Dave: Cletus was after my time (I graduated HS in 1983). Jethro was especially popular because of “The Beverly Hillbillies” and the Jethro Bodine character.

You make a good point about being “culturalist” in our views. Everyone is tribal to a certain extent and I saw this when I was a kid. My family is German on both sides, with my dad’s family hailing from Northern Germany (Prussia) and my mom’s family largely coming from Austria. We were at a family picnic and I overheard my grandmother, who was a very cultured woman and university professor, refer to Austrians as “goat herding yokels”. Not only was this shocking, but the laughter from the surrounding family members (on my dad’s side) was a jolt, too. When I asked my dad about this (out of earshot of my mom), my dad rolled his eyes and said “Austrians” with a tone of complete contempt. Prussians consider themselves “true” Germans, with Southern Germans, Bavarians and Austrians being treated as second class citizens.

My grandmother had left Germany in 1935 because of what she saw coming with the Hitler regime and she used to rail constantly against the mistreatment of others and racial injustice. She also used to quote Schiller and Goethe to me. Go figure.