A Place I Couldn't Leave: Memoirs of Edwin P (Peck) Rowell

This book is the life story of Edwin P. "Peck" Rowell, a 90 year-old musician and bandleader from Loachapoka, a small town in East Alabama. It gives a historic view of growing up in the 1920's and 30's when most country people worked hard raising crops to sell and sustain their families. Music was an outlet for many of those people and the Rowell family was no exception. Rowell's story weaves music into the fabric of his life from an early age, playing locally, becoming a well-known deejay, reaching for the stars in Nashville, TN, the home of country music. Although he had some successes and met a lot of the Nashville community, home and family were too strong to let go and he was never able to fully commit to leaving to chase his music dreams. But in the end, he was very content to stay, as he says in the title, "A Place I Couldn't Leave".