In Search of the Kingdom of the Happy Land, Part 1
We drive to the Hendersonville Library to hear Dolan Perkins-Valdez talk about her new novel, Happy Land, and a mysterious legend becomes real history
Last Monday evening Sam and I were driving from Brevard to a book-signing event at the Hendersonville Library, where Dolen Perkins-Valdez was to talk about her new novel, Happy Land.
I was looking forward to learning more about the “true legend” that I’d heard about from Sam some years ago, Henderson County’s now-vanished Kingdom of the Happy Land.
I had read that after the Civil War some newly freed slaves began walking north from Mississippi. Others joined them as they crossed Georgia and South Carolina, then into North Carolina. In the mountains of Henderson County they built a safe, new life.
Their community has long since disappeared, leaving few records. My story of their arrival, above, comes from the standard authority on this historic post-Civil War African American settlement, Sadie Patton’s 1957 pamphlet.
Today, Kingdom descendants live elsewhere in the county, but who were the first settlers? How did they feel in those extraordinary circumstances?
I had these questions ready to ask the author. But driving now on Kanuga Road, we suddenly found ourselves in a long line of stopped traffic and pulled into a driveway to turn around. Sam grew up near here, so he knew exactly which detour would get us to the library in time.
We turned right off Kanuga onto Price Road which becomes Willow Road, crossed over Finley Creek to the 3-way stop with Finley Cove Road, turned right on Willow through Valley Hill, then back onto Kanuga beside the new Ecusta Trail. From there we turned left onto Washington Street, then left onto 3rd Avenue and into the library parking lot.
When we got back on Kanuga Road, Sam said,
We just made a big loop around the property my family owned after the Depression. My grandfather couldn’t pay the taxes on his other property in the county, and this was left.
Later Sam told me the story about this family land that’s now part of the city of Hendersonville.
My great-grandfather Lindsay Baker bought this land in town after the Civil War because his wife Nancy had vowed to move from their home on Echo Mountain, after having suffered an attack by bushwhackers there.
It happened this way. One day when she was up there alone with her children, several young men broke into the house. They demanded she give them the family silverware and other valuables, which she had hidden under the house for safekeeping.
When she resisted, they threw baby Elbert and the bed’s corn shuck-stuffed mattress onto the floor and ripped out the rope supports. They threatened to take her 10-year-old son outside and hang him.
But my great-grandmother recognized one of the young men and knew he wouldn’t dare hurt her boy. So, she let the men leave the house with him, and soon he came back home unhurt.
Over the years, Sam said, the land in town was willed bit by bit to grown children and their families, so that only a few of his mother’s siblings had small homes, orchards and farm plots there when he was growing up.
Sam said,
My mother’s family withstood the losses, though I think they left their mark, and my father worked for wages. In the Depression he stood in bread lines.
Today on the site of Sam’s Uncle Homer’s apple orchard, on the map above, there’s a housing development just off Price Road on a street called Old Applewood Lane.
When we got to the library meeting room it was crowded, but I found two seats in the front row while Sam bought a few copies of Happy Land, one for his cousin in Virginia who grew up here, too.
The author was sitting at a table in front of me, talking with Ronnie Pepper, the local librarian and storyteller who helped Dolan research her subject. During her talk she told the audience there are some scenes in her book that take place in this very library.
Happy Land is about Nikki, a present-day African American woman living in Washington D. C., who answers her grandmother’s urgent call from Western North Carolina to come visit her. Nikki learns from Mother Rita that she, Nikki, is the great-great-granddaughter of Louella, the Queen of the Kingdom of the Happy Land in 19th-century Henderson County.
Nikki is intrigued, and as a reader I was compelled to go with her as she searches for her roots, learns about the Kingdom, and finds out why her grandmother has been so at odds with her daughter, Nikki’s mother.
Dolen and Ronnie took the stage and chatted comfortably about Dolan’s new book not only for, but also with, the audience.
Nikki’s story in Happy Land alternates with Louella’s. During Q&A, someone in the audience said he sees the land itself as a third main character. Yes, replied Dolen, it’s the place where a person belongs, the family place.
In the book her character Nikki says,
Here I am, walking beside my grandmother on acres and acres of land that my people have inhabited for over a hundred years. It's hard to put how I'm feeling into words other than to say I'm dizzy with grief. I didn't know you could mourn something you never had.
I find my imagination is not enough. I want to walk with Nikki into her great-great grandmother Louella’s life. What did the Kingdom look like?
Sadie Patton’s book shows a photo of “Robert Montgomery’s house — last building in the Kingdom,” and a photo of “Ezel Couch, who was brought to the Kingdom in 1873, one year old” (photos below).
During the talk I realized that Sadie Patton’s account is partly outdated. It’s now believed that most of the Kingdom residents came from Cross Anchor, South Carolina, midway between Spartanburg and Columbia. Perkins-Valdez based her story on the new research.
When someone in the audience asked if everything in the book was true, Dolan defined what I think is good historical fiction. She named a scene in Happy Land that she “made up”. But she connected with both Louella Montgomery and Nikki as an African American woman in the story of our nation, and she wrote their personal stories in the true spirit of what really happened.
Dolan said,
We're not just talking about land ownership. We're talking about believing that America belongs to you, believing that this land is our land, right? It's a sense not only of individual property ownership but also a sense of community.
I think back to the Edney family land in Hendersonville after the Depression, which was just one of many other homesteads in the same situation. Any historical era is made of the stories of the people swept along with it, resisting or not, peaceable or not.
I’m looking forward to reading the rest of Happy Land and to sharing with you more about this brief, mysterious happy land. So far, I’ve read enough to know that Nikki stays longer with Mother Rita than the week she planned.
But does she ever find that place on the map, deep in the mountains, where her ancestor ruled as royalty? Why did her people call it a kingdom? Did they realize their vision?
Can we realize ours, today?
Realized I missed Part 1!! Here it is. I remember being in Ronnie Pepper’s wonderful audience a longtime ago!! So looking forward to reading this great/important book!!
What a gorgeous read on so many levels! And I love Ronnie Pepper. Thanks Deda!