Lasting Legacies

Doc Watson: A Life in Music
By Eddie Huffman

Arthel “Doc” Watson was born into poverty but also a rich mountain culture in Deep Gap, Watauga County, in 1923. By the age of 2, he’d lost his sight, but he’d spend the rest of his life cultivating and sharing his vivid musical vision. On the guitar, he was a flatpicker without parallel. And as a living depository of Appalachian songs and stories, even as Watson rose to international fame in a career that garnered seven Grammy Awards, he stayed firmly rooted in our region. Greensboro writer Eddie Huffman’s new biography justly grants Watson “superhero” status, sharing a musical journey that we are lucky to join.

George Masa: A Life Reimagined
by Janet McCue and Paul Bonesteel

A diminutive man with a giant, global life, he was known to most in Western North Carolina as George Masa. Under that name, the Japanese immigrant (born Shoji Endo) spent the last 18 years of his life in Asheville. He wore many professional hats but rose to renown for his extraordinary nature photography and public-lands advocacy, helping to foster both the Appalachian Trail and Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Now, this lovingly but rigorously written biography probes untapped archival sources from the United States to Japan to flesh out Masa’s mystery-laden backstory.