Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at rinzlerarchives@si.edu or (202) 633-7322 for additional information.
Collection Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Contact archives staff for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Moses and Frances Asch Collection, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at rinzlerarchives@si.edu or (202) 633-7322 for additional information.
Collection Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Contact archives staff for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Moses and Frances Asch Collection, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at rinzlerarchives@si.edu or (202) 633-7322 for additional information.
Collection Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Contact archives staff for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Moses and Frances Asch Collection, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
File consists of liner notes from Newport Folk Festival and "Songs of the Civil War" albums; transcript from interview w/Irwin Silber, 8/7/1992; hand written notes and manuscript materials referring to biographical information pertaining to Moe; and correspondence between Silber and Peter Goldsmith regarding a tape, 7/9/1992.
Collection Restrictions:
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at rinzlerarchives@si.edu or (202) 633-7322 for additional information.
Collection Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Contact archives staff for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Moses and Frances Asch Collection, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
11 slicks, mechanical with 2 overlays and detached original photograph, mechanical with 3 overlays and attached photograph.
Photographer: David Gahr
Cover Design: Interdesign
Collection Restrictions:
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at rinzlerarchives@si.edu or (202) 633-7322 for additional information.
Collection Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Contact archives staff for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Moses and Frances Asch Collection, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
Covers his early life, education, life-long work in folklore, career at the Smithsonian, and the development of the Festival of American Folklife, c. 1934-1993, including: Early life and schooling at Swarthmore College; introduction to folk music, incl...
The Smithsonian Institution Festival of American Folklife, held annually since 1967 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was renamed the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in 1998. The materials collected here document the planning, production, and execution of the annual Festival, produced by the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage (1999-present) and its predecessor offices (1967-1999). An overview of the entire Festival records group is available here: Smithsonian Folklife Festival records.
Scope and Contents note:
This collection documents the planning, production, and execution of the 1967 Festival of American Folklife. Materials may include photographs, audio recordings, motion picture film and video recordings, notes, production drawings, contracts, memoranda, correspondence, informational materials, publications, and ephemera. Such materials were created during the Festival on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., as well as in the featured communities, before or after the Festival itself.
Arrangement note:
Arranged in 5 series.
Series 1: Program Books, Festival Publications, and Ephemera
Series 2: Fieldwork
Series 3: Photographs
Series 4: Audio
Series 5: Video
Historical note:
The Festival of American Folklife, held annually since 1967 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was renamed the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in 1998.
The 1967 Festival of American Folklife was produced by the Smithsonian Division of Performing Arts.
For more information, see Smithsonian Folklife Festival records.
Introduction:
In 1966, Smithsonian Secretary S. Dillon Ripley engaged James R. Morris to serve as Director of Museum Services, soon to become a new Division of Performing Arts. Ripley charged Morris to develop a full program of performances on the National Mall - sound and light show, readings and concerts, films, live demonstrations, and special exhibitions. Morris, who had previously organized the American Folk Festival in Asheville, North Carolina, in 1963, proposed that the Smithsonian host a folk festival as the centerpiece of the outdoors activities. Through the Asheville festival, Morris had come into contact with key people involved in the Newport Folk Festival, among them Alan Lomax. It was Lomax who suggested that the Smithsonian hire Newport's then-director of field programs, Ralph C. Rinzler, to help plan a Smithsonian festival. The term "folklife", drawn from Scandinavian usage, was chosen over "folk" as the name of the new Festival.
The first Festival of American Folklife was held July 1-4, 1967 in two tents - one for crafts and one for sales - a music stage, and a performance area on the terrace of the Museum of History and Technology (later, the National Museum of American History). Fifty-eight traditional craftspeople and thirty-two musical and dance groups from throughout the United States demonstrated and performed at the first open-air event. Mountain banjo-pickers and ballad singers, Chinese lion dancers, Indian sand painters, basket and rug weavers, New Orleans jazz bands and a Bohemian hammer dulcimer band from east Texas combined with the host of participants from many rural and urban areas of the U.S. The entire event was free to the public, the expense of the production having been borne by the Smithsonian aided by numerous civic and cultural organizations, business enterprises and State Arts Councils.
The 1967 Festival drew a huge crowd - estimated at more than 400,000 - and strong interest from the press, Members of Congress, and Smithsonian leadership. In the Smithsonian's annual report for 1967, Ripley reflected on the success of the Festival:
Within - in the Museum - the tools, the products of craft work, the musical instruments hang suspended in cases, caught in beautifully petrified isolation. Without, for the space of a few hours they came alive in the hands of specialists from all over America.... It was a moving spectacle and one that underscored the principle that a museum, to be a museum in the best sense of the word, must live and breathe both within and without.
The 1967 Festival marked the inception of a fresh attempt at the evaluation, documentation and celebration of a hitherto unrecognized area of vigorous American expression. Concurrent with the first Festival, an American Folklife Conference was organized (with assistance from Henry Glassie) to address topics of American and international folklife studies, the relationship between folklife and history, applied folklife, and folklife in schools, museums, communities, and government agencies.
The Festival was organized by the Division of Performing Arts, under the direction of James R. Morris. Ralph Rinzler was the Applied Folklore Consultant and Festival Artistic Director, and Marian A. Hope was Project Assistant. No program book or schedule was published, but news articles, congressional remarks, letters from the public, and a list of participants were later compiled in lieu of a program book. That document can be viewed in Series 1.
Participants:
Crafts
Harry Belone, 1912-1986, Navajo sand painter, Arizona
Herman Benton, 1914-1994, scoop maker, New York
Mary Bowers, 1922-2002, Seminole patchwork, needlework, Florida
Marie Z. Chino, 1907-1982, Acoma pottery, New Mexico
Mildred Cleghorn, 1910-1997, Indian cloth dolls, Oklahoma
Maisy Coburn, apple face and corncob dolls, Arkansas
Margaret Coochwytewa, 1923-1995, Hopi, coil and yucca leaves basket maker, Arizona
Victor Coochwytewa, 1922-2011, Hopi silversmith, Arizona
Freedom Quilting Bee, Alabama
Taft Greer, 1908-1986, weaver, Tennessee
Joseph Grismayer, 1888-1970, willow basket maker, Pennsylvania
Dewey Harmon, 1900-1972, whittler, North Carolina
Bea Hensley, 1919-2013, blacksmith, North Carolina
Louise Jones, 1910-1973, coil basket making, South Carolina
Robert Keith, chair maker, North Carolina
Mrs. Robert Keith, chair maker, North Carolina
Norman Kennedy, 1934-, carder, spinner, weaver, Massachusetts
Clifford Lucas, Indian dolls, New Mexico
Lila Suzanne Marshall, 1908-1994, corn shuck dolls, North Carolina
Charles Mayac, 1906-1971, ivory carver, Alaska
Leo J. Meyer, scrimshaw carver, Maryland
Alice Merryman, 1906-2007, corn shuck dolls, Arkansas
Norman Miller, 1905-1972, southern pottery, Alabama
Mrs. Norman Miller, southern pottery, Alabama
Hazel Miracle, 1915-2001, apple face, corn shuck dolls, Kentucky
Homer Miracle, 1910-1980, hand-hewn bowls, carver, Kentucky
Ann Mitchell, corn shuck dolls, Maryland
Golda Porter, spinner, North Carolina
Edd Presnell, 1916-1994, dulcimer maker, North Carolina
Wade Ward (1892-1971) and the Buck Mountain Band, mountain string band, Virginia
Yomo Toro Band, Puerto Rican music, New York
Ed Young (1910-1972), G.D. Young and Lonnie Young (1903-1976), African American fife and drum group, Mississippi
Young People's Chorus from the Scripture of Church of Christ, gospel, Virginia
Dance
Blue Ridge Mountain Dancers, cloggers, North Carolina
Chinese Lion Group, Washington, D.C.
Maurice Flowers, square dance caller, Maryland
Los Gallegos d'Espana, Galician dance, New York
Glinka Dancers, Russian dance group, New Jersey
Jochim Koyuk, King Island Eskimo dancer, Alaska
Mrs. Jochim Koyuk, King Island Eskimo dancer, Alaska
McNeff Dancers, Irish dancing with Ceilidh band, New York
Henry Paterick, square dance caller, Virginia
St. Andrews Society Group, Scottish dancing, Washington, D.C.
Forms Part Of:
Smithsonian Folklife Festival records: 1967 Festival of American Folklife forms part of the Smithsonian Folklife Festival records .
Smithsonian Folklife Festival records
Smithsonian Folklife Festival records: Papers
1967 Festival of American Folklife records - [Ongoing]
Related Archival Materials note:
Within the Rinzler Archives, related materials may be found in various collections such as the Ralph Rinzler papers and recordings, the Lily Spandorf drawings, the Diana Davies photographs, the Robert Yellin photographs, and the Curatorial Research, Programs, and Projects collection. Additional relevant materials may also be found in the Smithsonian Institution Archives concerning the Division of Performing Arts (1966-1983), Folklife Program (1977-1980), Office of Folklife Programs (1980-1991), Center for Folklife Programs and Cultural Studies (1991-1999), Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage (1999-present), and collaborating Smithsonian units, as well as in the administrative papers of key figures such as the Secretary and respective deputies. Users are encouraged to consult relevant finding aids and to contact Archives staff for further information.
Restrictions:
Access by appointment only. Where a listening copy or viewing copy has been created, this is indicated in the respective inventory; additional materials may be accessible with sufficient advance notice and, in some cases, payment of a processing fee. Older papers are housed at a remote location and may require a minimum of three weeks' advance notice and payment of a retrieval fee. Certain formats such as multi-track audio recordings and EIAJ-1 videoreels (1/2 inch) may not be accessible. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at 202-633-7322 or rinzlerarchives@si.edu for additional information.
Rights:
Copyright and other restrictions may apply. Generally, materials created during a Festival are covered by a release signed by each participant permitting their use for personal and educational purposes; materials created as part of the fieldwork leading to a Festival may be more restricted. We permit and encourage such personal and educational use of those materials provided digitally here, without special permissions. Use of any materials for publication, commercial use, or distribution requires a license from the Archives. Licensing fees may apply in addition to any processing fees.
3.83 Cubic feet (8 binders containing contact sheets, slides, and prints; 7 boxes (8.5"x10.75"x2.5") of 35 mm negatives; 2 binders of 35 mm and 120 format negatives; and 1 box of 11 oversize prints.)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Contact sheets
Slides (photographs)
Black-and-white negatives
Photographic prints
Place:
New York (N.Y.)
Saint Simons Island (Ga. : Island)
Date:
1963-2009
Summary:
The Diana Davies photographs consist of images taken by Diana Davies at various stages of her career. Locations include the Festival of American Folklife, the Newport Folk Festival, the Philadelphia Folk Festival, the Poor People's Campaign, various peace and protest marches and outdoor performances, New York City, and the Georgia Sea Islands. The collection includes contact sheets, negatives, photographic prints, and slides.
Original photographs, negatives, and color slides taken by Diana Davies. Materials date from 1963-2009. Bulk dates: Newport Folk Festival, 1963-1969, 1987, 1992; Philadelphia Folk Festival, 1967-1968, 1987.
Scope and Contents:
The Diana Davies photographs, 1963-2009, consist of black and white negatives, contact sheets and prints, as well as color slides and negatives. The bulk of materials depict major festivals and protest movements (including the Poor People's March of 1968) documented by Diana Davies (located in Series 1: Newport Folk Festival, Series 2: Philadelphia Folk Festival, Series 6: Festival of American Folklife, and Series 11: Social Justice). Also well-represented are non-festival performances (in locations such as clubs, concert halls, and homes), recording sessions, and other music-related images, mainly of notable figures in the American folk music revival (located in Series 3: Broadside Magazine, Series 4: Sing Out! Magazine Concerts, Series 5: Miscellaneous Concerts and People, Series 7: Recording Sessions, Series 8: Instruction Book Shots, and Series 9: Jazz, Blues, and Salsa Musicians). Series 10: Georgia Sea Islands consists of photographs depicting the culture, environment, and daily life of these coastal islands in 1966. Series 12: New York City Scenes contains photographs taken on the street depicting everyday life in NYC in the 1960s and 1970s. The collection also contains related papers in Series 13: Miscellaneous Papers and Correspondence.
Arrangement note:
Each item in the Diana Davies Photographs has been assigned an accession number, and like materials have been put together such as the Newport Folk Festival photographs, in a chronological sequence as much as possible. Materials in the three more recent donation batches (1998, 2004, and 2006) were numbered and integrated into the collection. In some series, the accession numbers are in numerical order, and in others, the numbers are random because like items with different number sequences were pulled together in a series for subject coherence. The best way to find occurrences of a particular subject is to use the ctrl+F function. Please consult the archivists if you have any questions about the collection contents.
Contact sheets, slides, and prints arranged in 8 binders; negatives and oversize prints are stored separately.
Arranged in 14 series:
Series 1: Newport Folk Festival
Series 2: Philadelphia Folk Festival
Series 3: Broadside Magazine
Series 4: -- Sing Out! -- Magazine Concerts
Series 5: Miscellaneous Concerts and People
Series 6: Festival of American Folklife
Series 7: Recording Sessions
Series 8: Instruction Book Shots
Series 9: Jazz, Blues, and Salsa Musicians
Series 10: Georgia Sea Islands
Series 11: Social Justice
Series 12: New York City Scenes
Series 13: Miscellaneous Papers and Correspondence
Series 14: Oversize Materials
Biographical/Historical note:
Diana Davies is a well-known photographer of folk performers and festivals. Davies photographed the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in its earlier years. Born in 1938, Davies grew up in Maine, the Catskills, New York City, and Boston. Her grandparents were local union organizers and Debs socialists; one grandfather was a gandy dancer with the railroad, and her grandmother was a textile worker in Massachusetts, New York, and Pennsylvania. Davies finds that her family background was later expressed in her own activist efforts.
Davies left high school at 16, and worked sweeping out coffeehouses, which gave her the opportunity to listen to music while she worked. She became interested in theater and music. In Greenwich Village, she began doing some sound technician work, and then got interested in photography. She taught herself how to develop and print photographs in a darkroom, and began photographing in theaters, shooting from behind the scenes. Her theater photos are at Smith College in Northampton, where she presently lives. In the early 1960s, she began working with the editors of Broadside Magazine, Sis Cunningham and Gordon Friesen. She developed an interest in human rights work, which grew from her contact with Sis and Gordon, and also her own family background. She also worked as a photographer in a wide range of settings, including night clubs, weddings, and doing portrait photography. This led her to work for major national and international media including the New York Times, covering such events as the war in Biafra, and traveling to Mexico, Cuba, and Portugal on assignment.
Davies' folk photographs represent about one-quarter of her body of work; her other major photographic work includes the Civil Rights Movement, the Peace Movement, and theater. Davies began photographing at the Newport Folk Festival in 1964, which she covered for a number of years. She knew Ralph Rinzler, and found him a vibrant, alive person excited by all aspects of culture. He introduced her to Bessie Jones from the Georgia Sea Islands, and in 1966 she made a photographic journey to the islands. Her work from this trip is included in the collection. Davies has also been a musician. She became involved with the punk rock movement of the 1970s, and felt that there was a connection between the hard-hitting songs from the punk world and the songs being published in Broadside Magazine. In 1975, she became part of a folk/punk women's band in Boston, and later moved to Western Massachusetts. In addition to being a photographer and musician, Davies is also a writer. She wrote a play entitled "The Witch Papers" in 1980, which was produced in Boston and other locations. The play was a vehicle for her human rights activism, comparing the technology of inquisition with labor sweatshops. In 1998, her play "The War Machine" was produced in Amherst, Mass. She lives in Northampton, and enjoys and participates in street performance, which she describes as the "most essentially communicative stuff you can come up with."
General note:
All contact sheets from the collection are digitized and accessible through this finding aid. Series-level slideshows accessible through this finding aid represent a small sampling from the collection.
Provenance:
The Smithsonian Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections acquired portions of the Diana Davies Photograph Collection in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when Ms. Davies photographed for the Festival of American Folklife. More materials came to the Archives circa 1989 or 1990. Archivist Stephanie Smith visited her in 1998 and 2004, and brought back additional materials which Ms. Davies wanted to donate to the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections. These two more recent donations of additional photographs (contact sheets, prints, and slides) consisted of documentation of the Newport Folk Festival, the Philadelphia Folk Festival, the Poor People's March on Washington, the Civil Rights Movement, the Georgia Sea Islands, and miscellaneous personalities of the American folk revival. In a letter dated 12 March 2002, Ms. Davies gave full discretion to the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage to grant permission for both internal and external use of her photographs, with the provison that her work be credited in any use.
Restrictions:
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at 202-633-7322 or rinzlerarchives@si.edu for additional information.
Permission for the duplication or publication of items in the Diana Davies Photograph Collection must be obtained from the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections.
Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Please contact the archives staff for further information.
The Festival of American Folklife, held annually since 1967 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was renamed the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in 1998. This collection documents the planning, production, and execution of the annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival. These Festival records include administrative papers and the audiovisual documentation of annual Festivals (1967-ongoing). Finding aids are available here: Smithsonian Folklife Festival records.
Scope and Contents note:
This collection documents the planning, production, and execution of the annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival. Materials include photographs, audio recordings, motion picture film and video recordings, notes, production drawings, contracts, memoranda, correspondence, informational materials, publications, and ephemera. In earlier years these materials were all created as paper records or analog media; ongoing retrospective digitization efforts aim to preserve those and make them more widely accessible. Increasingly, the Festival records are now born as digital media or electronic documents.
Staff and contractors of the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage collaborate with Smithsonian staff photographers to document the Festival in images. The Center's videographer, contract crews, volunteers, and interns video-record Festival performances and demonstrations. Volunteers trained by the Center's archivists record and log audiotapes at every Festival stage and discussion area. In recent years, the average documentation of a Festival may consist of some 10,000 images, several hundred audio recordings, and 5+ terabytes of video; this audiovisual documentation is complemented by thousands of pages of administrative and planning documents. In addition to the documentation of the Festival on the National Mall, the collection includes field research conducted by Smithsonian researchers or, increasingly, by researchers drawn from the community, state, or nation featured.
Festival papers
The Smithsonian Folklife Festival papers include the correspondence, memoranda, notes, planning documents, and various other records associated with the Festival as a whole or with one or more of its years or programs. This includes, among others, administrative records such as planning documents, contracts, agreements, and memoranda of understanding, correspondence, meeting materials, etc.; programmatic records pertaining to the development and curation of the Festival or one of its programs such as correspondence, reports, proposals, concepts, notes, other planning documents, etc.; participant records such as participant handbooks, participant invitation and contract letters, release/voucher forms, participant questionnaires, staffing and payment schedules, and related materials; and artwork and graphic design files used in publications, signage, and other media as well as associated release forms. It does not such categories of papers as finance and administration records, personnel records, development records, publicity files, or technical project files.
For any given Festival, materials within the collection typically include:
Program books, publications, and ephemera
Program books were published from 1968 through 2011 and again in 2013, and typically included introductory essays and keynote essays on each program, as well as a list of Festival participants, schedule of activities, site map, and staff list. Occasionally, the schedule and lists were published separately from the essays. Beginning in 2012, a shorter guide provided an overview of each program, its participants, and schedule. Beginning in 2014, an annual review reported on the activities of the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, including the Festival. Digital versions of these materials, as well as site maps for each Festival except the first, are found as the first series within each annual collection. In addition, the Rinzler Archives houses one or more copies of the original printed versions of each publication. In later years, web resources were often published to enhance the Festival experience. Digitally archived copies of these resources are accessible through this finding aid.
For many Festivals, one or more posters were published. Cookbooks were occasionally published in connection with a Festival program, particularly in the case of a foreign country's participation. Materials aimed toward children or families, typically suggesting activities they could engage in during the Festival or before and after their visit, were published for many Festivals or programs. Original printed copies of such publications and ephemera are housed within the Rinzler Archives; as these are digitized over time they will be made available through this finding aid.
Fieldwork
Fieldwork may take the form of photographs, audio or video recordings, notes, transcripts, reports, correspondence, and other documents. Where these are clearly associated with a single Festival program, they are identified as such, housed discretely within the Rinzler Archive, and inventoried as part of that program. In some cases, fieldwork notes and reports may also be found among the Smithsonian Folklife Festival Papers, so the inventories within each program here may not always be comprehensive. As materials are processed over time, these inventories will be updated and enhanced.
Photographs
Photographs may include digital photographs, photographic prints, negatives, and slides, both black-and-white and color. These depict events and activities on the National Mall during the Festival, as well as informal activities of Festival participants at the hotel or while visiting Washington. Ongoing digitization efforts aim to preserve earlier analog photographs and make them more readily accessible. The Smithsonian's Digital Asset Management System (DAMS) stores all of the digital images, whether born digital (19XX-present) or digitized from analog originals. The present finding aid seeks to provide direct access to a sample of such photographs, although in most cases numerous other photographs also exist in the Rinzler Archives.
Audio
Throughout its history, the Festival has endeavored to create a comprehensive audio record of the performances, discussions, and other activities on all of its stages and performance venues, typically by taking a feed from that stage's sound reinforcement system. Occasionally, audio recordings also included interviews with craftspeople or Festival visitors who were not on stage, as well as evening rehearsals and informal interactions at the Festival hotel. Given the nature of the Festival as an outdoor event and the inevitable interference of airplanes flying overhead and traffic noises from adjacent streets, and given that the requirements of live sound reinforcement are not identical with those of audio recording, the resulting recordings are sometimes subject to interruption and technical shortcomings. In certain years, special arrangements were made for high-quality, multi-track recording, even if the vast majority of recordings are done at lower quality. At the time of recording, volunteers create logs or track sheets describing the content of each recording; in some cases these have been revised and corrected and in other cases the simultaneous logs have not been verified or revised. Retrospective digitization efforts aim to preserve older recordings and make them more widely accessible.
Video
Motion picture films and video recordings of Festival activities were created beginning in 1968 (for film) and 1973 (for video). In contrast with the audio recordings that sought to document primarily the activities on stage, the film and video efforts were typically both more inclusive (by covering crafts, occupational demonstrations, foodways, rehearsals, and non-stage events) and more selective (focusing on a sampling of each day's activities or on a single program, rather than beginning-to-end coverage of the entire Festival). As with the audio recordings, simultaneous written logs note what was recorded. Digital video is stored on the Smithsonian DAMS, with ongoing efforts to digitize older analog materials, whether born as motion picture film or as video.
Arrangement note:
The Smithsonian Folklife Festival records include one collection of papers and administrative documents and annual collections of the audiovisual documentation associated with each year's Festival.
Smithsonian Folklife Festival records
Smithsonian Folklife Festival records: Papers
1967 Festival of American Folklife records - [Ongoing]
Historical note:
The Festival of American Folklife, held annually since 1967 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was renamed the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in 1998. It is produced by the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage (1999-present) and by its predecessors: the Center for Folklife Programs and Cultural Studies (1991-1999), Office of Folklife Programs (1979-1991), Folklife Program of the Office of American and Folklife Studies (1977-1979), and Division of Performing Arts (1967-1976). Beginning with the 1973 Festival, the National Park Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior became cosponsor of the Festival.
The Festival is organized to increase and diffuse knowledge about grassroots culture. It is a research-based, curated event, drawing on the efforts of Smithsonian staff, academic and lay scholars from the featured cultures, and people who know a great deal about their own cultures. The most distinctive feature of the Festival is its attempt to foreground the voices of tradition bearers as they demonstrate, discuss, and present their folklife and cultural heritage. Since its founding the Festival has always navigated between the various axes of art (as entertainment), cultural rights (as advocacy), education (as public service), and knowledge (as scholarship).
Since its founding, the Festival has featured exemplary tradition bearers from more than 50 nations, every region of the United States, scores of ethnic communities, more than 100 American Indian groups, and some 50 occupations. Each year's Festival typically includes several programs, each focusing on a state or region of the United States, a foreign country, an occupation, or a theme.
The Festival was born in 1967 during the tenure of Smithsonian Secretary S. Dillon Ripley, part of a larger effort to make the National Mall more accessible to the American public and to make the Smithsonian's programs more exciting and engaging. James Morris, director of Museum Services and then of the Division of Performing Arts, proposed that the Smithsonian host a folk festival as the centerpiece of the outdoors activities on the National Mall. Ralph C. Rinzler, then-director of field programs for the Newport Folk Festival, was engaged to help plan the 1967 Festival, serving as Festival Director from 1968-1982.
The Festival's growth and evolution over subsequent decades can be traced through introductory notes for each annual Festival. Those notes seek to provide an overview of that year's Festival and of each of its programs, as they were conceived by their organizers at the time. In certain cases, geographic names or other terms are retained that may not reflect current usage. Those notes also include detailed information on the institutional arrangements, key personnel, and major donors and partners for each annual Festival.
Related Archival Materials note:
Within the Rinzler Archives, related materials may be found in various collections such as the Ralph Rinzler papers and recordings, the Lily Spandorf drawings, the Diana Davies photographs, the Robert Yellin photographs, and the Curatorial Research, Programs, and Projects collection. Additional relevant materials may also be found in the Smithsonian Institution Archives concerning the Division of Performing Arts (1966-1983), Folklife Program (1977-1980), Office of Folklife Programs (1980-1991), Center for Folklife Programs and Cultural Studies (1991-1999), Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage (1999-present), and collaborating Smithsonian units, as well as in the administrative papers of key figures such as the Secretary and respective deputies. Users are encouraged to consult relevant finding aids and to contact Archives staff for further information.
Restrictions:
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at 202-633-7322 for additional information.
Access by appointment only. Where a listening copy or viewing copy has been created, this is indicated in the respective inventory; additional materials may be accessible with sufficient advance notice and, in some cases, payment of a processing fee. Older papers are housed at a remote location and may require a minimum of three weeks' advance notice and payment of a retrieval fee. Certain formats such as multi-track audio recordings and EIAJ-1 videoreels (1/2 inch) may not be accessible. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at 202-633-7322 or rinzlerarchives@si.edu for additional information.
Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Contact archives staff for information.
Copyright and other restrictions may apply. Generally, materials created during a Festival are covered by a release signed by each participant permitting their use for personal and educational purposes; materials created as part of the fieldwork leading to a Festival may be more restricted. We permit and encourage such personal and educational use of those materials provided digitally here, without special permissions. Use of any materials for publication, commercial use, or distribution requires a license from the Archives; please submit this form. Licensing fees may apply in addition to any processing fees.
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at 202-633-7322 or rinzlerarchives@si.edu for additional information.
Permission for the duplication or publication of items in the Diana Davies Photograph Collection must be obtained from the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections.
Collection Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Please contact the archives staff for further information.
Collection Citation:
Diana Davies photographs, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
Access by appointment only. Contact the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections at 202-633-7322 or rinzlerarchives@si.edu for additional information.
Permission for the duplication or publication of items in the Diana Davies Photograph Collection must be obtained from the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections.
Collection Rights:
Copyright restrictions apply. Please contact the archives staff for further information.
Collection Citation:
Diana Davies photographs, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
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