About the Project
Blue Ridge Music Trails is the product of an ongoing relationship between the N.C. Arts Council and UNC Press that now spans three books. Our first, the Cherokee Heritage Trails Guidebook, was published in April, 2003. Blue Ridge Music Trails was published in June, 2003. Literary Trails of the North Carolina Mountains was published in October, 2007. Each of these books, and their companion Web sites, serves the mission of the N.C. Arts Council by opening a window on our state's unique culture and insuring that it will remain strong and vital. UNC Press, an affiliate of the 16-campus UNC system, complements our efforts through its mission to advance scholarship and to serve the people of the state and the region. Founded in 1922 as the first university press in the South, it has demonstrated a deep understanding of our state's history and cultural heritage as well as a commitment to editorial excellence.
Preserve America Presidential Award
In May, 2004, President George Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush presented the first of four Preserve America Presidential Awards at a White House ceremony. One of the awards for Heritage Tourism went to the Blue Ridge Heritage Initiative, located in North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and Georgia. This initiative was responsible for promoting four groups of heritage tourism trails: Blue Ridge Music; Cherokee Heritage; Craft Heritage; and Farms, Gardens and Countryside. The accompanying guidebooks for driving tours, including Blue Ridge Music Trails: Finding a Place in the Circle, were recognized for helping visitors explore important cultural stories, places and traditions of the southern mountains. Accepting the award were North Carolina Arts Council Executive Director Mary B. Regan and Folklife Director Wayne Martin.
About the Author
Fred C. Fussell is a writer and documentary photographer who specializes in the traditional folk culture of the American South. From 1987 through 1993 he served as chief curator of the Columbus (GA) Museum, where he developed a major permanent installation on the culture history of the lower Chattahoochee River Valley region of Alabama and Georgia.
His books include Blue Ridge Music Trails: Finding a Place in the Circle (University of North Carolina Press, 2003), A Chattahoochee Album: Traditional People and Folksy Places around the Lower Chattahoochee River Valley of Alabama and Georgia (Historic Chattahoochee Commission, 2002), Pot Liquor: Tales and Recollections told by the People of Stewart County, Georgia (Historic Westville, Inc., 2003), and Memory Paintings of an Alabama Farm: the Art and Remembrances of Jessie DuBose Rhoads, Alabama Folk Artist (Historic Chattahoochee Commission, 1983). He has written articles and essays for The New Georgia Guide, The Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, The New Georgia Encyclopedia, The Georgia Music Magazine, and other journals and periodicals.
Fussell currently directs the Chattahoochee Folklife Project and is exhibit curator for the Gertrude "Ma" Rainey Blues Museum in Columbus, Georgia. He is also a visual artist and maintains a studio in Buena Vista, Georgia, where he lives.