^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Folklife Center News American Folklife Center The Library of Congress Spring 1992 Volume XIV, Number 2 ISSN 0149-6840 Catalog Card No. 77-649628 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Alan Jabbour, Director Ray Dockstader, Deputy Director Timothy Lloyd, Assistant to the Director Doris Craig, Administrative Assistant Hillary Glatt, Program Assistant Acquisitions Joseph C. Hickerson, Head Processing Stephanie A. Hall, Archivist Elaine Bradtke, American Memory Project Catherine Hiebert Kerst, American Memory Project Programs Peter T. Bartis, Folklife Specialist Mary Hufford, Folklife Specialist David A. Taylor, Folklife Specialist Camila Bryce-Laporte, Program Coordinator Jennifer A. Cutting, Program Coordinator Publications James Hardin, Editor Public Events Thea Caemmerer, Coordinator Reference Gerald E. Parsons, Reference Librarian Judith A. Gray, Folklife Specialist Administrative Office Tel: 202 707-6590 Reference Service Tel: 202 707-5510 Federal Cylinder Project Tel: 202 707-1740 Board of Trustees William L. Kinney, Jr., Chair, South Carolina John Penn Fix III, Vice-Chair, Washington Nina Archabal, Minnesota Lindy Boggs, Louisiana; Washington, D.C. Robert Malir, Jr., Kansas Judith McCulloh, Illinois Juris Ubans, Maine Ex Officio Members James H. Billington, Librarian of Congress Robert McCormick Adams, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution Anne-Imelda Radice, Acting Chairman, National Endowment for the Arts, Lynne V. Cheney, Chairman, National Endowment for the Humanities, Alan Jabbour, Director, American Folklife Center THE AMERICAN FOLKLIFE CENTER The American Folklife Center was created in 1976 by the U.S. Congress to "preserve and present American folklife" through programs of research, documentation, archival preservation, reference service, live performance, exhibition, publication, and training. The Center incorporates the Archive of Folk Culture, which was established in the Music Division of the Library of Congress in 1928, and is now one of the largest collections of ethnographic material from the United States and around the world. FOLKLIFE CENTER NEWS James Hardin, Editor Timothy Lloyd, Editorial Advisor David A. Taylor, Editorial Advisor Design by Library of Congress Graphics Unit Folklife Center News publishes articles on the programs and activities of the American Folklife Center, as well as other articles on traditional expressive culture. It is available free of charge from the Library of Congress, American Folklife Center, Washington, D.C. 20540. Folklife Center News does not publish announcements from other institutions or reviews of books from publishers other than the Library of Congress. Readers who would like to comment on Center activities or newsletter articles may address their remarks to the editor. FOLKLINE For timely information on the field of folklore and folklife, including training and professional opportunities and news items of national interest, a taped announcement is available around the clock, except during the hours of 9 A.M. until noon (eastern time) each Monday, when it is updated. Folkline is a joint project of the American Folklife Center and the American Folklore Society. Dial: 202 707-2000 ................................................................ Editor's Notes Acadian Origins A note from England offers an explanation for the etymological origins of the term Acadian, as it was discussed in Folklife Center News (fall 1991), Ray Brassieur, "The Long Hard Road to Madawaska: Acadian Cultural Retention in Maine's Upper St. John Valley." I would like to note that although I am not a scholar of the subject, I do know that the origin of the term "Acadie" in reference to pre-British Nova Scotia comes from the Indian term "quaddy" as in "Passamaquaddy" and means "bountiful land." As your interesting article points out, there were many connections between the Francophone settlers and the Indians, and this linguistic borrowing seems logical. After reports of the area's fertility reached France, "le Cadie" was altered to "Acadie" or Arcadia, a logical and perhaps even Rousseauan embellishment. And of course, the pronunciation of the term "Acadien" with the soft "d" easily slipped into the current term "Cajun" to refer to those transplanted to Louisiana. Yours Sincerely, Joe Boyd Rykodisc UK Ltd London, England Heritage Parks and Folklife During the past two decades, a combination of factors--social, economic, political, and environmental--has led a number of organizations on the local, state, and national level to create or designate certain areas as heritage parks (also known as centers, corridors, and trails). A heritage park is an area designated for conservation and interpretation because of its natural, historic, and cultural value. The principal sponsor of these heritage areas has been the U.S. Congress working through the National Park Service, whose involvement began in the late 1970s. A few states have established their own heritage parks, notably Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and New York. Generally speaking the Park Service's heritage areas possess the following characteristics: (1) a focus on contemporary as well as historic traditions, (2) the interpretation and conservation of living cultural traditions, (3) the creation of independent commissions to plan and oversee park programs, and (4) ongoing partnerships with local and state agencies through cooperative agreements. Living cultural traditions are the special interest of folklorists, and the Park Service has called upon the American Folklife Center to assist in planning three of these heritage areas by conducting folklife surveys: in Lowell, Massachusetts (1987-88), northern Maine (1991), and currently in southern West Virginia. When state and federal agencies and large commercial operations plan or engage in activities that affect traditional culture, folklorists also have a responsibility to see that the accumulated wisdom of local people is heard and included in the decision-making process. Accordingly, the Center's work on these three projects has gone beyond research and documentation to include advocacy for the place of local people and communities in setting policies for heritage centers. In this issue of Folklife Center News, Shalom Staub gives a brief history of heritage parks and then describes the Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Program. And in her article based on field research for the New River Gorge Folklife Project, Karen Hudson describes the way local people have freed themselves from the monotony of company-built housing by personalizing their own houses and other buildings. In both articles the theme emerges of people taking charge of both their own lives and the activities in their home territories. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Architecture and Personal Expression in Southern West Virginia By Karen Hudson ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Between December and February 1992, the American Folklife Center conducted a "cultural landscape" survey in the New River Gorge region of West Virginia. The purposes of the survey were to describe the area's built environment, recommend areas and activities for further fieldwork, and suggest how the resulting discoveries might affect the design of a cultural heritage center being constructed by the National Park Service at Grandview, West Virginia (see Folklife Center News, winter 1992). The survey consisted of interviewing areas residents, driving selected roads in three counties, noting both cultural patterns and anomalies, and taking both black and white photographs and color slides of representative sites. For nearly a century, the various houses, barns, fences, and other man-made structures of the Appalachian region (known as the "cultural landscape") have played a prominent role in its representation in books, magazines, and film. From nineteenth- century magazine illustrations of windowless, single-room log cabins to twentieth-century television programs focusing on unpainted, one- or two-room company houses with yards cluttered with rusty automobiles, the dominant image of the region has been the dilapidated and weather-beaten Appalachian home. While some of these presentations are authentic, some are contrived, and nearly all are selective. Both popular and academic interpreters of Appalachian culture have tended to focus on extremes and, as a result, have misrepresented the diversity and reality of Appalachian life. In 1916 a mountaineer complained to a church official about the typical portrayal of the region: You missionary people do not treat us right. You come with your cameras and photograph our worst homes and our lowest people and then throw them on the screens to be seen. You never tell of our good people nor of the substantial things of the community. But I reckon you have to do that in order to get money out of your members (quoted in Herrin, Dean. "Poor, Proud, and Primitive: Images of Appalachian Domestic Interiors." In _Perspectives on American Furniture_, Gerald W.R. Ward, ed. [New York: W.W. Norton, 1988], p. 101). Like missionaries, academics have also tended to focus on selective features of the Appalachian built environment. Most scholarly works can be divided into two broad types. The first type concentrates on what is obviously traditional (log cabins and barns, for example), thus perpetuating a romantic image of the region. The second group focuses on the detailed documentation of industrial sites, usually concentrating on company-owned towns where mine owners and designers seem to have used architecture to manipulate and control workers and their families. The coal town studies tend to promote a culture-of- poverty image and present Appalachians as helpless victims, rather than as actors in control of their own lives. The American Folklife Center's New River Gorge survey revealed a much more diverse landscape than has been described in the past. While it was easy for project researchers to locate log cabins and abandoned coal towns, we also found many cinder block bungalows, glazed tile barns and silos, Lustron houses, concrete block churches, Sears mail order homes, and geodesic domes. Contrary to past reports, the New River Gorge cultural landscape reflects the history of a community that designed, built, and used its buildings according to individual tastes and principles. And the territory is doted with homes whose original appearances have been altered to suit the occupant. The individually styled facades may appear quirky to the outsider, but their meaning is revealed through an understanding of the local history. Many of the homes were originally constructed by coal and sawmill companies for their workers. They were often constructed at one time to one homogeneous design. The box or vertical-plank house (cheap, fast to build, and temporary) was one of the most common types put up by area industrialists. Throughout the gorge, whole towns were built with row after row of identical box houses. While the plans varied, the basic construction technique did not. It consisted of vertical boards attached to the sills and plates to form both the interior and exterior walls, as well as the buildings' weight-bearing supports (all posts, studs, and braces were eliminated). Narrow vertical strips called battens were often placed over the spaces left between the boards. Today, West Virginians commonly call box houses "Jinn Linns" (sometimes pronounced "Jenny Lind," "Jinny Lynn," or "Gentle End"). Though box houses are located throughout the Appalachian region, it appears that West Virginia is the only state where the term, in its various forms, is commonly employed. The origin of the term to describe this house type is unclear. However, during the survey, one local resident related a story concerning its etymology. She explained that Jenny Lynn was a coal camp resident. Because all the box houses in her camp looked exactly the same, she decided to individualize her home by nailing narrow strips over the spaces between the vertical boards, thus creating the board and batten siding characteristic of Jinn Linn houses. Soon many others followed her example, our informant explained, and eventually named the house type after her. Unlike Jenny Lynn, most coal camp residents were required to maintain their box houses according to strict company standards or risk eviction. As the coal boom declined, however, companies began selling the homes to their tenants. Along with ownership, residents obtained the freedom to maintain their homes according to their own standards, and many chose to alter facades, make additions, and execute other changes. While some residents chose to purchase their camp homes, others decided to leave the company-designed camps altogether and construct their own homes. One resident commented that once people moved out of a company town, they were especially eager to acquire homes that did not look like those they left behind. As a result, many chose to purchase modern prefabricated houses, for example, the Lustron, an all-steel factory-made home manufactured in Ohio between 1948 and 1950. While less than two thousand of the homes were ever made, I saw five during the brief survey of the New River Gorge. As originally constructed, the Lustron was a one-story, gable-roof ranch with an exterior and interior skin of enameled steel panels bolted to a structural-steel frame and a concrete slab foundation. Unlike the Jinn Linn, the home was durable, easy to maintain, strong, and equipped with features designed to attract a middle-class buyer, such as a combination dishwasher and clothes-washing machine. The company's slogan was "A new standard for living." Other modern factory-made houses popular in the New River Gorge included Sears mail order, National, and Round "8." Since the first decade of the twentieth century, modern and innovative construction materials have been produced locally. For example, a number of local plants made cinder blocks by grinding up "clinkers"--slag left over after coal was burnt--and molding them into blocks. Numerous cinder block buildings, including homes, churches, gymnasiums, barns, and outbuildings were constructed throughout the Gorge. These buildings are easily identified because of their bluish color. One plant worker recalled that the making of cinder blocks ended in the late 1950s when power companies began pulverizing coal before it was burned, thus leaving no clinkers as a by-product. Subsequently, most of the plants began making standard concrete blocks. In fact, a number made cinder block and concrete block simultaneously, but, according to one worker, builders preferred cinder blocks, even though they were not as water resistant, because they were much lighter. "Red dog blocks" were another locally produced construction material. When coal was removed from the ground it was often mixed with black slate. The slate was removed from the coal and dumped into huge piles. The pressure at the bottom of the dumps caused the slate to start burning naturally. After the black slate burned, it turned red, thus producing red dog. The red dog was pulverized and molded into attractive dark red blocks. Buildings constructed of cinder, concrete, and red dog blocks are located throughout the New River Gorge region. The colorful materials are often used in striking combinations and an unusual amount of care is given to their decorative detail. For example, yellow and red bricks and stones are often used for window and doors trims, quoins, and belt courses (a projecting horizontal strip around the outside of a building). The complex balance between formal design and personal expression is the most striking feature of the New River Gorge landscape. Like the quilts commonly made in the region, much of the architecture is pieced together from locally made and recycled materials--cinder blocks, red dog blocks, field stones, tin, asphalt siding, and permastone. In the New River Gorge region of West Virginia materials rarely used in combination in other areas are carefully pieced together into a landscape filled with personal meaning. Editor's note: A number of scholars have, in recent years, examined the characteristics of Appalachia. For example, Rodger Cunningham, Apples on the Flood: The Southern Mountain Experience (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1987); Henry D. Shapiro, Appalachia On Our Mind: The Southern Mountains and Mountaineers in the American Consciousness, 1870-1920 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1978); and David E. Whisnant, All That Is Native and Fine: The Politics of Culture in an American Region (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1983). .............................................................. Karen Hudson is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Folklore and Folklife at the University of Pennsylvania, specializing in vernacular architecture. She was a fieldworker for the Center's West Virginia cultural survey. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Program By Shalom Staub ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Program was instituted in 1989 to create a system of "parks" designed to promote tourism and economic revitalization through the conservation and interpretation of a region's industrial heritage. The program emphasizes a multi-phase planning process to assess and develop conservation strategies for a region's historic, cultural, recreational, and environmental resources. "Heritage parks" require and initiate a shift in symbolic meaning, transforming areas of industrial decline into "cradles of American industrial heritage" with tourism potential and a revitalized community spirit that can attract new investment. Pennsylvania's efforts in this area built upon earlier "heritage park" models. Massachusetts was the first state to create such a program, known as the Massachusetts Urban Heritage State Park program, and, in 1979, New York State created its Urban Cultural Parks Program. Expanding the notion of a "park," these early efforts encouraged people to think beyond open, green space and consider urban blocks and restored mills and factories as constituting "parks." Still, in the pioneering Massachusetts model, the "heritage park" occupies a relatively small, circumscribed geographic boundary, akin to a historic district. The "heritage parks" model expanded significantly with the introduction of the "heritage corridor," first implemented in Illinois in 1984 along the remains of the historic Illinois and Michigan Canal. In 1985, another heritage corridor was established in the Blackstone River Valley linking Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Each of these projects was designated a "National Heritage Corridor" by act of Congress, and came into existence through joint federal, state, and local effort. The National Park Service has played a key role in developing the heritage corridor concept, adapting and refining the concept and practice as new efforts are made throughout the country. Pennsylvania is now the site of four federally assisted heritage project areas (at different stages in their development): the nine-county America's Industrial Heritage Project and the Steel Industry Heritage Park in southwestern Pennsylvania, the Lackawanna Heritage Valley in northeastern Pennsylvania, and the Delaware and Lehigh Navigation Canal National Heritage Corridor in eastern Pennsylvania. Interest in such efforts in Pennsylvania at the state and local levels goes back a number of years. In 1984, three state agencies collaborated to produce a report entitled _Pennsylvania Heritage Parks: A Concept with Applications_. These three agencies, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission and the departments of Environmental Resources and Community Affairs, offered the "Heritage Park Planning Project" as a framework "to preserve cultural resources in a manner which provides educational, recreational and economic benefits" by promoting community revitalization and stimulating tourism (_Pennsylvania Heritage Parks_ (Harrisburg: Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 1984), page 1). The plan called for the development of a set of regional and local parks drawing upon existing historical resources. The plan offered screening criteria for evaluating potential parks and described forty-two viable park possibilities, each based closely on extant and potential historic districts. The initial proposal lay dormant until 1987, when the three agencies, with the addition of the Pennsylvania Heritage Affairs Commission, revived the concept and sought to respond to federally assisted activities and growing interest in all corners of the state. The Heritage Parks Work Group, composed of staff from the Department of Community Affairs and the Heritage Affairs Commission, reevaluated the 1984 plan and reviewed the results of the ongoing efforts in Massachusetts and New York. Over the course of many months, the Heritage Parks Work Group designed a program that later received an initial appropriation of $550,000 in the Commonwealth's FY 1989-90 budget. The Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Program does not seek to re-create the Massachusetts model of state-financed and operated parks or the New York model of state mandated and assisted parks. Rather, the Pennsylvania program takes a "bottom-up" approach, emphasizing planning and process as much as product and local community involvement as much as the inventory of historic, cultural, educational, and recreational resources that eventually will constitute the park. Our efforts focus on industrial heritage, appropriate enough for Pennsylvania's legacy of industrial prominence and later decline. Projects must relate to one or more of the following industries: iron and steel, coal, textile, machine and foundry, transportation, lumber, oil, and agriculture. The first five of these--iron and steel, coal, textile, machine and foundry, and transportation--exceed all others in terms of numbers of people employed, the amount of capital invested, the value of their products, and their contributions to technological, labor, and business history over a sustained period of time. For brief periods, the lumber and oil industries have been significant employers and producers of industrial goods in the Commonwealth and the nation. Agriculture has played a key role in Pennsylvania's economy from colonial times to the present; in fact, agriculture is now the Commonwealth's leading industry. The driving force behind the Heritage Parks Program is economic development. A Pennsylvania Heritage Park is designed to complement existing economic development initiatives in a region or even become a primary program for economic revitalization. The intent of the program is to stimulate economic activity in an area by attracting tourists for both daily and overnight visitations, resulting in direct expenditures for traditional visitor services such as food, lodging, retail sales, and entertainment. Other spin-off economic objectives are the creation of employment opportunities, development and expansion of small business activity, and the formulation of public/private investment partnerships in the region. The attraction of major businesses, manufacturing, or industrial companies into the heritage park area is a long-term goal that will add substantially to the success of the initiative. The promise of economic revitalization has allowed this state program to grow at a time when many state programs are suffering sharp budgetary cutbacks. The appropriation grew to $950 thousand in fiscal year 1990-91 and $2 million for fiscal year 1991-92. Although driven by a concern for economic revitalization, the development of a heritage park depends upon a foundation of historical and cultural resources. The program is intended to enhance community, regional, and state-wide awareness and pride of Pennsylvania's historical and cultural legacy through the preservation, adaptive reuse, or restoration of historic sites and properties; the conservation of "intangible" cultural resources through documentation, interpretive programs and events; and educational materials to be made available to the public. A heritage park is also intended to link and enhance the educational and recreational infrastructure of the region. These objectives are expressed in the five formal goals of the Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Program: economic development, intergovernmental cooperation, cultural conservation, recreation, and education. Participation in the Heritage Parks Program depends heavily on the availability and identification of "heritage resources." Almost invariably, these "resources" are first conceptualized by applicants as the hulk-like remains of industrial structures and the tangible remains of an industrial elite, what might be called the "sites and structures of the rich and famous" approach. But Pennsylvania's Heritage Parks Program is set apart from similar programs nationally by its insistence that "heritage resources" encompass both the built environment and also the human dimension of industrial heritage: the social history of the communities and workers who built and sustained Pennsylvania's industries, and the associated folklife: the living cultural traditions shared within occupational and ethnic groups and local communities. We have used the term "cultural conservation" to encompass these tangible and intangible elements of cultural heritage. Our focus on the people and their own understanding of their heritage is consistent with the program's overall "process" orientation, which demands local community involvement in shaping the goals of a particular heritage park. The program requires each project to establish a Local Heritage Park Task Force to represent a broad spectrum of interest groups in the region and to guide applicants towards an open, participatory planning process with ample opportunity for public review and comment. Now moving into the implementation phase, the Pennsylvania Heritage Parks program offers a model of the cultural conservation paradigm in action. This program has shown that new policy and program structures can indeed overcome longstanding disciplinary and bureaucratic predisposition and inertia and, in so doing, establish exciting new alliances and creative interaction for the encouragement of folklife. Shalom Staub is the executive director of the Pennsylvania Heritage Affairs Commission. This article is adapted from a longer verison to be published in a collection of essays edited by Mary Hufford, "Making Heritage: Perspectives on Cultural Conservation," to be published by the University of Illinois Press. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Neptune Plaza Concert Series: Fifteen Years of Musical Diversity By James Hardin ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Thea Caemmerer has two telephone numbers for the U.S. Weather Bureau, and one of them reaches a real live meteorologist. By 10:00 A.M., on the third Thursday of the month, from April until October, she must determine whether the American Folklife Center's outdoor concert will, indeed, take place outdoors. Caemmerer is the Center's public events coordinator, and the Neptune Plaza Concert Series is one of her chief responsibilities. On sunny days, the popular series attracts Library employees, congressional staffers, tourists, and devotees of the particular music being presented. Many in the audience have been notified in advance by flyers and phone calls. They bring their lunches, sit on the steps of the Library's Jefferson Building or at the picnic tables on either side of the plaza, and look across the stage to the U.S. Capitol and the lovely wooded grounds surrounding it. They listen, applaud, tap their feet, and sometimes get up to dance. Bluegrass and gospel are staples of the six-event season, but the hallmark is cultural diversity, the presentation of many different musical traditions. Since the series began in 1977, audiences have been entertained by Andean singers, Egyptian, flamenco, Polish, and Hungarian dancers, blues guitarists, African drummers, and bands representing Cajun, zydeco, klezmer, Indonesian, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Swiss, Irish, and many other cultural traditions. The ambitious goal of bringing many different kinds of music is restricted by two considerations, one financial, the other philosophical. "The series has a modest budget," says Caemmerer. "We book local groups who don't have travel expenses. But to get groups from outside the area, we have to piggyback, arrange for our noontime concert when they are in town to play evening concerts elsewhere. We hope the prestige of the Library of Congress and a congressional audience will entice them." The second consideration pertains to the educational mission of the Folklife Center to present authentic folk music; that is, traditional music that comes from a community and is played for that community. The series is wary of folk music interpreters who are not themselves steeped in the traditions they represent. The Library of Congress has a long history of musical presentation, and the first concert of folk musicians at the Library was on December 20, 1940, part of a four-concert program in the Coolidge Auditorium commemorating the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which ended slavery. The Golden Gate Quartet, with Josh White on guitar, was featured at "A Program of Negro Folk Song with Commentary." The same year, the head of the Folk Archive, Alan Lomax, organized a concert of folk musicians at the White House. And in 1948, folksong collector Helen Hartness Flanders, wife of Vermont senator Ralph Flanders, presented a lecture and concert of New England balladry with three New England folksingers, again in the Library's Coolidge Auditorium. When the Folklife Center was created by an act of Congress in 1976, a reception was held in the Library's Great Hall, on February 19. Performers who took part in the program were the Irish Tradition, the Country Gentleman, Mariachi America, Tony Alderman, Elizabeth Cotten, and John Jackson. Another concert of folk musicians was held on the Neptune Plaza in September, just outside the great bronze doors to the Great Hall. This time the celebration was billed as a picnic, and it arose from a more general impulse to make the venerable institution a little less intimidating, a little more friendly. When Daniel J. Boorstin took office as Librarian of Congress in November 1975, he discovered that the Neptune Plaza (named for the Court of Neptune Fountain that fronts the Thomas Jefferson Building) was a much underused resource that afforded wonderful views in all directions. He urged Architect of the Capitol George White to help him furnish the plaza with picnic tables, colorful umbrellas, and planters, thus adding a welcoming aspect to the building. There were balloons, popcorn, and cotton candy at that first outdoor concert (September 23, 1976), making it an American celebration appropriate for the Bicentennial year. The musicians engaged to perform were veteran blues singer and pianist Wilbert "Big Chief" Ellis of Birmingham, Alabama, with James Bellman on electric bass; and guitarist and singer John "Bowling Green" Cephas of Woodford, Virginia, accompanied by Phil Wiggins on harmonica. The musicians were recommended by Richard K. Spottswood, who was working at the Library as a consultant on a fifteen-record series of folk music albums, Folk Music in America. The record project was one of several initiatives at the Library celebrating the U.S. Bicentennial. Enthusiasm for the concert led Alan Jabbour, the director of the Folklife Center, to consider an annual series. He thought the series might bring public recognition to the new center, make an immediate contribution to its home institution, and create a presence visible to the Congress across the street. How to arrange for a six-concert season seemed daunting at first, but that problem was solved by enlisting the aid of another Washington folklore institution, one that had been around almost as long at the Archive of Folk Culture--the National Council for the Traditional Arts (NCTA). The NCTA was founded in 1933 as the National Folk Festival Association. A private nonprofit organization, the NCTA presents the National Folk Festival each year and provides technical and content assistance for many folk arts presentations. Jabbour worked out an arrangement with council director Joe Wilson to do the bookings for the Neptune Plaza Concert Series and a full program was arranged for the 1977 season. The first concert in the series was held April 25, 1977, and featured the Blue Grass Cardinals. Like the previous year's concert, it too was a "picnic," with balloons, popcorn, and hot dogs. The program was also billed as a 177th birthday party for the Library of Congress (one day belated, so as to accommodate the schedules of the Librarian and Deputy Librarian), and included a large cake. The Library was founded April 24, 1800, when President John Adams signed a bill appropriating five thousand dollars "for the purchase of such books as may be necessary for the use of Congress." Since the Neptune Plaza Concert Series began in 1977, it has relied on many advisors to guide the selection of musicians. The NCTA no longer handles the bookings for the series, and Thea Caemmerer consults with a variety of Washington-area persons: radio host Dick Spottswood; Dan Sheehy, director of the Folk Arts Program of the National Endowment for the Arts; Lee Michael Dempsey, bluegrass specialist; Nick Spitzer, a folklorist often featured on National Public Radio; Joe Wilson, director of the National Council on the Traditional Arts; Michael Licht, the District of Columbia folklorist; and staff members at the Smithsonian Institution and the Folklife Center. When Edwin Colon y su Taller Campesino took the stage on April 23, 1992, to present traditional string music from Puerto Rico (introduced by Dan Sheehy), they inaugurated the fifteenth season of the Neptune Plaza Concert Series. But the group joined a company of folk musicians whose performances at the Library began more than fifty years ago. In the thirties and forties, American folk music may have meant Negro blues and spirituals, New England and Appalachian ballads. Today the American Folklife Center extends its purview to embrace a far greater diversity of cultural expression. The success of the Neptune Plaza Concert Series continues to depend on one central impulse, the devotion of many persons to the varied folk traditions in this land of many musics. .............................................................. Captions: FCN, spring 1992 Mining community on the main county road, Mohegan, West Virginia, September 1938. (LC-USF 34-50186-E) Photo by Marion Post Wolcott. Farm Security Administration Collection, Library of Congress Two-story red dog block home with a permastone facade and a brick addition in Mt. Hope, West Virginia. (NRG-KH-6-63231-5) All photos for this article by Karen Hudson Typical Ginn Linn home with its characteristic board and batten siding, in Kilsyth, West Virginia. (NRG-KH-6-63231-6) Glazed tile barn and silo in Oak Hill, West Virginia. Local builders used glazed tile to construct a host of buildings including homes and churches, as well as commercial and agricultural structures. (NRG-KH-6-63231-10) Ocatagonal shaped, cinder block, agricultural support building in Odd, West Virginia. (NRG-KH-6-63231-13) Concrete block corn crib with red and yellow brick trim on the Whitlock mine pony farm in Fayette County, West Virginia. (NRG- KH-5-63231-13) Lustron home in Oak Hill, West Virginia. (NRG-KH-5-63231-20) Cinder block smokehouse in Fayette County, West Virginia. (NRG- KH-62838-30) Homestead Works in operation, 1905. (LC-D401-10924-LC) Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress Steel Industry Heritage Regional Planning Council meeting, 1991. Consultant Elliot Rhodeside reviews his firm's draft maps of the proposed heritage area with council members. Photo by Randolph Harris Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Program project areas: no caption Edwin Colon of Edwin Colon Zayas y su Taller Campesino performed traditional string music from Puerto Rico on April 23, 1992, the inaugural concert of the fifteenth anniversary season of the Folklife Center's Neptune Plaza Concert Series. Photo by Reid Baker On September 23, 1976, Librarian of Congress Daniel J. Boorstin hosted a "picnic" to celebrate the decoration of the Neptune Plaza. The Court of Neptune Fountain is below the plaza, upper left, facing the street. The Hungarian folk group Eletfa brought four musicians and six dancers to the Neptune Plaza for a June 21, 1990, concert. Mattie Johnson and the Stars of Faith, August 20, 1987. There are hundreds of gospel groups in the Washington, D.C., area, and gospel is featured regularly in the Neptune Plaza Concert series. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Omaha Record at New Low Price ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Center director Alan Jabbour presented a documentary recording of Omaha Indian music to Charles Lone Wolf of the Hethu'shka (Warrior Society) from the Omaha Tribe in Macy, Nebraska, after the group performed at the Library of Congress on August 22, 1985. Photo by John Gibb Omaha Indian Music, produced by the American Folklife Center in cooperation withe the Omaha tribe, features dance songs of the Hethu'shka Society, along with the traditional Omaha funeral song, the Song of the Maize, love songs, and other social songs of the Omaha people. The songs on the album were selected from wax-cylinder recordings made between 1895 and 1910 by ethnologists Alice Cunningham Fletcher and Francis La Flesche. Although the fidelity of these historic recordings cannot compare with those made through contemporary technology, they are remarkably good and convey the vitality and exuberance of Omaha tradition. The album is accompanied by a seventeen-page booklet. Omaha Indian Music is available from the Library of Congress, Motion Picture, Broadcasting, and Recorded Sound Division, Washington, D.C. 20540, for a special price of four dollars ($4), including postage. Make checks payable to Library of Congress, M/B/RS Division. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Concert Series T-Shirts ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Folklife Center staff members at the Court of Neptune Fountain in front of the Library's Jefferson Building, wearing Neptune Plaza Concert Series T-shirts (top row: Victoria Brown, Thea Caemmerer; bottom row: Tim Lloyd, Hillary Glatt, Jim Hardin). The T-shirts feature a multi-color representation of Neptune with banjo, and are available from the American Folklife Center, Attn: Concert T- shirt, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540, for $10 plus $2 handling. State size: small, medium, large, or extra-large. Make checks payable to the American Folklife Center. Ingot-forging on train car, Homestead Works, Pennsylvania, 1894. The folklife and cultural heritage of industrial regions figures in the planning of the Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Program, which is described by Shalom Staub on page . Photo from Carnegie Library of Homestead, courtesy of Randolph Harris ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^END FCN TEXT^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^