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Posted by: Megan Harris
In 1942, Stewart Fulbright was a man on a mission: he desperately wanted to become a pilot in the Army Air Corps. Just shy of the weight requirement of 125 pounds, he gulped down half a dozen bananas on his way to his physical exam, only to find out that a lengthy written exam was …
Posted in: African American History, African Americans, Korean War, Oral History, Veterans History Project
Posted by: John Fenn
This is a guest post by Marcia Segal, a Processing Archivist at the American Folklife Center. Legendary blues singer Mississippi John Hurt’s song “Avalon Blues” appears on numerous recordings in the Tom Hoskins collection: “…Avalon, my hometown, always on my mind…” Hurt first recorded the song in 1928. In 1963, musician and blues music fan …
Posted in: Blues
Posted by: Stephanie Hall
On May 4, 1903, a prominent and well-respected attorney and U. S. commissioner, James Buchanan Marcum, was shot and killed on the steps of the Breathitt County courthouse in Jackson, Kentucky. “The J. B. Marcum Song,” more widely known as “The Ballad of J. B. Marcum,” preserves the memory of this important Kentucky citizen and the …
Posted in: Folksong
Posted by: Stephen Winick
On March 27, 2018, at Cecil Sharp House in London, the English Folk Dance and Song Society and the Elphinstone Institute of the University of Aberdeen hosted the public event ”40,000 Miles in Quest of Tradition: A Celebration of Carpenter Folk Online.” The event celebrated the launch of AFC’s James Madison Carpenter Collection at the Vaughan …
Posted in: James Madison Carpenter, Uncategorized
Posted by: Michelle Stefano
Yet another World Intellectual Property Day has arrived, and what better way to celebrate than to catch up with related developments on the folklife front? So far, this series has explored the international efforts of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in protecting traditional cultural expressions (TCEs) as intellectual property (IP) via IP protections. …
Posted in: Intangible Cultural Heritage, WIPO
Posted by: Megan Harris
The following is a guest blog post by Matt McCrady, Digital Conversion Specialist for the Library of Congress. The voice from seven decades ago comes through clear and distinct, with only the slight crackle of dust on the phonograph record to suggest the age of the recording. “Lloyd, this is Len. Remember? … Other day …
Posted in: Veterans History Project, Vietnam War, World War II
Posted by: Stephanie Hall
The last Friday in April is celebrated as National Arbor Day. The history of Arbor Day is profoundly connected with Americans’ relationships to trees over many generations. When European settlers first landed on the shores of eastern North America they encountered a landscape that is difficult for modern Americans to imagine. Familiar trees such as …
Posted in: Foodways
Posted by: Stephen Winick
On behalf of the American Folklife Center, I am pleased to announce that our James Madison Carpenter collection is now online. The collection, which consists of manuscripts, audio, photographs, and drawings documenting British folk music, song, and drama in the first half of the 20th century, is available worldwide through the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library’s …
Posted in: James Madison Carpenter
Posted by: Lisa Taylor
The following is a guest post by Barbara Hatch, Veterans Heritage Project Founder and Program Director. The program is based in Arizona. To learn more about this organization, read our 2016 post about it here. In 1998, students in my history classroom had seen the movie Saving Private Ryan and wanted to separate fact from …
Posted in: Narratives, Oral History, Storytelling, Students, teachers, Veterans History Project, World War II