Comedy County Cocke
Jon Tary handles Serpents following Sign/ Mac E Heten sinned distilled moonshine whisky/ The nature of risky act believed benign
Dante Commedia Inf. I:10-13
How I came there I cannot say, / I was so full of sleep/ When I forsook the one true way.
Cocke County, a mountain community in East Tennessee with a reputation, not altogether undeserved, as the region's capital of vice and corruption.
In the hills and hollows of this Appalachian community, an array of criminal activities: “Moonshinin”, organized gambling, cockfighting, prostitution, chop shops and racketeering flourish.
In contrast, Cocke County is also home to some of the few congregations of Holiness Churches that practice the act of Following Signs; “Serpent Handling”.
Appropriated sources: “Jon Tary”- Agesander's Laocoon Group, “Mac E Heten”- Barberini Faun, Painting Pastor - Guercino's St Luke Displaying a Painting of the Virgin, Painting Pastors Painting- Pastor Jimmy Marrow of Newport, TN.