Mitchell County Historical Society presents on May 9th at the Northlight Building on the Penland Campus at 7PM, The Appalachian School and the Penland School of Craft: Connections
Everyone is familiar with the Penland School of Craft, but few know the story about how it came to be. Yes, Miss Lucy Morgan is well known, but there are a lot more people who came before her to establish the school that she transformed into the internationally known school it is today.
We will tell the story from the first school that was on that property—the Flat Rock School to the Appalachian School to the Penland School of Craft.
We will focus on the people who founded the different schools and make sure to remember some of the local folks who worked with Lucy Morgan especially in the beginning to bring weaving and other crafts to the school and to our community.
The theme is connections—how so many people are connected to so many other people to make all of this possible. And how we, especially local people, continue to be important connections to the School of Crafts.
We’ll talk about folks from over around Macon County, down around Oxford, the first Bishop of the Asheville Episcopal Dioecies, Michigan, Vermont, and a very special person the educator John Dewey. Local folks like Aunt Susie Phillips and Cumi Woody, and Emma Conley. Talk about a murder that changed the course of the history of the school.
