lit a candle 5h agoShe made 73 fiddles with her own hands in a little workshop. That kind of dedication to craft is rare and beautiful.
Their story
Violet Brumley Hensley (1916-10-21 to 2026-08-07) was an American luthier and old-time fiddler from the Arkansas Ozarks, known as the Whittlin' Fiddler and the Stradivarius of the Ozarks. She handmade about 73 fiddles, performed for more than fifty years at Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri, debuted at the Grand…
Violet Brumley Hensley (1916-10-21 to 2026-08-07) was an American luthier and old-time fiddler from the Arkansas Ozarks, known as the Whittlin' Fiddler and the Stradivarius of the Ozarks. She handmade about 73 fiddles, performed for more than fifty years at Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri, debuted at the Grand Ole Opry at age 99, and entered the National Fiddler Hall of Fame at 101. She died at home in Yellville, Arkansas, aged 109.
She was born near Mount Ida, Montgomery County, into the same two-bedroom log home where her father, George Washington "Wash" Brumley (born 1874), had been born. Her mother, Nora Springer Brumley, died when Violet was eleven. Wash was a farmer and jack-of-all-trades who had carved his first fiddle at fourteen in 1888. Violet learned by watching him: splitting wood with a hatchet, drying stock by the fireplace, and using hand planes and homemade curved knives. She began playing around age twelve and finished her first fiddle at fifteen, then three more before she was eighteen. Most of her later concerts were played on fiddle No. 4, completed when she was about seventeen.
In 1935 she married Adren Hensley. Raising nine children (one son, Larry, stillborn) came first. She set aside fiddle making for about twenty-seven years, though she kept singing and clogging in family life. She also made lye soap, tanned leather, broke horses, tended crops, cut neighbors' hair, and worked for years as a hospital cleaner. The family spent time on Oregon fruit farms before settling in Yellville in 1968, where her home workshop became the center of her craft. She resumed building fiddles in 1961 and eventually completed sixty-nine more numbered instruments after the first four, using roughly a hundred native woods: wild cherry and maple for back, sides, and neck; spruce, pine, or buckeye for tops; dogwood tailpieces; persimmon pegs. A finished instrument took on the order of 240 hours. She kept a record book of woods, dates, and owners, and repaired instruments for others.
Public performance returned in the early 1960s when friends urged her into the Turkey Trot Talent Show in Yellville (second place). There she met Jimmy Driftwood, who steered her toward his theater in Mountain View. Silver Dollar City hired her in 1967 for wood carving; her stage presence soon made her a park entertainer as well. She fiddled and demonstrated making for decades of National Crafts Festivals and music festivals, reaching a forty-first consecutive crafts-festival appearance by 2007. She insisted on old-time mountain music rather than bluegrass, which she found too fancy, and was known for playing with the fiddle atop her head while clogging.
National attention followed: a National Geographic Ozarks feature in 1970; Smithsonian Folklife Festival demonstration the same year; Charles Kuralt's On the Road; television turns on The Beverly Hillbillies (1969 filming at SDC), Art Linkletter, Captain Kangaroo (1977), Live with Regis and Kathie Lee (1992), To Tell the Truth with Alex Trebek, and later CBS follow-ups. Family albums included Old-Time Hoedowns / Old Time Fiddle Tunes (1970s), The Whittling Fiddler and Family (1983), and Family Treasures (2004), with daughters Lewonna Nelson and Sandra Flagg, son Calvin Hensley, husband Adren, and later son-in-law Tim Nelson.
In 2014 she published Whittlin' and Fiddlin' My Own Way with co-author Randall Franks, naming her dream of the Grand Ole Opry. Fiddler Tim Crouch read it and asked banjoist Mike Snider to bring her on. On 2016-08-06, at 99, she played "Angeline the Baker" and "Black Eye Susie" (also reported as Black-Eyed Susie) and received multiple standing ovations. She returned for her 100th and 101st birthdays, including "Faded Love" on 2018-04-14. On 2018-03-30 she was inducted into the National Fiddler Hall of Fame. Honors also include Silver Dollar City Living Treasure / Hall of Fame recognitions, the 2004 Arkansas Living Treasure designation (Department of Arkansas Heritage / Arkansas Arts Council), Folk Alliance International Spirit of Folk (2016), and, in 2025, Violet Hensley Day and a Key to the City from Leslie, Arkansas.
Failing eyesight later stopped her from completing whole fiddles, but she still made parts and taught. Adren died in 1997. She was preceded in death by sons Calvin, Russell, Gary, and Larry Hensley, and survived by daughters Beatrice Porter, Sandra Flagg, and Lewonna Nelson; sons Marvin, R.G., and Eddie Hensley; and Wilma Flagg, who joined the family as a teenager; plus large descendant counts reported in the obituary. Funeral services were held 2026-08-13 at First Baptist Church of Yellville, with interment at Layton Cemetery. Cause of death was not made public. Silver Dollar City called her "the heart of an Ozarks tradition that connected generations," and she remained, in her own words after the Opry, "just me."
This memorial is for Violet Hensley (also Violet Brumley Hensley; Whittlin' Fiddler / Stradivarius of the Ozarks), the Arkansas old-time fiddler and luthier. It is not for other Hensley musicians or unrelated people named Violet Brumley.
Biography adapted from Wikipedia; NYT/Sandomir 2026; Encyclopedia of Arkansas; KY3; People/SDC; KTLO; NFHOF; autobiography with Franks 2014; Arkansas Times.
In their own words
“If you can read music, you play the violin. I can't read music, so I just play the fiddle.”
Distinguishing fiddle from violin (Tulsa World, 1982, via NYT).
“I wanted to play the fiddle just because we didn't have anything else to do. We didn't have television or radio, and Dad played, and I guess it struck me that I wanted to play.”
On childhood (KCPT interview via NYT).
“I always say, making a fiddle is a lot easier than plowing a field with a team of mules.”
On craft vs farm labor (Tulsa World via NYT).
“I was just me. Yes, I was pleased. But it's still just me. You don't want to try to be somebody you're not.”
After Grand Ole Opry debut (Springfield News-Leader via NYT).
“I learned tunes from others, but I had my own style.”
On fiddling (National Fiddler Hall of Fame bio).
“When you make a five gallon bucket filled with shavings, that was a fiddle.”
On labor of carving (Arkansas Living Treasure film interview via NFHOF).
“Shoot, I can make one of those fiddles.”
Childhood boast about copying her father's craft (NFHOF bio).
“She wasn't simply one of America's most respected fiddle makers and musicians, she was the heart of an Ozarks tradition that connected generations to this special place.”
Silver Dollar City official remembrance (KY3 / People / American Songwriter).
Photos
3Violet Hensley performing with fiddle; Arkansas Times remembrance coverage.
by People Forever
Violet Hensley workshop/performance portrait with fiddle (Encyclopedia of Arkansas).
by People Forever
Violet Hensley Opry-related still (Encyclopedia of Arkansas).
by People Forever
She played there for decades. A real treasure of the Ozarks.