River Rising: Jeremy Jones, His Old Farmhouse, and Hurricane Helene

River Rising: Jeremy Jones, His Old Farmhouse, and Hurricane Helene

Constant Wonder • Season 14, Episode 15
Aug 5, 2026 • 55m

Jeremy Jones has loved exploring the Blue Ridge Mountains since childhood, and despite his world travels, his identity as a "mountain person" always brought him home. His family has lived in Henderson County for five generations—so when Hurricane Helene sent the river rising toward his old farmhouse, it threatened more than a house. In this episode of Constant Wonder, Jeremy joins host Marcus Smith to share what it took to rebuild, and how the experience reconnected him to his neighbors, his family, and a history in these mountains that runs deeper than he'd realized. Guest: Jeremy Jones is a professor of English Studies at Western Carolina University, and the author of books "Cipher: Decoding My Ancestor’s Scandalous Secret Diaries" (Blair, 2025) and "Bearwallow: A Personal History of a Mountain Homeland" (Blair, 2014).