I now feel that one ought to be able to do something that is a lasting thing for the world . . . something that will always have real value.
                             -- Doris Ulmann


Doris Ulmann, a noted New York photographer, spent the last several years of her life traveling through the southern Appalachian mountains in search of people whose way of life moved or intrigued her. Her work in Appalachia led her to photograph school children and college presidents, women at their loom and men carving animals from wood.

Traveling companions from writer, Julia Peterkin, to folk musician, John Jacob Niles, said that Doris' drive to make photographs blocked out heat and fatigue during the day and kept her up nights developing the day's prints. By the time of her death in 1934,  her work numbered some 10,000 photographs and included more than 3,000 images of the artists and craftspeople of the southern highlands whom she affectionately termed, "my  mountaineers."

Through Ulmann's photographs and excerpts from her correspondence, archival film, interviews with historians, Dr. Melisssa McEuen, Dr. Ron Pen, Loyal Jones, and David Featherston, as well as individuals photographed by Ulmann, this documentary explores the life and work of one of America's most important and prolific photographers.

Today the John C. Campbell Folk School in North Carolina still teaches many of the crafts documented in Doris Ulmann's photographs. 

Many of Doris Ulmann's photographs may be found on the web.  Click here for a link to on-line archives.