William Edmondson: miracle worker.

In the 1930s, in Nashville, Tennessee, William Edmondson emerged as a gifted folk sculptor of tombstones. Becoming a folk sculptor came as a complete surprise to Edmondson. A son of former slaves, he had worked at several jobs and, then, for 24 years in a hospital. When he retired in 1931 at about age 60, he heard the call: "I was out in the driveway with some old pieces of stone when I heard a voice telling me to pick up my tools and start to work on a tombstone.... I knowed it was God telling me what to do."

To make tombstones for his neighbors who had died, Edmondson used discarded chunks of roadside curbing. For chiseling, he used old railroad spikes, and for …