I found this record at one of my favorite thrifts stores in Elkins, WV for $1. It was sitting among a cache of other France-related LPs (a few of which I also nabbed…you never know when you might need French accordion music for an “I Love Paris in the Springtime” theme party, you know?). And now I’m thinking and wondering about the person who owned them. I’m imaging a woman who lived in West Virginia her whole life, an ardent Francophile who never had the money to get there herself (let alone leave the country. To folks in this region, “the city” is either Charleston or Morgantown, or, if you’re lucky, Pittsburgh). What did “France” look like in her head, I wonder, and how did she build that image? Along with these albums, what were her sources?
