PIONEER PORTRAITS

Ten Years Ago

January 31, 2013

Kate Hockersmith, the instigator and, some might say "mother," of Waitsburg's bluegrass scene, remembers the first local jam night. It was some time in December at the old Carmen's Deli on Main Street. She put the youthful Troublemakers, fresh from their musical exchange in Japan, in the same room with several veteran bluegrass musicians from Walla Walla and created a Touchet Valley tradition marking its fifth anniversary this winter. Together with bluegrass lessons Hockersmith teaches at home and an after-school program she runs in the Waitsburg High School band...