Smokies
Rye Holler Boys
Bluegrass band
Bryson City, NC (Swain County)
The four young men who comprise the Rye Holler Boys, all in their teens, are deeply influenced by the bluegrass music of their grandparents' generation. Though they cite younger bluegrass artists as influences-fellow Bryson City native Cody Shuler in particular, and his band, Pine Mountain Railroad-it is the music of the founding fathers of bluegrass that most inspires them. Their favorites include Jimmy Martin, Ralph Stanley, and Flatt and Scruggs.
Read more about Rye Holler BoysRonnie Bradley
Woodcarver
Whittier, NC (Jackson County)
Ronnie Bradley remembers whittling as a very young child. "Let any little boy get ahold of a knife," he says, "and he's going to whittle."
Read more about Ronnie BradleyRiverwood Pewter
Metal workers
Dillsboro, NC (Jackson County)
Riverwood Pewter's origins date to 1930, when Ralph Morgan and his son, Ralph, Jr., learned the pewterer's art at the Penland School of Crafts. The younger Ralph, who was a teenager at the time, was hired by his aunt Lucy Morgan, founder of the Penland School, to become the school's first pewter instructor.
Read more about Riverwood PewterNoel Booth
Stringed Instrument Maker
Waynesville, NC (Haywood County)
Instrument maker Noel Booth is becoming a well known figure in the world of contemporary banjo makers. After growing up in Georgia and north Alabama, Noel studied instrument making with guitar maker Brian Gallup in Big Rapids, Michigan. He gained valuable production woodworking experience at Silver Creek Paddles in Bryson City, then focused his skills on banjo making while working at Cedar Mountain Banjos in Brevard. He now directs his skills to his own line of instruments.
Read more about Noel BoothLois Hornbostel
Mountain dulcimer player
Bryson City, NC (Swain County)
Bryson City resident Lois Hornbostel is a nationally-renowned mountain dulcimer player and teacher. She plays many styles of music from Southern Appalachian to Celtic to Cajun and World Music. She is the author of several books on playing techniques and repertoire for the mountain dulcimer, published internationally by Mel Bay Publications.
Read more about Lois HornbostelLesa Postell
Heritage skills demonstrator
Sylva, NC (Jackson County)
Lesa Postell remembers that during her childhood in Jackson County, "Everything was done as a family. We raised food as a family, we ate as a family, we worked as a family." The traditional arts and homemaking skills that Postell carries on today were learned in this manner. "It was part of life," she says. "I grew up seeing and experiencing it." Her family has deep roots in the Smoky Mountains. Her mother's family are from the Cataloochee section of Haywood County, and fanned out in the Maggie Valley-Waynesville area when the National Park Service acquired Cataloochee.
Read more about Lesa PostellKaren Taylor
Horticulturist
Robbinsville, NC (Graham County)
Karen Taylor's deep knowledge of the flora of Western North Carolina comes from a lifetime of experience and learning. Growing up in Graham County, Taylor first learned about traditional row-crop farming from her parents, who worked a family farm in their native Smoky Mountains. In the 1960s, the family left farming to open a greenhouse, which is still in operation today.
Read more about Karen TaylorJulie Wilson
Fiber artist
Clyde, NC (Haywood County)
Julie Wilson and her family began raising sheep more than twenty years ago. Now the owners and stewards of a thirty-acre, late-nineteenth-century farm in the Fines Creek section of Haywood County, Wilson and her husband and daughters care for a flock of Shetland sheep, Scottish highland cattle, angora goats and rabbits, and llamas.
Read more about Julie WilsonJohn Page
Leatherworker
Topton, NC (Graham County)
John Page is a Western North Carolinian by birth, but it was in North Georgia, where he grew up, that he learned the skills of fine leatherworking. His adopted hometown of Buford, Georgia, was for many years the home of the Bona Allen leather goods factory, and was sometimes billed as "the leather capitol of the world." "Going through town," Page writes, "you could smell the different leather processes, some good and some bad, but some of the finest leather work was created in these leather shops."
Read more about John PageJohn Grant
Stone carver
Cherokee, NC (Qualla Boundary)
During a four-year stint in the Air Force, and at the encouragement of his mother, Cherokee artist John Grant began to carve with soapstone found on the banks of California's Folsom Lake. Making many small carvings that caught the eyes of others, he was encouraged to enter local art shows, and began winning ribbons for his work.
Read more about John Grant
