Ben Jones, better known as “Crazy Cooter” from the television series “The Dukes Of Hazzard,” is about as enlightened as they come for a redneck:

For Ben Jones, born outhouse poor in rural Virginia, that has been the greatest gift. He chased education to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, found fame and success as an actor and then became a U.S. Congressman from Georgia. …

Crazy Cooter, a redneck Southern icon, once laid his head in the same room as [Thomas] Wolfe, an intellectual literary giant. That is a gift born only of a free democracy. Isn’t America great?

I used to love driving to Skyline Drive in the Shenandoah Mountains every fall and not just to see the fall colors. The real treat was driving by Cooter’s Place in Sperryville, Va., and seeing Ben Jones, a former congressman, chatting it up with the locals and the tourists, with the infamous General Lee from the TV show right there on the lot.

Cooter’s Place closed in 2003. The driving tour west just isn’t the same now, but I’m glad to see Cooter is in the news again for his book, an aptly named one at that — “Redneck Boy In The Promised Land.”

I have to get a copy. And Cooter, if you’re reading, I’d love to interview you for this blog.