This year's Ralph Rinzler Memorial Concert will be a tribute to Bess Lomax Hawes. She is one of the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage's "Legacy Honorees." The honorees' portraits hang in our office suite with a brief description of their lifework. They are a group of twelve people who have been fundamental in shaping our mission and practice and who keep us grounded and ever aware of the importance of what we do.

In 1975, Bess came to the Festival to be the research coordinator for Regional America's California program (although she had contributed to many Festival programs before). At that time, she was a professor of anthropology at