Henry W. Shoemaker
Encyclopedia
Henry Wharton Shoemaker was a prominent American
folklorist, historian
, diplomat
, writer, publisher, and conservationist
.
, but was closely associated with India
, where he spent summers in childhood and took up residence later in life. The son of Henry Francis Shoemaker, railroad and business magnate, he attended Columbia University
in New York City and served in the military, attaining the rank of Colonel. Attracted to foreign service, he worked in European embassies before returning home to enter a brokerage venture with his brother William. His brother died in an elevator accident, and Henry closed the brokerage.
and legend, hunting heritage, and historical and environmental preservation. Familiar with the Roosevelt
family in New York, he was a supporter of Theodore Roosevelt's calls for the values of strenuosity, conservation, and Progressivism
. Shoemaker, for example, founded the Alpine Club in Pennsylvania to encourage mountain climbing and hiking, and wrote one of the first tourist guides to the natural wonders of Pennsylvania in Eldorado Found (1917).
After his brief stint on Wall Street
, Shoemaker turned to publishing, running newspapers in Reading
, Altoona
, and Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania
. He was also an active writer, which he had begun in student publications at Columbia. He gained notice as a journalist after 1898, when he reported legends from Pennsylvania mountain residents and workers in lumber and hunting camps and coalfields, which he first published in central Pennsylvania newspapers and then more widely in the book Pennsylvania Mountain Stories (1908). This was the first of twelve volumes in the Pennsylvania Folklore Series (1908–1924) that promoted the culture and landscape of central Pennsylvania.
From his maternal home in McElhattan which he inherited, Shoemaker devoted much of his energy to environmental conservation and considered folklore associated with the endangered landscape deserving of preservation along with the state's forests and wildlife. In this campaign associated with the Progressive movement, he became involved as a campaign writer for Gifford Pinchot
's runs for U.S. Senator
(1914, 1926) and Governor (1923, 1931). Pinchot appointed Shoemaker as chair of the Pennsylvania Historical Commission (1923–1930) and various state boards for environmental and historical preservation. Serving as campaign manager for Herbert Hoover
's presidential campaign in Pennsylvania in 1929, Shoemaker was later appointed by Hoover to be U.S. ambassador
to Bulgaria
(1930–1933).
; the legend has been perpetuated in many tourist brochures for sites to the present day such as Penn's Cavern and the Pennsylvania State University
.
Shoemaker's humanistic interests in his creative writing also showed in his campaign to have artists use local folklore as a resource for literature, poetry, art, and music. A prolific writer, he produced more than 100 books and pamphlets and hundreds of articles. In addition to his books of legends such as Susquehanna Legends, In the Seven Mountains, Penn's Grandest Cavern, Tales of the Bald Eagle Mountains, Allegheny Episodes, Juniata Memories, North Mountain Mementos, South Mountain Sketches, Black Forest Souvenirs, for which he is best known, he published more ethnographic field collections of songs and ballads (Mountain Minstrelsy of Pennsylvania, 1931), folk speech (Scotch-Irish and English Proverbs and Sayings of the West Branch Valley of Central Pennsylvania, 1927), and crafts (Early Potters of Clinton County, 1916). He also wrote some of the earliest accounts of hunting and animal lore, such as Pennsylvania Deer and Their Horns (1915), Pennsylvania Lion or Panther (1914), Wolf Days in Pennsylvania (1914), and Stories of Great Pennsylvania Hunters (1913).
s for the society. While he was minister to Bulgaria from 1930 to 1933, he took notice of Bulgaria's official efforts to preserve its folklore that he thought could be applied to the United States.
Upon his return to the United States, he began a daily column for the Altoona Tribune
, which he had purchased in 1912, in which he covered regional folklore and history and called for cultural conservation efforts. He had an opportunity to develop his plans when he was appointed state archivist of Pennsylvania from 1937 to 1948 and director of the State Museum in Harrisburg from 1939 to 1940. In the posts, he called for the state to sponsor collection and preservation of folklore in addition to keeping the state's documentary record.
After the archives, museum, and historical commission merged to form the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission following World War II
, he oversaw the creation of the Division of Folklore in the commission in 1948 and took the position of the nation's first state folklorist. Over forty states now have comparable positions. In the post, Shoemaker sponsored publications, meetings, festivals, and exhibits, although he entered into bitter disputes with academic folklorists in Pennsylvania over his popularized presentations of folklore.
Shoemaker left the post in 1956, retiring to Restless Oaks. Shoemaker died shortly thereafter near his McElhattan home in 1958. Many of his papers are located in repositories at the Pennsylvania State University, State Archives of Pennsylvania, and Juniata College
(where a Shoemaker Gallery is named after him).
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
folklorist, historian
Historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...
, diplomat
Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a state to conduct diplomacy with another state or international organization. The main functions of diplomats revolve around the representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state, as well as the promotion of information and...
, writer, publisher, and conservationist
Conservationist
Conservationists are proponents or advocates of conservation. They advocate for the protection of all the species in an ecosystem with a strong focus on the natural environment...
.
Early life, family, and career
Shoemaker was born in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, but was closely associated with India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, where he spent summers in childhood and took up residence later in life. The son of Henry Francis Shoemaker, railroad and business magnate, he attended Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
in New York City and served in the military, attaining the rank of Colonel. Attracted to foreign service, he worked in European embassies before returning home to enter a brokerage venture with his brother William. His brother died in an elevator accident, and Henry closed the brokerage.
Preservationist, Progressive, and pressman
Shoemaker summered in McElhattan, Pennsylvania, at an estate called Restless Oaks owned by his mother's family, and wrote that this experience deeply influenced his lifelong devotion to folkloreFolklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
and legend, hunting heritage, and historical and environmental preservation. Familiar with the Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...
family in New York, he was a supporter of Theodore Roosevelt's calls for the values of strenuosity, conservation, and Progressivism
Progressivism
Progressivism is an umbrella term for a political ideology advocating or favoring social, political, and economic reform or changes. Progressivism is often viewed by some conservatives, constitutionalists, and libertarians to be in opposition to conservative or reactionary ideologies.The...
. Shoemaker, for example, founded the Alpine Club in Pennsylvania to encourage mountain climbing and hiking, and wrote one of the first tourist guides to the natural wonders of Pennsylvania in Eldorado Found (1917).
After his brief stint on Wall Street
Wall Street
Wall Street refers to the financial district of New York City, named after and centered on the eight-block-long street running from Broadway to South Street on the East River in Lower Manhattan. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, or...
, Shoemaker turned to publishing, running newspapers in Reading
Reading, Pennsylvania
Reading is a city in southeastern Pennsylvania, USA, and seat of Berks County. Reading is the principal city of the Greater Reading Area and had a population of 88,082 as of the 2010 census, making it the fifth most populated city in the state after Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Allentown and Erie,...
, Altoona
Altoona, Pennsylvania
-History:A major railroad town, Altoona was founded by the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1849 as the site for a shop complex. Altoona was incorporated as a borough on February 6, 1854, and as a city under legislation approved on April 3, 1867, and February 8, 1868...
, and Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania
Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania
Jersey Shore is a borough in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is on the West Branch Susquehanna River, west by south of Williamsport. It is part of the Williamsport, Pennsylvania Metropolitan Statistical Area. In the past, Jersey Shore held farms, railroad shops, cigar factories, a...
. He was also an active writer, which he had begun in student publications at Columbia. He gained notice as a journalist after 1898, when he reported legends from Pennsylvania mountain residents and workers in lumber and hunting camps and coalfields, which he first published in central Pennsylvania newspapers and then more widely in the book Pennsylvania Mountain Stories (1908). This was the first of twelve volumes in the Pennsylvania Folklore Series (1908–1924) that promoted the culture and landscape of central Pennsylvania.
From his maternal home in McElhattan which he inherited, Shoemaker devoted much of his energy to environmental conservation and considered folklore associated with the endangered landscape deserving of preservation along with the state's forests and wildlife. In this campaign associated with the Progressive movement, he became involved as a campaign writer for Gifford Pinchot
Gifford Pinchot
Gifford Pinchot was the first Chief of the United States Forest Service and the 28th Governor of Pennsylvania...
's runs for U.S. Senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
(1914, 1926) and Governor (1923, 1931). Pinchot appointed Shoemaker as chair of the Pennsylvania Historical Commission (1923–1930) and various state boards for environmental and historical preservation. Serving as campaign manager for Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
's presidential campaign in Pennsylvania in 1929, Shoemaker was later appointed by Hoover to be U.S. ambassador
Ambassadors from the United States
This is a list of ambassadors of the United States to individual nations of the world, to international organizations, to past nations, and ambassadors-at-large.Ambassadors are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate...
to Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
(1930–1933).
Folklore and conservation work
Praised for drawing attention in his creative writing to the traditions of the Pennsylvania "mountaineers", Shoemaker nonetheless drew criticism for his alteration and occasional fabrication of legends. His goal, he announced, was to show the legacy of legends for landscape features such as trees, animals, caves and caverns, rivers, and mountains; by making people realizing the spiritual narratives associated with the environment he hoped to make them more respectful and conservation-minded. An example is his publication of the legend of Princess Nit-a-Nee, supposedly connected to the Nittany Mountains in Centre CountyCentre County, Pennsylvania
Centre County is a county located in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. It is part of the State College, Pennsylvania Metropolitan Statistical Area. As of 2010, the population was 153,990....
; the legend has been perpetuated in many tourist brochures for sites to the present day such as Penn's Cavern and the Pennsylvania State University
Pennsylvania State University
The Pennsylvania State University, commonly referred to as Penn State or PSU, is a public research university with campuses and facilities throughout the state of Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1855, the university has a threefold mission of teaching, research, and public service...
.
Shoemaker's humanistic interests in his creative writing also showed in his campaign to have artists use local folklore as a resource for literature, poetry, art, and music. A prolific writer, he produced more than 100 books and pamphlets and hundreds of articles. In addition to his books of legends such as Susquehanna Legends, In the Seven Mountains, Penn's Grandest Cavern, Tales of the Bald Eagle Mountains, Allegheny Episodes, Juniata Memories, North Mountain Mementos, South Mountain Sketches, Black Forest Souvenirs, for which he is best known, he published more ethnographic field collections of songs and ballads (Mountain Minstrelsy of Pennsylvania, 1931), folk speech (Scotch-Irish and English Proverbs and Sayings of the West Branch Valley of Central Pennsylvania, 1927), and crafts (Early Potters of Clinton County, 1916). He also wrote some of the earliest accounts of hunting and animal lore, such as Pennsylvania Deer and Their Horns (1915), Pennsylvania Lion or Panther (1914), Wolf Days in Pennsylvania (1914), and Stories of Great Pennsylvania Hunters (1913).
First state folklorist
In 1924, he cofounded the Pennsylvania Folklore Society with Bishop J.H. Darlington, and he was its president from 1930 until 1957. From 1924 to 1932, he published a series of monographMonograph
A monograph is a work of writing upon a single subject, usually by a single author.It is often a scholarly essay or learned treatise, and may be released in the manner of a book or journal article. It is by definition a single document that forms a complete text in itself...
s for the society. While he was minister to Bulgaria from 1930 to 1933, he took notice of Bulgaria's official efforts to preserve its folklore that he thought could be applied to the United States.
Upon his return to the United States, he began a daily column for the Altoona Tribune
Altoona Tribune
The Altoona Tribune was a daily newspaper in Blair County, Pennsylvania.It was launched on January 1, 1856 by Ephraim B. McCrum and William M. Allison, with equipment purchased from the defunct Altoona Register. Two years later, H. C. Dern acquired Allison's share of the company, and in 1875, Hugh...
, which he had purchased in 1912, in which he covered regional folklore and history and called for cultural conservation efforts. He had an opportunity to develop his plans when he was appointed state archivist of Pennsylvania from 1937 to 1948 and director of the State Museum in Harrisburg from 1939 to 1940. In the posts, he called for the state to sponsor collection and preservation of folklore in addition to keeping the state's documentary record.
After the archives, museum, and historical commission merged to form the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission following World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, he oversaw the creation of the Division of Folklore in the commission in 1948 and took the position of the nation's first state folklorist. Over forty states now have comparable positions. In the post, Shoemaker sponsored publications, meetings, festivals, and exhibits, although he entered into bitter disputes with academic folklorists in Pennsylvania over his popularized presentations of folklore.
Shoemaker left the post in 1956, retiring to Restless Oaks. Shoemaker died shortly thereafter near his McElhattan home in 1958. Many of his papers are located in repositories at the Pennsylvania State University, State Archives of Pennsylvania, and Juniata College
Juniata College
Juniata College is a private liberal arts college located in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania. It is named after the Juniata River — one of the principal tributaries of the Susquehanna River. In 1876 it became the first college founded by the Church of the Brethren and has been co-educational since...
(where a Shoemaker Gallery is named after him).