Birmingham Audubon Mountain Workshop

Published on May 8, 2018 at 4 p.m. by Michelle Little

An oral history project centered on the origins and history of the Birmingham Audubon Mountain Workshop founded by Elberta Reid, Jeanette Hancock, and Dr. Dan Holliman.

Transcript

[music playing]

[J.T. Dabbs] I think the ability to unplug for a few days and just be at the
Audubon Mountain Workshop is a great opportunity for young people's eyes to be
opened and- and you know, to look up from their smartphone and see, you know,
what an amazing place we live in, in the state of Alabama, what amazing
diversity we have, and what a unique ecosystem we have here in Mentone. It's
amazing, the species, the diversity of the species, and all the different things
that, that are here. So it's, it's a great opportunity, I think, for us to teach
a younger generation what great resources we have and how important it is to
them, so, uh, so it's, it's a, I think an interesting and important part of the
Audubon Mountain Workshop.

[00:00:53.22] Keely Smith: (voiceover) Every year, for over 40 years, for one
long weekend in May, the Birmingham Audubon Society has held its mountain
workshop on Lookout Mountain, near Mentone, Alabama.

[birdsong]

[00:01:20.10] Keely Smith: (voiceover) the workshop has been held since the very
first at Alpine Camp for Boys, located at the west fork of the Little River,
adjacent to DeSoto State Park. The boy campers have not yet arrived, but the
staff is already mostly there and the cafeteria is up and running. From Thursday
afternoon through packing up after lunch on Sunday, workshop participants get a
pretty intensive program on native plants and animals, local crafts, culture and
folklore, and even classes on meditation and survival.

[00:01:50.07] A typical day starts with the 6 am bird walk, this being an
Audubon Society project, after all, 7:30 breakfast, 8:30 to 11:30 first class,
noon lunch and free time, 2:30 to 5:30 second class, 6 pm supper, 8pm keynote
speech or Saturday night square dance in the gym, and then for the hardy perhaps
an owl prowl, or a lichen lighting with backlight

[00:02:18.20] All the original participants of the workshop agree that the basic
model for the workshop came from naturalist Blanche Dean, legendary high school
biology teacher at Woodlawn in Birmingham. Beginning about 1951, she created
ecological campouts for adults, exploring the remarkable diversity of plants and
wildlife statewide. She and her itinerant, informal adult education classes
roamed from Dauphin Island to North Alabama, and one of her most fondly
remembered camps was at Desoto State Park. Although her camps ended in the
mid-1960s, she encouraged active members of the Audubon Society and other
environmental circles, including Elberta Reid, to revive her educational nature
camps. Elberta Reid, Jeanette Hancock, and Dan Holliman worked together to
organize the first Audubon Mountain Ecology Workshop in the spring of 1977.

[00:03:17.09] Jim Brown: but the classes, you now there are classes in almost
every aspect of biology and to a certain extent a lot of cultural classes.
Benthic bottom organisms, extreme ecology, ferns, succulent plants, bats, uh,
insects, lichens. There's a range of classes, uh, by people who, uh, either
they're professionals, many of them were professional PhD biologists in the
field, others are very knowledgeable amateurs.

[00:03:50.15] Jimmy Stiles: I mean, where else can you go and, you know, find
out about land snails, fish, or edible plants, or, I mean, I think, I think
there's been a course on every topic that you could possibly relate to the
natural; world at some point during the history of the Audubon Mountain
workshop, as well as the culture, you know, and the- the folk architecture or
pottery or, you know, baskets, ballads, you know, rattlesnakes. You can get it
all at Audubon Mountain, you know.

[00:04:31.07] Greg Harber: So what I usually tell people, it's a four day
ecology camp for adults and for children. We learn a little bit about everything
under the sun, if it flies, crawls, flops, swims, whatever, this is the
opportunity to learn about it. This is when even the big kids and the little
kids all share something in common. It's not just birds, even though it's
sponsored by the Birmingham Audubon Society, um, it's more than just birds,
obviously. And so, you know I guess that's the other fun thing about it, is
seeing some of the instructor, or taking classes, joining in with the other
instructors, trying to broaden their own horizons about things. So, you know,
it's just, great [laughs] you got the thirty-five, or forty, or forty-five, or
fifty, however old the instructor is and they're out there, you know, running
around, chasing, got their nets and they're "oh, cool, look what I caught" and
you know it's like, wait a minute, that's uh, Duncan, or, you know, some of
these people who are instructors in colleges and universities, it's like, oh
wait, he's like a big giant kid up here.

[00:05:40.20] Jim Brown: I heard somebody call it the best collection of
naturalists in seven states. So it's a whole lot of, a whole lot of talents in,
in, uh, in everybody with that big shared interest in ecology and nature, too.
[00:05:57.02] And I think the Audubon Mountain Workshop was so important to me
because here is this local Alabama example with its roots in Blanche Dean and
maybe input from other Audubon Societies around, kind of championed by Dan
Holliman and Jeanette Hancock who could really make it work. I used to think of
Dan and Jeanette as the king and queen of the May, because they were the
principals in that first decade or two of the whole camp

[00:06:24.07] Jack Johnston: The workshop organizers were Elberta Reid, who is
here now and, uh, Elberta and Jeanette Hancock. Jeanette Hancock and Elberta
were Mountain Brook residents and friends, and they knew Blanche Dean, so at
some point the conversation arose about something to do in remembrance of her,
or along the same lines of what she was doing. So Jeanette and Elberta were good
organizers, that knew a lot of people, and Dan Holliman had the academic
connections to bring in faculty. So it worked well. He left the organization to
them, and they depended on him to arrange with the faculty. So that was the
partnership that arose. And, um, it worked well.

[00:07:25.01] Elberta Reid: well, the way we found this was we were - this was,
this was before Bob and I married, but I think the Hanocks had married by then.
They were, they were good friends, they were, in fact, in fact, I had to
introduce- introduce a friend, (unintelligible [00:07:40.17]) I had to introduce
Jimmy and Jeanette Hancock. So we were old, we were good friends, we'd gone to
school together. And uh, I think they had married and I think there were
probably four couples who came up for a weekend at- at camp, at the Desoto state
park. And I think Bob Reid, Bob, my husband was the one who was the birder and
he's the one that got us all, all into birding so I think this was his idea that
we come up here and because Jim, uh, this was the, this is really ancient
history f-four young, un-unmarried couples wouldn't go off together, and we were
out of school without a chaperone but the Hancocks had married so they were our
chaperone [laughs]. We were hike- we went hiking. Just, didn't know where we
were going, just started out on a day-long, you know, what, we were, we were
ready to go for the day. On the other side of the river was sitting someone I
knew. It was Ann Hillhouse who had been at (*** [00:08:47.03]) with me and we
had roomed together at the University of Colorado for summer when we were in
summer school, when we were in school. And, and, you know, we didn't know they
were, I didn't know they were there and they didn't know anybody but me in our
crowd, but we were, we, uh, called across the creek and I think we may have
walked across the dam, you can walk across that dam. Y'all wouldn't mind doing
it, I would have to take a cane with me to do it now to keep from falling off
but, but anyway. The-the Hancocks and the Hillhoues eventually became really
good friends, and the Hancocks love this area, and the Hillhouses encouraged
them to look at the house to rent, two door, which is just down that road. And
then a couple houses down from that they, the Hancocks started renting, and they
rented, they rented for I don't know how many years, ten or fifteen years maybe,
before they bought a place up the hill. So Jeanette, by, with the-the- spending
time next to the Hillhouses and right down the road, got to know the O'Ferralls,
and she became familiar with the camp.

[00:10:00.27] Jeanette Hancock: And Elberta came up to visit us, just, and I
knew the O'Ferralls were not well, and she said "Blanche Dean used to have a
workshop over at Desoto, I bet we need to start this," so um, we went up to Dan
Holliman, I mean, excuse me, went up to, um, Dick O'Ferrall and bless his heart,
I mean, I give a lot a credit because he said normally he did not rent out the
camp for less than 50 people, but he liked the idea. And he says "we'll try this
for thirty-five people." We had no idea if people would come starting on
Thursday night. And so, thanks to Dick O'Ferrall and his wife, Alice, they
agreed to let us do it, and the rest is history.

[00:10:48.16] Dick O'Ferrall: Well, uh, Jeanette and Jimmy Hancock, Judge
Hancock and his wife, rented a cottage out our front gate, and one day Jeanette
and Elberta Reid came down to talk to Alice and me about, would we consider
allowing them to do, do a workshop here at camp, uh, they, they wanted to, as
much as possible, uh, to continue what Blanche Dean had started in her nature
workshops, and uh, they said "would you consider it?" Well, we said "of course
we will." And that was just the beginning of it. And Elberta and Bob Reid, her
husband, Jeanette, and Jimmy were great encouragers to us too, and we just
established a great relationship with them and Birmingham Audubon.

[00:11:55.12] Alice O'Ferrall: There's so many people in that early ?

Dick O'Ferrall: Early times. Weezie Smith, Virginia Thrasher. Ethel Owen, I
believe is her name, of course Bob Stiles and Jim Brown?

Alice O'Ferrall: It just goes on.

Dick O'Ferrall: Dan Holliman

Alice O'Ferrall: And Dan Holliman

Dick O'Ferrall: Dan Holliman, he was just an incredible man, and he had such a
passion for the out of doors, for people, he was just one of the kindest men
I've ever met. And um, nothing ruffled him.

Alice O'Ferrall: [laughs]

Dick O'Ferrall: [00:12:30.07] And uh he was just, he was incredible. And we
loved having that relationship with him too.

[00:12:41.13] Jack Johnston: He was a professor of zoology, uh, really kind of a
Renaissance man, and he came to academics because he was trained in many things.
His PhD was in mammology, specializing in the mammals of Alabama, so he
basically worked his entire life in Alabama. And this allowed him to know people
from one end of the state to the other, from the mountains to the beach, and of
course he knew many faculty members in the, in biology at universities
throughout the state. And his knowledge of mammology in the state was
unparalleled to anyone I've ever seen.

[00:13:19.19] Bob Stiles: And uh, he, I think Dan was probably the best
all-around naturalist, maybe, that Alabama has seen. Uh, he- he was really good
at everything from birds to invertebrates. And I really enjoyed, I learned a lot
from Dan and I really enjoyed being, uh, with him and working with him, uh.

[00:13:55.07] Diane Holliman: He was a character. I didn't know what a character
he was until...you know, until I met other people in the world and thought
"wow!" [laughs] With the travelling, and the - he had a great sense of humor too.

[00:14:10.02] Jack Johnston: he was a person who was part Choctaw Indian. And
there's been reference made by some to something that's called a "Choctaw
chuckle." it isn't a laugh, it's a chuckle "huh huh huh huh." Well he had this.
A soft, laughing chuckle. And when he did this, you always knew that something
funny was on his mind, or- or he had just said something funny and he was
waiting to see if you caught it. So, when you're around him, you had to
appreciate...uh, his dry sense of humor which was-was always light, and uh,
not...not at all serious but could have a serious undertone

[00:14:57.06] Jimmy Stiles: So, Dan Holliman and [pointing at Bob Stiles] y'all
and the Browns and several people would get together, um, every night up here
and just sit around and talk about the weirdest, most random stuff. I- I- So as
an example, I remember, years ago, Dan Holliman starting a, a conversation about
the...which way a pig's tail would curl whether you were north or south of the equator-

[laughter]

[00:15:38.16] -um, to the Coriolis effect and stuff like that, just the [Bob
Stiles coughs] most off-the-wall conversations that only, you know, astute
biologists would have, you know.

[00:15:51.13] J. T. Dabbs: If you're a, I think my experience in Audubon, um,
whether it's Birmingham Audubon or other Audubons I've been associated with as
I've moved around, is it's, um, there are a lot of birders associated with
Audubon and with Audubon Mountain Workshop, but if you're a birder, you're also
a naturalist, you love all that because it's all interrelated. And so, you know,
whether you're, uh, learning about wildflowers or you're learning about edible
wild plants, you know, I would dare say that probably most people up here you
know, have binoculars with them, because they're interested in the birds and the
diversity of the birds, and so uh, it's really, uh, it's a fun hobby an
interesting thing, and, um, you know, what a great place to do it.

[00:16:35.05] Jimmy Stiles: I started coming here when I was four or five, I
guess five years old. Um, started coming up the first year. (gestures at Bobby
Stiles) He was teaching and uh...yeah. Roamed, roamed the camp and went to all
the adult classes. Uh, terrorized the instructors and, um-

Bob Stiles: Drove Ken Marion crazy.

[Laughter]

Jimmy Stiles: True, Ken Marion crazy, which is terrible because it spurred by
interest in herpetology which led to a poverty-ridden career as a herpetologist.
But uh, yeah. So we, I-I think we, I- I've come ever, every year since.

Keely Smith: Oh wow.

[00:17:30.09] Jimmy Stiles: Um-

Kelly Smith: And about how many years is that?

Jimmy Stiles: I think this is thirty-seven.

[00:17:35.18] Ken Marion: Dr. Bob Stiles was the ichthyologist at Samford and he
was always coming here, and he had his son, Jimmy Stiles, there with him from,
right off the bat. And doctor, um, Jim Brown had a, his son, Josh, with him too
and they were, you know, four, five, six, they started off. They would follow me
around, because they were sort of, boys and they wanted to go out and find
things. So they did this for several years, and uh, an actual fact, uh, it got a
little bit irritating because they would arrive up here a day before. And Jimmy
and Josh would go out and just catch everything within a walking radius of this
place. And so when we went on our walks, I mean, they would give me some of
these animals that I could show. But the walk was pretty abysmal now because
they had just caught everything. So the next year I had a plan. I had a plan
knowing they were going to do this, because I had no way to stop Jimmy and Josh
from catching these things especially when they were here the day earlier. So I
decided that, I got with Jimmy earlier, before he went down, uh, I said uh,
"Let's do something really neat there. Let's make, you can go out and catch
things, but sort of remember where you caught them. Then what we're going to do
is, before, just in a couple hours before I go teach my class, you're going to
go back out and take this bucket of animals and you're going to put them under
where you think you caught them, but remember those things." So, we would go out
with this class, and Jimmy would - I don't recall if Josh was following us that
day or not - but Jimmy would follow in the back and I told him, you know, "keep
it quiet, kid, don't let on." And so we'd get to the first log and I'd say
something like "this looks like habitat for the red salamander" and I'd turn the
log over, "My gosh, there is one!"

[laughter]

[00:19:47.12] And so this would go on for, for a number of these rocks and logs
and the people who were in the workshop just thought I was a god. [laughs]
They-they thought, they just thought, they thought I was probably the greatest
herpetologist in the world because I was calling the shots. Well, it worked for
a while but I- Jimmy kept snickering in the background ?

[laughter]

[00:20:09.11] so I finally, the cat was out of the bag a little bit, but it was
a great, it was a great way to do it. He remembers it, and I remember too. And
so, we made, I guess, the best out of what was not a great situation. [laughs]
But it uh, fortunately, as he said, it probably, it did lead to. whether
fortunate or not, it did lead to a career in field biology which [laughs] is, I
guess he's not making tons of money doing it but he's making, he's having fun.

[00:20:37.00] Jeanette Hancock: Jimmy Stiles. Did he tell you that we used to
put him up on the table and-

Kelly Smith: No!

Jeanette Hancock: - because his birthday would be during the workshop and he was
so little that he'd get up, we'd put him up on the, and sing "Happy Birthday" to
Jimmy Stiles, and look what's he's doing now. So that tells you that there was a
spirit behind the faculty, that it meant a lot to them.

[00:20:59.22]

Greg Harber: And that's the nice thing about it. Here, when you see everybody,
if it seems like family it's because it is family, I mean, people, it may be the
only time during the course of the year when all these different people get
together. I saw Bob Stiles for the first time in 3 or 4 years, I haven't seen
him in a while. And he was always so generous with his time, oh, he was just, he
would bring Jimmy up and...it was just great. You'd get to see him but he'd grow
up and grow old and, you know, grow wise together and we just, you know it's
like this is the time we get to catch up on what everybody's doing even though
they might be in different places throughout the state, throughout the
southeast, um, it really is just a special thing.

[00:21:48.25] Jeanette Hancock: But he used to say, "Jeanette, this is a better
ministry of what you're doing, of what you're doing at this workshop than
anything you do at St. Luke's." The reason for that is that so many people could
come to the workshop not knowing anybody, and immediately we made them feel
apart. And also a lot of people, teachers who may not could afford to go way
off, could come, so it brought in a lot of people who did not have the means or
the friendships to do other things (to Ethel Owen) Don't you think I'm-

Ethel Owen: That's right.

Jeanette Hancock: And so we really became a real family. And we really,
everybody ministered to each other in a real - and we would comment, this is as
Christian a setting without being a religious setting. [music playing] And I
think, and the faculty helped make that so it was a combination of all these ingredients

[00:22:46.05] Keely Smith (voiceover): For long-time faculty and many workshop
participants who come year after year, it's been an important part of their
lives. It starts with a nucleus of professional biologists giving serious field
experiences into local lifeforms. Then there's a penumbra of folks outside that
nucleus with special interests or expertise in the local culture, partly shaped
by the local ecology. And pervading it all is the fellowship in a community
where most every single person is sensitive to the richness of the environment
and concerned with dangers to it. Maybe the best way to close would be with the
Walter Cox blessing before every meal: [00:23:28.05] "Oh God of all outdoors and
of every living thing, help us to make Thy way our way and keep us mindful
always of the needs of others. Give us a reverence for all your creation that we
may be good stewards of your many blessings and will treat them as assets to be
passed on to future generations, enhanced and not impaired, and that we may use
your resources wisely in the service of others to your honor and glory forever, Amen."

[A SAMFORD TRADITIONS AND ORAL HISTORY RECORDING INITIATIVE PRODUCTION

Interviewees (in order of appearance)

Jim Brown

Bob Stiles

Jimmy Stiles

Greg Harber

Jack Johnston

Elberta Reid

Jeanette Hancock

Dick O'Ferrall

Alice O'Ferrall

Diane Holliman

Ken Marion

Interview Organizer - Jim Brown

Prayer - Walter Cox

Interviewer - Keely Smith

Videographer - Claire Davis

Film Editor - Keely Smith

Voice Over - Keely Smith

Voice Over Script Writer - Jim Brown

Transcribers - Jim Brown, Keely Smith, and Emily Youree

Music - "Audionautix: Acoustic" - Jason Shaw

A special thanks to the Birmingham, Audubon Society for hosting Samford STORI
for the 2017 Mountain Workshop

In loving memory of Dr. Dan Holliman, 1932-2009]

Audio Information
Attribute	Value
Interviewer	Keely Smith
Interviewee	Jim Brown
Repository	Samford University Oral History Collection
Collection	STORI Collection
Accession	SUHist/Folklore/004