Interview with Fred Shepherd and Emily Wolfson



[Some chatting before interview begins --Shepherd tells about something that happened in the past to an acquaintance or coworker of theirs.]

SHEPHERD: And Dick, but Dick never got to work before 11 o’clock.

WOLFSON: Yeah.

SHEPHERD: That was Dick.

WOLFSON: That was Dick.

SHEPHERD: But he had had it. He went into that office. He was as red as that chair. Said, ‘God damn it, Dick, Gordon, you dumb son of a bitch. Get me my ball for my typewriter!’ You got, he just, one up side, down the other.

WOLFSON: I can’t believe…

SHEPHERD: Poor Dick was not the same for the whole day. The whole idea -- I think he felt personally violated that this man…

WOLFSON: Well, of course.

SHEPHERD: …would go into his office and take his things and…

WOLFSON: He had no business in there, and what did he do with it? Put it on his typewriter?

SHEPHERD: Yeah, yeah, too cheap to go get another one I guess.

WOLFSON: Oh, for Heaven’s sake.

WOLFSON: I didn’t know that.

SHEPHERD: He was an absolute idiot.

WOLFSON: Oh, my, well, I’ve got to change chairs, ‘ cause I’m too low.

SHEPHERD: Okay, you want to get up on -- put the pillows up there?

WILLIHNGANZ: Here, here. You want these?

WOLFSON: We’ll just move the chairs.

WILLIHNGANZ: Let’s just change chairs. Yeah, change chairs. There you go.

WOLFSON: We always - I had to take pillows with me to buy my last car.

Oh, my!

SHEPHERD: Oh, my!

WILLIHNGANZ: So, tell me a little bit about the uh, the early years. When did you join, Fred, when did you join that Guild?

SHEPHERD: I think it was in 1967 or ‘68.

WOLFSON: I think that’s about right.

SHEPHERD: Yeah, around that time.

WOLFSON: I think it was ‘67 that we started the fair.

SHEPHERD: Yeah.

WOLFSON: Yeah.

SHEPHERD: And, the first fairs were absolutely hysterical. ‘Course, we were all excited about going to the Indian Fort, wherever that was, and we discovered that when we got to Berea.

WOLFSON: Yeah.

SHEPHERD: But, you entered into the big parking lot, which was below a trail that led to the Indian Fort, and the craft persons would be on either side of this trail, that proceeded all the way up to the amphitheater and the Indian Fort. And when we got up there, we were greeted by the chair…was Garry, I 2:00guess, Garry Barker, and there was nothing to put your work on except you were directed to a pile of concrete blocks.