Sheep shearer Anthony Cole
The Southern Highland Craft Guild will host its annual Heritage Day on Saturday, September 17, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Folk Art Center. The free event features demonstrations of traditional crafts, live bluegrass and gospel music and the legendary Annual World Gee Haw Whimmy Diddle Competition at 2 p.m.
Lyle Wheeler will be demonstrating the making of chair parts for the iconic Appalachian settin’ chair, using techniques and tools harkening back to the 1800s. “I will be using a shaving horse to hold the material, red oak, and I will be shaping it with a drawknife and spokeshaves,” Wheeler says.
Wheeler will also be demonstrating the making and prestidigitation of the whimmy diddle, a traditional Appalachian folk toy made from two sticks of rhododendron, one with carved notches and a propeller attached to the end. Rubbing the notches with the second stick makes the propeller spin. In the competition, contestants are judged by how many times they can make their whimmy diddle gee (spin to the right) and haw (spin to the left). “I have the highest average finish of any competitor and look forward to reclaiming my title in the professional division again this year,” says Wheeler.
Katherine Caldwell, owner of Spirit of the Grain, will be demonstrating her wheat weaving craft during Heritage Day. Caldwell was taught wheat weaving by Guild member Janet Morris who learned it in the 1980s from masters of the craft from England and Kansas. “This craft dates back to the dawn of agriculture and there are patterns still used that trace back to ancient Mesopotamia where growing wheat and other grains began,” says Caldwell. Wheat weaving is not historically or indigenously done in the Appalachian region, where the more popular crop was corn. “I am part of the Heritage Day event because it is also a harvest event and wheat weaving was historically part of the harvest season,” says Caldwell. “The last bit of wheat from the fields was taken and the straws were shaped and braided into some kind of wonderful pattern or symbol and hung in people’s homes through the winter.” Hopes were that the “spirit of the grain” would bring a successful harvest the following year.
For more information, call 828.298.7928 or visit CraftGuild.org.
