Poets Karen Paul Holmes and Brenda Kay Ledford to read at the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, NC, on Thursday, June 15, 2017

JOHN C. CAMPBELL FOLK SCHOOL

On Thursday, June 15, 2017 at 7:00 PM, John Campbell Folk School and North Carolina Writers' Network-West are sponsoring The Literary Hour, an hour of poetry and prose reading held at Keith House on the JCFS campus. This event is held regularly on the third Thursday the month. The reading is free of charge and the public is invited to attend. Poets Karen Paul Holmes and Brenda Kay Ledford will be the featured readers, both of which are widely published poets. This should be an excellent program and presents an exceptional opportunity to hear these two women read their poems, many of which are centered on the mountain area.

Karen Paul Holmes was selected for Best Emerging Poets, 2015 (Stay Thirsty Media), and her full-length poetry collection, Untying the Knot,was published by Aldrich Press in 2014 (available on Amazon.com). Her poems have appeared in journals, such as Prairie Schooner, Poet Lore, Poetry East, and Atlanta Review, and anthologies such as The Southern Poetry Anthology, Vol 5: Georgia. Holmes serves as the Towns County Representative for the North Carolina Writers' Network-West, and is a member of the Georgia Poetry Society.

Formerly the VP-Communications at ING, Holmes now works as a freelance writer and teaches writing classes at John C. Campbell Folk School, Writers Circle, and elsewhere. She’s inspired by the Blue Ridge Mountains, Lake Chatuge, and her home in Hiawassee, GA. Holmes supports writers through a critique group she started in Atlanta, and the Writers Night Out she founded/hosts in Blairsville on the second Friday of every month.

Brenda Kay Ledford is a seventh-generational native of Clay County. She was an honor graduate of Hayesville High School, earned her Master of Arts in Education from Western Carolina University, and received a diploma of highest honors in creative writing from Stratford Career Institute.

Ledford’s work has appeared in many journals including Our State, Woman’s World, Country Extra, Chicken Soup for the Soul, Angels on Earth, 30 Old Mountain Press anthologies and Blue Ridge Parkway Silver Anniversary Edition coffee-table book.

Aldrich Press published her poetry book, Crepe Roses, that won the 2015 Paul Green Multimedia Award from North Carolina Society of Historians. Ledford has received this award nine times for her books, collecting oral history on Southern Appalachian and on her blogs: http://blueridgepoet.blogspot.com and http://historicalhayesville.blogspot.com.She also won the North Carolina Press Association’s Journalism Contest Award for her feature on the John C. Campbell Folk School in 1999.

Ledford is listed with A Directory of American Poets and Fiction Writers, North Carolina Literary Map, North Carolina Storytelling Guild, and Who’s Who in America. She has appeared on the “Common Cup,” talk show on Windstream Communication’s cable television, and also was interviewed on “The Blue Sky Show” over WJUL/WJRB Radio Station and gives regional poetry readings.

Poets Joan M. Howard and Rosemary R. Royston to read at the John C. Campbell Folk School Literary Hour, Brasstown, NC, Wed., May 17, 2017 at 7:00 PM

 On Wednesday, May, 17, 2017, 7:00 PM, two local poets will read at the John C. Campbell Folk School's, "The Literary Hour", at Brasstown, NC. Poets Joan M. Howard, and Rosemary Rhodes Royston will be reading selections of their poetry, and the public is invited.

Joan M. Howard’s poetry has been published in The Lyric, The Road Not Taken: The Journal of Formal Poetry, Lucid Rhythms, Victorian Violet, Our Pipe Dreams, Aurorean, Wild Goose Poetry Review, Miller's Pond, the 2012 Georgia Poetry Society's anthology Reach of Song, POEM, Wayfarer, and others.

Howard recently published a book of poetry, Death and Empathy: My Sister Web, a tribute to her sister Webster, and to Howard's husband, Jack. The book focuses on Howard’s grief and the gift of life itself, through nature, animals, travel and love. 

 She is a former teacher, member of North Carolina Writers' Network West, has studied German and English literature. Howard goes birding and spends time in Athens, GA, and on the beautiful waters of Lake Chatuge, in Hiawassee, Georgia.

Rosemary Rhodes Royston holds an MFA in Writing from Spalding University, is a lecturer at Young Harris College, Georgia, and is a Rep for North Georgia for the NCWN-West. Royston’s poetry has been published in journals such as The Southern Poetry Review, The Comstock Review, Main Street Rag, Coal Hill Review, FutureCycle, STILL, New Southerner, and Alehouse. Her essays on writing poetry are included in Women and Poetry: Tips on Writing, Teaching and Publishing by Successful Women Poets, McFarland. 

Royston’s poetry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and she was the recipient of the 2010 Literal Latte Food Verse Award. Her chapbook, Splitting the Soil, is available at Finishing Line Press. 

Most recently, she received Honorable Mention in the George Scarbrough Poetry Contest, Mountain Heritage Literary Festival, along with her short fiction being selected as Honorable Mention in the Porter Fleming Literary Awards, 2012. Royston blogs at The Luxury of Trees.

The Literary Hour at JCCFS is sponsored by the North Carolina Writers' Network-West.

Don't miss The Literary Hour at the John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC, March 16,2017 at 7:00 PM

On Thursday, March 16th, 2017 at 7:00 PM, John C. Campbell Folk School and NC Writers Network- West are sponsoring The Literary Hour, an hour of poetry and prose reading held at Keith House on the JCFS campus, Brasstown, NC. This reading is usually held on the third Thursday of the month. It is free of charge and open to the public. Poet Joan Howard and writer Bob Grove will be the featured readers. Both of these authors are residents of the area and published extensively. It should be an entertaining evening.

Joan Howard: Her poetry has been published in The Lyric, The Road Not Taken: The Journal of Formal Poetry, Lucid Rhythms, Victorian Violet, Our Pipe Dreams, Aurorean, Wild Goose Poetry Review, Miller's Pond, the 2012 Georgia Poetry Society's anthology Reach of Song, POEM, Wayfarer, and others.

Joan is a former teacher, a current member of North Carolina Writers' Network-West, and has studied German and English Literature.  Howard goes birding and kayaking and spends time in Athens, Georgia, and the beautiful waters of Lake Chatuge in Hiawassee, Georgia.

Bob Grove: Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Bob now lives in the mountains of North Carolina. Including studies at Cleveland State University, Baldwin-Wallace College and the University of South Florida, he received his Bachelor of Arts degree at Kent State University and his Master of Science degree at Florida Atlantic University. His diversified curriculum enabled him to teach courses in English, journalism, creative writing, general science, physics, chemistry, biology, earth science, space science and psychology.

Bob has been an ABC-TV public affairs director, an on-air personality, and the founder and publisher of Monitoring Times magazine. A prose critique facilitator for the North Carolina Writers Network and a director of the Ridgeline Literary Alliance, he has published 19 books and hundreds of articles in 21 magazines.

Now retired after 35 years as founder of Grove Enterprises, an international supplier of radio communications equipment, Bob has more time to write. He has published a mystery novella (Secrets of Magnolia Manor), his memoir (Misadventures of an Only Child), a collection of children’s stories (Adventures of Kaylie and Jimmy), and has written several flash fiction stories as well as some poetry. He has been awarded several gold medals in the North Carolina Silver Arts literature competition.

Bob’s public readings are popular as a performance art form, typified by his well attended annual reading, in costume and British dialect, of Dickens’s A Christmas Carol at the John C. Campbell Folk School. He has been a featured speaker at 14 national conventions and a U.S. Congressional committee.

His collected writings on technical topics (Antenna Basics, Antenna Anthology and Ask Bob) are now available online, as is his informative Abnormal Psychology which he uses as a teaching text in continuing education classes, and Antiquing: A Collector’s Guide for appraising and auctioneering.

Several of Bob’s books are available on Amazon Kindle, and a sampling of his shorter works may be viewed on his website: bobgrove.org.

The Literary Hour at John C. Campbell Folk School, to have open mic on February 16, 2017, 7:00 PM, Brasstown, NC

Co-sponsored by the John C. Campbell Folk School and the North Carolina Writers' Network-West

Glenda Council Beall and Mary Ricketson to read at The Literary Hour at John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC, Thursday, September 22, 2016, 7:00 PM

Glenda Council Beall

Mary Ricketson

JOHN CAMPBELL FOLK SCHOOL

On Thursday, September 22, 2016 at 7:00 PM, John C.Campbell Folk School and NC Writers Network West are sponsoring The Literary Hour, an hour of poetry and prose reading held at Keith House on the JCFS campus. Usually this is held on the third Thursday of the month but this month it will be the fourth Thursday. The reading is free of charge and open to the public. Poets Mary Ricketson and Glenda C. Beall will be the featured readers; both are well-established mountain area poets.

Glenda Council Beall is a poet, memoirist, and teacher. Beall’s poems, essays and short stories have been published in numerous literary journals and magazines including, Reunions Magazine, Main Street Rag Poetry Journal, Appalachian Heritage, Journal of Kentucky Studies and online, Your Daily Poem, Muscadine Lines: A Southern Journal, The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, and Wild Goose Poetry Review.

Beall's poems have been anthologized in The Southern Poetry Anthology: Volume VII: North Carolina 2014, Lights in the Mountains, The Best of Poetry Hickory Series, 2011, Kakalak: North Carolina Poets of 2009, and Women’s Spaces, Women’s Places, among others. Her poems have won awards in the James Still Poetry Contest and the Clay County NC Poetry Contest.

Beall taught memoir writing at John C. Campbell Folk School for a number of years. She teaches senior adults to write about their lives at Tri-County Community College where she will begin a new course on September 1. She says she enjoys hearing the unique stories written by each of her students. “Everyone can leave a written legacy for their grandchildren,” says Glenda.


Glenda served as leader of North Carolina Writers’ Network West in 2007 and 2008, and is now Clay County Representative for NCWN West. She is a co-administrator of the blog for NCWN-West.

Beall is author of NOW MIGHT AS WELL BE THEN, poetry published by Finishing Line Press, and she compiled a family history, PROFILES AND PEDIGREES, THOMAS CHARLES COUNCIL AND HIS DESCENDANTS, published by Genealogy Publishing Company.

Glenda Beall is owner/director of Writers Circle Around the Table, where she invites those interested in writing poetry or prose to her home studio for classes taught by some of the best poets and writers in North Carolina and Georgia. Links are: www.glendacouncilbeall.com and www.profilesandpedigrees.blogspot.com

Mary Ricketson, Murphy NC, has been writing poetry 20 years, to satisfy a hunger, to taste life down to the very last drop. She is inspired by nature and her work as a mental health counselor. Her poetry has been published in Wild Goose Poetry Review, Future Cycle Press, Journal of Kentucky Studies, Kentucky Review, Lights in the Mountains, Echoes Across the Blue Ridge, Freeing Jonah, Red Fox Run, and her chapbook, I Hear the River Call my Name. Her new collection of poetry, Hanging Dog Creek, was recently published by Future Cycle Press. She is Cherokee County representative to North Carolina Writers Network West, and president of Ridgeline Literary Alliance.

Mary writes a monthly column, Women to Women, for The Cherokee Scout. She is a Certified Clinical Mental Health Counselor and an organic blueberry farmer.
Ricketson won the gold medal for poetry in the 2011 Cherokee County Senior Games/Silver Arts and silver medal for 2012 and 2013, and first place in the 2011 Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest 75th anniversary national poetry contest.

The Literary Hour is co-sponsored by the North Carolina Writers' Network-West. which is a program of NC Writers Network.

NCWN-West Poets Dr. Linda G. Jones and Marcia Hawley Barnes to read at the Literary Hour at John C. Campbell Folk School, Aug. 17, 2016, 7:00 PM

On Wednesday evening, August 17, 2016 at 7:00 PM, John Campbell Folk School, in Brasstown, NC, and the North Carolina Writers' Network-West are sponsoring The Literary Hour, an hour of poetry and prose reading. The reading is free of charge and open to the public. Normally scheduled for the third Thursday of the month, this month the event will be on Wednesday. Poets Dr. Linda Jones and Marcia Hawley Barnes will be the featured readers, both of which are accomplished poets. This should be an excellent program and greatly anticipated by writers and poets in our area.

Dr. Linda G. Jones joined the faculty of Young Harris College in 2009 and is currently an Associate Professor of Biology and Dean of the Division of Mathematics and Science. She teaches courses in human anatomy and physiology, animal physiology, developmental biology, comparative anatomy, parasitology and neuropharmacology. She earned a B.S. in Biology from Stetson University, an M.A. in Biology and Ph.D. in Pathology from Vanderbilt University and completed postdoctoral studies in pharmacology at the University of California, San Diego. Most of her career was spent in biomedical research, primarily in the area of cell signaling of the cardiovascular system and more recently in neuroscience. She is now happy to be teaching students in the classroom and serving as a mentor for student research. One current research model is the Zebrafish embryo used for developmental and toxicological studies. She has a number of interests outside of the science classroom which include reading and writing poetry. She is a member of the North Carolina Writers' Network-West and a participant in the their poetry critique group.


Marcia Hawley Barnes is a Georgia writer and poet. She is a member of the North Carolina Writers’ Network-West, and Ridgeline Literary Alliance. Ms. Barnes celebrated the American family and cuisine in 2008, when she researched, illustrated, and published The Little Book of Secret Family Recipes. A heritage cookbook, the collection contains favorite recipes found in the archives of her family. In 2016, her first children’s book, Tobijah, illustrated by Doreyl Ammons Cain, was published by Catch the Spirit of Appalachia. Her poetry has been published in Stone, River, Sky, An Anthology of Georgia Poems. The author also writes a monthly book review for a local newspaper, Clay County Progress.

Dr. Linda G. Jones

Marcia Hawley Barnes