Puppeteers of America is the national puppetry organisation in the United States, founded in 1937, running festivals, regional guilds, awards and a grant programme, and publishing The Puppetry Journal.
Here is the argument for joining, and it is a strong one
Jim Henson attended his first Puppeteers of America festival in Detroit in 1960, where he became friends with Burr Tillstrom. Tillstrom introduced him to Don Sahlin. At the 1961 festival Henson met Jerry Juhl and Frank Oz. In 1969, at a festival in Utah, he watched Caroll Spinney perform and asked him to join on the spot.
Jane Henson said plainly that Jim found the core group of the Muppets at these festivals
Sahlin, Juhl, Oz — the builder, the writer, the performer. None of that came from an agency or a job posting. It came from turning up in a room full of puppeteers.
Henson later served as its president
, from 1962 to 1963, and directed the 1963 national festival. Frank Oz’s father, Mike Oznowicz, served as president in the 1970s.
The structure
National festivals alternate with regional ones, and regional guilds operate year-round in most parts of the country. You can join a guild without joining the national body, or the reverse, though most people do both.
What members get
The Puppetry Journal, access to a substantial audio-visual lending library, festival access, and eligibility for the New Works Fund.
The awards
include the President’s Award, the only American lifetime achievement honour in puppetry. Recipients include Jim Henson, Bil Baird, Burr Tillstrom, Julie Taymor, Peter Schumann and Frank Ballard.
Its origins
trace to Paul McPharlin, who convened the first American puppet conference in Detroit in 1936. The organisation formed the following year in Cincinnati.