It started the way a lot of things do in the mountains, with long winter nights, too much boredom, and a group of young people looking for something to fill the quiet.

What followed wasn’t a jump scare or a campfire story, but a slow unraveling. A Ouija board bought off a store shelf. Questions asked half-jokingly. Answers that came back a little too specific. And a sense that something had been invited into the room long before anyone realized what they were opening.

This episode is told as it was shared with me, not as a warning about monsters, but as a warning about curiosity, fixation, and the way attention itself can become a doorway. We hear from those who lived it, and from a pastor who helps frame what happens when fear, belief, and the unseen start overlapping.

This is not an endorsement of the occult. It’s a cautionary story about lines that don’t announce themselves until after they’ve been crossed.

Because in Appalachia, roots run deep and shadows run long.

The manhunt was over. All six escapees from Virginia’s death row had been captured. But in Appalachia, the end of the chase wasn’t the end of the story.

This episode follows what came next, the years of waiting, the court battles, the executions, and the quiet ways a community learns to live with the aftermath of violence and institutional failure. We walk through what happened inside the system after the escape, why Mecklenburg Correctional Center lost death row, how so many safeguards failed, and what justice looked like when it finally arrived home in Smyth County.

At the center is Lem Tuggle Jr., the last living member of the Mecklenburg Six, whose case stretched on for more than a decade. Along the way, we examine the roles of prosecutors, defense attorneys, and victims’ families, and how history sometimes reveals its meaning only years later.

This is not a story about spectacle. It’s about time, accountability, and what remains after the doors close again.

Because in Appalachia, roots run deep , and shadows run long.

In the days after the escape, nothing felt settled.

As six condemned men vanished into the dark, fear moved faster than facts, shaping decisions, changing routines, and leaving communities to wonder what might come next.

This episode follows the long stretch between certainty and capture, when roads felt closer, distance felt uncertain, and the waiting did most of the damage.

Roots & Shadows: The Real Appalachia explores what happens after the door opens and before it finally closes again.