Exhibition Overview
The Records of the Council of the Southern Mountains, 1970-1989,
were given to the Southern Appalachian Archives of Berea College
through a resolution of the Council’s Board of Commissioners
April 24, 1970, and later by deed of gift on June 11, 1990. The
accumulated 218 cubic feet were received in several installments
from 1984 to 1995. These records accounted for the nineteen years
of Council history from 1970 to 1989. Several boxes of pre-1970s
material was presorted out of this collection and will merge
into the Council of the Southern Mountains Records,1912-1970,
at a later date.
The already processed 1912-1970 collection covers the period when
the organization's reform efforts were directed toward encouraging
church, education, health, government, and business interests to
develop consensus-based strategies for solving regional problems.
It documents the Council's creation, early successes and struggles,
its 1950s rise to national prominence and wrenching, internal ideological
conflicts over how best to wage the War on Poverty during the 1960s.
The combined collections, along with the records of the CSM
related Appalachian Volunteers, also at Hutchins Library, provides
a unique, comprehensive resource for studying the shifting style,
content and direction of social reform efforts in southern Appalachia
during much of the twentieth century. This material is also an
important resource for the study of the Appalachian identity
movement and generally enhance the attractiveness of the already
rich vein of Appalachian primary source material in Berea’s
Southern Appalachian Archives. The combined collection also augments
the Kentuckiana Digital Library’s full text version of
the Council of the Southern Mountains’ monthly magazine Mountain
Life & Work, for the years 1925-1958.
A Brief History
The history of the Council of the Southern Mountains (CSM)
1912-1989 reflects the shifting style, content and direction
of social reform efforts in southern Appalachia during much of
the twentieth century. The CSM (originally Conference of Southern
Mountain Workers) was formed in 1912 as the result of multi-state,
fact-finding travels conducted in 1908-1909 by John C. and Olive
Campbell who were sponsored by the Russell Sage Foundation. The
Campbells identified a pressing need to bring geographically
isolated health, education, and church workers together to share
ideas, experiences and enthusiasms. An exploratory meeting in
Atlanta led to the creation of a formal organization and plans
for an annual conference.
The first and subsequent annual conferences brought hundreds
of people together and served as forums for discussion of problems
and solutions. Through these interchanges the organization developed
a vision of the Appalachian region as a whole and in 1925, moved
beyond conference sponsorship to advocating a unified "program
for the mountains."
John C. Campbell served as the Council's executive secretary
until his death in 1919. Olive Campbell continued in his stead
until 1928. During her administration, an office was established
in Berea, Kentucky as the result of financial and ideological
ties with Berea College. Helen Dingman of Berea's Sociology Department
succeeded Olive Campbell, serving as part-time Executive Secretary
and editor of the Council's magazine, Mountain Life and Work
, until 1942.
Dingman was followed by Alva Taylor and then Glyn Morris during the 1940s,
a time of dire financial straits for the Council. Preoccupation with the
war and frustration over years of seeing worthy projects going begging led
to shrinking membership rolls. Financial support from both Berea College
and the Sage Foundation ceased in 1949 and for a time the Berea office was
closed. Enough funding was found to reopen in 1951 and Perley F. Ayer of
the Berea College Sociology Department became executive secretary.
Ayer’s overarching vision for the Council was that it
not be the champion of any one cause or group, but provide a
forum where differing or even opposing sides could come together
and create positive change. His efforts during an energetic fifteen-year
tenure resulted in the Council becoming the largest and most
significant social reform organization in Appalachia by the mid-1960s.
Under Ayer’s leadership, the annual conferences increased
in size and importance. The budget grew from $4600 in 1952 to
$105,000 in 1964. For the first time significant numbers of major
utility and energy companies joined the organization. Council-coordinated
programs in the areas of children’s dental health, maternal
and infant care, and adult education were undertaken in Kentucky,
Tennessee, and Virginia. In 1959 the first of ten annual workshops
on the problems of Appalachian migrants were held for urban areas
service professionals. A corollary to this program was the establishment
in 1963 of a Chicago office to provide information to migrants
about coping with city life and a place to gather for mutual
support.
In the 1960s, the Council served as an expert source of information
and know-how for those at the federal level working to establish
the Appalachian Regional Commission. The War on Poverty funding
that followed allowed major increases in Council staff, budget,
and programs. However, with federal monies came pressure to alter
the Council’s working philosophy. Its traditional consultative
/ coordinating approach gave way to one of program implementation
and its accompanying bureaucratic intricacies.
The Appalachian Volunteers (AVs) was the most precedent-breaking,
program conceived by CSM staff. It was based on the concept of
inspiring young people from Appalachia to prepare themselves
for service to their home region. In 1964 an initial group of
students from Kentucky colleges spent vacation time repairing
one-room schools, tutoring, and promoting self-help activities
among community residents. The project’s early results
were impressive enough to win a major funding increase. This
made year round programming possible but had the unforeseen result
of attracting young white activists from outside the region,
several of who were veterans of the civil rights movement in
the south.
Internal philosophical differences over the community organizing
aspect of the program led to Appalachian Volunteers staff leaving
the Council in May of 1966. They incorporated in Bristol, Virginia,
as a non-profit organization and were approved to receive the
federal funds originally allocated to the Council. Remaining
federal funds allowed the Council to continue training community
action technicians, providing technical assistance to anti-poverty
agencies, promoting establishment of community action programs,
and administering on-the-job training and other manpower projects.
The 1960s national debate over how best to achieve social change
was represented in microcosm among Council staff and membership.
Several younger staff rejected the council's non-confrontational,
consensus seeking stance. Growing tensions between old and new
ideas lead to passionate debates among Council members at the 1969
and 1970 annual conferences. At the 1969 conference, an amendment
to the by-laws was passed that within three years, required 51%
of the CSM governing board to be drawn from the ranks of the poor.
The resulting atmosphere of conflict led to the resignations of
many of the Council’s long-time members. The 1970 conference
capped the changes of the previous year with the adoption of a
resolution that the resources of Appalachia should be placed under
democratic, public control. Believing this resolve to constitute
a socialistic or even communistic stance, many additional members
resigned. Executive Director, Loyal Jones resigned soon after the
1970 conference.
In Jones' place, Warren Wright, Julian Griggs, and Isaac Vanderpool
formed a leadership triumvirate. Management by professional staff
was replaced by a grassroots, cooperative structure. Membership
was restricted to "Appalachian organization(s) working for
a democratic and economically secure future for Appalachia and
our people." The Council became mainly a crusading organization
that focused particularly on helping poor people to organize
for the purpose of challenging governmental and industrial establishments,
championing the rights of coal miners and textile mill workers,
and fighting against strip-mining. Council offices were moved
from Berea to Clintwood, Virginia, in 1972 and publication of Mountain
Life & Work continued on a monthly basis until the
organization disbanded in 1989.
- Harry Rice
Continue to the Online Exhibition and Timeline
to know more about how CSM changed in the 1970s and 1980s.
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