John Blakemore, Annabel Morris Buchahan, John Powell

Texan Annabel Morris Buchanan, Virginia composer and proponent of the Anglo-Saxon folk-song school John Powell, and local entrepreneur John Blakemore: from this star-crossed trio emerged the idea for the White Top Folk Festival.

"It was not the first time that there had been music on the mountain, but it was the first time the world of music and literature was aware and listening. There had been a narrow winding trail to the top of Virginia's second highest mountain and there had been fiddlers' contests on its clear high slope before. When Ike Sturgill, of Konnarock, at the foot of the mountain, suggested to Mr. Blakemore, manager of the White Top Company, that they have a "Fiddler's Convention" on the Fourth of July, 1931, it was not an entirely new idea, but the timing made it a very important one.

"The weather on the mountain is apt to be bad in July, so Mr. Blakemore was not very enthusiastic about the proposed date, but he did pass on to his cousin, John Bucahan, and his wife, Annabel Morris Buchanan, the idea of an old-fashioned fiddlers' contest. By the time Ike Sturgill's modest suggestion had been passed on from Mrs. Buchanan to Virginia's internationally known composer and pianist, John Powell, it had grown into something a good deal bigger than he had forseen—no less an attempt to bring to the mountain as many as possible of those who sang authentic ballads and folk songs, played the traditional melodies on dulcimer, fife, fiddle, or banjo, and those who danced the old dances and to bring to hear them people from all over the country—and the world—who wanted to listen for pleasure, for learning, for recording, for research in their heritage of music.

Mr. Blakemore did his part. The roads were improved, with turnouts, and graded... With what he thought was optimism, he planned for about 500 people. Ten times that many came during the nine subsequent festivals, there were thousands on White Top for two days every August. All records toppled in 1933 when Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt attended one day of the Festival, helping to attract a crowd reported in the newspapers at 22,000."

["Music on the Mountain," pp. 4-5]