BOONE - Thanks to Carson Sailor, Public History graduate student at Appalachian State University, Horn in the West is undergoing a major revitalization process beginning this year.
Owned and operated by the Southern Appalachian Historical Association, a nonprofit whose mission is to preserve the cultural heritage of the Blue Ridge Mountain region through education and entertainment, Horn in the West was designed and built in 1952 by John Lippard and four students from the North Carolina State School of Design, and today is the oldest Revolutionary War outdoor drama space in the United States.
Horn in the West is also home to the Hickory Ridge Living History Museum, a museum designed to demonstrate how life was lived by the earliest European immigrants to 
North Carolina. “For 65 years we have told the story of the intrepid people of North Carolina, who decided to rise up and fight against the British,” says Carson Sailor. “The living history museum portrays what is going through the people's mind's before the play starts...a lot of people up here were running from something...Either they were in some legal trouble and they found themselves up here, or they had finally found a way to work themselves out of the rigged indentured servitude system.”
Carson came to Appalachian from Flagler College, a small liberal arts college in St. Augustine, Florida where he studied public history and worked for the National Park Service doing reenactments as well as serving as tour guide and historical consultant for the Ponce de Leon Hotel, a Gilded Age site in St. Augustine. Carson chose to pursue a master’s degree at Appalachian because he found Appalachian’s quirky character and strong public history program extremely appealing, not to mention the major budget cuts to Humanities programs happening across Florida.
Looking for a summer job before he graduates this December, Carson reached out to the Southern Appalachian Historical Association to see if he could obtain a job that had relevance to his degree. “I said ‘I don't care if I am a janitor, I want to work for a museum, I want to work for a history organization.’ And they said "Oh, do you want more or less to be our man on the ground for everything?’ and I said ‘Ok!’ So they hired me as an Executive Administrator.”
As Executive Administrator Carson will be able to work between the Museum Director and the Theater Director, while also writing historical programming, developing new initiatives and fundraising, all before he actually obtains his degree at the end of this year.
As a part of his role in developing new initiatives, Carson is doing a major overhaul of the Hickory Ridge Living History Museum. This multi-tiered development initiative initially began when Carson approached the Horn in the West Board of Directors and requested to operate tours through the living history museum more than 6 weeks out of the year, extending operations from the first of April through November. With approval from the board, Carson decided to take on more improvements to the site.
The next step in Carson’s plan has been to bring in new talents. Inspired by his own experiences working as a reenactor while an undergrad, Carson pushed to bring in Appalachian students from the public history program.“My first thought was we need to hire Appalachian students and we need to hire Appalachian public history students in undergrad, so we can snag them as a freshman or sophomores and give them the skills necessary to help them work on a site.”
Creating new jobs under Carson’s guidance, Horn in the West hired Senior Cameron Clark, Senior Grayson Butler, and recent Appalachian graduate Cole Holiday, as historical interpreters and educators. The educators and historical interpreters will be trained in period tasks, such as open hearth cooking and black powder weaponry, to demonstrate how North Carolina’s colonial settlers lived at that time.
Carson’s final goals for Horn in the West is to bring the museum up to code with the American Alliance of Museums Best Standards and Practices by this time next year, as well as develop a corps of reenactors and volunteers. “I haven't been able to work at a successful site that hasn't had a dedicated corps of volunteers,’ says Carson, ‘the best places have had old folks, and young folks, and college students, and retirees working together and building a really good sense of community.” Carson’s hopes are that within the next five years the museum will see all administrative improvements made, and will have ability to hire a full-time staff paid competitively.
In the next few years Carson is hoping to partner more with Appalachian State University, opening the site up for workshops and as an outdoor classroom. but we're really looking towards Appalachian to use us as a workshop. Ultimately the goals for the Horn in the West are to invite students, the greater community, and visitors to Boone to "live your history"
Tours are currently held Tuesday through Friday; 10am and 2pm.