Southern Highland Craft Guild - History

History

The Guild was actually the brain-child of Olive Dame Campbell, founder of the John C. Campbell Folk School. She and other founding members met through the Southern Mountain Workers Conference which was held in Knoxville beginning in 1900. At the Southern Mountain Workers Conference of 1926 Olive Campbell suggested forming an actual official crafts organization. This was followed by planning meetings in 1928 and 1929 at which founding members decided the goals and by-laws of the Guild at the Spinning Wheel in Asheville, North Carolina.

They then came up with the name of Southern Mountain Handicraft Guild. The organization was chartered in 1930 as the Southern Mountain Handicraft Guild and in 1933 changed its name to the Southern Highland Handicraft Guild. The name changed again in the 1990s where the word "Handicraft" was changed to just "Craft".

During the Great Depression and in the 1930s the Guild cultivated commerce for craftspeople in the Appalachian region. Educational programming is another fundamental element of the organization's mission. The Guild began work with the National Park Service in 1942 when they opened a shop on the Skyline Drive in Virginia. Unfortunately, World War II gasoline rationing ended that for the duration. Various other venues such as Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and Mammoth Cave National Park did not work out.

In the 1940s TVA work led to the formation of the Southern Highlanders, a craft marketing organization which was government sponsored and had shops at the Norris Dam in Tennessee and the Rockefeller Center in New York City. Because of the broad over-lap in region and purpose, Southern Highlanders merged with the Craft Guild in 1951. This same year the Parkway Craft Center that is run by the Southern Mountain Craft Guild opened at the Moses Cone Manor house.

Frances L. Goodrich was a founding member of the guild organization. She came to the Asheville region in 1890 to do educational and organizational work as a volunteer for the Presbyterian Home Mission Board. The idea of being involved in the arts and crafts field was an inspiration for her in the form of an antique bedspread. She had a background in art and knew about the Arts and Crafts movement from years of living in Europe. She seized the opportunity to create a crafts market, because the coverlet gift brought home the fact that craft work was still being done in the mountains.

The founding members also launched the library, which today is a collection of 9000 books and materials on craft, craft history, international and regional craftwork, and other art and regional materials.

Since 1980 it has operated out of the Folk Art Center in Asheville on the Blue Ridge Parkway as its permanent home. The guild is the second oldest craft organization in the United States behind the Boston Society of Arts and Crafts.