Fifteen years ago, when planning the first Folklife Festival, we were aware that the Smithsonian holds the world's most extensive collection of objects relating to American history and everyday life. Many of these objects--some made relatively recently and others in past centuries--were made by folk craftworkers. It seemed appropriate, therefore, to tie these objects to the tradition-bearers themselves. And so it was that we gathered from around the nation craftworkers--as well as musicians, dancers, and storytellers--and christened the event a "folklife" festival rather than simply a folk festival. Secretary Ripley, in commenting on the object orientation of a later Festival, noted: "The possibility of using a museum that is essentially a historical documentary museum as a theatre of live performance where people actually show that the objects in the cases were made by human hands, and are still being made, practiced on, worked with, is a very valuable asset for our role as a preserver and conservator of living cultural forms."