Author Neal Wooten to Present October JCHA Program

News

Wednesday, 18 October 2023 08:07

The October 2023 meeting of the Jackson County Historical Association will be at the Scottsboro Depot Museum on Sunday, October 29 at 2:00 pm. The speaker will be author Neal Wooten.

Neal grew up on Sand Mountain, Alabama, where, as Amazon says, “everyone was white and everyone was poor. Prohibition was still embraced. If you wanted alcohol, you had to drive to Georgia or ask the bootlegger sitting next to you in church .”

He credits a math teacher at Sylvania High School with setting him on the path that made him the interesting adult that he is today. He graduated from Auburn University with a B.S. in applied mathematics. He became a math teacher and director of a math school in Milwaukee, winning numerous math awards. He is now the Managing Editor for Mirror Publishing, a contributor to the Huffington Post, columnist for The Mountain Valley News, curator of the Fort Payne Depot Museum, creator of the popular Facebook comic strip “Brad’s Pit,” and a standup comedian.

Neal is an eclectic and prolific author. His first book was a coming-of-age novel set on Sand Mountain, Three of Hearts (2011). His earlier books—Reternity: Where Science and Fair Collide (2011); My Brother, My Judge (2012); and Pitbulls and Aliens (2015)—are all adult works of fiction. He has written two children’s books about dealing with physical handicaps: I’m Not Defective: The Story of Josh (2015) and The True Story of Blossom and the Handicapped Opossum (2021)

In 2017, he and Nicholas Peruzzo published Brad’s Pit (2015), a collection of their cartoon strips. In 2017, he wrote a very good local history about a 100-year-old Indian woman named Nancy Emmaline Callahan Dollar, titled Granny Dollar.

In 2019, he published a collection of Southern essays titled Corn Born and Corn Bread.

His most recent books are non-fiction: an account of a misunderstood pitbull titled A Dog Named Mutt (2022) and a personal memoir titled With the Devil’s Help: A True Story of Poverty, Mental Illness, and Murder.

At the October JCHA meeting, he will present an overview of his story from With the Devil’s Help. Come and here this interesting man talk about growing up on Sand Mountain, an experience that many of us share.

If you have Neal Wooten books you would like for him to sign, bring them with you. He will also have some of his books for sale.

Members and non-members are invited.