Discover the heart of the South through unforgettable real-life tales.
Kathryn Tucker Windham’s Count Those Buzzards! Stamp Those Grey Mules! is an entertaining collection of vernacular beliefs and cultural practices of rural Alabama in the early twentieth century. Written for entertainment, it nevertheless documents superstitions, rituals, and informal codes that shaped social life in the American South.
Windham’s recollections illuminate oral traditions and life in the South. Presented in the Windham’s beguiling voice, these stories preserve a disappearing body of folklore. Although intended for a wide audience, the book invites engagement with themes of memory, regional identity, and the transmission of belief systems across generations.
This new edition includes a short introductory note by Dilcy Windham, Kathryn Tucker Windham’s daughter as well as a foreword by Emily Blejwas (MA Sociology, Auburn University), the author of The Story of Alabama in Fourteen Foods. Blejwas’s foreword contextualizes Count Those Buzzards! as a cultural document, highlighting its role in preserving Alabama folklore, evoking childhood memories, and inspiring readers to record and share their own lived traditions.