Category: Archives
We've been engaging hands and hearts since 1925. Enjoy learning about our history and special memories of the Folk School. Explore our posts below to take a glimpse at our past. To learn more, visit our History Center on the Folk School campus, where you'll find interesting examples of 20th-century Appalachia on display.
Goodbye to Bea Hogan, friend of the Folk School
Marion Beatrice “Bea” Robinson Hogan (1918–2020) completed her earthly journey Saturday, July 18, 2020. After graduating from Andrews High School, Bea attended John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, where she learned weaving and woodcarving along with traditional Appalachian arts, music and dance. There Bea met her future husband, Frank Hogan, who reportedly declared, “That’s my wife, boys, if I ever get her!” upon first seeing Bea. The couple made a home in Brasstown and worked at the Folk School.
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A Look Back at Folk School May Day Celebrations
Wishing you a happy May Day! We’re looking forward to dancing around the May Pole together again, but until then, we put together this post filled with photos of years past, a video from 2011, and an excerpt by Nanette Davidson about May Day from The Folk School Cookbook. Enjoy!
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Working Under the Star – Part III
Part III: Folk School Staff with American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Connections
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Working Under the Star – Part II
Part II: Who were these AFSC people, anyway?
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Sidewalk Discovered in Front of History Center!
The last few mornings in the History Center, I have been downstairs putting together our latest exhibit. While I was absorbed in my thoughts of arranging textiles in glass display cases, I finally glanced up to notice Danny Wilson outside the window, on his hands and knees, busily working away. It turns out, Danny was in the process of uncovering a long forgotten sidewalk, steps, iron rail, and front door in front of the History Center building! Danny, of course, had known what lay beneath the layers of compressed soil, rusted farm implements, poison ivy vines, and lilies of the valley.
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A Monday Morning Message
There are treasures in the Folk School archives that help us get perspective for understanding the days we live in. Anna Shearouse, who works in our archives, found this item. It is one of the “Monday Morning Messages” of William H. Danforth, who founded the Purina company. He wrote these to his employees for forty years. This one is dated May 23, 1932:
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