Summer is over, the kids or grandchildren are back in school, the retired amongst us are planning winter getaways, here at “Yikes! I’m Retired … Now What?” we are getting back to work. … and the 2022 Mariposa Folk Festival has concluded and passed into history. This year’s event, the first post-pandemic festival, is being talked about as the greatest Mariposa since it returned to the town in which it started in 1961. I was there and I could not argue against that account
An amazing lineup was presented, the weather was ideal, and the performances were at times stunning. It was all capped off by the fact that this was the first ever sellout crowd since the festival’s return to its hometown.
You may be wondering, “what does the Mariposa Folk Festival have to do with MY retirement and retirement in general”? I will address that at the end of this piece. 🙂
A Bit of Festival History
The Mariposa Folk Festival is an iconic Canadian cultural event. It is often referred to as the “Grand Dame” of Canadian folk festivals. It was not actually the first folk festival mounted in Canada but, it is unquestionably the most widely recognized. According to the Canadian Encyclopedia:
“A handful of Canadian festivals attained and held international recognition and drew performers and listeners from all parts of Canada and, by the 1990s, elsewhere in the world. Best known of these was the Mariposa Folk Festival. “
It is certainly the longest lasting of the major Canadian folk festivals. It originated in 1961, in the small town of Orillia, Ontario and has put on a major festival every year since 1961, except for a very few years, like 1981 and during the recent pandemic. Even during those unhappy periods, the Mariposa organizers managed to put on alternative live, or as during the pandemic, online events.
Mariposa is a survivor! The question for me is, “how did that happen?” Not many things last for over 60 years, especially things that can be as tenuous in nature as a one-off outdoor music festival that is reliant on weather and ticket sales.
My History with Mariposa
In the interest of full disclosure, I do have to report that I served on the Mariposa Folk Foundation Board of Directors for the better part of a decade from 2009 to 2019 in two separate stints. During that time, I twice sat on the Executive in the roles of Vice President and Treasurer. Bottom line… this is not going to be an unbiased, journalistically responsible, detached examination of its people and happenings. I am far too emotionally connected to this splendid event to be able to do that. 🙂 What I would like to share with you is why I think Mariposa has survived for over six decades.
My Mariposa “Survival” Theory
I have a theory. The Love-goddess would claim that I have many theories… some not entirely worthy. That notwithstanding, I think this one is amongst my best. 🙂 My theory is that Mariposa has survived for over 60 years because it has been led by several strong, intelligent, driven, and incredibly amazing women. I want to tell you all about them. It was they who created, formed, and sustained Mariposa over the years.
Most of the historical information about these women comes from Michael Hill’s wonderful book “The Mariposa Folk Festival – A History”. More about Michael and his book later.
A Brief History
Mariposa has a rich and interesting history – a lot of it extremely bumpy and perilous. After the 1963 event, the city fathers in Orillia decided they had had enough of the folk music lovers who were invading their town for the event each year and ordered Mariposa out. It later briefly landed in Toronto before beginning to wander about for a few years. Then, it once again landed back in Toronto on Centre Island.
Centre Island is where some of its most rich and historic events took place. Most significant of these was 1972 when the likes of Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Gordon Lightfoot, and Jackson Browne showed up as visitors. I wish I could say I was there that year, but I was not. In an interesting personal musical twist of fate, that very same weekend I was sweating it out in the heat of Maple Leaf Gardens attending The Rolling Stones’ Toronto stop on the Exile on Main Street tour.
The 1980s found it generally in decent shape and situated at Molson Park in Barrie, Ontario. Molson Brewery was a major sponsor but after a while the relationship between it and the Mariposa organizers began to fall apart. Once again it hit the road where it wandered for the 90’s, ever on the lookout for a permanent home.
The net outcome was that in the year 2000 the Mariposa Folk Festival returned to Orillia and one of its most successful runs began.
The history I am not telling you is how many times the festival ran up against the brink of bankruptcy, disillusionment, infighting, and the loss of the will to survive. But ultimately, survive it did. And in my opinion the glue that held it all together was the leadership provided by a small number of relentless, committed women.
First up, the woman who started at all.
Ruth Jones-McVeigh – The Progenitor
In January of 1961 a presentation to the local Chamber of Commerce was made by John Fisher, a CBC broadcaster, on how to promote tourism in small towns. Ruth Jones was in the audience that evening and as the saying goes… a seed was planted.
Being a folk music aficionado, she was intrigued by Fisher’s account that the number of arts festivals in smaller Canadian centres were rising. A few days later she was toying with the idea of trying to mount a folk music festival in Orillia.
Ruth conscripted her husband Dr. Casey Jones and alderman Pete McGarvey, who both liked the idea, and the wheels were set in motion. The name Mariposa was chosen for the festival because Stephen Leacock had identified… thinly veiled of course… Orillia as Mariposa in his famous book Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town.
She also involved music industry folks, Estelle Klein and Sid Dolgay of the Travellers folk music group. The Orillia Town Council gave its blessing, funds were raised, and on August 18, 1961, the first ever Mariposa took place, launching the storied history of Canada’s most important and celebrated folk music festival.
The intense advertising and lobbying campaigns undertaken by Ruth in her role as President resulted in an unprecedented number of attendees showing up for the weekend event. Thousands of people came from across the country. All in all, the crowd was well behaved and year one was deemed to be a complete success. However, they didn’t charge a high enough admission to cover all the costs of the festival, requiring them to ultimately put the festival in the hands of a Toronto promoter in an attempt to bring organization and financial prudence to the event.
By the third festival year, the crowd had grown to the point where it had become unruly and was beginning to overwhelm the town. Things began to spin out of control. This is the point at which the city fathers became decidedly unhappy and ordered the festival out. Thus, began Mariposa’s exodus on to the sometimes-bumpy road that Mariposa would travel down over the years.
But Ruth Jones McVeigh’s dream was launched and moving forward. She disassociated herself from the festival after the third year, but her legacy was sealed.
I am pleased to say that the organizers of the Mariposa Folk Festival invited Ruth to the festival to recognize and honour her contributions after its return to Orillia in 2000,
Listen to my former fellow Mariposa Board member Monique Jaiko Marchildon interview Ruth Jones McVeigh about the early years of Mariposa.
Estelle Klein – The Innovator
Although Ruth had left the organization, many others stayed to soldier on. One of the most important of those was Estelle Klein who joined Mariposa in year two.
In 1964 Estelle was asked to take on the duties of Artistic Director… although some pressure was required to get her to do so. It soon became apparent that this was Estelle’s true calling. She assembled a stellar lineup including Buffy Sainte Marie, Reverend Gary Davis, Gordon Lightfoot, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, Mississippi John Hurt, a variety of Indigenous artists and many other performers.
One of her most lasting innovative contributions to Mariposa came in those early days – the establishment of the “workshop” concept. Workshops are still the highlight of most Mariposas to this day. It is a very simple model that works beautifully. Three or four musicians or groups are gathered on a stage where they take turns performing songs, generally related to a suggested theme. These always result in the other musicians joining in on the individual performances turning them into jams of the highest order. Magic! The “workshop” concept has been adopted and used ever since by most folk festivals in Canada.
Estelle also mentored individuals who went on to establish other folk festivals across Canada. These included individuals like Mitch Podolak who founded both the Winnipeg and the Vancouver folk festivals. Mitch credited Estelle with teaching him everything he needed to know about running a music festival.
Estelle routinely discovered artists who later went on to have prominent careers. In 1965, she brought an unheard-of Canadian female folk singer to Mariposa, Joni Mitchell. Apparently, she had a fairly limited repertoire at the time and Estelle suggested that she get to work expanding her song catalog. 🙂 Good advice Estelle.
Estelle was always leading the way in terms of evaluating what they were doing and was always willing to embrace new concepts. In 1966, she introduced an Indigenous music component to the to the festival which has been carried forward throughout its history. She was also the first Artistic Director to bring folk rock to a folk event. She was constantly leading the way in providing a setting for new styles of folk music as they arose. She insisted on offering a number of stages at the festival site so people had a choice of who to see and listen to.
Estelle continued as the Artistic Director of Mariposa until 1981 when she was forced to give up the role for health reasons. She was never the President of Mariposa, but she was its driving force for almost two decades. She remains the gold standard for festival Artistic Directors in this country and is held in high regard by music industry insiders, performers, and lovers of Mariposa.
There is an Estelle Klein stage at Mariposa every year, and in recognition of her contributions to folk music in Canada, Folk Music Ontario established the Estelle Klein award as their highest award. It honours those who have provided major contributions to folk music in Canada.
Lynne Hurry – The Protector
After the 1986 festival, Mariposa was in very bad financial shape… $200,000 in debt… from which it appeared there was no way back. Organizers had divided themselves into two diametrically opposed factions. One side wanted to put Mariposa out of its misery and end its run. A second group, led by Lynne Hurry, wanted to battle on and breathe life back into the festival. Lynne Hurry and her group of supporters won the day, the festival lived on, and Lynne Hurry became president.
The 1980s were interesting years in Mariposa’s history. Molson Brewery became a bit of a saviour in that it became a large corporate sponsor and offered their large special events park in Barrie to host the event. However, philosophies differed. Molson wanted Mariposa to become more of a rock festival, which did not sit well with the organizers. The last Molson supported festival in 1990 was very close to a complete disaster. It rained all weekend and there were virtually no ticket sales at the gate. Mariposa was back in serious trouble.
But Lynne never gave up. Mariposa retreated to Toronto where it had a brief stay at Ontario Place. After that, organizers under Lynne’s leadership attempted to plant seeds around the province encouraging satellite roots music events in several small towns. Most of these never germinated to any large extent. Mariposa at that point had been reduced to being a one-day event in the Parkdale area of Toronto.
However, one of those small seeds that Lynne had planted did begin to sprout… in the place where Mariposa originated, the town of Orillia. Local alderman Tim Lauer and two associates Gord Ball, and Don Evans… forever known afterwards in Orillia as the “three wisemen” … picked up on the concept because they were already involved in an ongoing annual event called the “Arts for Peace Festival”. Their involvement with that project morphed into the idea that they would chase Mariposa in attempt to lure it back to Orillia. To simplify it all, meetings with Lynne Hurry and other Mariposa organizers ensued… some bumpy and nearly disastrous, but ultimately, in the year 2000, Mariposa went home.
After that, as the original Mariposa group from Toronto, and the Orillia group (FestO) were working on marrying the two organizations together, leadership roles gradually shifted towards those who were locally involved. However, it must be remembered that it was Lynne Hurry, through sheer will, strength of personality, and never-ending determination who led Mariposa through its darkest years when Mariposa could easily have been lost.
There must have been countless times during those days when all of Mariposa’s volunteers assumed that extinction was just weeks or months away. And so, it may well have ended then; but thanks to Lynne, Mariposa was kept on life support until the right time and circumstances presented themselves to set it back on a new track – onwards and upwards.
Pam Carter – The Modernizer
That is not to say that it was all sunshine and light immediately after the return to Orillia. No, serious ups and downs and disagreements ensued for several years behind the scenes. However, throughout all that, the group of individuals tasked with the operational mounting of the festival, the Festival Organizing Group “FOG” continued to put on events that resembled Mariposa in its most successful years.
Pam Carter quickly revealed her leadership abilities as a member of FOG and became chair of the committee in the second half of 2008. Members of the Board of Directors also recognized her talents and in February of 2009 she was elected to the Board as Vice President.
In 2013, she added the title and responsibilities of President to her management portfolio. At the time, she was the clear choice to head the organization. She had full knowledge of all the operational pieces involved in mounting the festival and she understood the requirements and responsibilities of the Board of Directors.
Without being limited to the following, the Board works to: provide sound financial management, navigate the political intricacies of working with governments and granting bodies, regulate organizational governance, plan and implement ticket sales, undertake research and conduct data analysis, provide overview of the artist selection process, manage festival archival issues, assist with sponsorship attraction where necessary, report to members, and just generally deal with the big picture issues.
Board President and FOG chair are two big jobs with many important yet separate responsibilities and tasks. These roles are full-time jobs for two people in most organizations… but currently just one at Mariposa
Pam Carter came to Mariposa with a background in public sector management, so she was already well versed in working closely with people in her chain of command. The transition to being head of both the Board and FOG was a smooth one for her.
If you were to ask Pam about her accomplishments at Mariposa, she would probably say that she didn’t feel responsible for, or initiate, any of the positive changes and lasting developments that have taken place during her tenure. That may be true, but it was under her professional, often inspiring leadership and management that many of Mariposa’s major successful initiatives were nurtured to fruition.
From my perspective, before Pam became President, Mariposa still had a bit of a “let’s rent a hall and put on a show kids” sensibility. Under Pam’s leadership, Mariposa has grown to become a well-organized, well run, financially successful, “modern” organization. This is all because of her outstanding management and leadership skills. And that is what places her in the ranks of all these other women who have led Mariposa over the years
First and foremost, amongst Pam’s many skills is an understanding of how important it is to be “collaborative” in the decision-making process… especially in an almost 100% volunteer organization. A friend of mine who was a vice president in a large international retail firm went on to a senior management role in an almost total volunteer charity in retirement. On several occasions, she mentioned to me how very different it was managing volunteers then paid employees… apparently, volunteers don’t really bother to follow directives/suggestions/asks if they disagree with the idea or don’t really feel like doing so. 🙂 Apparently, management in these organizations often becomes the classic “herding cats”.
Second amongst Pam’s many attributes is her strength at “relationship building”. This is absolutely necessary in many arenas, including not just working closely with the hard-working individuals of FOG, but also by maintaining strong connections with funding and grant awarding bodies, creating a welcoming atmosphere for corporate sponsors, being actively involved with music industry organizations (e.g. Folk Music Ontario, Canadian Live Music Association), and finally, demonstrating the ability to be able to navigate political situations at various levels of government.
Pam has also demonstrated a commitment to “social responsibility” at Mariposa. As leader, she has supported Mariposa’s greening efforts to such an extent that it has become the gold standard for music festivals across the country. In 2015 Mariposa won the Tourism Industry Association of Ontario (TIAO) Award of Excellence for Sustainable Tourism.
Pam Carter speaking about the origins of Mariposa’s Greening efforts:
Under Pam’s leadership, Mariposa’s “online presence” has grown from “I know a guy who knows a guy who can build us a website” to offering an attractive, content rich, information laden, interactive website. It also has a wide range of social media offerings to allow Mariposa attendees to keep in touch with what is going on with the festival and with other Mariposa devotees. The most recent web-based edition was the opening of an online store.
Pam has long been a key champion of “community building”. By that I mean the supporting of the idea that Mariposa attendees and long-term devotees consider themselves part of a special community. A great deal of this has been done through Mariposa’s online effort, but most of it has come simply by word of mouth. Individual Mariposa lovers tell friends about the festival and encourage them to attend and in turn the newcomers embrace the Mariposa sensibility.
The Mariposa community has been built up in many ways over the years but one of the most interesting has been the fact that Mariposa attendees can now camp right on the site and become part of the greater Mariposa “village” for the weekend.
In November 2011, Pam Carter, in her role as FOG chair, approached the Orillia City Council with a proposal that would allow weekend long camping at the festival site. It was approved and camping has continued there ever since. At the 2022 festival, over 1000 campers lived on site. These attendees include an enormous fleet of Volkswagen “Westfalia” camper vans who now flock to Mariposa every year.
You would think that “financial responsibility” would be one of the first things I would have discussed given Mariposa’s shaky monetary history. In this case, for modern Mariposa, it has become a bit of a moot point. Pam Carter has insisted on financial responsibility and caution in all aspects of the organization’s operation.
One area in which Pam has been a financial driver is her commitment to the growth of the sustainability fund that was initiated several years ago by a previous president, Ted Duncan. This is often referred to as Mariposa’s “rainy-day fund”. Under Pam’s leadership, and her insistence on annual contributions to the fund, the Board was able to report at the 2022 Annual General Meeting that the fund was worth more than $1 million at the end of the 2021 fiscal year. Mariposa is in the best financial shape of its 60+ years.
The other hallmark of a great leader is the ability to “deal with adversity”. Certainly, the first three women named here had major challenges with which they had to deal. That said, I’m not sure any of those challenges were as disruptive as the recent COVID-19 pandemic. For modern Mariposa, it resulted in a complete shutdown of the festival for 2020 and 2021. Pam and her team worked with various government and funding bodies to provide financial stability throughout the shut down and organized a number of online concert events and ultimately “safe” live events to keep Mariposa’s hand in the live music game.
In 2022, Mariposa mounted one of its most successful events ever. The show sold out for the first time in its twenty-year history back in Orillia. Not only had Mariposa survived the pandemic, it thrived… all under Pam Carter’s strong leadership.
One final note to Pam Carter’s years at the helm of the organization is a fun fact. Mariposa now has its own brand of beer, Mariposa Sun Lager produced seasonally by the Sawdust City Brewery in Gravenhurst, Ontario. 🙂 Cheers!
I honestly think Pam is going to be terribly annoyed with me for writing this piece without acknowledging the many contributions made by all the other hard-working individuals in the organization. She is not an individual who seeks praise for herself, but rather prefers to pass it along in recognition of the contributions of others. The hallmark of a great leader.
Pam Carter, the fourth in a 60 year long line of outstanding female leaders.
My only thought or question remaining is who will be the next woman to pick up carry forward the Mariposa banner?
Am I Sugar-coating Things?
Am I sugar-coating things a bit when I speak about the contributions of these four women? Possibly. One cannot be a driving force without exposing some shortcomings for others to take note of and complain about. It is easy to see how any of these women would end up with some detractors who would be happy to point out perceived missteps, imagined or real. That said, there is no denying the immense contributions all four of these women have made to the survival and sustainability of Mariposa, and that they vastly outweigh any minor deficiencies.
Footnote
As an interesting footnote to all of this, three of these four women once went to war with each other. When I mentioned the divisive meeting above in which Lynne Hurry rallied the pro festival troops, I failed to point out that in fact it was Estelle Klein who was leading the second group, which wanted Mariposa to be allowed to “die with dignity”.
Further, when Ruth Jones-McVeigh heard about the effort to try and shut down Mariposa, she rushed down from her home in Ottawa, even though she was no longer directly involved with the festival and helped Lynne Hurry win the battle to have Mariposa continue.
So, Mr. Retiree Guy, What Does All of This Have to do With Retirement?
You’re right, this does not seem to have a whole lot to do with retirement in general. However, I was elected to the Mariposa Board of Directors in February 2009 on the same day as Pam Carter and was elected. I retired from my “real” work two years later. So, for close to a decade Mariposa was my volunteer work in retirement.
I can assure you that volunteering in an “Arts” organization is an absolutely amazing and enriching thing to do in retirement. Not only are you giving back to community and society, you are also immersed in an artistic culture and interesting work that you probably were not party to during your working life.
So, give some thought to seeking out a cultural event or organization in your area and find out how you can get involved. Yes, volunteering at hospitals, food banks, or working with the less fortunate are wonderful things to do in retirement but there are other interesting things to do as well. Give it some thought.
Additional Readings
I have only skimmed the facts and details in this piece so If you are interested in reading more about the history of Mariposa and these amazing women, several resources can be checked out. First up is Michael Hill’s wonderful book “Mariposa Folk Festival A History – The Book”. It is available in many bookstores and online at Chapters.
Additionally, there are a number of great articles available on the Mariposa website. These can be found in the “Event Info” and “Our Stories” sections.
Mariposa’s Mandate
FYI – The mandate of the Mariposa Folk Foundation (MFF) is the promotion and preservation of folk-art in Canada through song, story, dance, and craft.
