Joe Hayes (edit name/settings)

Joseph (Joe) Hayes is an author and teller of stories mainly found in the folklore of the American Southwest. Hayes was an early pioneer of bilingual Spanish/English storytelling.
Joe was the youngest of five children with two brothers and two sisters. His father often told stories to the children and later, Joe would do the same for his children. Spending his late childhood and adolescent years in southern Arizona, Joe picked up the Spanish which would become an integral part of his storytelling and writing.
In 1968, Joe graduated from University of Arizona with a Bachelor of Arts in English. He started teaching at Sunnyside High School in Tucson, Arizona. Joe left teaching and was employed in mineral exploration work from 1972–1976, working all over the western U.S. as well as in Mexico and Spain. He returned to Los Alamos, New Mexico in 1976 and again taught English. His interest in storytelling deepened, partly due to the early influence of his father, and he started to share the tales with a broader audience. In 1979, he began to devote himself full time to sharing stories. He focuses on elementary school audiences although his work appeals to a wide range of ages. In 1989, he was designated a New Mexico Eminent Scholar by the New Mexico Commission on Higher Learning. He is a guest lecturer at colleges and universities and delivered the Commencement address at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at U.C.L.A. In 2001, he traveled to Cuba participate in a translation workshop sponsored by Writers of the Americas and developed his interest in Cuban and African folk tales there. For children and adults alike, Joe's storytelling sessions outside the tepee at the Wheelwright Museum in Santa Fe are a summer tradition that has continued for over 25 years.