Daylan's Story was produced as we work to secure the funding for our first feature 'This Field Looks Green to Me. In our movie, we explore what life was like in 1950's, to bring us a perspective on our world today. Set in a small Appalachian coal mining town we take a look at how the Jim Crow laws of the south affected not only adults but children on both sides of the color line. Today’s kids have different challenges: gangs, guns, and opioids. And though they are living in two different times, the question remains the same: How do you manage to grow up without getting caught in the web of prejudice and violence?
The Green Fields Initiative is an outcome of our film that we are currently developing and it is designed to bring kids and local law enforcement together by building ball fields and relationships in the urban and rural areas to prevent gang and drug involvement.
Daylan Jernigan is a Junior at St. Edward High School in Cleveland, Ohio and is a fine example of the young men, and women, who just need someone to step in and bring a little bit of hope to their world. Giving hope to kids is so important. If kids don’t have hope, they will never have the opportunity to dream about a better life.
Picture Credits:
African-American family, May 09, 1949, Daily Reflector (Greenvillie, N.C.), J. Y. Joyner Library, East Carolina University, accessed 22 January 2018 digital.lib.ecu.edu/2007
Carriers at fair, Oct. 09 1964-Oct 10 1964, Daily Reflector Negative Collection, J. Y. Joyner Library, East Carolina University, accessed 22 January 2018 digital.lib.ecu.edu/7483
A Greyhound bus trip from Louisville, Kentucky, to Memphis Tennessee, and the terminals. Sign at bus station. Rome, Georgia, Bubley, Esther, 1943 September, Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, FSA/OWI Collection, [LC-DIG-fsa-8d33365]
Miners' wives and children on the front porch of a typical, fifty year old house. Kentucky Straight Creek Coal Company, Belva Mine, abandoned after explosion [in] Dec. 1945, Four Mile, Bell County, Kentucky. Lee Russell, [541201] catalog.archives.gov/id/541201
Middlesboro, Kentucky images special thanks to Byers Rogan.