Estel Sizemore

Photographs ©1996 Malcolm J. Wilson

The youngest of ten children, Estel Sizemore was seven when his father left the family's home in Hyden, Kentucky for a job in Cincinnati. Estel, his mother, and the youngest of his siblings stayed behind working the family's hard-scrabble farm and hiring out to other farmers for as little as a quarter a day. When he was fourteen, Estel followed his father to the city.  

"My brothers and sisters as they grew up they would leave, you know. It's kind of like a bird in the nest. When they get so old they've gotta go. You kind of get tired of that kind of life. You thought there was something else better. But really there wasn't nothing no better." 

Perceptions of Home: The Urban Appalachian Spirit ©1996 The Urban Appalachian Council (now Urban Appalachian Community Coalition)

Photographs ©1996 Malcolm J. Wilson; Interviews ©1996 Don Corathers

Photographs digitized by the Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library. Genealogy & Local History Department.