Decades of dedication to documenting the Ozarks region led Gordon McCann to Columbia on May 19, where he was recognized as a Living Traditions Sustainer Fellow by the Missouri Folk Arts Program. 

 

The award, now in only its second year, honors individuals “and their deep-rooted contributions to traditional arts within their vibrant Missouri communities,” notes information on the MFAP’s website. 

 

Gordon McCann has long lived this reality. McCann, nearly 93, has spent much of his life working to share, promote and preserve the traditional arts. A key moment in his interest began in the 1970s, when he attended Emanuel Wood’s Ozark Opry on the square in Ozark, which began a longtime love for old-time Ozarks music. 

 

Since that time, McCann has recorded thousands of hours of jam sessions, music events and more related to the Ozarks. He also amassed a collection of thousands of items, particularly books and other ephemera, related to the region. McCann co-authored a book with legendary Ozarks documentarian Vance Randolph and has worked with the Smithsonian Institution. 

 

These efforts and more have led McCann to be a major force behind connecting Ozarks knowledge and resources to help share the region’s history – and to receive an honorary doctorate from MSU in 2010. 

 

Much of McCann’s physical work now resides at Missouri State University Libraries. In 2007, McCann donated many of his recordings to the university, and in 2023, the bulk of the rest of his collection was also acquired. 

 

“Many items in Gordon’s collection are one-of-a-kind and irreplaceable,” says Tom Peters, dean of MSU Libraries and director of the Ozarks Studies Institute, upon announcement of the collection’s move to the university. “His years of work are monumental to the story and collection of our region’s history. I am grateful to him for his many years of ongoing dedication, and also for the fact that these treasures now get to live into the future and help promote greater understanding and study of the region.”

 

It’s McCann’s work that led Peters to help nominate him for the statewide award, for which he was selected by a panel of judges. 

 

A specially-made wooden plaque – made by TJ Southard, a master artist in the MFAP’s Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program – was presented in a ceremony that also recognized two other Living Traditions Sustainer Fellows, as well as 2024 TAAP participants.