Pioneer collector of folklore in the central Pennsylvania mountain region and first official
state folklorist in the United States (1948–1956), serving the state of Pennsylvania. As a
journalist after 1898, 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
home near Lock Haven, Pennsylvania, 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.
Praised for drawing attention to the traditions of the Pennsylvania “mountaineers,”
Shoemaker nonetheless drew criticism for his alteration and occasional fabrication of
legends. A prolific writer, he produced more than 100 books and pamphlets and hundreds
of articles. In addition to his books of legends, for which he is best known (and most
criticized), he published reliable 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]).
Shoemaker became a prominent newspaper publisher in Pennsylvania after World
War I and published many folkloristic pamphlets and books by himself and others. 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
monographs for the society. He held several appointments to state government
commissions and was particularly active in public-history activities: He was chair of the
Pennsylvania Historical Commission (1923–1930) and president of the Pennsylvania
Federation of Historical Societies (1925–1926). In 1930 President Herbert Hoover
appointed him minister to Bulgaria, a post he held until 1933. While he was minister, he
took notice of Bulgaria’s official efforts to preserve its folklore. In 1935 he began a daily
column for the Altoona Tribune 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.
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 first state folklorist. In that post, he sponsored publications, meetings, festivals, and exhibits now common in public-folklore programming, although he entered into bitter
disputes with academic folklorists in Pennsylvania over his popularized presentations of
folklore. Shoemaker left the post in 1956, and a similar state folklore program was not
established until 1966, again with the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission.
Shoemaker died near his McElhattan, Pennsylvania, home in 1958.
Simon J.Bronner
References
Bronner, Simon J. 1995. Popularizing Pennsylvania: Henry Shoemaker and the Progressive Uses
of Folklore and History. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Hoffmann, Frank A. 1959. Henry W.Shoemaker, 1882–1958. Journal of American Folklore
72:345–346.
Shoemaker, Henry W. [1914] 1991. Black Forest Souvenirs Collected in Northern Pennsylvania.
Baltimore: Gateway Press for the Pine Creek Historian.
——. [1915] 1992. Tales of the Bald Eagle Mountains in Central Pennsylvania. Baltimore:
Gateway Press for the Lycoming County Historical Society.