Our Story

Born in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee and raised in central Appalachia, 3x EMMY Award Winning filmmaker and writer Joshua Deel (Josh) has been a son of the mountains since his youth. He grew up hearing the Americana folktales of Daniel Boone, Johnny Appleseed, Paul Bunyan, and John Henry. With an insatiable sense of adventure burning within, his eyes have been set on the horizon from his earliest memories. Josh wanted to be Indiana Jones when he grew up so he could explore, have an adventure, and get the girl!

Over the years, Josh has consistently chosen the road less traveled, believing that it is quite possible to accomplish whatever he focuses his mind, energy, and efforts towards. He has always been fascinated with music, playing drums in a band for a number of years, as well as film. Immediately following high school, Josh was recruited to play baseball by a professional team but ultimately chose the path of entrepreneurship and academics.

After completing business school, but before leaving for additional graduate studies in Classics at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland with the goal of becoming a professor, Josh and his young family decided, instead, to start a permaculture based organic farm in Southwest Virginia. With more than a decade of land management and animal husbandry under his belt, Josh regained much of the old knowledge and skills of agrarian life from former generations.

Josh has also built a thriving finance business. However, a profound yearning for adventure travel, connection to place, and passion for storytelling remain central to his life. So in 2020, Josh seriously began exploring the idea of becoming a full-time filmmaker. He created the Mountain Roots Productions film company and launched the highly successful Exploring Appalachia series in 2022, which is a fusion of cultural journalism meets cinematic indie-docuseries. Utilizing distribution platforms like Facebook and YouTube, the series has garnered a global audience receiving multiple millions of views and nearly a hundred thousand regular followers in its first year alone. Entering 2023, Josh accepted a position as the Senior Producer for a first-of-its-kind, all digital television station called PBS Appalachia. He is now a three-time EMMY nominated cinematographer, writer, and editor.

In a sense, Josh has begun to embody his vision of becoming Indiana Jones via his many journeys, adventure travel, and marrying the love of his life, Lena Najar. Together, they are raising their three children in the rural beauty of Southwest Virginia. Josh is now telling stories through a variety of filmmaking and documentaries… eyes to  the horizon!