why is TN known as the"hillbilly State"?

Answer 1

"Tennessee became associated with hillbilly culture in the minds of viewers only after the media coverage of the 1925 Scopes Trial depicted the state's residents as backward rubes. Newsreel footage of the Dayton citizens who crammed into the town to observe the happenings, coupled with the scathing observations of H. L. Mencken, left lasting impressions of Tennessee as the locus of the illiterate and unreconstructed. This stereotype was, perhaps unwittingly, reinforced by the growing popularity of country music heard in national broadcasts from Nashville on WSM and Knoxville on WNOX. These random events converged to cement the image of Tennessee as the home of the hillbilly."

(For those who aren't sure of what the Scopes Monkey Trial is, it was a legal battle which pitted lawyers William Jennings Bryant against Clarence Darrow over teacher John Scopes' introduction of the theory of Evolution into a public classroom. Being that TN is firmly in the Bible Belt, this created quite an uproar.)

Answer 2

I am not sure why but Kentucky and West Virginia are also known as Hiillbilly States. These two states also have hills that people live on my friend. That nickname sure is a getter. What I mean is that people know as Hillbilliys live in these two states also.

Answer 3

Because it's full of dumb hillbillies

Answer 4

I've never heard that one before.

Answer 5

Have you ever heard the accent? "Nuf said.

Answer 6

Why is KY the "bluegrass" State ?
This is why their ***backwards.