Gertrude Graham Smith, better known as Gay, settled in rural North Carolina, not far from the Penland School of Crafts, in the early 1990s. Smith was born to a privileged background in Philadelphia in 1953. Her father was an obstetrician/gynecologist who also taught the subject; her mother was a college graduate who in her later years was ordained an Episcopalian minister. Although Episcopalians are generally associated with upper or upper middle class WASP society, which is where I come from, they also have a very strong good works/service orientation, so there’s actually some pretty liberal, socially oriented Episcopalians out there. Her mother was the assistant priest at a church serving a poor African-American community in North Philadelphia.