The passing of a wonderful writer and Netwest Member, Jo Carolyn Beebe

 It is with great sadness that I announce the passing of Jo Carolyn Beebe, a member of NCWN-West for many years.

Jo Carolyn Beebe

September 23, 1937 — August 6, 2023

Hiawassee

 Jo Carolyn Beebe, age 85, of Hiawassee, Georgia, passed away on August 6, 2023, at her home.

Jo Carolyn Beebe reading at the John C. Campbell Folk School

I met Jo Carolyn in Nancy Simpson’s writing class when I first came to NC in 1996. She was interested in Genealogy, and she wrote family stories about growing up in Mississippi and stories about her ancestors. Her readings were always entertaining.

Back in May, I received an email from her saying she didn’t drive at night anymore and could not attend nighttime events. So many of our members have reached an age when driving at night is difficult. Her dear husband, John, who always accompanied her to Writers Night Out readings, is not well either.

The following is from 2017 when she and I and Glenda Barrett were reading at the folk school for the Literary Hour.

“Jo Carolyn Beebe is a native of Mississippi. Many of her poems and stories are based on her recollections of conversations with her grandparents. Her Grandmother Anderson said, "The Bartletts are kin to Daniel Boone. They came through the Cumberland Gap with him." Great-grandfather Ricks showed her a greasy circle in his front yard where no grass would grow. "This is where the Indians cooked their food," he told her.

She also has her own memories of life in a small, rural town. Her story, "The Way You Hypnotize a Chicken," really happened when she and a friend hypnotized one of Grandmother's hens. And where else but in a small town could two little girls play in the funeral home and pick out their everyday casket and their Sunday casket?

Jo Carolyn has been published in Main Street Rag, Clothes Lines, Women's Spaces Women's Places, Lonzie's Fried Chicken, Lights in the Mountains, Echoes Across the Blue Ridge, and by Abingdon Press. She was most gratified with her family history book The Beekeepers and Sons of Ander.

She is a graduate of Miami University, Oxford, and has been a resident of Towns County for 21 years.”

Diana Smith said, "She was kind, funny, talented, supportive to everyone, and had a wonderful southern voice which was prominent in her writing. She was an expert in genealogy and taught classes in it.  We lost a wonderful person too soon."

Her short story, "Boys Can Be Angels Too" was for children and was published as a Christmas play by Abington Press," Diana said, "and she has a book ready for publication now."

We will miss Jo Carolyn and send our heartfelt sympathy to John and all of her family and many friends. 

 

 

 

John C. Campbell Folk School makes changes

 John C. Campbell Folk School has dropped COVID 19 restrictions. 

Read about it here.

Take writing classes at the Folk School with excellent instructors.

I am taking an online course next year from the Folk School. How nice it is to have the opportunity for both in-person and online classes with these top writers. 

The John C. Campbell Folk School changed my life in so many ways. I first took poetry classes with Nancy Simpson, Carol Crawford, Kathryn Byer, and many other writers. Later I taught writing at the folk school and that was a huge step in my life. 

Glenda Beall

Noted Poet and Writer Glenda Beall to be Featured Reader for Mountain Wordsmiths

Mountain Wordsmiths  - September 22, Thursday morning, 10:30A.M. 

 

Members of Mountain Wordsmiths are honored to have as our featured reader for September noted writer, poet, and writing mentor Glenda Beall on Thursday morning, September 22, at 10:30 via Zoom. Our monthly gathering, sponsored by the North Carolina Writers’ Network-West, continues its online Zoom presence because local writers as well as writers from other cities and states are joining us each month online.

Beall is the program coordinator for the NC Writers’ Network-West and also teaches memoir writing. She has published a book of poetry, Now Might as Well be Then, co-authored a collection of short stories, essays and poems, Paws, Claws, Hooves, Feathers and Fins, with Estelle Rice, and compiled a family history book, Profiles and Pedigrees, Descendants of Thomas Charles Council (1858 - 1911).

To find more of her published work, Click the following link.

 https://profilesandpedigrees.blogspot.com/p/my-published-work.html

After living the first part of her life on a family farm in southwest Georgia, Beall and her husband, Barry, moved to Hayesville, NC in 1995. 

 In 1996, after taking classes with noted poet Nancy Simpson,  she began publishing her writing in literary journals and reviews.  She comes from a family of storytellers and her narrative poetry reflects her ability to tell stories.

She is an advocate for clean air and uses only natural products for cleaning in her home. She is concerned that we use too many chemicals where we live and work and on our bodies. She can be found online at www.glendacouncilbeall.com

NCWN-West is continuing to stay in touch by using technology to share our writing. Also known as NetWest, the organization will offer writing events and writing classes online, while several other writing groups are now meeting face-to-face again.

Those wishing to attend Mountain Wordsmiths may contact Carroll Taylor at vibiaperpetua@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link. We welcome those who would simply like to listen to the beauty of wordsmithing.

                                  

By Carroll S. Taylor,  Guest Writer

Celebrating the life and legacy of Dr. Gene Hirsch, poet

 

Those in the photo above met Saturday afternoon to celebrate the life of the late Dr. Gene Hirsch who was the founder of the writing program at the John C. Campbell Folk School in the early nineties. Because of his dedication to writing and writers, many poets, novelists, and creative nonfiction writers found their voices, and found the confidence and inspiration to write their stories in verse or in prose.

All of us present on Saturday told our story of how Gene influenced us. He was the most generous of people and taught poetry classes for free out of his cabin in Cherokee County NC.

He taught at the folk school every time he came down from his home in Pennsylvania where he worked as a geriatric doctor. Gene was a person who encouraged others. He never made anyone feel they were unworthy to call themselves poets and as a result so many people published their words that were found to be important to others. 

I am especially grateful to Gene Hirsch because the writing program at the John Campbell Folk School was where most of my writing education took place. I did not study creative writing in college but was once told I had an equivalent of a master's degree right here from the best writers anywhere. 

People like Valerie Nieman, Kathryn Byer, Darnell Arnoult, Steven Harvey, Carol Crawford, Nancy Simpson, and so many other wonderful teachers came to Brasstown NC, and taught us for a week and made a huge difference in our lives. 

I took one or two week-long classes every year for ten years and then I taught at the folk school. Thank you, Gene. You never knew how many people you touched because you convinced the director and the board of the folk school to include the craft of writing in their schedule.

Thanks to Mary Ricketson for organizing this memorial to Gene.

News from Glenda Beall

 I am very pleased to be accepted for the anthology Kakalak 2022.

See the winners in poetry and art at:

https://moonshinereview.com/2022/07/21/kakalak-2022-announcing-winners-inclusion/

POETRY SELECTED FOR PUBLICATION

J. S. Absher, “The Place of the Blues in the Water and Carbon Cycles”

Laura White Alderson, “Oh That Billy Bumpus Lee”

Alexandra Aradas, “notes to ak freeland”

Pam Baggett, “To the Woman Who Told Me She Has Nothing in Common with Black People”

Don Ball, “Pocket-Dialing the Pandemic”

Richard Band, “On Tom Sawyer’s First Sight of Becky Thatcher”

Joan Barasovska, “Osage Avenue, Early Morning”

Sam Barbee, “DOA”

Michael Beadle, “The Gauntlet”

Glenda Council Beall, “If”

Libby Bernardin, “Self-portrait in a Red Dress”

Al Black, “Elysium Soccer Fields”

Teresa McLamb Blackmon, “The Hitchhiker”

Susan Blair, “The News Is Not New Anymore”

Gary Bolick, “A Country Heart”

Gay Boswell, “Rules”

Katie Ellen Bowers, “Most Mornings”

Cheryl Boyer, “Love, Simply”

Mary O’Keefe Brady, “How My Morning Goes”

Doris Thomas Browder, “Always She Moaned Her Own Bad Luck”

Joyce Compton Brown, “Forgive Me, I Just Bought a Refrigerator”

Les Brown, “Green Deserts”

Kathleen Calby, “Breakneck Creek”

Bill Caldwell, “Pluck”

Barbara Campbell, “What Really Mattered the Day the Ambulance Took You Away”

Paloma A. Capanna, “Sirens Over Ukraine”

Fran Cardwell, “Old Island Church Watch Night”

Mark Caskie, “Winter Rations”

Kenneth Chamlee, “What Falls Out”

S.L. Cockerille, “Take Jesus, for Example”

Joy Colter, “Ideation”

Barbara Conrad, “Who Has the Key to the Garden?”

Julie Ann Cook, “Massacre of the Innocents: An Art Class Study of Rubens’ Masterpiece”

Susan McClain Craig, “To the Living Statue”

Jane Mary Curran, “Funeral in March”

Steve Cushman, “This Is Not a Covid Poem”

Debra A. Daniel, “Revising My Mother’s Thirteenth Birthday”

John Desjarlais, “Our Fathers’ War”

David Dixon, “Holy Ground”

Mary Alice Dixon, “Snakeberry Mama”

J Dwight Donald, “A Native Son”

Deborah H. Doolittle, “In Connemara”

Sandra Dreis, “The Potato”

Joanne Durham, “Almost Morning”

Ralph Earle, “At a Pause in the Pandemic”

Nadine Ellsworth-Moran, “A Different Kind of String Theory”

Terri Kirby Erickson, “Cana”

Lynn Farmer, “Paid”

Nicole Farmer, “Exalted”

Michael Gaspeny, “Prince Memory”

Paige Gilchrist, “Weep Holes”

Ed Gold, “At the Wesley”

Terri Greco, “Sonnet After Gregory Orr”

Anne Waters Green, “On Viewing Behind the Myth of Benevolence”

Bill Griffin, “The Woman Who Fears She Has Lost Her Son”

Cordelia M. Hanemann, “Counting the Ways”

Janis Harrington, “Quarantine”

Sandra Sturtz Hauss, “Kensico—Last Day of Spring”

Peggy W. Heitmann, “Remedy”

Mary Hennessy, “A Praise Poem Without the Praise”

Ann Herlong-Bodman, “Deer in Shadows”

Jo Ann Hoffman, “At the Mouth of the Cave with Elijah”

Charles Israel, Jr., “Holy Sonnet 14”

Karen Luke Jackson, “Peeling at the Pale Green Line”

Becky Nicole James, “Cadillac”

Steph Jeffries, “Kindness, Served”

Kelly Jones, “starry night after the diagnosis”

Patricia A. Joslin, “Hiking the Blue Star”

Jeanne Julian, “Walk in Thaw”

Britt Kaufmann, “Rights County Appalachia”

Helga Kidder, “August Song”

Eugene Kusterer, “Encounter”

Dallas Lee, “Scuffing the Stones”

Susan Lefler, “If We Had Poets”

Greg Lobas, “Mother of Justice”

John Longbottom, “Drumbeat”

Kathryn Etters Lovatt, “She Is Not Herself”

Gina Malone, “Visitations”

Sandra Marshburn, “To My Students”

Mary E. Martin, “Caught”

Preston Martin, “George Cables and Cal and Eve”

Nancy Martin-Young, “ACME”

Katherine H. Maynard, “Bucking Hamlet’s Stars”

Terri McCord, “Decontaminating the Lake”

Marjorie Schratz McNamara, “Where We Are”

Ashley Memory, “Making Bread and Butter Pickles”

Yvette R. Murray, “Saturday Mornin’ in Washington Park”

Arlene Oraby, “My Black Beauty”

Alice Osborn, “Skirts in the Snow: Leaving the Donner Party”

Pattie Palmer-Baker, “Not Enough Love”

Aleta Payne, “Veritas”

Gail Peck, “Lunch Box from Hiroshima”

Gary Phillips, “Coyote”

Fred Pond, “Carolina Reaper in the Garden”

Gary V. Powell, “Dump Run”

Sarah Pross, “Gypsies”

David Radavich, “Loving Cleome”

Judith Cummings Reese, “Cassia”

Lucia Walton Robinson, “Picnic on James Whitcomb Riley’s Tomb, 1958”

Betty Ritz Rogers, “Gordon’s Ashes”

Marilyn Keith Rousseau, “Blood-Red Tomatoes”

Richard Rubin, “Passing”

Leslie M. Rupracht, “Aunt Barb’s Huckleberries”

Nasrollah Samiy, “Love Letters”

Diane Sasson, “Removal”

Roberta Schultz, “Deep Ends”

Martin Settle, “Die with Too Many Faces”

Jane Shlensky, “Ode to a Box Turtle”

Sherry Siddall, “Trading Path”

Michael Simpson, “For Edward R. Murrow”

H.R. Spencer, “Mahamari, a Haibun Sequence”

Caren Stuart, “Snake Harmer”

Nancy Swanson, “Savannah River Basin”

Lynne Santy Tanner, “My Phone Sends Me a Video of My Deceased Husband”

Jo Barbara Taylor, “Incunabulum”

Melinda Thomsen, “A Composition & Arrangement of Matter”

Lucinda Trew, “virgins widows and wives”

Rob Vance, “My Collection”

Mark Vogel, “Memo to Water Workers”

Priscilla Webster-Williams, “Photo of a Women’s Group in a Park, 1974”

Eric Weil, “A Generation-Counting Quilt”

Jennifer Weiss, “2020 Was the Worst Year”

Louise Gwathmey Weld, “Wild Night”

Nancy Harmon Womack, “The Seamstress”

Janice P. Wright, “We Apologize: A Poem 4 Our Youngins”

 

 I marked the poets I know on this list, but all of them are excellent. I am proud to be chosen and look forward to reading the book. 

Mountain Wordsmiths to Celebrate National Poetry Month

April is National Poetry Month, and Mountain Wordsmiths will celebrate the beauty and significance of poetry on Thursday morning, April 28, at 10:30 AM via Zoom.

Our monthly gathering sponsored by the North Carolina Writers’ Network-West is continuing its online presence because local writers, as well as writers from other states and cities, are joining us each month on Zoom.

Kathryn Stripling Byer

Glenda Beall, NCWN-West Program Coordinator, will begin the meeting with a tribute to two late members who had a profound effect on area poets as well as poets across North Carolina and nationwide. Kathryn Stripling Byer was the first woman to be named Poet Laureate of North Carolina (2005-2009). 

Nancy Simpson founded NCWN-West, which provides support and connection for members of NCWN who live in Western North Carolina and in the Georgia counties which touch North Carolina.

Nancy Simpson

Byer and Simpson mentored countless poets, both beginners and seasoned poets alike. Beall will read a selection of their poems as a tribute to their lasting legacy. In lieu of Open Mic, during the program, all attendees are encouraged to read a favorite poem or one they have written.

NCWN-West is continuing to stay in touch by using technology to share our writing. We will offer writing events and writing classes online until we can safely meet face-to-face again. Many writers are enjoying the convenience and flexibility of Zoom meetings because of our ability to include poets and writers from other locations.

We welcome those who were regulars at Coffee with the Poets and Writers that met at Moss Memorial Library. Those wishing to attend Mountain Wordsmiths may contact Carroll Taylor at vibiaperpetua@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link. We welcome those who would simply like to listen to the beauty of wordsmithing.

Written by Carroll S. Taylor

Have you visited JCCFS? Now is the time.

 My friends, if you have never been to the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, NC, you must put it on your calendar to spend time there.

The school began in the 1930s as a replica of Folk Schools in Denmark, Sweden, and other countries, but has grown tremendously since its birth when the natives of Clay and Cherokee County gave land and labor to build it. 

One of our NCWN members, Dr. Eugene Hirsch, who was from Pennsylvania, but owned a mountain cabin near Murphy, NC, was a poet as well as a renowned doctor. On one of his trips down south, Gene Hirsch spent a week taking a class at the folk school in Brasstown. Like most of us locals, he fell in love with the casual, friendly, and enthusiastic people there and continued to take classes, but he thought this would be a great place for a writing program. 

He talked to the director of the school and soon there were writing classes on the schedule. Our own Nancy Simpson served as Resident Writer and she brought some of the best poets, novelists, and nonfiction writers to the little town of Brasstown, a place they might never have heard of if not for the writing program at John Campbell. I am fortunate to have been a student there many times over the years and to have taught writing there. Some of my happiest times were at the John C. Campbell Folk School, and I met people who have become life-long friends.

This photograph is of one of the first classes I taught at JCCFS in 2008

I have never been able to put into words the feelings I had while attending and the feelings I had when I left. Your classmates or your students become like family as you share common interests such as weaving, painting, cooking, dancing, playing instruments, and writing. I am reading a memoir by Betty Brown, a fellow student I met in a writing class at John Campbell a decade ago. She is well known as a visual artist also. I find that she is an excellent writer. 

Below is the writing schedule for this year. I know most of these writers and some are long-time friends of mine. Make a pledge to yourself to spend a week or a weekend in a writing class with one of the fantastic writers who will be your instructor. You will stay in a comfortable cabin with other students. You will share meals from the dining room and you will attend gatherings outside now because of COVID. Visit their website and read the catalog. I promise you if you spend time there enjoying a craft of your choosing, making friends, and learning more about yourself, you will make memories that will be with you always.

For those of us who live in counties near the school, we can come home at night.  The tuition is half of the price paid by others.

Click on this link to see what is happening in the writing classes.

CLASSES WITH MEDIA CODES THAT CONTAIN WRITING

SUBJECT   INSTRUCTOR	CLASS TITLE	DATE
Writing Rosemary Royston	Creative Writing Across Genres	Sunday, May 8 - Saturday, May 14, 2022
Writing Annette Clapsaddle	The Body Keeps the Story	Sunday, June 12 - Saturday, Jun 18, 2022
Writing Pamela Duncan	Fiction Writing - Focus on Craft	Sunday, July 3 - Friday, Jul 8, 2022
Writing Dana Wildsmith	What's in Your Writing Folder?	Sunday, August 14 - Saturday, Aug 20, 2022
Writing Darnell Arnoult	Creative Nonfiction in a Flash	Friday, September 2 - Sunday, Sep 4, 2022
Writing Valerie Nieman	The Breath of Life: Discovering and Depicting Characters	Sunday, October 30 - Saturday, Nov 5, 2022
Writing Bobbie Pell	Poetry - The Wonders of Nature	Friday, November 18 - Sunday, Nov 20, 2022

John C. Campbell Folk School open again

 
The John C. Campbell Folk School is holding classes again and if you are looking for a great way to spend a weekend, you want to sign up for a writing class by Carol Crawford in August. It is not too early to register. Remember, if you live locally, your tuition is discounted.

https://classes.folkschool.org/class_details.aspx?pk=23676

We love the folk school here in western North Carolina and appreciate the writing program started years ago by the late Dr.  Gene Hirsch when Jan Davidson was director of John Campbell.

Nancy Simpson, popular poet and co-founder of NCWN-West was once Resident Writer there. Nancy brought many outstanding writers and poets here to teach weeklong classes. Those were some of my happiest times, taking classes and later teaching at JCCFS.

We look forward to more writing classes as our world gets back to normal again.

Creator of the Netwest Program Concept - Marsha Warren

 Marsha Warren was executive director of the North Carolina Writer's Network when Nancy Simpson and Kathryn Byer began efforts to include the mountain counties in the literary community of North Carolina. Nancy Simpson gave the credit for our present NCWN-West Program to Marsha Warren.

After thirty years, Warren is retiring from heading the Paul Green Foundation where she moved on to after leaving the NCWN.

This is an excellent article about Marsha Warren:

https://www.ncwriters.org/whitecross/2020/11/17/happy-trails-marsha-warren/

We wish Marsha the very best in her retirement years and we thank her for helping to create NCWN-West all those years ago. 

To read more about the history of our program here in the mountains, click on https://www.netwestwriters.blogspot.com and select the Founding of NCWN West page. 

Shout Out Atlanta features poet, Karen Paul Holmes

 

We are thrilled to see an interview with Karen Paul Holmes in an Atlanta publication, Shout Out Atlanta.

Karen came to success in writing poetry when she took a poetry class sponsored by NCWN-West. The late Nancy Simpson, co-founder of the mountain program, taught the all day workshop in Blairsville, GA. Many of our members live in North Georgia. Karen has a vacation home on Lake Chatuge where she spends much of her time. She attended our poetry critique meetings at Tri-County Community College where she honed her skills with published writers like Janice Moore and Nancy.

This is the link to this outstanding interview.

https://shoutoutatlanta.com/meet-karen-paul-holmes-poet-freelance-writer/?fbclid=IwAR0zbA8fG8OW1ZkiM_8QIzdou7aptsRN2zOyKxo65mF4Luzrm07xOCnU7RU

Leave a comment below, please. Support your fellow writers with you words.

 

Poet, Dr. Eugene Z. Hirsch, 12/18/31 -- 9/3/20

This post written by Mary Ricketson

Gene Hirsch, MD, a poet of our mountains, died September 3, 2020, after a long struggle with cancer.  

He was a well-known writer in western North Carolina.  He taught poetry at John C. Campbell Folk School for many years, and helped Nancy Simpson start North Carolina Writers Network West 25 years ago or more.  He regularly attended critique groups, read at organized events, and taught small groups of poets at his home in Murphy.  Gene was teacher and mentor to be remembered.  He lived in Pittsburgh PA and in Murphy NC, and visited Murphy often, until May 2019.

Gene was known as a loving man who listened deeply to every poem from any kind of writer, rustic beginner to polished expert.  He cared about the craft of writing and also cared about the person writing the poem.  As a physician, he had a long career practicing medicine.  In later years he taught doctors and medical students to provide the best of medical and human help to dying patients.  The following is a quote, introduction to his long essay, Intimacy and Dying, written earlier this year, unpublished.

I am a retired geriatrician who, for thirty five years, taught humanistic values in Clinical Medicine to medical students and doctors. From 2000 to 2010, at Forbes Hospice in Pittsburgh, I guided students through the ancient clinical art of responding to struggles and needs of dying people. Among other curricular activities, with permission, we (2 -4 students and I) visited patients in their homes, not to learn procedures for obtaining medical histories, but for the specific purpose of listening to their thoughts, feelings, ordeals and supports. They understood that they were being placed in the role of teachers rather than patients. This proved to be important to all.

Gene kept his illness private, made no apology for that request.  He asked me to talk with him late in his dying process, asked me to be “ears to listen, for some day my dying to be worth my life.”  I will have more to say about that after I have settled enough to review the scratchy notes I kept of this time.  He also asked me to organize a memorial after his death. He said he wants to be remembered in our mountains.  Once the world is safe to gather in person, when the pandemic is over, we will have a memorial for memory, poems, and a celebration of his life.

His body has been cremated.  At some time, in respect for his request, his family will spread his ashes privately at his former home in Murphy.  He gave that home to his wife’s son and family, a family who loves the mountains and the privilege to vacation there. 

During the final months of Gene’s illness, he engaged the help of a friend and poet in Pittsburgh, Judy Robinson, to organize and seek publication of his poems.  The result of that effort is indeed a book, published 7-15-20, available from Amazon, details below.

Cards and words of sympathy may be sent to Gene's wife, Virginia Spangler, 139 Overlook Drive, Verona PA 15147.

In fond memory of Gene Hirsch,  

Mary Ricketson

Speak, Speak, pub July 15, 2020
Paperback $30, Amazon

Dr. Eugene Hirsch, Gene, to all who know him, has extended to me the privilege of editing his poetry, an assignment I accepted with pleasure. This collection, “Speak, Speak,” is the culmination of Gene’s long career of writing, and reflects the complexity of his mind and experience. As a physician/writer he joins a distinguished list, and in my opinion as a reader/editor, he earns his place among the others, notably Maugham, Chekhov, William Carlos Williams.

Judith R Robinson, editor

https://www.amazon.com/Speak-Gene-Hirsch/dp/939020240X/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=gene+hirsch&qid=1598800059&sr=8-1

Poets and possible classes for 2020

Congratulations to Carroll S. Taylor for having her poem chosen to appear in Reach of Song for 2019.
Read more including the poem and words of the judge here.

Mary Ricketson recently had another poem published in The Lake, a fine journal.
Read her poem here.

Our Netwest poets continue to submit and publish their poetry all over the world, not just in the USA.

If only Nancy Simpson, poet and instructor, were here to see what she created in Clay, Cherokee, and the counties in north Georgia with her classes at John Campbell Folk School and Tri-County-Community College. 

Nancy Simpson

Carroll Taylor never met Nancy, but has benefited from all of us who learned from Nancy, as has so many others.

Every week I receive calls from people who want to learn, to take classes and become poets and writers of prose and who want to become part of our fabulous writers' group.

Aren't we fortunate to live here and be part of the writing community?

If you live in Murphy, Hayesville, Hiawassee, Young Harris, Blairsville or within driving distance of Tri-County College, you can check with Lisa Long about upcoming writing classes for 2020. Contact me, Glenda Beall, at gcbmountaingirl@gmail.com and I will try to help you with information.

Meet our Writers' Night Out Headliners: Linda Jones & Alan Cone

October 11, 7 pm

Union County Community Center

Blairsville, GA

Open Mic follows the reading

Join us for Linda's intelligent, heartfelt poetry; and Alan's smart, quirky prose. (Read his bio below for a sample). 

Linda Grayson Jones is an Associate Professor of Biology and Dean of Math and Science at Young Harris College. She has read and written poetry since childhood and recalls reading The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes to her third-grade classmates. With a B.S. in Biology from Stetson University, an M.A. in Biology and a Ph.D. in Pathology from Vanderbilt University, Linda's career path was primarily in academic biomedical research, but in 2009 she returned to her first love—teaching. She remains a reader and writer of poetry and is a member of the North Carolina Writers’ Network. She credits North Carolina poet Nancy Simpson (1938-2018) for encouraging her to use Grayson Jones as her published poet’s name.

 Alan Cone is the author of many short stories and a novel, The History of the Decline and Fall of Roland Arnheiter. He explains that he “comes to North Georgia by way of Texas, on our nation’s frontier, where a man writes with both fists or perishes.” Alan's work is anchored always in a common man’s self-effacing humility. His penchant for dry humor and sarcasm is reflected in his artist’s statement: “With acuity and wisdom, with perceptiveness and whimsy, I usher audiences through an odyssey of freshman-level erudition and beyond. My quietly courageous abasement of the writer’s dais will leave you challenged, thoughtful, hungry for less.”  He also admits that he does not actually smoke a pipe.