Bria
n Newton &
THE SAGA OF
BROOMCORN JOHNNY By Bob Lawernce Long before renowned craftsman Brian Newton ever handcrafted a broom, he had several diverse careers: an Air Force jet fighter mechanic; an engineer designing machines to manufacture medical devices based on prototypes; a real estate dealer; and motorcycle shop owner. So why did the Beaufort, South Carolina, native finally settle into specialty broom making that would win him honors, see his work featured in Hollywood movies and TV, and display his wares at the White House? “I had grown up around traditional crafts and wanted to work with my hands and make something useful and unique,” says Newton whose parents were spinners and weavers. It all started in Indiana in the 1990s after Newton purchased broom-making equipment dating back to the late 19th and early 20th centuries and began hand-stitching brooms from broomcorn the way they were made back then. It started as a hobby but it soon morphed into a fifth career for Newton because word got around and people wanted to buy his unique handcrafted brooms. Soon he was displaying and selling them at small craft shows, then large craft shows, followed by affluent juried art shows. Demand grew to the point that in 2009 he opened a retail store in Nashville, Indiana, while also doing some wholesale. The following year, he received his first large wholesale order from Anthropologie, a chain owned by Urban Outfitters, for 1,000 colored Shaker cabin brooms which he describes as “hand-dyed brush, soft shoulder, hand-stitched with hand-finished handles.” The chain sold them in their stores in large cities nationwide and advertised them in their catalog. “At that point, I had two buildings, one for retail and another dedicated to wholesale production where I had employees doing prep work and shipping.” Newton crafts his brooms on machines made between the mid-1800s to 1903 and an electro/pneumatic winder acquired from Newton Broom’s Don Leventhal (the name alignment is a coincidence). Despite the availability of modern machines, he prefers the old ones because “it keeps it real,” explaining that “When I touch the old wood I hear those who came before me. I think about what their lives might have been like. What was happening in their world at the time they were using this same
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machine. I know the back pain they felt because I feel the same pain. In some small way using the old equipment, and making brooms the old ways keeps them from being forgotten. Perhaps I’ll not be forgotten either. There is a legacy in it all. A history. It’s important not to forget.” Regarding his nickname, it’s derived from another aspect of his craft, pertaining to those having the skill sets needed to grow and harvest broomcorn, which he once did when he started out in Indiana. Thus, he says, there are a few broom makers with those skills who share the Broomcorn Johnny moniker. Females in the trade are referred to as Broomcorn Janes. Even so, in doing an Internet search for “Broomcorn Johnny,” Brian Newton dominates. Because planting, growing, and then harvesting broomcorn is both time-consuming and labor intensive, Newton no longer does it, the same reasons mass broomcorn growing in the U.S. vanished more than 60 years ago. By then, Mexico was quickly
