[female voice] This place has a heartbeat of its own.

[male voice] You just get a vibe that you're here at home.

[female voice] It's given me opportunities that I never thought I'd have.

That atmosphere is infectious.

[female voice] It's a magical little place in the mountains.

[Female VO] Made with the state fruit of North Carolina, Mighty Muscadine offers a line of superfruit supplements and juices made from the Muscadine grape, including the Cellular Health Antioxidant Beverage, Vinetastic.

More at mightymuscadine.com.

[♪♪♪] [Joshua Deel VO] Nestled along the jagged lines where Virginia shakes hands with Tennessee.

Bristol is more than a town.

It's a state of mind.

It's a meeting place of contradictions that somehow make sense.

Here, history and the now don't just co-exist, they dance.

Like old friends, swaying to the tune of a shared memory.

This is the birthplace of country music, the sacred ground where the Carter family and Jimmy Rogers carved their stories into vinyl and into hearts.

It's where art still thrives, pouring itself into every corner on the stage at the Bristol Ballet, in the analog home of the Ernest Tube, or the living museum that is the birthplace of country music.

Here, music doesn't simply echo, it resonates.

It's a heartbeat that pulses through the streets and the people who call this place home.

This is Bristol, Virginia, Tennessee, one town with two names, one story, split across a border yet unified by something deeper.

A map can't show you what makes this place special.

Sure, you could point to its landmarks, but they're just stones and steel without the people.

The Bristolians, there's your magic.

[♪♪♪] I've heard it said where we are affects who we are.

Makes sense, right?

I've always believed you can't really understand yourself until you understand where you come from.

Hi, I'm Josh, and I'm hosting this series with PBS Appalachia to explore the places people still call home, their hometowns, and to uncover the stories that make them unique.

Hometowns is about exploring the communities that give America its character.

This season, we're going off the beaten path, on a journey from Virginia to Wyoming.

Now, don't get me wrong.

Many of these places have their flaws, warts and all.

But if that's all you focus on, you're missing the bigger picture, the raw, untamed beauty of the land, and the depth and complexity of its culture.

These are the things that speak to the heart of understanding what it really means to be an American.

It's a journey worth taking.

Trust me.

[♪♪♪] To understand Bristol, you have to peel back the race cars, guitars, and neon glow of State Street to a time when this land was raw Appalachian frontier.

In the late 1700s, settlers carved paths through the dense forests, drawn westward by promise and peril, staking claims at a rugged crossroads where Virginia met the vast unknown of the western territories.

By the early 19th century, Bristol was a lifeline, critical for traders, travelers, and dreamers chasing horizons.

The railroad's arrival in the 1840s forged Bristol into what we know today.

Two towns divided by a state line but united by steel tracks and shared ambition.

This wasn't convenience.

It was necessity, transforming Bristol into a hub where commerce flowed and two states met as one.

Even now, State Street splits the town, but the divide is symbolic, not divisive.

The line is a thread, stitching together two communities into one resilient story.

It's in every cobblestone, every weathered brick, and every person who fought to carve a town from wilderness, built its railways and now preserves its legacy.

Bristol doesn't just straddle a border, it erases it.

This isn't about geography.

It's about community, where necessity birth unity and determination keeps the story alive.

-There's a large amount of acreage here that was undeveloped in the 1700s and there was a Revolutionary era fort called Fort Shelby.

They built this house in 1814.

The King family knew all these political leaders.

So the story is that Andrew Jackson stayed here the night before his own inauguration, and James King's son rode with him.

We're also told Robert E. Lee had dinner here.

[Woman] Yes.

And so you get all this, you know, the property is just amazing.

But then you get Mitchell family history with it.

We have their photographs.

We have everything.

It was over there.

So we're working on preserving all that.

King College sort of operated it as a museum, kept everything as is, and then we got the property from them.

[Joshua VO] In a changing world where history often gets paved over in the name of progress, Daniel and Monica's work is an act of defiance.

It's a refusal to let the past fade away, a determination to keep Bristol's story alive, not just in books or museums, but in the bones of the places where life happened.

Because for them and for Bristol, history isn't something to admire from a distance.

It's something to live with, to honor and to protect.

Preservation isn't nostalgia.

It's a way of moving forward while holding tight to what makes this place and its people extraordinary.

-Bristol is real.

It's real people that live here.

We've never lived in a town quite like this.

I guess technically, I've lived in four towns, and I've never, never experienced anything like the people that live here.

It's diverse and urban, but it's also culturally Appalachian.

It's not a sell-out.

It's just real.

[Joshua VO] And then there are remarkably unique ventures like Ernest Tube, where old meets new in the most tangible way.

This one-of-a-kind recording studio embraces the analog technology of the 1920s and 30s direct-to-disc recording, proving that the past isn't something to be replaced, but something to be revisited, reinterpreted and respected.

Here in Bristol, the line between yesterday and today blurs, and what emerges is a town that is keeping its musical legacy alive for the future.

[Clint Holley] We're at the Ernest Tube in downtown Bristol, Virginia.

I am the founder and chief bottle washer here at the Ernest Tube.

The Earnest Tube is we call it a direct-to-disc, or a direct the lacquer recording studio.

And what we celebrate is the way that music was recorded during the Bristol sessions, and really up until about 1950 and maybe in more rural parts of the United States.

It could have been as long as 1960 This style of recording is unique that it's one track and one microphone, and the artist or group comes into the studio, they gather around the microphone.

We spend some time kind of moving people around the studio.

Say there's a singer and a banjo player.

Well, banjo player goes way in the corner.

[laughs] Singer gets up on the microphone.

And we actually spend quite a bit of time moving people around.

We'll mark the floor so people know, if they leave that spot, to come back to that spot, because there's no fixing it after we're done.

So after we spend, you know, maybe an hour to two hours sound checking, we'll start getting into the performances.

And what's really cool about it is that it's a performance-based type of recording.

What comes out of your mouth and what comes from your instrument is what goes onto that disc.

And when, you know, we pull that disc off, you can play it on a turntable.

So we put it on a turntable and we let people hear it for the first time, and people's faces, it's like magic to them.

And then it even sounds like what happened in the studio.

To me, is what's amazing, as so many mechanical and human-oriented processes are involved in it, that when it comes back and it sounds exactly like what happened in the studio, it really does seem pretty magical.

And so we say it's the essence of the 1927 sessions with modern insight.

So we have the ability to take that disc that's recorded and we can transfer it into the digital realm, so people can use it on social media and streaming services.

So it's a way for an artist to do something that's a little bit different, give their music a little bit of a different sound.

-You could probably do this in Nashville.

Any of those other big, you know, music scenes that you talked about.

-Right.

-What keeps you here?

-I really think it's important for other towns to develop like an infrastructure for musician and creative people to be able to operate in.

So Bristol has a lot going for it in terms of that.

And I really thought by bringing well-made music here, we could help enhance the infrastructure for musicians and artistic type people.

-How many people in the world are even attempting what you're doing.

-With this kind of recording like this, I would say there's, in the United States, maybe under half a dozen people do it.

A dedicated studio like we have, cutting onto the lacquer discs like that.

We might be the only one in the United States that I'm aware of.

Yeah, what we do is very unique.

[guitar strumming] [Clint Holley] So that history that started in 1927 really has chugged along kind of under the radar for a long time, but a lot of people maybe still don't know the full story yet.

-You know, a lot of people assume that, because we're called the birthplace of country music, that we were the very first country music recording.

But what happened in Bristol just had this perfect storm of events.

That meant that while there was these other recordings that have their own significance, it sort of was like this coming together of three things that really set the foundation for early commercial country music.

The fact that the technology changed also meant that they got a lot of music in a shorter period of time.

Being able to, like, disseminate it and distribute it and market it so that more and more people were aware of it.

Really made what happened in Bristol very special.

-[Joshua] Timing.

-Timing.

Timing is everything.

I mean, it always is.

And, you know, right people, right time.

You know, all it takes is one of those things to maybe have been a little bit different.

And maybe it would have been a different story.

-Johnny Cash calls it the most important thing to ever happen in country music.

So you know, whether you believe Johnny or not, millions of people do, and the museum has evolved into what's just right around the corner from this building, this beautiful, multi-million dollar facility where they celebrate the history of the Bristol sessions and what happened here, and what the impact of that was afterwards.

I mean, the history of what happened here in Bristol, I mean, if you had just recorded Jimmy Rogers and the Carter family in the same week in 1927, that would have been huge.

But if you think about other quote, unquote music cities in the United States, you know, Detroit's got Motown.

And Cleveland, they call the home of rock and roll.

You think it sounds like New Orleans?

You think it sounds like Memphis, with these really important things that happened in music over time, and Bristol has that same story to tell, but I just think it's one of those last stories that really hasn't fully been told yet.

[Joshua] The Smithsonian connection, why is that such a big deal?

[Dr. Rene Rodgers] So it's a big deal on two levels, I guess.

One is that it's a recognition of the importance of the story we're telling from this amazing institution that matters so much to like the history of America and the United States and how we tell that history.

But it's also really a great thing for our community, because of that Smithsonian affiliation, we're able to bring in really interesting resources and programs and exhibits that we might not otherwise have access to, and certainly, a lot of people in our community might not have access to.

So having that connection is really important.

It is a very big music town, so just looking at it from our organization standpoint, I mean, obviously the museum is so music-focused.

But you know, even though we're focused on the 1927 Bristol sessions here at the museum and with the birth of country music, we are very much about looking at the context, both before and after, and how all of those things come together and make a much bigger story and a much more nuanced story than people imagine.

The region as a whole, not just Bristol, but the region as a whole is just so music-focused.

It is a place to be if that's something that you love and enjoy.

-Every year, there's the festival called Bristol Rhythm and Roots Reunion, which has just celebrated its 24th anniversary.

How many towns closed down their entire downtown to celebrate music and their history?

I think that's what makes that festival really special, is you know, they close down State Street.

You get to party in Tennessee and Virginia at the same time.

-Throughout the year, there's music events.

There's lots of musicians who live in this area too, really influential and important musicians, which makes it a really exciting place to be -if you love music.

-Right.

-Bristol is my new family, I guess, in a lot of ways.

And as it says on the sign, it's a good place to live.

[Joshua VO] Bristol's artistic soul goes far beyond its claim as the birthplace of country music.

The same energy that drew legends here fuels a thriving art scene that's as vital as the music itself.

Since 1973, the Bristol Ballet has stood as a cornerstone of this cultural heartbeat, delivering performances that dazzle and training that shapes the next wave of artists.

In Bristol, the rhythm of its storied past moves seamlessly with the creative pulse of today, a living, breathing testament to a town that celebrates art in all its forms.

[Moira Frazier Ostrander] We are in our 76th season.

So very few, even other American companies, are that old.

We're the same age as New York City Ballet.

That might put a little context in how amazing it is to be three-quarters of a century old.

[Amanda Hairston] We're classically rooted, and that's our primary focus.

-And we try very hard to keep up with current trends.

Make sure that, because we learn things as time progresses about physics and physicality and what's safe for dancers and what's not.

[Moira] And we offer classes for as young as 12 months and all the way through adults.

I had an 88-year-old in my adult ballet once, so we truly offer something for everybody.

[Amanda] We've really all three made it a big effort to have outreach for the arts, arts accessibility.

The first year, we were at Southwest, it was many folks first ballet.

They had never seen ballet.

So that's really important to us to have that Arts Access.

[Moira] We have a long history at Bristol Ballet of doing performances with Appalachian themes, Appalachian music.

Our founder, Constance Hardinge did a few ballets, but most notably one called Mountain Ballad that was set in the mountains, about life in the mountains, to music that was inspired by the mountains.

So we definitely have a long history of making sure those Appalachian roots are present, even in classical ballets.

[Joshua] With your backgrounds, I'm sure you're talented and you're certified and all these things.

You probably could have taught this or done this in other places.

-Mm-hm.

-Yes.

[Joshua] What keeps you in Bristol?

[Moira] It's home [laughs].

[Amanda] As the saying goes, it's a great place to live.

-[Moira] Yep.

-It really and it really is.

[Michelle Plescia] If you did grow up with it, it's something you like coming back to.

And I think we all have been outside of Bristol and lived at other places, and we all came back.

It's just comfortable and safe.

You know, this had the same six degrees of separation.

Well, here it's like, two.

-[Moira] Yeah.

-[Joshua] Like two.

[Moira] Yeah.

[Joe Deel] I got one guy that comes in here every day.

He was in here today, he comes in.

When he walks in the door, they put two hot dogs down because they know he's getting it.

And his name is Richard, and he comes in here.

He's retired.

He comes in, eats two hot dogs, reads a book.

He'll sit here for an hour and read, and then my girls make him a couple scoops of ice cream.

Not on the menu.

They make it for him.

And he'll sit here and eat a little sundae.

And does it five days a week.

Nobody should eat here five days a week.

I'm the first one to tell you that.

I moved to Damascus, Virginia when I was about 12 years old, from Cocoa Beach, Florida, product of a divorce.

And I grew up-- this is my hometown, Damascus and Bristol, and just a regular old working guy, got out of school, went to college for a little while, ended up going to culinary school, and got a culinary degree.

I like to eat.

And, you know, never thought about owning a 25-seat burger joint.

But I was working for a gentleman who had a fine dining restaurant here, and I was a chef, and he had five restaurants here in the area.

He owned this little 25-seat burger joint.

He asked me if I wanted to buy it.

And now it's kind of my life is hamburgers and hot dogs.

The Burger Bar, it actually started, the history goes back to 1942 and it was called the Snack King.

It's passed through several different hands.

We wanted to keep it original.

The guy I bought it from, he was going for a different element.

He was trying to make it a high-end burger joint.

And we talked to the local people, and they said, “Hey, we want an old-timey place.” So we tried to bring it back to the original Burger Bar.

It's a clean slate here for opening a business.

And we've got so many places here that are just dying for new businesses.

[Joshua] How long have you been in business?

-[Carla] Over 16 years now.

-[Joshua] Really?

-[Carla] Over 16 years.

-[Josh] Did you use to open it?

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

We've been the sole proprietors since day one.

-You say we.

-Me and my husband.

-Yeah, my husband.

-Okay.

-He's considered the owner.

I'm considered the general manager, -as far as the scheme of things.

-Right.

But I do run this store.

I really run the day-to-day.

But he's the behind-the-scenes.

It wouldn't run without him, that's for sure.

A lot of people did not think this was a very good location.

It was a dark corner.

There were no other business other than the the shops across the road, which was an attorney's office, and people thought it was a terrible place to go.

And it wasn't until we proved ourselves that people wanted to be on this street and this section has come along so well.

-I know when we put it out there, where should we visit?

Who do we need to meet in Bristol -This place came up often.

-That's awesome.

We're happy that people could feel that way.

We wanted to be a community hub.

I really thought I would stay very small.

I didn't mind that.

That's really in my mind's eye.

That's what I had in mind was knowing every customer by name, knowing what they wanted when they walked through the door.

The reason that it's called Blackbird, we couldn't think of a name for our bakery.

So we have a friend in Kingsport that my husband went to college with her husband, and we were just asking for some input.

Could you all help us think of some names to the bakery?

We threw out a few names, and she threw a few back at us, but she is the one who came up with Blackbird Bakery.

I was a pie baker.

That's what I love to do.

I can bake about anything, but I'm a pie maker.

I'm a croissant maker, anything that deals with laminated dough, that is me and so but I love to make pies, and that's what I was doing when I was practicing at home.

All I had were books.

And I had to practice and practice and practice.

-Magazine, pictures.

-Oh my gosh.

It was awful.

I like to never figured out how to do a croissant because I couldn't understand what they were trying to tell me.

And without the professional knowledge, and someone showed me from like a culinary school, it was just really hard, but I finally mastered it, and that's why she came up with the Blackbird Bakery, four and 20 blackbirds baked in a pie.

That's where it came from.

I love birds, and I didn't want any old bird either.

I didn't want a crow or something menacing, even though that's cool.

I like crows, but I wanted to be one of those cute little everyday blackbirds with the little yellow beak that you see everywhere, common like me [laughs].

Can't let anything get you down.

You know, if I had listened to people, I would have never opened Blackbird.

We were laughed at.

You name it.

People said it terrible place to go.

Can't believe you're doing it.

Our families were a little afraid for us because we sold our house to do it.

I mean, everything hinged on this bakery being it successful, we never thought it wouldn't be.

-[Joshua] You were all in.

-[Carla] Right.

-[Joshua] You were all in.

-[Carla] Right.

We look back now that we're older and we're like, we probably were pretty insane.

-But it takes that, it takes that, those blinders.

-It really did-- -What you're talking about.

-Pledge yourself to it, and we did, and I just feel like God has blessed the effort.

-At that big Music Festival in September-- [Joshua] But you're covered up during that.

-Well, we served about 4,000 hamburgers in three days.

[Joshua] Yeah.

[Joe] So it's fast, it's just nothing but elbow.

But we have a lot of families.

The reason I wanted to keep this like this, I want my old timers to come in here and be able to bring their grandkids in and say, “Hey, this is what it was like when I was a kid.” So as long as I'm alive, this is what it's going to be, you know.

And we tried to keep it the old-fashioned.

-Bristol to me... ticks so many of my boxes of things.

Friendly people.

I really do believe in what the sign says, but I think it should say it's a great place to live, not good.

It's not just good, it's great.

I love the small-town feel, and I traveled like England, Scotland, Ireland, places like that that are very similar to where we live.

But what I found is that we have everything I was looking for in my own town.

[Joshua VO] Bristol is a city that wears its firsts like a badge of honor.

In 2022, it breathed new life into the old Bristol Mall, transforming it into Virginia's first ever casino, now reborn as hard Rock Bristol.

It's more than just a casino.

It's a second act for forgotten property, employing nearly 1500 people and injecting fresh energy into the local economy.

But Bristol isn't stopping there.

Soon, it'll claim another pioneering title as the home of the nation's first all digital PBS station, PBS Appalachia.

From this innovative hub, we're proud to bring you Hometowns.

This series dedicated to preserving the rich history and culture of Central Appalachia.

And this is just the start.

Our new studio will be the birthplace of stories that showcase the soul of this incredible region.

-I'm from Bristol.

All my life, yep.

Been here a long time.

-You didn't feel like leaving.

-Yeah, every day.

-Oh, you do, but you never did.

-Well, you know, I've been some places, but I like Bristol.

You know, it's been good to us.

It's been good to my family.

We've made a living here.

You know, my dad, my brother, and me, and you know, lot of people can't say that we work together.

And dad passed away 10 years ago, but we work together every day.

There was a fellow named Chick Little, and he told my dad, said, “Charlie, you ought to go next door and open that place over.” I said, there's not a bike shop around there.

And on June the second, 1962, my bicycle career started.

My baseball career was over [laughter].

He said, “Son, get up.

You have a job.” I was 13, and, you know, and it's been good to us.

Really, it has.

Ted Williams has actually said in those chairs, but it was before my time.

-Right here?

-Yeah.

There's been a lot of lies told in those seats, and some truth.

Very little truth, but a lot of lies.

[Joshua VO] In Bristol, speed isn't just a concept.

A year before Charlie and Hal Boyd opened their bike shop, another kind of adrenaline hit the town with the Bristol Motor Speedway.

Boyd's gave locals the thrill of the open road while the speedway unleashed the deafening roar of race cars in the Appalachian foothills, pulling fans from every corner of the globe.

Two wheels or four, it's all about chasing that rush.

-1961 is when the place opened.

It was originally supposed to be about six miles down the road in Piney Flats, Tennessee.

The gentleman that we're building at Larry Carrier, Carl Moore, and another gentleman named RG Pope.

Larry heard about a guy in Charlotte, North Carolina, building a race track.

They decided that we need to build a race track in Bristol.

This is going to be great.

Tried to build it in Piney Flats.

And the preachers and the farmers were like “No way, you're not building a race track in our community.” And they came down, bought this land here.

It was the largest dairy farm in the area, and the track was originally going to be a little bigger than what it is.

It's a half-mile track.

But really, if you look at the contour of the land, they built into the land.

They built between two hills, which I'm sure was a little cheaper, a little more cost-effective, because you could build the grandstands into the hills, and then a half-mile race track fit right in the middle.

Helene hits, massive devastation right down the road from us.

We know how to move people around and things around.

And so that caused us to stand up the Northeast Tennessee Disaster Relief Center, and it's still going today.

We supply to the counties, whether it's Tennessee or North Carolina or Virginia.

We all had an agreement with the state whenever we stood this up, that whoever's in need, we help.

We don't see county lines and we don't see state lines.

-We love Bristol, okay.

Bristol's... it's a good town, and it's a town that, if you need help, somebody will help you, you know?

It's always been like that, and I hope it continues to be.

-We get asked all the time.

Our NASCAR races are some of the most popular races of the season within all of NASCAR.

And folks will say, “Why is that?

What is it about Bristol?” And it's the track, it's the short track, half-mile, high bank, Saturday night racing that takes a lot of folks back to their roots of when they grew up going to a short track.

But I think even more than that, it's the people in this region.

They are so hospitable and so welcoming.

Everyone that comes is like a family member or a friend to them.

And it's not just an act, it's real.

[Hal] I mean, they always said to my dad, “Charlie, when you go and retire?” And dad would always say, when I'm old enough.

He's 87 and they said, “Charlie, you'll retire when they roll you out.” You know what?

That's the truth.

-[Joshua] Really?

-[Hal] Yeah.

-[Hal] Sorry [chokes up].

-[Joshua] It's all right.

[Hal] I hope I can stay till they roll me out.

[Joshua VO] Bristol is more than a town.

It's a crossroads where the grit of the once frontier meets the soul of the artist, and the roar of the race track collides with the hum of a guitar string.

It's a place that doesn't just remember where it came from.

It pushes that legacy forward with every song, every step, every turn of the wheel.

This isn't a town frozen in time.

It's alive, raw, and unapologetically real.

In Bristol, the story isn't over.

It's still being written.

[♪♪♪] [female voice] This place has a heartbeat of its own.

[male voice] You just get a vibe that you're here at home.

[female voice] It's given me opportunities that I never thought I'd have.

That atmosphere is infectious.

[female voice] It's a magical little place in the mountains.

[announcer] Made with the state fruit of North Carolina, Mighty Muscadine offers a line of superfruit supplements and juices made from the Muscadine grape, including the Cellular Health Antioxidant Beverage, Vinetastic.

More at mightymuscadine.com.