PRESS RELEASE

FAIRFAX—Departing from his typical rare disease and plastic surgery research, DC area plastic surgeon, Dr Craig R Dufresne announced the Authorea preprint article, “History of the Moss Farm of Sand Run in Upshur County, West Virginia”. This preprint traces the migration of David N Moss and his family from the Shenandoah Valley in the 1840s to this West Virginia farm’s contemporary operations in the 2020s. Unlike some histories of Appalachian farms that focus on specific aspects, the history of the Moss Farm is presented in the context of the founding family and surrounding village for a holistic perspective.

Dufresne has been concerned for some time that America was forgetting its history, risking losing its identity. Finding a nexus between preserving farm family history and human health, Dufresne decided to accept the challenge and embarked on three years of exhaustive historical research, including examining artifacts, primary sources, and hours of oral history interviewing.

In 2024, the fruits of this labor were presented at the 47th Annual Appalachian Studies Conference, the premier scholarly conference for Appalachian research, Annual Meeting of the Society of Appalachian Historians, and was accepted to be presented at the International Mountain Studies Conference, in Boone, NC, which was cancelled following devastation from Hurricane Helene.

A world-renowned DC area rare disease specialist and cosmetic and reconstructive plastic surgeon, Dufresne and his research fellow, with whom he co-authors much of his work, have an agricultural and history research background—Dufresne holding an agricultural degree and his research fellow being a West Virginia native raised on a family farm and holding a history degree.

Preprints are a type of preliminary, freely available article that has not yet undergone thorough evaluation the way articles in academic journals do. Preprints typically contain information authors wish to make public quickly, without waiting for an academic journal to finish processing their article. Dufresne hopes wider dissemination will inspire other farm families to document their histories. To help encourage and equip families to undertake their own research, Dufresne published a how-to article in a farming trade periodical based on his experiences working on the Moss Farm Family’s history.

For more information and to arrange interviews with Dr Dufresne and a patient who has this very rare syndrome, please contact the office.