Martha Ross

Martha Ross

Artisans

Basket makers

Basket making

Basketwork

Cherokee baskets

Cherokee women

Handicraft

Manners and customs

In this photograph, which is part of a series of four, Cherokee basket weaver Martha Ross demonstrates how to prepare white oak for making a basket. After cutting and curing, the oak tree is quartered before the maker begins the process of making splits. In this photograph Ross is shown pulling apart a length of white oak repeatedly to make subsequently thinner strips. Martha Lossiah Ross (b. 1931) was born and raised in Big Cove, a remote section of the Qualla Boundary near Cherokee, North Carolina. Her mother, Charlotte Lottie Welch Lossiah, made and sold baskets. Ross specialized in white oak baskets and joined the Qualla Arts and Crafts cooperative in 1956. In 1975, she began working there and remained for 23 years. The last photograph of the series is stamped with the mark of Asheville-based photographer Ron Ruehl; he most likely took the entire series of pictures.

Ruehl, Ron

Photograph Collection

Hunter Library Digital Collections, Western Carolina University, Cullowhee, NC 28723

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/CNE/1.0/

jpg;

photographs

StillImage

11064

https://southernappalachiandigitalcollections.org/object/11064

2008-11-25

All rights reserved. For permissions and use, contact Qualla Arts and Crafts Mutual, Inc., Cherokee, NC 28719;

Qualla Boundary

Appalachian Region, Southern

8" x 10"(dimension)

Cherokee Traditions