the blue Fugates. Is there anything really wrong with being called a West Virginia redneck? Its a part of our culture. Not myth or legend; The Blue People of Kentucky were an isolated enclave of Appalachian people who lived with an embarrassing skin discoloration until a young hematologist took notice and found a solution. The only real picture is of a man who turned himself blue by eating silver. Benjy was a pretty big item in the hospital, his mother says with a grin. His lips and fingernails still turn a shade of purple-blue when he gets cold or angry a quirk that so intrigued medical students after Benjys birth that they would crowd around the baby and try to make him cry. On a hypothesis, he gave a substance called methylene blue to family members who were willing to take it. From California herself, the informant was very curious to hear about what the people of West Virginia were like. Many is more accurate since the practice is legal, or legal under certain circumstances, in more than 20 states. Her name was Ruth Pendergrass, and she had been trying to stir up medical interest in the blue people ever since a dark blue woman walked into the county health department one bitterly cold afternoon and asked for a blood test. The condition was clearly genetic, but the key for Cawein was reading reports of hereditary methemoglobinemia among isolated Inuit populations in Alaska where blood relatives often married. By the time theyd get to the top, the person would be gone. martin fugate was blue from birth, which has nothing to do with inbreeding. By the end of this spectacular journey, you'll be saying "I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT JUST HAPPENED BUT I LOOOVED IT." Read more Blue Man Group 4,830 reviews A dinner table with a group of girls out celebrating a friends birthday, Its Precursors and,. Fresh blood to do with inbreeding a pretty big item in the urine a few stereotypes a... The condition reduces the individuals ability to carry oxygen in their blood is itself blue % may minor... 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