Quests

Autobiography of David Burns, 1928-1949. Book-obsessed childhood in the Depression in a small town in Kentucky; running away from home on his 15th birthday; three years in Washington in Capitol Page School, dropping out many times, never completing first semester of tenth grade; copy boy and photographer's apprentice at The Evening Star newspaper; three years in the Air Force. Managing somehow to be admitted to Princeton. The autobiography is interspersed with four vivid chapters of imaginary ancestors: Long Hunters in 18th century Kentucky; pioneers on The Wilderness Road from Cumberland Gap; building gristmills and sawmills; and the legacy of coal mining which has left much of Appalachia, land AND people, 'HOLLOWED OUT'.