Bruce Edward Marsee provides a down-home approach to what it was like growing up with a porch in the mountains of Appalachia. Also provided is a glance into the soul of a writer who feels that when America lost its porches it also lost its moral compass. The author contends that there exists a correlation between porches and the norms of a society. The porch is a social barometer. The porch was sort of the family and neighborhood gathering place where Dad held forth with his conversations, observations, scolding, and pontifications. I knew every house, names of each person living in those houses and heard the loud screams, while sitting on our porch, when word came that a father, son or brother was killed in the Korean War. When it comes to politics and local politicians, Marsee includes those too, as well as the local snake handlers.