Early in his life, Kentucky writer and

painter Harlan Hubbard saw clearly

that our industrial society could not de-

liver on its promises of human improve-

ment. In response he set himself apart

from industrial values, to !ive a life of

self-sufficiency based on more funda-

mental principles. By 1929, when he be-

gan keeping a joural, his differences

from the dominant assumptions of his

times were well established, along with

his interests in pa,inting writing, and

music, and in the Ohio River and its

tributaries and countryside,

In 1943 Harlan married Anna Eiken-

hout, and the following year they built

with their own hands a shantyboat on

which they would voyage down the

Ohio and Mississippi rivers, ending in

the Louisiana bayous in 1951. Fl~om

1952 until their deaths in 1986 and

1988, Anna and Harlan lived in a house

they built themselves at Payne Hollow

beside the Ohio River in Trimble Coun-

ty, Kentucky.

Harlan Hubbard s books--Shanty-

boat, Shantyboat on the Bayous, and

Payne Hollow--tell of their life during

those years, a life that was at once fru-

gal and abundant, solitary and hospita-

ble, fundamental and elegant, a life of

homemaking and handmaking. Togeth-

er they kept house, gardened, read aloud

to each other, made music, welcomed

guests. Harlan cut firewood, tended a

herd of goats, fished, and painted. His

books spoke eloquently to-the many