Festival inspired Coggswell to pursue storytelling

ST. LOUIS, Mo. – Gladys Coggswell tells stories that make her audiences think, laugh and cry.

The master storyteller graces the St. Louis Storytelling Festival April 30-May 2 with a voice that reaches deep inside, from a whisper to a cry of joy.

Coggswell is one of 28 regional storytellers who will tell tales, spin yarns and enchant those attending the festival during its 36th annual event. This year’s festival will find her telling stories at schools and public parks, and as one of four tellers taking part in a special taping of St. Louis Public Radio’s “We Live Here” program.

“All events are free and open to the public,” said Lisa Overholser, festival director and University of Missouri Extension community arts specialist. MU Extension and partners sponsor the festival.

Coggswell, a Hannibal resident, brings her rich African-American history to life through family folk tales. Her great-grandmother, who helped raise her, was a storyteller in her own right. She conjured stories with morals to teach lessons.

During her childhood, sickness struck the family, causing Coggswell to live in 11 foster homes. She dropped out of school at 16, but found solace in the stories that had been passed down to her.

“Storytelling is a lifesaver for me,” she says. “I found healing, hope, family, love and a place where I belonged. I found it then and I find it now in storytelling.”

She had been telling stories since 1979, but it wasn’t until she attended her first St. Louis Storytelling Festival in the late 1980s that she decided to pursue storytelling on a professional level. She entered the Missouri Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program under now-deceased jazz singer Mae Wheeler.

She has mentored numerous apprentices since then. At the height of her storytelling career, she suffered a stroke that took away her ability to walk and talk. She gradually recovered and with the assistance of former apprentice Angela Williams, Coggswell is back to telling at her peak and wants to soar even higher.

She and Williams also document life in small communities. After training through MU’s Missouri Folk Arts Program, they visited small towns to film and record folklore from local residents.

In 2005 Coggswell received the Missouri Arts Council’s Individual Artist of the Year Award, as well as an award for outstanding storytelling from the Griot Museum of Black History in St. Louis.

In 2010 she received the Governor’s Award for Distinguished Literacy Achievement from the Missouri Humanities Council. She has a master’s degree from University of Missouri-St. Louis, which is awarding her an honorary doctorate in May.

When not telling stories, Coggswell sings jazz with Ben Brumbry and the Messengers and is a storyteller-in-residence at the Mark Twain Boyhood Home and Museum in Hannibal.

Coggswell’s book, “Stories from the Heart,” which explores Missouri’s African-American heritage, was published by the University of Missouri Press in 2009.

For more information about the St. Louis Storytelling Festival and a schedule of events, go to www.STLStoryTellingFestival.com. For more information on Gladys Coggswell, visit www.coggswell.com.