DRAMA 1936 PMSS 50th Anniversary Pageant

Pine Mountain Settlement School
Series 16: EVENTS
Series 33: DRAMA
1936 PMSS 50th Anniversary Pageant
Written in 1930 by Unknown Author

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TAGS: 50th Anniversary of Pine Mountain, plays, dramas, pageants, Uncle William Creech, William Creech, Aunt Sal Creech, Sally Dixon Creech, settlement school, anniversaries, celebrations, Creech family

DRAMA 1936 PMSS 50th Anniversary Pageant

“A Pageant of Pine Mountain” – A 1919 Version

An early mention of the play “A Pageant of Pine Mountain” can be found in Evelyn K. Wells’ record of dramatics at Pine Mountain covering the years 1913 to 1928:

We remember an interesting succession of plays: Robin Hood in a real Sherwood Forest, Peter Pan, and The Piper with beautiful outdoor setting, Shakespeare done by children whose own speech was so often Shakespearean, The Pageant of Pine Mountain, given for the Board Members in 1919, with its episodes of Indians, early settlers Uncle William and the School, set against the Pole House Knoll where now the log cabin of Uncle William and Aunt Sal stands. The children wrote this pageant themselves taking whole school sessions to visit Uncle John and Aunt Sis and Aunt Sal to get the proper atmosphere and of course the properties were all real, the flint lock gun, the linsey skirt, etc.

“A Pageant of Pine Mountain” – Written in 1930

THE PAGEANT OF PINE MOUNTAIN was written in 1930 by an unknown author and performed in 1936 for the 50th anniversary of the founding of the School. The play, performed in an outdoor setting at the School, captures the evolution of the School. The cast was composed of students, staff, community, and importantly, of descendants of the School’s founding family, the Creech Family.

The five-page play script for presentation at Pine Mountain Settlement School contains annotations regarding the casting, though the names are not validated. The assignment of the cast is not fully known and is taken from the annotated script and from photographs.

The play consists of a PROLOGUE, three EPISODES and an EPILOGUE. A program for the final production has not been located in the collections.

CAST: A Pageant of Pine Mountain 1936

PROLOGUE: William Napier	SOL SHELL: Winfield
BOY: Richard	BYTHIE: Bess
OLD MAN: Edward Adams	LOUIZE: Roselie Creech
YOUNG GIRL: Dakota ? Eva Lewis ?	JOHNNY YOUNG:
SQUAW:	AUNT SAL: Wilmer Creech
SECOND WARRIOR: Oscar	POLLY: Polly
FIRST WARRIOR: Bennie Turner	JOE: Rankin
CHIEF: Collin	NANCE: Mary Wilder
EAGLE: William O’Day	UNCLE WILLIAM: Farley
FLEETFOOT: Sylvan Hayes (Silven)	HENRY: Robert Creech
WARRIOR: Addie Cornett	BILL: Charles Creech
WARRIOR: Dillard Couch	MAT MANEY: Manon Day
WARRIOR: William Lewis	EPILOGUE: Woodrow ? and William Napier
	TWO LITTLE GIRLS ON HORSE: Marthey and Elena ?

DRAMA 1936 PMSS 50th Anniversary Pageant

TRANSCRIPTION

[transcription needed]

A PAGEANT OF PINE MOUNTAIN 1930

PROLOGUE

EPISODE I

EPISODE II

EPISODE III

EPILOGUE

(After the family have gone in to dinner and all is still, comes the spoken Epilogue.)

“I want to tell you my reasons why I want a school here at Pine Mountain. Some places hereabouts are so Lost from Knowledge that the young’uns have never been taught the knowledge of reading and writing and don’t know the country they were borned in or what State or County they was borned. We need a whole lot of teaching how to work on the farm and how to make their farms pay, also teaching them how to take care of their timber and stuff they’re wasting. In the way they farm and doing no good it is hardening them and they are turning to public works, too many of them. Hit’s lack of knowledge of science that’s caused the trouble, and with good teaching seems like they would be greatly bettered. I hope our good friends will come forward and help us all they can to make better people out of our mountain people that has been raised up here in ignorance ad almost regardless of law.

I don’t look after wealth for them. I look after the prosperity of our nation. The question of this world is naught. We are born into it naked and we go out naked. The savin’ of the soul is what we should seek. I want all young’uns taught to serve the livin’ God. Of course, they won’t all do that but they can have good and evil laid before them ad they can choose which they will. I have heart and cravin’ that our people may grow better. I have deeded my land to the Pine Mountain Settlement School to be used for school purposes as long as the Constitution of the United States stands. Hopin’ it may make a bright and intelligent people after I’m dead and gone.”

Thus did the old man speak, having cherished thirty years
The dream that had its small beginning in this cabin.
The land he gave, and there came forward two good friends
Women with hearts to care, and minds to plan, and strength
To sow and weed and tend until the fields spread wide.
The school about us is the tribute to these three,
Our daily tasks fruit of their planning and their search;
But there are tributes we see less, to their nobility,
In scattered homes and schools where thinking men ad women
Live out their gratitude ..
Courageous struggle
Of the Indian, vision of the pioneer,
Brave selflessness of many who have made the vision
Live, —these are our heritage! We build for ages
That come after, our best life searching out the way
Their steps shall walk. Like those who came before
The fruits of search before their feet we lay.