Carter Family Grandson Removed from Board
The Carter Family Fold’s board of directors recently voted to remove Dale Jett, grandson of Country Music Hall of Fame performers A.P. Carter and Sara Carter, partly due to a disagreement over a deal he arranged with the the University of North Carolina in April 2007 involving 30 years worth of audio recordings. Under the deal, Jett sent about 4,000 audio cassettes containing 1,500 hours of live performances from the Carter Fold to the school’s Southern Folklife Collection. Jett resigned his post in response to a December 3rd letter from board President Howard Klein, and was then formally voted off the Carter Family Memorial Music Center board of directors during a Dec. 15 meeting. His departure from the board underscores continuing divisions over how to preserve the family’s musical legacy. Maxine Kenny, the former project director of a grant from the Virginia Humanities Foundation to preserve the Carter Fold’s audio archives who left the project in response to Jett’s departure, supports Jett and contends that the board was notified of the agreement. Both sides are consulting attorneys.