Count Those Buzzards! Stamp Those Grey Mules!: Superstitions Remembered from a Southern Childhood

A nostalgic journey through the beliefs, customs, sayings, superstitions, and folk wisdom of a Southern childhood

Count Those Buzzards! Stamp Those Grey Mules! is a warm and engaging celebration of the folklore, superstitions, and everyday wisdom that once shaped life across the rural South. Drawing on her Alabama childhood, beloved storyteller Kathryn Tucker Windham recounts the sayings, rituals, beliefs, and customs passed from generation to generation long before information was instantly available at the touch of a screen.

With humor, affection, and a keen eye for the memorable details of ordinary life, Windham introduces readers to a world where bottle trees repelled evil spirits, rabbit’s feet promised good fortune, and signs and omens guided daily decisions. Her stories capture not only the traditions themselves but also the families and communities that kept them alive.

Part memoir and part folklore treasury, this enduring classic preserves a rich cultural inheritance while offering a vivid portrait of twentieth-century Southern life. Featuring a new introduction by Dilcy Hilley Windham and a foreword by Emily Blejwas, this edition invites readers to rediscover a fascinating world of memory, myth, and tradition.