DEAR FRIEND Letters 1969

Pine Mountain Settlement School
Series 17: PMSS Publications (Published by the School)
Dear Friend Letters 1969

DEAR FRIEND Letters 1969 May and November

[Sketches by Mary Rogers]

TAGS: Dear Friend letters 1969,fundraising letters,PMSS Director Burton Rogers,sketches by Mary Rogers,

CONTENTS: Dear Friend Letter 1969 May 29

Page 1
Header: “Pine Mountain Settlement School
Pine Mountain, Kentucky 40864
May 29,1969“

Sketches: small tree on right with mountain range in background; a view from above of a valley between mountain ranges.

Director Burton Rogers writes: “Twenty years ago we realized our obligation to close the entirely private boarding high school in which hardly one student in ten came from our immediately surrounding neighborhoods, in order that we might invite the county school system to bring to our campus all the children of the one-room schools in these valleys where few pupils stayed to complete their eighth grade.”

Rogers continues with statistics showing improvements in students’ attendance through the years since the change to a consolidated school at PMSS, ending with this year’s graduation of 15 boys and 8 girls in the Chapel. He describes PMSS’s services, such as experimental programs, health care now offered in a new special public health clinic and recreational opportunities.

Page 2
Sketch: Mountain range and valley.
PMSS staff have known that the “present assistance to the public school program would no longer be needed and the Pine Mountain Settlement School could turn to other channels of service [and] now there are definite developments.” The county school system studied a detailed analysis of its needs made by the University of Kentucky. Thus, the state will approve a single building for the two Harlan County school districts, to be built by 1971.

Both the staff and the Board of Trustees formed committees to study and prepare for “new patterns of service.”

Meanwhile, in the fall PMSS will start “a new service in guidance and counseling to pupils and parents” to help the community to prepare for the upcoming enlarged school program.

Burton expresses an urgent need for funds from PMSS friends. “Last summer and autumn I was greatly privileged to enjoy a leave of absence in Europe, very generously arranged by our Trustees. I returned more fully convinced than ever that the young people of Appalachia are second to none in basic potential and that they are unequal only in opportunity.”

“Sincerely yours,
[signed] Burton Rogers, Director”

GALLERY

CONTENTS: Dear Friend Letter 1969 November 29

Page 1
Sketch: Children playing basketball and engaged in Boy Scout activities with mountain range in background; holly leaves and berries.
Director Burton Rogers updates “Dear Friends” with the following:
” … [B]oth our staff and our Board of Trustees are now engaged in a very thorough and complete canvass of the entire situation, examining all possible needs in this area…to determine the particular…services which Pine Mountain is most suited to render” once the School is no longer in partnership with the public school system. PMSS welcomes advice from all sources.

Summer and autumn’s projects have included excursions for the young people, including camping; recreational opportunities, particularly at the swimming pool; physical education classes at the pool for upper grades in the first three weeks of the new school year; maintenance repair and renovation; farm work, including the sorghum molasses project; Youth Self-Help work program; Neighborhood Youth Corps.

Rogers lists the many gatherings that used PMSS facilities throughout summer and fall: weddings in the Chapel; religious groups; Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts; special dinner meetings of civic organizations in the county and area; a Chapel concert presented by a young lady from Harlan, who is now with the Cologne Opera in Germany; and conference of representatives of settlement institutions and rural centers. Also, PMSS provided facilities for the public Health Department weekly clinic this summer, which gave screening exams and tests to 309 adults.

Page 2
Sketch: A group of children busily explore books in the library.

In the new school year that opened at the end of August, a PMSS graduate with a university degree is teaching upper grades. The principal has returned from a year of graduate study and set up a pupil guidance and counseling service, emphasizing home and community relations. Members of the community are employed to tutor special needs students. Special music classes have been added to the club experiences each Thursday afternoon.

A federally financed education program helps adults complete their school diploma requirements.

“These glimpses of life at Pine Mountain will serve to assure you that we are by no means slowed down by uncertainty concerning the future. ... In these times of ever rising costs, and of troubled youth, we urgently need all possible support….”

“Sincerely yours,
[signed] Burton Rogers, Director
PINE MOUNTAIN SETTLEMENT SCHOOL
Pine Mountain, Kentucky
November 29, 1969
All gifts to the Pine Mountain Settlement School, Inc. are tax deductible.”

GALLERY

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