The Savant of Rhea County, Tennessee

Alvin Goins was a hard worker who, like many Appalachian men of his time, never finished school and was unable to read or write. That never stopped him from getting work as a laborer in and around his home of Rhea County, Tennessee.

But Mr. Goins was a little bit different.

He was a mathematical genius, able to look at a pile of block, bricks and lumber and calculate in his head, almost to the last piece of wood, how much material would be needed to do the job.

Today we tell his story.

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