{"id":279,"date":"2022-03-25T17:13:35","date_gmt":"2022-03-25T17:13:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/?p=279"},"modified":"2022-04-01T13:32:14","modified_gmt":"2022-04-01T13:32:14","slug":"the-smithville-fiddlers-jamboree-and-finding-my-calling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/2022\/03\/25\/the-smithville-fiddlers-jamboree-and-finding-my-calling\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cThe Smithville Fiddler\u2019s Jamboree and Finding My Calling\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Almost exactly one year ago, I fell victim to the soul-searching state of mind that enraptures every senior as they arrive at their last year. Age-old enigmas, such as how I was going to prove to my parents that an English degree wasn\u2019t <\/em>the worst decision I\u2019d ever made, were far more stressing than any research paper. I had inklings of what I wanted to do\u2014 vague visions of myself surrounded by books and old things\u2014 \u00e0 la Evie Carnahan shelving dusty tomes in The Mummy<\/em> (1999). Fate soon dispatched me a sign: a flier in Henderson Hall for an Archives Management and Research course. Through this class, I discovered a profound love of the archives, and after bugging Megan Atkinson, our university archivist, enough times\u2014 she offered me an internship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Frazier Moss and others on stage at the Smithville Fiddler’s Jamboree<\/strong>, Photograph by Eddie Breswell, 1977. RG 161, Neil Dudney photographs, https:\/\/tntech.access.preservica.com\/uncategorized\/IO_170c5f38-dbb8-4ece-a375-9b89e3d333c1\/<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

As luck would have it, the Smithville Fiddler\u2019s Jamboree hit the Big 5-0 this year, and the Jamboree\u2019s board sought a research assistant for a book celebrating its semicentennial anniversary. One of Tennessee Tech\u2019s Archives and Special Collections\u2019 primary duties is the preservation of the Upper Cumberland\u2019s history and culture, thus the Jamboree board looked to Tennessee Tech for assistance. They had the resources, decade\u2019s worth of materials (photographs, programs, negatives, documents, even an artifact or two) but lacked the technology to properly process it. That\u2019s where I came in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have digitized, preserved, and researched materials not only emanating from the jamboree, but also explored topics about the Smithville area in general to compose a comprehensive history of the festival. Notably, the Joe L. Evins Papers and Tennessee Tech\u2019s Presidential Papers shed light on the origins of the most integral aspects of the jamboree, such as the town square that houses it every July. Evins was also a prime mover in the jamboree\u2019s creation, alongside other notable Smithville natives, such as Barry C. Williams. Tech and the jamboree, as it turns out, has a rather long history together. The jamboree has called at least one Tennessee Tech president, Arliss Roaden, amongst its special guests over the years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Left to right: Unknown, Smithville Mayor Edward Frazier, Dekalb County Judge Billy J. LaFever, Tennessee Tech President Arliss Roaden, and Joe and Ann Evins at the Smithville Fiddlers Jamboree opening ceremony<\/strong>, 1980. RG 161, Neil Dudney photographs, https:\/\/tntech.access.preservica.com\/uncategorized\/IO_38cdd365-bb8e-4abe-ac74-bedf12fc7f20\/<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Recently, the materials entrusted to me by the Jamboree board have been donated to Tennessee Tech\u2019s archives. With the anniversary book nearing completion, my work as an intern has shifted to ingesting the newly digitized Jamboree materials into our archive. This was an end goal from the start; the board wished for the Jamboree\u2019s materials, its history, to not only be researched, but also translocated to a more secure and preservation-friendly location. Now, the Smithville Fiddler\u2019s Jamboree Collection is underway, which the majority of materials in the process of digitization. I am thrilled to see this project from its initial stages to its finalization as a formal collection. It is a great honor for my research to help not only the Smithville Fiddler\u2019s Jamboree board, but also future students in their own projects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Jacob Gentry, 2022 March.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Through this experience (99.9% this experience, .1%  The Mummy<\/em>), I discovered my true calling is preservation. I was fortunate to be given this wonderful opportunity, and work in a field previous unknown to me. It saddens me to report that my internship is nearing the end of its tenure, but my work is just about done here. My time in the archival world is far from over, however, as I will soon be moving to attend Indiana University Bloomington to pursue master\u2019s degrees in both Literature and Library Science, with a concentration in Rare Book and Manuscript Librarianship (think Indiana Jones<\/em> but only books). So, if you are interested in festivals, especially those involving fiddles, do check out our latest collection. I promise you will not be disappointed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Almost exactly one year ago, I fell victim to the soul-searching state of mind that enraptures every senior as they arrive at their last year. Age-old enigmas, such as how I was going to prove to my parents that an … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[18,127,97,126,128,125,6,4,129],"class_list":["post-279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-internships","tag-archivesinternship","tag-arlissroaden","tag-digitization","tag-joelevins","tag-smithville","tag-smithvillefiddlersjamboree","tag-techyeah","tag-ttuarchives","tag-uppercumberlandhistory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/80"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":286,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions\/286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tntech.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}