INSPIRED BY THE PAST, WRITTEN FOR THE FUTURE
About Rachel Smalley
Rachel is a children's book author and literacy advocate in Dalton, Georgia. She grew up in East Tennessee where Appalachia’s rich storytelling tradition first shaped her love of history and picture books. Drawn to little-known narratives from the region’s past, Rachel writes true tales that honor the ingenuity, resilience, and grit of Appalachia’s people. Her work reflects a belief in the power of story to connect generations and instill pride of place. A former elementary school teacher, Rachel is a lifelong reader, writer, speaker, and the founder of Hillbetty Books.
Her debut picture book, TUFTED: The Stitch & Story of Catherine Evans Whitener, tells the true story of an Appalachian girl whose hand-tufted bedspreads helped set Northwest Georgia's chenille and carpet industries in motion. It is a story about invention, perseverance, generosity, and the way one ordinary act can ripple outward—through a family, a community, and generations still to come.
Teacher’s Eye and Storyteller’s Instinct
Rachel’s years in the classroom taught her to listen closely: to the rhythm of a sentence, to the questions children ask, and to the moment a story offers a child a way in. She knows that picture books use few words but ask each one to do important work. A few pages can give a child new vocabulary, a new question, or a new way of seeing the place they call home.
That experience still shapes everything she writes. Rachel wants a book to sound good when read aloud, to respect a child’s intelligence, and to leave enough space for the illustrations to carry part of the story. Long after the reader finishes the words on a page, the listener should still be reading the pictures, discovering details, asking questions, and finding what the text leaves unsaid.
She also knows that a little well-placed humor goes a long way. She even managed to work the word underwear into TUFTED, which, as any teacher can tell you, is almost guaranteed to earn a classroom laugh.
Appalachia has always been rich in stories. Its children deserve to find those stories on the page.
Appalachia has always been rich in stories. Its children deserve to find those stories on the page.
A Common Thread
Rachel grew up in Maryville, Tennessee, near the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains. In 1992, she moved to Dalton, Georgia, to teach fifth grade and made the Carpet Capital of the World her home.
Her connection to Catherine Evans Whitener’s story began in a different place: Grassy Fork Holler in East Tennessee, where Rachel’s Granny Freeman was raised. Rachel grew up hearing stories of mountain living and the quiet art of making something from very little.
When she learned about Catherine, the young woman whose ingenuity helped set Northwest Georgia’s textile industry in motion, Rachel recognized something familiar. Catherine reminded her of her Granny: resourceful, strong-willed, practical, and unwilling to let hardship become an excuse.
Rachel often imagined that Catherine and her Granny would have understood one another immediately. Separated by only a little time and distance, they shared the same Appalachian inheritance. Those common threads became part of the heart of TUFTED.
Following the Thread to Publication
A calling is not the same as a set of instructions. Catherine stitched her way into history without a pattern; more than a century later, Rachel followed the thread, learning draft by draft how to shape the story into a picture book.
She joined the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, attended conferences, took classes, worked with a writing coach and professional editors, and studied stacks of picture book biographies. She examined structure, pacing, language, page turns, and the relationship between text and art. She soon learned that a shorter book is not an easier one.
The facts were only the beginning. Rachel had to find the heart of Catherine’s story and hold a young reader’s attention while tracing how Cathy’s work empowered other women, sparked a cottage industry, and helped transform Dalton from the Bedspread Center to the Carpet Capital of the World.
Getting it right required more than writing. Rachel interviewed Catherine’s great-niece, consulted historians and community experts, and asked where the manuscript rang true and where it misfired. She built a 100-page research deck and a spread-by-spread art guide for illustrator Katie Hickey, gathering photographs, maps, timelines, textile patterns, clothing, tools, architecture, and machinery to make the past feel inhabited rather than merely explained.
With every revision and illustration note, Rachel returned to the same question:
“Is this worthy of Catherine and true to the community that carries her story?”
No one tells a story like this alone. TUFTED was shaped by the knowledge, memories, and generosity of local historians, educators, civic partners, artists, families, and supporters who believe Catherine Evans Whitener's story deserves to be carried forward, not folded away.
The book is the first stitch in a larger vision: bringing more of the region's overlooked stories into the light so young readers can discover the history beneath their feet.
To help preserve and share those stories, Rachel established the Appalachian Historic Preservation Fund through the Community Foundation of Northwest Georgia. Net proceeds from TUFTED support that fund.
A Story Rooted In Community
Beyond the Writing Desk
Rachel lives in Northwest Georgia with her husband, Robert, and their Labradoodle, Charlie, who has developed a reputation for appearing near or occasionally on top of the books she shares. Rachel and Robert are the parents of two adult children, both of whom have built lives connected in their own ways to communication, ideas, and storytelling.
When Rachel is not writing, researching, speaking, or searching for another picture book to add to her collection, she enjoys gardening, arranging flowers, spending time with her family on St. Simons Island, skiing, and visiting museums and Broadway shows in New York City.
Her favorite place to be, however, is still in front of a room full of children with a good picture book open in her hands.
