Lynn Cornfoot reports from her shoot with Maxie Eades

Just north of Traveler's Rest, SC lives an amazing woman named Maxie Eades, the bowl digger. Maxie isn't your average gal. She grew up in the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains, was number 15 out of 16 children and is a tomboy at heart. In fact, when I got there, she confessed, "I was worried you were a-gonna be one of those prissy types." Maxie is very close to her sister Jean who lives just up the road from her. Being the last two children born to such a big family, their father took care of the youngest girls, who by consequence, were raised like boys. Their daddy was a sawmill worker and would take Maxie and Jean to work with him. This is where it all began. Maxie's love for anything mechanical began here - which by the way includes motorcycles, airplanes, and in her retirement, making bowls out of wood. A creature of habit, she is in the shop everyday tending to her craft, wielding chainsaws and digging out chunks of wood to create dough bowls, spoons and even snowshoes. Maxie likes to say "There's sawdust in my blood." Not bad for an 84 year-old, right? 

Note from Executive Producer:  Maxie Eades appears in the film Bowl Digger by Kristy Higby on ETV's Southern Lens series. Lynn will be producing a new piece for the upcoming Carolina Stories high definition documentary titled "Uncommon Folk" set to air in January 2011.

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