On a warm September evening in Berkeley Springs, the air often carries two things: the faint sweetness of apples drifting from a backyard tree, and music—lively, old-time music—that sounds as if it’s been playing here forever. At the center of that sound is sometimes a woman with silver-streaked hair bent slightly over a hammered dulcimer, coaxing the kind of melodies that can make you forget the century you’re in. This is Sam Hermann’s way of keeping time—not with a watch, but with a lifetime of rhythm, wool, and the quiet hum of a place she’s called home for half a century.
Fifty Years Rooted in Place
Sam arrived in Hampshire County in 1973, a young woman with wanderlust and a clear-eyed need for beauty. She could have gone west—Colorado was in the running—but the soft folds of West Virginia hills won her over. Here, she was closer to Maryland, yet wrapped in the quieter, slower pace that feeds the kind of work she would come to love.
She bought a piece of land that felt right, and for someone like Sam, “right” was more than a view. It was a sense of belonging before you’ve even unpacked. Fifty years later, the property still grounds her. The seasons rotate like the wheel of a spinning wheel—predictable but never dull. Winter snow turns the pasture into something out of a woodcut print; summer swells with green so vivid it seems to hum.
Strings that Bind
Before wool, there was music. Over forty years ago, a bandmate from Critton Hollow—a group devoted to traditional Appalachian string music—helped found the Summer Concert Series through the Morgan Arts Council. The idea was simple: music, outdoors, and open to everyone.
Critton Hollow’s sound is made of familiar parts—fiddle, guitar, hammered dulcimer—but their playing is something more than the sum of those strings. Joe, her husband and partner in life and music, switches easily between guitar and fiddle, his bow tracing notes that weave in and around Sam’s hammered dulcimer like ivy finding a trellis. They’ve played together for fifty years, not just in Berkeley Springs but around the country and internationally, their music a staple at events like the Apple Butter Festival.
For Sam, music isn’t a separate pursuit—it’s the town’s heartbeat, a reminder that culture here grows from front porches and open-air pavilions as much as from galleries.
Wool, Sheep, and Guardian Dogs
Sam learned to knit at eleven, but it wasn’t until 1985 that she began spinning her own wool. A friend in Berkeley Springs nudged her toward the craft, and like many things in her life, she didn’t dabble—she committed. Soon she and Joe were raising sheep, the kind whose fleece could be spun into something worth keeping.
Raising sheep is a rhythm of its own. Once a year they shear, rolling the fleece into bundles that smell faintly of grass and the long days spent outdoors. The cleaning and carding are slow, meditative tasks. There’s a kind of satisfaction in watching raw wool transform under your hands, the fibers aligning into yarn that will one day keep someone warm.
Guardian dogs stand sentry over the flock, their presence both practical and quietly reassuring. In a place where coyotes are as much a part of the night as crickets, these dogs are not pets—they’re co-workers, trusted as much as any human partner.
From Hat Kits to Heirlooms
Sam’s first commercial venture with wool was as practical as it was charming: a “kit-to-knit” hat, complete with yarn and pattern. It was a way for people to make something themselves, to hold onto the connection between raw material and finished piece.
That same ethos runs through all her work today. At SamSpun.com and the Icehouse Art Gallery, she sells sweaters, rugs, yarn, hats, and yes, still those kits. They’re not just products—they’re the physical record of a year’s work on the land, of sheep grazing, of fleece washed and spun, of hours spent at the loom or with knitting needles in hand.
Each piece has its own pace. Rugs take time, anchoring rooms for decades. Sweaters carry the shape of the body they’re made for. Even a simple skein of yarn feels like it’s waiting for its next chapter.
A Sense of Place
When asked what a visitor to Berkeley Springs should see, Sam doesn’t hesitate: “Go to the parks. Walk the Paw Paw Tunnel. Visit the art galleries.” It’s not a checklist—it’s an invitation to notice how culture and nature fold into one another here.
The parks hold the springs that first drew people to this town like George Washington. The Paw Paw Tunnel is an echo of a different kind of labor and vision, dug by hand, lined in brick, a monument to stubbornness and engineering. The art galleries are proof that creativity here is not a garnish—it’s part of the main course.
The Long Thread
In fifty years, Sam has balanced more than most—music, sheep, wool, and the inevitable chores that come with keeping a small farm running. Yet the throughline in her life is not busyness; it’s continuity. The same dulcimer she played decades ago still sings under her hands. The same flock’s descendants graze in the same fields. The same festivals fill the town square.
Her work, like the best traditional music, resists hurry. A rug takes as long as it takes. A lamb grows to yield its first fleece when the seasons say so. A tune isn’t done until the last note fades, whether it’s played in a concert hall or under the open sky in Berkeley Springs.
In a world—well, in a region—where change comes in quiet increments, Sam Hermann’s life feels like a long, unbroken thread. One end is tied to the girl who learned to knit at eleven; the other is still being spun, somewhere between the dulcimer’s final chord and the next skein of wool ready to be wound.
If you’re in town and catch sight of her—maybe at a festival stage, maybe at a booth of hand-dyed yarn—you’ll understand. This isn’t a hobby. It’s a life’s work, anchored in place and stretched across decades, as much a part of Berkeley Springs as the springs themselves.
