Rumors of Rural America's Death

For the umpteenth time, an urban commentator has suggested that small-town residents would be better off if they packed it in and moved to a big city. But Athens, Tennessee, a town of about 13,000 located between Chattanooga and Knoxville, has other ideas. And they live by them. These pieces usually unfold like this: Rural America is poorer, sicker, and less connected than the rest of the country, with fewer job opportunities and wealth to make us players in the global market. High rates of addiction and poverty make rural America beyond saving. If you live in one of these small towns, you should consider moving to the closest city so you and your children will have some chance at a good quality of life.  Yet rural places and small towns still have a heartbeat because people still work, live, and worship in them. I sure would relish sticking it to the Times and every other self-appointed prophet that presumes to announce the decline of my community or any other small town in the United States. They measure our worth in dollars from thousands of miles away, but don’t seem to understand that you can’t put a price on the way we keep showing up.