PUBLICATIONS PMSS EPHEMERA 1944 Pine Mountain Family Album

Pine Mountain Settlement School
Series 17: PUBLICATIONS PMSS
EPHEMERA
1944 Pine Mountain Family Album

GOVERNANCE 1944 Directors Reports and Letters to BOT

Pine Mountain 1944 Family Album, cover page. [1944_PMSS_family_album_000] cover by Mary Rogers, Staff.


TAGS: Ephemera, Pine Mountain 1944 Family Album, Pine Mountain Settlement School publications, biographies, narratives, photograph, drawings, founding of PMSS, PMSS Board of Trustees list, PMSS staff list, PMSS farm, PMSS alumni, Creech School students, 1944 graduating class, hospital staff


PUBLICATIONS PMSS EPHEMERA 1944 Pine Mountain Family Album

The 1944 Pine Mountain Family Album provides a snapshot of the School during the WWII years. The small 14-page booklet contains several narratives, 10 brief updates and stories, and 15 photographs of PMSS workers, students, board members, and community members who made memorable contributions to the spirit of the School during a difficult time in the country’s history.

The biographies and photographs of both staff, students and community include those of Rev. Lewis Lyttle, Evelyn K. Wells, Mr. and Mrs. Glyn Morris, Mr. and Mrs. William D. Webb, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur W. Dodd, Gladys Hill, William Hayes, Jim Centers, Lloyd Lewis, Stella Taylor, Charles Creech, Creech School students, 1944 graduating class, Dr. Francis Tucker, Grace M. Rood, Dr. Emma Tucker and Mr. and Mrs. Glenn LaRue.


TRANSCRIPTION: 1944 Pine Mountain Family Album

Cover: [1944_pmss_family_album_02.jpg]

PINE MOUNTAIN 1944 FAMILY ALBUM

Page 1. [1944_pmss_family_album_01.jpg]

PINE MOUNTAIN FAMILY ALBUM
Pine Mountain Settlement School
Pine Mountain, Harlan County, Kentucky

Chaplain Glyn A. Morris, Director
Mr. William D. Webb, Acting Director

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

DR. CLARK BAILEY Harlan, Ky.
MR. W. W. BALL Maysville, Ky.
MR. J. S. CRUTCHFIELD, Chairman, Pittsburgh, Pa.
MRS. LEONARD ELSMITH [Dorothy Olcott Elsmith] Woods Hole, Mass.
MRS, ANDERSON GRATZ Lexington, Ky.
MRS. INGHRAM. D. HOOK [Mary Rockwell Hook] Kansas City, Mo.
MR. C. N. MANNING Lexington, Ky.
DR. ARTHUR L. SWIFT, JR. New York City
DR. JOSEPH VAN VLECK, JR. Hartford, Conn.
MISS EVELYN K. WELLS Wellesley, Mass.

The drawings on the cover page were made by Mrs. Burton Rogers [Mary Rogers] of the school staff, and represent buildings on the school grounds. Reading down on the left, and around the page, they are Big Log, Boys House, Schoolhouse, Laurel House, Chapel, Far House and West Wind.

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THE FOUNDING

More than thirty years ago, Rev. Lewis Lyttle carried the first messages from this valley to the “quare women” at Hindman, and from them back to Uncle William Creech. Mr. Henry Creech remembers the day when Mr. Lyttle and Uncle William talked over Aunt Sal‘s dinner table, and by kerosene lamplight planned for a school on Greasy Creek. Judge Lyttle, now of Wallins Creek, is the only one now living of that group of early founders. He comes every year, still walking the mountain, to tell the boys and girls of Pine Mountain the story of those brave beginnings and at our request has written a short letter for this album.

“About the Spring of 1910 Miss [Katherine] Pettit accompanied by a young lady Miss Ethel Delong, a teacher of Hindman school, from Connecticut (or some of the northern states) who later on became Mrs. Zande, came to my house and I accompanied them to the mouth of Big Laurel. There we were met by John C. Campbell, representative of Russell Sage Foundation fund. We spent two days looking over the surrounding country, there seemed to be very little inducement to establish a school in that place it was so isolated that it could only be reached by bridle or foot trails across Pine Mountain. The party of us went to Uncle William Creeches and lodged for the night. We told him what we were out for, and he was interested. So he said, ‘if you are in earnest in what you say, if it will be any inducement, I will give you a 25 acre spot to start on.” Undaunted by the handicaps that existed, Miss Pettit accepted the proposition and began immediately to plan to start work. Other folks promised to give timber and work.

“So she rented a farm house to live in and began to build the first house which was built of hewed logs. When the first house was finished she began to gather children from the nearest homes. Some lived close enough…
(Continued on final page)

[Photo caption: Rev. Lewis Lyttle]

Page 4. [1944_pmss_family_album_04.jpg]

THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES

As Secretary of the school for thirteen years, Acting Director for a time after Mrs. [Ethel de Long] Zande‘s death, and since then Secretary for the Board of Trustees, Miss [Evelyn K.] Wells has kept a deep and continuing interest in Pine Mountain. No one today has the complete understanding and perspective on our problems that is hers, and no one is more generous in giving of her wisdom to their solution. She writes:

“I wonder if Andy’s gun, with its four notches in the barrel, still hangs over the door of Big Log at Pine Mountain. It was just 22 years ago that we wrote about him in the Pine Mountain Notes. Many of you — for Pine Mountain is blessed in its continuing friendships — may recall the story of Andy. He was twenty years old, in the second reader and wanting to come to our school, but it had devolved upon him to take up a family feud and kill the man who had killed his brother. ‘Had I ought to kill him? Paw says I have a bound to, but if I do I can’t get to come to school. Most likely I will get in the pen for killin’ a man, or if I don’t I’ll be afeard of bein’ laywayed every time I step out. I allowed you fellers could holp me know what was right.’ The result of his conversation with Miss Pettit was the leaving of his gun at the school, sign and symbol of a rejected code, — and two years of larning, during which he graduated to the fifth grade.

“Andy’s problem, while rather more dramatic than that of mountain boys and girls today, stands for our relationship with them, for ‘we fellers’ still have to holp them to know what’s right, in a hundred ways. And the problem is that of schools everywhere, how to help young people to think straight in a world where violence has broken loose. Every day the evidence rolls in, from distant corners of the world, that Pine Mountain has not failed. We hope you fellers who read this may holp us to continue to do what is right for the Andys at Pine Mountain today.”

[Photo caption: Miss Evelyn K. Wells]

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THE ADMINISTRATION

Friends of the school will be interested to know that Chaplain Morris, Director on leave of absence, is now somewhere in England. His address is:

Chaplain (Capt.) Glyn Morris
0-467.504
1109th Engineering Combat Group A. P. O. 230,
c/o Postmaster, N. Y. C.

Mrs. Morris is staying at her home in Wilkes Barre, Pa. …

Mr. and Mrs. [William D.] Webb with their family began their second year with us in August, and they have steadily stood by in the critical time since. It seems fitting here to mention the gigantic canning program of last summer which they generously supervised in these lean months. In community relations as well as school and maintenance programs, they have contributed generously and effectively. We cannot be too grateful for their energy and resourcefulness.

[Photo captions: Mr. and Mrs. William Webb ; Capt. and Mrs. Glyn Morris]

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THE STAFF

For twelve years Mr. [Arthur] Dodd has served the school as Principal, as teacher of music, science, and history, two years as Business Manager, as Acting Director at various times, and recently as printing instructor, along with other responsibilities. Always of course he has been a strong friend and counselor to both student and staff members, Mrs. Dodd likewise has been a loyal member of the school family, as student first, then community worker, and housemother at West Wind for several years.

Staff Members

Mr. William Webb
Mrs. Webb
Miss Helen Bartlett
Miss Lucille Beeler
Mrs. Birdena Bishop
Miss Alice Cobb
Miss Edith Cold
Mr. Arthur Dodd
Mrs. Dodd [Georgia Ayers Dodd]
Mr. William Hayes
Miss Gladys Hill
Mrs. Alice Joy Keith
Miss Helen Kingsbury
Rev. Glenn LaRue
Mrs. [Dorothy] LaRue
Miss Elizabeth McBride
Miss Josephine Merrill
Mrs. Adelaide Northam
Rev. Roland Pinke
Mr. Burton Rogers
Miss Grace Rood
Miss Gertrude Smith
Miss Minerva Sparrow
Dr. Francis Tucker
Dr. Emma Tucker
Mr. Brit Wilder

[Photo caption: Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Dodd]

Page 7. [1944_pmss_family_album_07.jpg]

THE STAFF

Miss Gladys Hill came to Pine Mountain as housemother at Big Log and teacher of arithmetic. She has been here longer than any other worker now here, and is the staff member whose experience bridges the gap from the last days of Miss [Katherine] Pettit‘s leadership through the present time. Since 1937 she has led the Co-op group. Miss Hill writes as follows of the cooperative experience:

“Our first undertaking was to write a constitution, and to make it work for ourselves, and we learned how to organize a Miss Gladys Hill rural cooperative. We set up the first store in the basement of the girls’ Industrial building, boys and girls doing the painting, wiring, and carpentry work. (The present store is in the new Laurel House.)

“Through the past six years each class has had the actual experience of organizing the cooperative, issuing shares, building capital stock and buying provisions for the shelves. Members have shared alike in clerking, buying, bookkeeping, banking and cashier’s work. Food selection is part of the course, and each week a different student goes to Harlan to shop for the store. The study of consumer buying is supplemented by further research in the Science and Home Economics class rooms.

“For the past four years we have written Co-op plays at the close of the study of world cooperatives. In these we have shown the Rochdale weavers opening their store in Toad Lane, the fishermen of Nova Scotia starting study clubs in their kitchens, the colored share croppers learning to help themselves on Delta Cooperative Farms at Rochdale, Mississippi and REA power coming to the home of one of our neighbors on Greasy Creek.”

[Photo caption: Miss Gladys Hill]

Page 8. [1944_pmss_family_album_08.jpg]

THE FARM

Readers of last year’s Album will remember Bill [Hayes], a graduate who has stayed with us for seven years, as farmer and bulwark of the school. His letter about the farm, printed here, neglects to say, and therefore we add it, that the improvements of the past six years, and especially last year’s splendid record are entirely due to his wisdom and tireless work.

“The Pine Mountain School farm has grown from swamp land and rocky hillsides to what is now the best soil in the neighborhood. The rough rocky hillsides have begun to set permanent pastures of which we have about 20 acres. Many thousands of feet of farm drain tile have converted the wet swampy pieces of land to some of the best vegetable plots. Many tons of raw lime rock have been rolled down the mountain, to be burned in our lime stacks and kilns. Cover crops planted every year protect and keep the soil in good condition.

“The Pine Mountain Dairy has one of the larger Ayrshire herds of the state. Our foundation stock was introduced about 20 years ago and since that time we have developed several leading cows. Our fourteen milking cows keep us in milk the year round and through the vacation time surplus cream is turned to butter. Our herd sire is available to our community folk, and most of the neighbors have at least one good grade cow which came from the herd.

“The year 1943 was successful despite the labor shortage on the farm. A few of the farm records show that we produced 240 bushels of Irish potatoes, filled 1000 cans with green beans and 1000 with tomatoes. For our meat supply we killed 3026 lbs. of pork and 1700 lbs. of beef, so that the school has been able to have meat occasionally. This was not true in other years. Our herd produced 11,500 gallons of milk. Our flock of hens, started this year, has produced 451 dozen eggs through September to December.”

[Photo caption: Mr. William Hayes]

Page 9. [1944_pmss_family_album_09.jpg]

THE ALUMNI

Jim [Centers] came to Pine Mountain in 1938 from Harlan, and graduated in 1941, with special training in mechanics. One of the many reminders we have of him is the new electric wiring of the school, of which he did a large and skilled part. He was the first of a fine family of brothers and sisters to come here, and Mildred, another sister, is a senior this year.

We quote a part of a letter from Jim, written somewhere in the Atlantic ocean:

“I miss Pine Mountain and truly wish I was still there. It has everything a person wants. I am proud that my two sisters and my brother attended the school. As I think of my past experience at Pine Mountain I can say that those few years were my happiest, and better than all the rest put together, I guess.”

Lloyd Lewis came from Line Fork, not far from the Cabin extension center of Pine Mountain School. He graduated just last year, and is now at Great Lakes training center. He was the only one of our boys and girls in the service able to be back with us at Christmas time, this year.

Lloyd was awarded at Commencement time, a thoroughbred Ayrshire heifer, in recognition of his outstanding work at the Dairy.

[Photo captions: Cox. James Centers ; a/s Lloyd Lewis]

Page 10. [1944_pmss_family_album_10.jpg]

THE ALUMNI

Stella [Taylor] came to Pine Mountain in 1935 from the mouth of Turkey Fork, eight miles away. One of our earliest recollections of her stay here is the heartfelt remark of a staff member, “If only we had 120 Stellas!” She was a loyal Co-op, and a devoted community worker, responsible for much of the constructive work done among needy families on her own creek, and through it all she was steadily preparing to be a nurse, under Miss [Grace] Rood‘s guidance. After graduation in 1938 Stella continued her course at Berea, graduated last spring, and is now somewhere in England with the U. S. Army.

Charles [Creech] is Uncle William‘s grandson, Henry Creech‘s oldest boy. He and his brother Bob are both in the service, Bob in the Pacific, and Charles somewhere in England. He is an alumnus of Pine Mountain and a graduate of Berea Academy and Moorehead College. A recent letter to his father says he is well enough but “wouldn’t exchange one acre of Kentucky land for everything east of the Atlantic.”

[Photo captions: Lt. Stella Taylor ; Sgt. Charles Creech]

Page 11. [1944_pmss_family_album_11.jpg]

THE COMMUNITY

A school Christmas entertainment is known as a “Christmas tree” in this locality. Here are a few of the Creech school youngsters, persuaded to gather for a picture after their own Christmas tree this year. After the completion of the eighth grade some of these boys and girls will be coming through the gate to register as Pine Mountain pupils and to find there, we hope, health, happiness, and training.

[Photo caption: Community Christmas Tree]

Page 12. [1944_pmss_family_album_12.jpg]

THE STUDENTS

There is always a solemn kind of pride and a certain strain of sadness about presenting a graduating class. We have had them so long and know them so well. This year there is an added wrench, for these boys and girls of Pine Mountain’s fifteenth graduating class will not go their separate ways as in the past to farms and jobs and special training. In a sense they leave together this year to share a nation’s summons to service. They will in one way or another carry out directly Uncle William‘s desire that Pine Mountain should be a benefit “To the whole nation and the people across the sea…” They go with our prayer that they may see beyond the world-at-war they now enter, to the peace they may help to create and preserve.

[Photo caption: Graduating Class of 1944]

Page 13. [1944_pmss_family_album_13.jpg]

THE HOSPITAL

The October [1943] Notes brought us many interested responses and many requests for a look-see at our hospital people. Here they are — Dr. Francis Tucker, Miss [Grace] Rood, Dr. Emma Tucker and Mrs. LaRue. The LaRues have come to us just this year, missionaries from the China Inland Mission, on furlough. Mr. LaRue, as woodworking instructor, and Mrs. LaRue, as assistant nurse, have made a real contribution to our staff.

[Photo caption: The Hospital Staff]

Page 14. [1944_pmss_family_album_14.jpg]

(Continued from first page)

THE FOUNDING

…to board at home. Those that could not she managed to give them work and began to get teachers to instruct them. It looked like a small beginning, but there was to be a great future.

“I have been in close observance of the work that was being done there ever since I made the first visit with them and it seems like the Lord has blessed and guided everything that has been done for some noble purpose. All the money that has been spent has sure been put to a noble purpose and has paid a big dividend to the uplift of that country. When they began to build, that section of country was a hot bed of moonshine stills, that has been eliminated, and righteousness now prevails.

“We none can tell what the future will be but from what has been done at Pine Mountain School and what is being done now, what ever the problems we have to solve when this war is over that Pine Mountain School will be a great help to us in helping us to get back on a good footing.”

[Photo caption: Elizabeth Oaks Dodd, aged one year, the pet of the family, Pine Mountain’s youngest grandchild, and our hostage for its hope in the future.]

Printed at Pine Mountain Print Shop


GALLERY: 1944 Pine Mountain Family Album


SEE:
PUBLICATIONS PMSS EPHEMERA 1943 Pine Mountain Family Album

SEE ALSO:
BIOGRAPHY – A-Z
NOTES – INDEX
PUBLICATIONS PMSS Ephemera

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PUBLICATIONS PMSS Ephemera Guide

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