"Ashpet." In Richard Chase, Grandfather Tales. Boston: Houghton, 1948. pp. 115-23. Rpt. 1976. pp. 102-9. With one drawing by Berkeley William, Jr., of Ashpet watching the dishes fly down to the creek to wash themselves (a detail Chase invented). In a modest mountain home live two spoiled daughters and a misused "hired girl" who would like to go to church-meetin' with the others. When the "old witch-woman" makes the dirty dishes wash themselves, and turns simple objects into a mare for Ashpet to ride and a pretty but not extravagant red dress and red slippers, Ashpet begins to look like a more down-to-earth, independent heroine than European princesses in glass slippers and carriages with flashy fairy godmothers, or peasant girls who chase after princes. Ashpet never says she wants to go to the meetin' to compete for a prince or any man, but she wins the hand of the King's son after he finds her hiding under a tub. In the end, the mean woman and her daughters try to do Ashpet in, but the Old Hairy Man gets them instead, after keeping Ashpet captive in a cave for a while. Ashpet helps the army find the Old Hairy Man's weak spot with a bullet that knocks him out. The "king's boy" throws the bad woman and her daughters down to the deep hole of water where the Hairy Man lives. Chase notes that Mrs. Nancy Shores, his informant in Wise County, VA, had the old woman who helps Ashpet say "crack three nits in my head" instead of "comb my head." Chase's
"Ashpet." In Judy Sierra, ed. The Oryx Multicultural
Folktale Series: Cinderella. Phoenix: Oryx Press, 1992. Left: Drawing by Chelseah, a primary grade student in Franklin County, VA, after seeing a performance of Stephenson's Ashpet (spring 2000). See more pictures in AppLit's Picture Gallery. Right: Ashpet gets help from her neighbor (at the Ferrum Folklife Festival, Oct. 2001). Compare the photo of Ashpet and wise old woman from Davenport's film.
Performance
Note: Stephenson's "Mutsmag" and
"Ashpet" were performed Below, "Ashpet" at Ferrum College Women's Leadership Conference 2008.
Ashpet: An American Cinderella. Dir. Tom Davenport, 1990. In this film with a realistic World War II setting, the role of the fairy godmother or wise witch-woman was rewritten and expanded for a wonderful African American storyteller, Louise Anderson, who tells riddles and a short tale within the tale in the role of Dark Sally. She encourages Ashpet to remember her dead mother, use her real name Lily, stop letting people take advantage of her, and above all, to use her brain for her own benefit. Sally's magic comes from deep wisdom combined with good humor, matriarchal strength, and family and community history. She reinforces the heroine's direct links with a beneficent maternal influence, a theme emphasized in the German "Ashputtle" and other old tales, when she gives Ashpet beautiful clothes and jewelry that had belonged to her mother. This Ashpet is more independent than other Cinderellas because she decides to leave her foolish and selfish family herself, as well as planning to wait for the soldier she loves. Bibliography of Davenport's Fairy Tale Films. "Ashpet's Dreams" by Brenda Gough. In Loyal Jones, ed. Appalachian Folk Tales. Illus. Jim Marsh. Ashland, KY: Jesse Stuart Foundation, 2010. pp. 40-50. This book has twelve tales by different storytellers and writers, with a Note to Parents and Teachers, a glossary, and background on the collectors and storytellers. Gough is a Kentucky writer. (See Folktale Collections Indexed in AppLit.) Compton, Joanne. "Ashpet: An Appalachian Folktale." In Literature Lures: Using Picture Books and Novels to Motivate Middle School Readers. Ed. Nancy Polette and Joan Ebbesmeyer. Greenwood Village, CO: Teacher Ideas Press, 2002. In the section on Parody along with other "fractured fairy tales" in this thematically organized textbook. "Ash Pet" as told by Anndrena Belcher is summarized in Telling Tales Teacher's Guide for the KY Educational TV series of dramatized folktales (p. 69, with study guide pp. 70-71). Belcher's performance of "Ash Pet" at the 1991 National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, TN is available as an audio recording at the American Folklife Center, Library of Congress. Belcher includes the ending found in Chase's Grandfather Tales. At the end she says she told this tale to her grandmother, who cried and laughed and said, "This is my life." Belcher then observes that in these days of talking openly about child abuse, physical and emotional, "we look at these old tales and they are survival tools. We can remember how Ashpet did it or Mutsmag or even Jack, and in times of loneliness and desperation we have something to hang on to." "Ashpet" told by Anndrena Belcher (30 min.). In For Old Time's Sake. Videocassette. Appalshop,1989. A blend of storytelling, music, and dance designed especially for use in educational settings. Also includes "Bubble Gum Baby" (24 min.); "Jim Barton's Fiddle" (15 min.); Interview (18 min.). Creative Activities
for Three Folktales includes jump rope chants about Ashpet and
other activities for children. Schroeder, Alan. Smoky Mountain Rose: An Appalachian Cinderella. Illus. Brad Sneed. New York: Dial Books for Young Readers, 1997. Rose, a trapper's daughter, loses her glass slipper at a party given by the rich guy on the other side of the creek. The fairy godmother is a huge hog. Sneed's water colors feature elongated figures and unusual perspectives similar to those in American paintings by Thomas Hart Benton. Analysis of dialect used in this picture book. "Cinderella's Slipper," an unpublished tale collected by Emory L. Hamilton of Wise, VA, from Mrs. Goldie Hamilton, Jan. 9, 1940. Full text in this web site. Typewritten transcription in the James Taylor Adams collection in the Blue Ridge Institute (JTA-2315). There is no stepmother in this unusual Cinderella variant about three orphan sisters. The eldest feels unworthy to marry the rich man at her aunt's ball because she thinks that working hard to care for her younger sisters has made her unattractive. When she kicks off her slipper for good luck, it accidentally lands in the lap of the rich young man. He later insists that he wants to marry only her, while the younger sisters vow generously that they will "learn to work hard and care for" themselves. There is no magic helper in this tale and the teller noted in remarks at the end, "I learned this from my grandfather, when I used to stay with him 41 years ago." "I believe it is a true story. It was said it was true when I first learned it." "Cinderella." Told by Hattie Presnell to Barbara McDermitt. Cassette tape MCD-5. Barbara McDermitt Collection. Archives of Appalachia, East Tennessee State University. On this tape, Presnell comments on the storytelling tradition of Beech Mountain, NC, and tells swiftly narrated versions and fragments of some tales to McDermitt. Presnell's "Cinderella" is a quick retelling of Perrault's French tale, with two sisters and a stepmother who never liked Cinderella and gave her ragged clothes. Cinderella cries because she can't go to a party. Her godmother tells her to get a pumpkin and mice to make a coach and horses. Cinderella puts on golden slippers and fine clothes and her sisters don't know her at the party. She has to be home by midnight and loses a slipper. The prince asks everyone who can wear the slipper. Cinderella's family says she is nothing at all ("like a dog") but she comes out and fits in the slipper so the prince takes her and marries her and they live happily ever after. Presnell comments on this tale's relevance to real life: it could be that somebody treats you so bad and somebody would come along and help you out. Fleischman, Paul. Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal: A Worldwide Cinderella. Illus. Julie Paschkis. New York: Henry Holt, 2007. "The author draws from a variety of folk traditions to put together this version of Cinderella, including elements from Mexico, Iran, Korea, Russia, Appalachia, and more" (Worldcat). The Author's Note refers to Fleisschman's desire to recognize lesser known tellers of Cinderella tales. Reviewers praise the way that story elements from 17 cultures are combined artfully in Fleischman's story and Paschkis' colorful folk art illustrations. Appalachia is the only regional (rather than national) storytelling tradition recognized on the map on the end papers and on one page in the middle of the text, where the stepmother orders the girl to pick lentils out of the ashes (as in the German "Ashputtle") and "scour all the kitchen pots." After the stepmother and her daughters leave for the palace, "Then a witch woman came in and spoke a spell—and up jumped the pots and scoured themselves." Richard Chase's notes in Grandfather Tales (see above) point out that "The magic washing of the pots is my own invention" (p. 216 in 1976 ed.). See an insightful, nuanced review of this book by Uma Krishnaswami at ChildrensLit.com (and other "Cinderella" books on that page). She points out that regional distinctions are not acknowledged for other countries in the book. "Chipper." Told by Dianne Hackworth. Tales & Tunes. Audio cassette. This is a role reversal adaptation of Cinderella or Ashpet tales by a NC storyteller, with modern details. Chipper is a working boy with shabby clothes. Griselda is wealthier but not beautiful. They fall in love at a barn dance Griselda's father holds to find her a husband. Chipper loses one of the Australian lizard lip boots his fairy godfather gives him, which reveals him later to be the man of Griselda's dreams. Also contains "Jack & The Frogs," "Don Gato," "Possum & Snake," "The Fox," "You Talk Too Much," "Jack & The King's Girl," "Cat Came Back," and "Father Grumble." Hackworth also tells "Chipper" in Mountain Tales, along with "Here's To Cheshire," "The Hoe Handle, Snake, and Barn," and "Old Dry Frye. "This video includes 2 hours of tales from the Appalachian Region." Orville Hicks tells "Red Devil Suit," Jack and the Varmints," "Two Uncles and Their Horses," "Jack and the Three Sillies." Charlotte Ross tells "Catherine Sherrill" and "The Cabin." Info. with photos at Dianne's Storytelling Site. "Rushiecoat and the King's Son." In Leonard Roberts. Nippy and the Yankee Doodle, and Other Authentic Folk Tales from the Southern Mountains. Berea, KY: The Council of the Southern Mountains, 1958. (Reprinted in Smith, Jimmy Neil, ed. Why the Possum's Tail is Bare and Other Classic Southern Stories. New York: Avon, 1993, pp. 19-25.) This Kentucky tale is much like "Cinderella" and "Toads and Diamonds," with one ugly stepsister. The beautiful girl's own mother appears, to do her work and send her to the king's dance in fine clothes. An old Grandpa and three bloody heads in the water also give her magical help when her mean stepmother sends her off to the end of the world to get water. As in "Ashputtle," a bird warns the prince that the wrong sister is maiming her foot to put on the glass slipper. After her marriage, Rushiecoat is turned into a rabbit by her jealous stepsister, using a pin obtained from a witch. Here the tale has similarities with Catskins. When the rabbit's hide is burned, Rushiecoat and her baby can return to the prince. Roberts calls this tale "a cunning medley of about four of the most widespread fairy stories of the world, containing large parts of Types 402, 480, and 510. "The Girl That Could Do Any Job of Work" in Marie Campbell. Tales from the Cloud Walking Country. Indiana UP, 1958. Rpt. Athens: U of George Press, 2000, pp. 242-43. This short tale has a mean stepmother (no sisters), who makes the girl do impossible tasks (sort out feathers, empty a pond with a spoon, build a castle with rocks). The girl's diligent attempts are aided by a little old woman who destroys the stepmother at the end by pulling down the castle on top of her. The little old woman gives the girl to a king for his bride. Mutsmag is an orphan with two mean sisters who overcomes adversaries and marries a prince in the end in some versions, but gets other rewards and remains independent in others. Golden Delicious: A Cinderella Apple Story, picture book by Anna Egan Smucker. Watercolor illustrations by Kathleen Kemly. Morton Grove, IL: Albert Whitman, 2008. This book is more natural and agricultural history than folklore, recounting the discovery of the Golden Delicious apple with allusions to Cinderella. "Every Golden Delicious apple tree in the world is descended from that one tree 'that just grew' on Anderson Mullins's farm in Clay County, WV in the early 1900s!" A nursery in Missouri purchased the tree and took twigs for growing new trees. While searching for the "Queen of the Apple World" and tasting many "disappointing" apples, Paul Stark says to his brother, "I feel like the prince who tried a glass slipper on one smelly foot after another to find Cinderella." The Author's Note gives further background on the apple's history and the grafting process.
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"Ashpet" by 
The treatment of Ashpet and the old woman in the role of
the fairy godmother emphasizes how unfair it is for people to be demeaned
because they are "old, ugly, dirty, poor, and different."
When the old woman gives her magical help, Ashpet’s request for
a red dress and, later, her deliberate act of kicking off one shoe
when she slips away from the prince show that she takes some initiative
in bringing about her own happy ending. She marries the lovestruck
prince in her red dress and gold slippers in the end. 
See also
in Dec. 2003 within the play called
Grandmother Tales at 