Restrictions to Access

Use of audio or visual materials may require production of listening or viewing copies.

Restrictions to Use

No usage restrictions.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Tom Rankin Collection #20062, Southern Folklife Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Acquisitions information unknown (Acc. 102614).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: Anne Wells, June 2016

Encoded by: Anne Wells, June 2016

Archival processing of the Tom Rankin Collection was made possible through a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Blues (Music)--North Carolina.
• Country music--North Carolina.
• Fiddle tunes--North Carolina.
• Fiddlers--North Carolina.
• Fiddling--North Carolina.
• Henry, Big Boy.
• Mansfield, W. T.
• Musicians--North Carolina.
• Old-time music--North Carolina.
• Rankin, Tom.
• Scott, C. L.

• Folkstreams.net Collection (#20384)
• Southern Folklife Collection Field Notes (#30025)
• Southern Folklife Collection Moving Image Materials (#30002)

A photographer, filmmaker, and folklorist, Tom Rankin has been documenting and interpreting American culture for nearly twenty years. He received a B.A. from Tufts University (1980), an M.A. in folklore from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1983), and an M.F.A. in photography from Georgia State University (1987). For fifteen years he served as director of the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University, where he is now the director of the MFA in Experimental and Documentary Arts. His photographs have been published widely in numerous magazines, journals, and books, and he has exhibited throughout the country. His books include Sacred Space: Photographs from the Mississippi Delta (1993), which received the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Award for Photography; Deaf Maggie Lee Sayre: Photographs of a River Life (1995); Faulkner's World: The Photographs of Martin J. Dain (1997); and Local Heroes Changing America: Indivisible (2000).

The Tom Rankin Collection consists of 31 field recordings, 1980-1982, created and compiled by photographer, filmmaker, and folklorist, Tom Rankin, while he was a graduate student in the Curriculum in Folklore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The audio recordings primarily feature interviews and performances by blues, country, and old-time musicians from North Carolina. Artists featured on the recordings include Richard "Big Boy" Henry, a country blues artist of Beaufort, Carteret County, N.C; C. L. Scott, a traditional fiddler of Morehead City, Carteret County, N.C.; W. Earl Wicker, an old-time fiddler of Tramway, Lee County, N.C.; Jim Harris, a centenarian fiddler of New Bern, Craven County, N.C.; the Swain family of Columbia, Tyreell County, N.C.; and Mr. O. Williard, an old-time fiddler of Williamston, Martin County, N.C., among others. Rankin primarily recorded the artists performing at their home, while folklorist and banjo player, Bill Mansfield, accompanied many of the artists on the recordings. The collection also includes studio recordings of Big Boy Henry recorded at WUNC in Chapel Hill and dubs of Living Atlanta, a documentary radio series produced by WRFG.

• Audiocassettes (FS-20062/516, FS-20062/533, FS-20062/1005, FS-20062/1007, FS-20062/1211-1214)
• Audiotapes (FT-20062/1310-1316, FT-20062/1328-1338, FT-20062/1389-1393)