Get to Know Grandma Gatewood at Rose Glen Literary Festival February 25th in Sevierville
Rose Glen Literary Festival in Sevierville features lectures, workshops and book signings by authors from the Smoky Mountains and Appalachian region. One of this year’s featured authors is Ben Montgomery who wrote Grandma Gatewood’s Walk: The Inspiring Story of the Woman Who Saved the Appalachian Trail, which won the 2014 National Outdoor Book Award for History/Biography.
Ben Montgomery, who is actually Emma Gatewood’s great-nephew, has authored the only biography of the hiking celebrity known as “Grandma Gatewood.” What made her so famous? Her amazing story began in May 1955 when she began her 2,050-mile walk on the Appalachian Trail. Gatewood wore canvas Keds and carried only a homemade drawstring sack. In September of that year, she became the first woman to thru-hike the AT alone. Emma Gatewood was 67 years old. Then she went and hiked it two more times.
At Rose Glen Literary Festival, meet Grandma Gatewood through the words of Ben Montgomery, a 2010 Pulitzer Prize finalist and staff writer at the Tampa Bay Times.
The Rose Glen Literary Festival will be held at the Sevierville Convention Center on Saturday, February 25, 2017 from 9:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. All programs at the festival are free with the exception of the Luncheon ($20 per person).
Other Featured Authors and Books at the 2016 Rose Glen Literary Festival
- Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson – Heard of the Body Farm? This writing team coauthored Death’s Acre about the University of Tennessee’s Anthropology Research Facility known as the Body Farm which Dr. Bass founded twenty-five years ago. Meet the famous forensic anthropologist, Dr. Bass and National Geographic documentary writer and producer, Jon Jefferson to learn more about this critically-acclaimed book.
- June Hall McCash – Her most recent Marguerite’s Landing was published in April 2016. A published poet, McCash has also written four historical novels and seven non-fiction books. Almost to Eden, her first novel won the Georgia Author of the Year Award for First Novel in 2011. Since her retirement from Middle East Tennessee University, McCash writes full-time and has won more awards for her work.
- Jim Stokely – Jim Stokely discovered an unpublished manuscript after the death of his mother, author Wilma Dykeman entitled Family of Earth: A Southern Mountain Childhood which he’s since published. Wilma Dykeman (1920-2006) was living in the English Mountain area of Cocke County, TN during the last months of WWII when she authored this memoir where she tried to explain the purpose of life in wartime.
For more information and Luncheon Tickets, contact Sevierville Chamber of Commerce at 865-453-6411.
