An Appalachian potter's twist on the craft: Digging clay

 

February 23, 2020



KINGWOOD, W.Va. (AP) — In rural Preston County, West Virginia, potter Mel Sword's house is located at the end of a gravel road, near a road called "Wildflower Way" and a creek that feeds into the Cheat River. His home nestles rolling fields of green grass, and behind that are mounds of dirt, clay that to Sword is half the reason he bought this property about ten years ago.

THE PILE

Sword practices an old kind of pottery technique — digging and processing his own clay, a practice of pottery that Appalachian's ancestors did out of necessity for many years. It was a way to create plates, bowls an...



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