Catskills Folk Connection on Racism

Catskills Folk Connection’s mission is to conserve and celebrate the expressions of everyday life of all people in the Catskill Mountain region. The mission is founded on an underlying belief in cultural equity. Our focus on folklore, folk art, and folklife provides a way toward an inclusive society made up of diverse groups, communities and individuals, whose ways of life are significant and are deserving of equal support and respect.

Therefore Catskills Folk Connection, in solidarity with communities of color throughout the United States, and with other folklorists and their organizations in New York State and beyond, offers our support of the Black Lives Matter movement in its quest for justice for people of color and for the eradication of institutional racism. We deplore the nationwide ongoing violence against communities of color and recognize that now is the time for us, all of us, to engage in difficult conversations with family, friends, colleagues, and others within our communities.

Catskills Folk Connection affirms its commitment to be part of the societal change that will alleviate racism in all its forms, that will counter stereotyping and scapegoating among our region’s residents, and that will promote equal rights and equal access to cultural and economic prosperity for all. We pledge to seek diverse leadership for Catskills Folk Connection, to continue efforts to expand our programs with marginalized groups in the Catskills, and to increase our support for local and community scholars.

--- Ginny Scheer, Folklorist

_____ Meet the Folk Artists 4 _____

A new bi-weekly feature

Ken Etts and Joe Hewitt

Whistle Stick

Ken Etts lives on the acreage his grandfather farmed in Montgomery Hollow, Roxbury NY.  He and his wife Toni run a successful dog kennel and grooming service as a retirement business.   Ken, known locally as "Chub",  made a living in car body repair and had a reputation for being able to shape metal and bondo so sensitively that his work was commonly called "artistic."

Ken's contribution to the exhibit "Folk Art in Wood", to take place in September, is neither metal nor bondo.  By chance, I had my cell phone when I encountered Chub at the convenience store and somehow the conversation came around to the whistle stick.  He quickly retrieved one from his truck and demonstrated it for me. [Please forgive my un-huhs and clucks during the recording!]  The wood carving - notches taken out of edges of a square "dowel"- is a technique that characterizes some folk creations called "tramp art" that are often included in exhibitions of Outsider Art.  In the whistle stick the notches are more functional than artistic.  Watch the video and see if you can detect what makes the propeller turn.  Then watch again to see what makes it reverse direction.  Can you hear the whistle that happens at the same time?

Ken Etts demonstrating the whistle stick, December, 2019

Ken has made several whistle sticks.  He says he learned to make them and to operate them from Joe Hewitt, the legendary state trooper and tradition bearer originally from Denver NY and now living in  New Kingston.  Joe is well-known as a keeper of bees, a student of Native American traditions, and a deep well of local knowledege and skills.  He remembers teaching Chub to make whistle sticks, but said he hadn't made one in a long time, until now.  Joe learned to make whistle sticks from Freddy Hammond, a fellow state trooper who was from Ithaca, "the best friend I ever had in the state police," Joe says.

Joe Hewitt demonstrating his newly made whistle stick, January 2020.

The folk process is usually assumed to be oral transmission from one generation to the next.  But in the case of the whistle stick it seems to be from one adult male to another.  Perhaps this is just a happen-so, because another wood skill Freddy Hammond knew - making a whistle from striped maple bark - Joe had already learned as a child from Ralph Felter Sr., a carpenter who was working at Joe's Dad's farm.  And still in the generational pattern, Joe remembers showing his kids how to make striped maple whistles.  He realizes now that he needs to show his grandchildren how to make and use whistle sticks, passing on both the creation and mystery. 

You will be able to view a whistle stick, and perhaps a demonstration, this September at Catskills Folk Connection's exhibit, "Folk Art in Wood" at Hanford Mills Museum.  It will run through September and end with the Museum's Woodsmen's Festival in early October.  Should we not be able to present the exhibit for in-person viewing, there will be an on-line exhibit at Catskills Folk Connection's new website, now being designed.

Ginny Scheer, Folklorist, Catskills Folk Connection

, 

______Meet the Folklorists 3 _____

A new  bi-weekly feature 

Kira Lendo

Creator of Pictures in Wood

Kira makes pictures in wood using a woodburner.  The varying textures and wood tones look like layers of different wood, but instead come from choices of tips for the woodburner.  “There is no layering... if you touch one of the pictures you will feel the indentations – some of them deeper than others -  [of] the pen – it’s not really a pen but the woodburner – burning itself into the wood.”

She uses color on a few of her works, but most of them are in the colors of the wood itself.  For the natural colored ones she uses  "... different tips ... it looks almost like a pen, and the tip is different.   And the one I use has different wires on it and some of them make better .. curves, some may shade better.  … I have a tendency to use the same one that I like over and over again ..."

Kira is inspired by her mother who was an accomplished artist in pencil and watercolor.  As she found her creative spirit grow Kira tried many different media, settling on wood-burned pictures, supported by her husband who clear coats the pictures, builds frames and encourages her with select tools.  Kira is clear that doing art is her time for herself, for her self-expression.  Nevertheless, she participates in a few craft shows each year where she sells her work.

You will be able to view some of Kira's creations this September at Catskills Folk Connection's exhibit, "Folk Art in Wood" at Hanford Mills Museum.  It will run through September and end with the Museum's Woodsmen's Festival in early October.  Should we not be able to present the exhibit for in-person viewing, there will be an on-line exhibit at Catskills Folk Connection's new website, now being designed.