raising $5,000 to improve Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Bill and his wife Hester Daves Beecher (our 2013 Evergreen Ball Co-Chair along with Jill Griffith) established a personal fundraising page on Razoo.com where other Friends of the Smokies can sponsor his feat.  Bill started his efforts in May, and so far he's raised $1,076 toward his goal of $5,000.

Bill is the son-in-law of Friends Board Member Nancy Daves, whose family treks to Mt. LeConte were featured in the Knoxville News Sentinel in 2010.  Read her story.

Can you help Ironman Bill reach his goal?  To donate, click here

Mayna Treanor Avent painted in her log cabin studio near Elkmont for many years. Jim Thompson's and George Masa's photographs of the mountains were instrumental in the push to form Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  The stonework of the Civilian Conservation Corps workers along Newfound Gap Road is truly artistry through engineering.  Quilts, pottery, songs, and woodcrafts of the Park's former residents are treasures passed down through generations.  Art is certainly all around the Smokies.

Now it is being celebrated in Great Smoky Mountains National Park through the new Artist in Residence (AiR) program.

This is a popular program throughout the National Park Service, with resident artists working annually in places like Rocky Mountain National Park and Acadia.

Friends of the Smokies is proud to support this emerging program with help from the Avent Cabin Fund.  This year, the artists will live and work in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  The 7 participants will create pieces that will communicate the beauty and importance of our Park's special places and the life within them.  Each artist will also give two public presentations about their work (when they are scheduled, we'll share the info online , ).

In addition to lodging in park housing for 4-6 weeks, through a partnership with Arrowmont's School of Arts & Crafts the AiRs will enjoy the opportunity to collaborate with artists at the Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts in Gatlinburg.  Thanks to the team at Arrowmont for lending their knowledge and expertise to the selection committee, and for helping to publicize the program.

Printmaker Tom Virgin and Cherokee high school intern Tagan Crowe are already working in the Smokies.  Observe Tagan creating large oil paintings at the Oconaluftee Visitors Center until July 28th (12:20 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.- Thursday thru Saturday).

Friends of the Smokies, along with the other full color license plate groups and their supporters, tourism businesses, and mountain lovers are disappointed that House Bill 1035 was not brought to the North Carolina Senate floor for a vote to save this full color license plate, which includes a white box, even after 

 

• the NC House of Representatives unanimously passed the bill to repeal the sunset of all NC full color license plates
• the NC DMV and NC State Highway Patrol issued a report recommending North Carolina continue to issue full-color background special license plates in the new standardized format (white box)
• the NC Joint Legislative Transportation Oversight Committee unanimously recommended the full color plate program be reinstated

We are hopeful that during the 2013 long legislative session that NC legislators will fix the problem.

 

We are grateful to everyone who wrote letters, sent emails, and made phone calls to their NC legislative contacts to support our efforts to eliminate this threat to our Friends of the Smokies plate.  Your continued purchases and renewals are important to continue funding improvements to Great Smoky Mountains National Park. 

 

We appreciate the business community and individuals who support the plate program and all that it brings to western North Carolina - supporting the tourism economy and protecting valuable natural resources. 

 

We encourage our North Carolina friends to continue purchasing and renewing the plates-they are still helping Great Smoky Mountains National Park. 

Join acclaimed national storyteller Michael Reno Harrell for an afternoon of Smoky mountain stories at the Oconaluftee Visitor Center in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Harrell will bring his Southern humor and warmth to the front porch of the visitor center at 4 p.m. Saturday, June 30. The show promises hearty laughs and happy sighs for all ages, and is free and open to the public.

Harrell is donating his performance to benefit Friends of the Smokies, a non-profit organization that supports conservation, education, historic preservation and other priorities benefiting the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.