RIP Folklorist Archie Green

Archie Green, a former shipwright and carpenter turned folklorist who energetically promoted the idea of public folklore — that is, that folklorists should work outside the academy to gather, preserve and publicize local cultures through government agencies, museums, folk festivals and radio stations. His signal achievement in this area was the lonely lobbying campaign he conducted for nearly six years to create the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, which became a reality when Congress, by a unanimous vote, passed the American Folklife Preservation Act, signed into law by President Gerald R. Ford in January 1976. Archie Green was 91 when he died of kidney and heart failure March 22 at his San Francisco home.