Federation of Appalachian Housing Enterprises, Inc. (FAH) records now available

The collection guide for the Federation of Appalachian Housing Enterprises, Inc. (FAH) records is now available on ExploreUK!

The FAHE records are the final collection in the “Action in Appalachia: Revealing Public Health, Housing, and Community Development Records in the UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center” project. The two-year project, funded by the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) Cataloging Hidden Special Collections and Archives grant, proposed to make available 645 cubic feet of War on Poverty-era records from Appalachian social justice organizations.

The Federation of Appalachian Housing Enterprises, Inc. was founded in 1980 with the mission to eliminate poverty in Appalachia. FAHE focuses on public health, education, and affordable housing, using an interconnected group of non-profits across the Appalachian Region, including in Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Virginia. The collection contains reports, minutes, correspondence, printed materials, and program files, which document FAHE's work on community development and affordable housing in the Appalachian Region from 1980 until 1992.

Commission on Religion in Appalachia (CORA) records now on ExploreUK!

As part of the “Action in Appalachia: Revealing Public Health, Housing, and Community Development Records in the UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center” CLIR funded grant, UK SCRC has completed processing the Commission on Religion in Appalachia records collection. The re-housing and description of these files were finished with the help of our student workers and will provide an irreplaceable insight into the movement for Christian church support of labor, civil rights, envirmental protection and other vital causes in Appalachia. 

The Commission on Religion in Appalachia, also known as CORA, was founded in 1965 in Knoxville, Tennessee and continued to work in the region until 2006. Through CORA’s Appalachia Development Projects Committee, many financial and technical grants were given to organizations with a shared goal of uplifting communities in Appalachia. Grants assisted the Federation of Appalachia Housing Enterprises, Appalachian Ministries Educational Resource Center and the offered aid during strikes like at Pikeville Hospital in 1973.

The Commission on Religion in Appalachia (CORA) records collection is a large collection with 185 cubic of photographs, audio and film recordings, and documents. CORA’s finding aid is now available on ExploreUK!  

Arnold Miller, UMWA (United Mine Workers Assosiation) President and Reverence Max E. Glenn, undated

Student workers, Ashley and Kelsie, arranging CORA's more than 180 cubic feet of  documents and media!

CORA's records include film, audio cassettes, vinyl records, photographs and ephemera.

Coal, Camps, and Railroads Digitization Project

The University of Kentucky Special Collections Research Center (SCRC) successfully completed work on its National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) digitization grant, resulting in online access to 140 cubic feet of materials from the Bert T. Combs Appalachian Collection. The materials from the Coal, Camps, and Railroads project are available to the public through the digital library ExploreUK.

 The newly digitized materials at UK focus on 189 years of economic development in the Eastern Kentucky coalfield from 1788 to 1976. The 10 individual collections document:

•  the search for, extraction of, and distribution of coal, oil and natural gas resources in Breathitt, Boyd, Clark, Floyd, Harlan, Lawrence, Letcher, Perry and Powell counties;
• the creation of railroads to bring these raw materials to industrial manufacturers and electrical power generators across the United States; and
• the company towns, their services and the individuals who grew up and made possible this economic development.

 These collections include the Benham Coal Company records, Wheelwright collection, Sherrill Martin papers, Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company and Lexington and Eastern Railway Company records, and the Kentucky Union Land Company records. Additional details on the collections can be found at http://uknow.uky.edu/content/coal-camps-and-railroads-digitizing-primary-sources-appalachian-economic-development.

Above: From the Means family papers

UK SCRC was originally awarded the NEH’s Humanities Collections and Reference Resources (HCRC) grant for the Coal, Camps, and Railroads project in 2013. The HCRC program supports projects that provide an essential underpinning for scholarship, education, and public programming in the humanities. Thousands of libraries, archives, museums and historical organizations across the country maintain important collections of books and manuscripts; photographs, sound recordings and moving images; archaeological and ethnographic artifacts; art and material culture; and digital objects. Funding from this NEH program strengthens efforts to extend the life of such materials and make their intellectual content widely accessible, often through the use of digital technology.

 UK Special Collections Research Center is home to UK Libraries’ collection of rare books, Kentuckiana, the Archives, the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History, the King Library Press, the Wendell H. Ford Public Policy Research Center, the Combs Appalachian collection and ExploreUK. The mission of the center is to locate and preserve materials documenting the social, cultural, economic and political history of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.

 Below: From the Kentucky Union Land Company records

Seaton family papers

The Seaton family papers have been digitized and are now available on ExploreUK.
This collection primarily relates to the Means family of Ashland, Kentucky, who played a dominant role in the development of the iron industry in the Hanging Fork region of southern Ohio and in eastern Kentucky. They also played a prominent part in the development of both river and rail transportation in the area and in the formation of Ashland, Kentucky as an industrial city. These papers include both personal and business-related correspondence, financial records, legal documents, memorabilia, newspaper clippings, journals, scrapbooks, and photographs.    

This collection was digitized as part of the Coal, Camps, and Railroads project funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Means family papers digitized

The Means family papers have been digitized and are available on ExploreUK! A prominent iron and river and rail transportation family, the Means played an important role in the formation of Ashland, Kentucky as an industrial city.

This collection was digitized as part of the Coal, Camps, and Railroads project funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. 

Appalachian Leadership and Community Outreach, Inc. records now on ExploreUK!

“For the first time signs of progress have come to the area – but not to the most isolated hollows”

~ALCOR: Bi-Annual Report, 1969-70

As part of the “Action in Appalachia: Revealing Public Health, Housing, and Community Development Records in the UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center” CLIR funded grant, UK SCRC has completed processing the Appalachian Leadership and Community Outreach, Inc. records collection. The re-housing and description of these files was finished with the help of our graduate student workers and will provide an irreplaceable insight into community outreach in Eastern Kentucky through college student’s eyes. College student interns were the main backbone to all Appalachian Leadership and Community Outreach, Inc. programs and projects. ALCOR’s goals were to:

1. Provide centers of enrichment in each community;
2. Provide the children with new experiences through group activities, creative expression and broadening horizons;
3. Provide improvement of health and sanitation standards;
4. Make people aware of the available resources and how to use them;
5. Encourage individual members of the community to communicate with each other.
(Appalachian Leadership and Community Outreach, Inc., 1969, p. 5)

The Appalachian Leadership and Community Outreach, Inc. records, dated 1969 – 1982, contains nearly 49 cubic feet of documents related to project development and programming. ALCOR hired college student workers to live with the families they were helping in 16 different communities located in Knott, Floyd, Letcher, Perry, and Leslie counties. Community centers were developed by using vacant buildings, church facilities, and one-room schoolhouses to provide nutrition education, dental and cleanliness hygiene, medical care, recreation, and community development. In addition to paperwork, college files provide us with publications such as “Mountain Memories” and “Appalachian Heritage” that incorporate personal stories and poems together. In addition to the publications, various nutrition pamphlets and posters are supplied giving rigorous nutrition information; such as, bread information and the dangers of eating too much sugar. Perhaps the most interesting parts of this collection are the surviving journal entries from several of the student workers detailing their day-to-day activities and the photographs depicting all of the work they accomplished over the decade of the 1970s.

The Appalachian Leadership and Community Outreach, Inc. records’ finding aid is now available on ExploreUK!

Eastern Kentucky Health Services Mobile Clinic, undated.

Woman, man and three boys setting up game of horseshoes, undated.

Beech Creek Center Cookout, August 1976.

Girl receiving vaccination, undated.

Blog post by University of Kentucky School of Information graduate student, Ashley Martin Keith.

Community Action in Appalachia series digitized

Community Action in Appalachia: An Appraisal of the “War on Poverty” in a Rural Setting of Southeastern Kentucky reports (1968), a 13 volume assessment of the Kentucky War on Poverty program, has been digitized and is available on ExploreUK. Individual report titles include:

Unit 1. Quality of Life in Rural Poverty Areas
Unit 2. Economic Progress in an Appalachian County: The Relationship Between Economic and Social Change
Unit 3. A Selective Description of a Knox County Mountain Neighborhood
Unit 4. Family Life Styles, Social Participation, and Socio-Cultural Change
Unit 5. Poverty, Participation, and Political Socialization
Unit 6. The Youth Development Program
Unit 7. Modernization of Life Styles
Unit 8. Leadership and Community Relations
Unit 9. The “Image” of the Knox County Community Action Program
Unit 10. The Knox County Economic Opportunity Council Anti-Poverty Arts and Crafts Store Program
Unit 11. The Early Childhood Program
Unit 12. The Health Education Program
Unit 13. Recent Home Construction in Two Appalachian Counties

Speaking of digitized Appalachian resources, did you know about this site?
 https://exhibits.uky.edu/appalachian-resources

Eastern Kentucky Health Services, Inc. records now on ExploreUK!

In 2014 UK SCRC became a recipient of CLIR funding for processing “Action in Appalachia: Revealing Public Health, Housing, and Community Development Records in the UK Libraries Special Collections ResearchCenter”! This processing project is now in full swing and the first collection, Eastern Kentucky Health Services, Inc. records, has been newly housed, arranged and described by our team of student workers. This collection provides unique documentation for researchers of public health efforts in rural Kentucky.

The Eastern Kentucky Health Services, Inc. records (dated 1975-1983, undated; 47.5 cubic feet; 46 boxes and 7 folders) contain grant applications from Eastern Kentucky health facilities to begin or improve services. EKHS, Inc. began its mission to help increase access to healthcare with a single primary health care clinic in Knott County founded by Kentucky natives, Grady Strumbo and Benny Ray Bailey, in 1972.  Strumbo’s and Bailey’s success acquiring funds for their clinic became a model for the region and led to the EKHS, Inc. grant program. Their initiative considered the unique needs of establishing health care services for rural and often poor Kentuckians unlike other health care financial assistance programs in the nation at the time. EKHS, Inc. assisted numerous health care facilities, from small single bed family care homes to larger medical centers throughout 1970’s and 1980’s. 

The Eastern Kentucky Health Services, Inc. records’ finding aid is now available on ExploreUK! 

Above: Student workers, Matthew Noe and Ashley Keith, rehousing and creating the inventory of blueprints related to grant applications in the Eastern Kentucky Health Services, Inc. records. Here is the blueprint for a proposed addition to Memorial Hospital in Manchester, Kentucky. 

Above: Image from Manchester, KY; Memorial Hospital; Artist's Conception; Drawing of Memorial Hospital by Watkins, Burrows, and Associates. Part of James Edwin "Ed" Weddle Photographic Collection, 1948-1981.

Memorial Hospital applied for financial assistance from EKHS, Inc. to help expand their facility circa 1979. 

Benham Coal Company records now online!

The Benham Coal Company records, one of several Appalachian collections to be digitized by UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center as part of the National Endowment for the Humanities funded Coal, Camps, and Railroads project, is now available on ExploreUK.

Located on the eastern side of Harlan County, Kentucky, Benham is a coal town developed by the Wisconsin Steel Company, a subsidiary of International Harvester. Beginning in 1910, the city was constructed from rural communities once tied together by subsistence agriculture to provide the raw material to another industrial city where steel was made. Benham was often described as a “model” coal camp, one with better quality housing with running water and electricity, schools, churches, a hotel, commissary, meat market, theatre, baseball diamonds, a doctor, and other amenities supplied by the company. As the demand for coal diminished in the 1940s and 1950s, miners and their families looked elsewhere for work. By the 1970s, Benham‘s continued loss of population corresponded to its dwindling coal production and in 1986, International Harvester left Benham altogether.

The Benham Coal Company records (151 cubic feet, 302 Boxes; dated 1911-1973) focus primarily on the early years of Benham Coal through the 1940s, including office files, employee benefits association records, files on accidents and safety, and photographs.

UK Libraries was awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities grant in 2013 for the Coal, Camps, and Railroads project. Over 130 cubic feet of portions of the Bert T. Combs Appalachian Collection, including the Benham Coal Company records,  will be selectively digitized, focusing on 189 years of economic development in the Eastern Kentucky coalfields from 1788 to 1976.

The materials document the search for, extraction of, and distribution of coal, oil, and natural gas resources, the creation of railroads to bring these raw materials to industrial manufacturers and electrical power generators across the United States, as well as the company towns, their services, and the individual lives that grew up to sustain and make possible this economic development.

The Sherrill Martin papers, Tacony Oil Company collection, and the Kentucky Union Land Company records have also been digitized as part of the Coap, Camps, and Railroads project and are available on ExploreUK. More information on UK Special Collections Research Center’s online Appalachian collections can be found here.

Saying Goodbye to the "Mother of Folk"

 

Jean Ritchie, Appalachian folk singer, songwriter, author, and dulcimer player, passed away yesterday at the age of 92. Born and raised in the Cumberland Mountains, Ritchie was known as the “Mother of Folk”. She released several albums on Elektra records and performed at Carnegie Hall. Ritchie also worked to record and document American, British, and Irish ballads. A graduate of the University of Kentucky (1946, B.A. in social work), Ritchie was the first recipient of UK’s Founder’s Day Award, and in 2002, she was awarded a National Endowment For The Arts National Heritage Fellowship.

Above: President H. L. Donovan presents Jean Ritchie with the school’s first Founder’s Day Award, 1955

The University of Kentucky Special Collections Research Center houses the typescript of Singing Family of the Cumberlands, Ritchie’s 1955 publication on her family’s history.

New Collection Guides Available on ExploreUK

We are pleased to announce that the following collection guides are now available via ExploreUK. Please contact the University of Kentucky Special Collections Research Center at sclref@lsv.uky.edu for further information.

• Wade Hall Collection of American Letters: Clayton B. Martin papers, 2009ms132.0122 | (dated 1934-1948, undated; 0.70 cubic feet; 2 boxes) comprises correspondence between Martin and his wife Dorothy, his finances, and military experience
   
• Boynton Merrill, Jr. papers, 2010ms042 | (dated 1645-2008, bulk 1960-1980; 4.18 cubic feet; 20 boxes) consists of research sources, book illustrations, manuscript materials, correspondence, cassette tapes, and one reel-to-reel tape, which relate to Merrill's research, writing and eventual publication of the book, Jefferson's Nephews: A Frontier Tragedy
   
• Isabel Cook Bureau scrapbooks, 74m2 | (dated 1893-1951, undated; 0.1 cubic feet; 11 boxes) comprises scrapbook volumes containing items of interest from the various places Isabel and Ernest Bureau lived and visited
   
• Kentucky Appalachian Region materials, 2014ms0229 | (1970s-1980s, 0.68 cubic feet, 2 boxes) comprise documents, correspondence, and newsletters relating to the Appalachian region of Kentucky
   
• James G. Dana account books, 56m313 | (dated 1826-1840; 0.23 cubic feet; 2 items) consists of two account books documenting Dana's printing activities as well as his personal affairs
   
• Mollie Blassingame herbarium, 46m33 | (dated 1855 June 23; 0.1 cubic feet; 1 item) comprises a handwritten herbarium that documents plant life in Texas
   
• Hiram Lyday Sloanaker Guardian Angel manuscript, 64m127 | (dated 1954-1963; 0.15; 1 box) consists an excerpt from his autobiography and his curriculum vitae from 1963
   
• John Fox, Jr., Duncan Tavern papers, 1997ms203 | (dated 1883-1919, undated; 0.45 cubic feet; 1 box) comprises correspondence and manuscripts from Duncan Tavern, Paris, Kentucky, that document Kentucky author John Fox, Jr. (1863-1919)
   
• Alice Lloyd Caney Creek Community Center papers, 2007ms040 | (dated 1915-1972, bulk 1915-1923; 0.45 cubic feet; 1 box) primarily comprises correspondence that document Alice Spencer Geddes Lloyd and the Caney Creek Community Center in connection with the Hindman Settlement School and the Knott County Community Improvement Association
   
• Joseph S. Satchwill scrapbook, 46m6 | (dated 1878-1901; 0.07 cubic feet; 1 item) comprises newspaper clippings primarily consisting of Baptist religious and allegorical stories
   
• Maurice MacKenzie Leach papers, 2009ms073 | (dated 1896-1989, bulk 1896-1945; 1.27 cubic feet; 4 boxes) contains catalogs, programs, correspondence, ledgers, lists, notes, pedigrees, a photograph, and printed materials pertaining to his career in the horse industry, particularly to his work with imported horses
   
• Robert G. Wallis scrapbook, 46m7 | (dated 1900-1911; 0.24 cubic feet; 1 item) consists of a scrapbook entitled Our Martyred Governor, William Goebel
   
• Federal Writers' Project manuscript, 46m55 | (dated 1939; 0.45 cubic feet; 1 box) comprises a typescript of Kentucky: A Guide to the Bluegrass with accompanying photographs documenting Kentucky's geography, agriculture, architecture, churches, newspapers, archaeology, folklore and history
   
• Henry C. Prewitt account book, 46m152 | (dated 1854-1857; 0.04 cubic feet; 1 item) comprises an account book that documents Prewitt's farm in Montgomery County, Kentucky
   
• Mary Kay Venable Weathers scrapbooks, 46m34 | (dated 1861-1912, [n.d.]; 1.21 cubic feet; 1 box, 2 items) comprise newspaper clippings that include: poems, fictional stories, engravings, politics, military, inventions, world politics, wildlife, political cartoons, marriage, and Civil War topics
   
• Lyne-Smith family papers, 1997ms387 | (dated 1820-1932, undated; 3 cubic feet; 10 boxes, 2 items, 1 folder) comprises correspondence, ledgers, photographs, financial papers, legal papers, maps, and printed material, which documents the business and personal lives of the Lyne family of Kentucky and the Smith family of Columbus, Texas
   
• William E. and Helen Woodward papers, 2009ms046 | (dated 1892-1965; 6.75 cubic feet; 15 boxes) comprises correspondence, diaries, legal and financial documents, manuscripts, notes and photographs that document William Woodward’s personal, financial, legal, and business matters. Woodward’s wife, Helen Woodward, collected these materials as a means to document William’s life and work as a historian. Materials span approximately from William’s late teens (1892) until well after his death (1965)
   
• Simpson family papers, 2014ms0231 | (1833-1960; 0.23 cubic feet; 1 box) comprises slave accounts, correspondence, deeds, stock certificates, a phrenological character, and a newspaper clipping that document the Simpson family's personal, financial, and legal matters
   
• Dorothy Frisch collection on John Jacob Niles, 2014ms0232 | (1929, 1944-1983, undated; 0.45 cubic feet, 2 boxes) comprises sheet music by John Jacob Niles; printed materials, including advertisements and performance programs; correspondence; Christmas cards; newspaper clippings; a photograph of an unidentified woman playing the autoharp; and a hardcover first edition of The Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles
   
• Emergency Fund and Service, Incorporated (EFSI) records, 1966-1981, undated  (96m10) (dated 1966-1980, undated; 14 cubic feet; 30 boxes) consists of the operating records of the Emergency Fund and Service, Incorporated and documents the organization's attempts to fight poverty in Knox County, Kentucky, from 1966-1980
   
• The Great Council of Kentucky of the Improved Order of Red Men records, 2012ms046 | (1905-1968, undated; 0.68 cubic feet; 2 boxes) comprises the operating records, correspondence, and printed materials of the Great Council of Kentucky of the Improved Order of Red Men, documenting the Council's activities as a secret patriotic society in the first half of the twentieth century
   
• Bill Kephart collection on Wheelwright (Ky.), 88m7 | (dated 1978-1980, undated; 1.35 cubic feet; 3 boxes) consists of records relating to three interrelated organizations and illustrates the roles they had in the transfer of ownership of the town from Mountain Investment to the citizens of Wheelwright, Kentucky

UK Special Collections Research Center receives CLIR funding to process significant Appalachian collections

UK Libraries is one of the recipients of CLIR funding for “Action in Appalachia: Revealing Public Health, Housing, and Community Development Records in the UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center”! This processing project targets seven hidden collections of War on Poverty-era, social justice organizational records.

More information can be found here.

Above: “General scene upper station Weeksbury Mining Camp (Eastern Gas).; creek runs beside dwellings, people look on,” 1946, from the Russell Lee: Wheelwright, KY Photographic Collection

Frontier Nursing Service Quarterly Bulletins Now On ExploreUK

We're pleased to announce the quarterly bulletins from the Frontier Nursing Service records have been digitized and are now available on ExploreUK.

Mary Breckinridge founded the Frontier Nursing Service (FNS), originally known as the Kentucky Committee for Mothers and Babies, in rural Leslie County, Kentucky, in 1925. To that mountain area, Breckinridge brought a background and professional training that enabled her to establish and maintain a unique health care organization.

You can see other Appalachian-related collections on the new Online Appalachian Resources page.

New Appalachian Collections Available

We’re pleased to announce the first of the University of Kentucky Libraries’ NEH Coal, Camps, and Railroads collections have been digitized and ingested to ExploreUK. More information about the grant can be found at the end of this post.

Sherrill Martin papers, 1937-1954, undated

The Sherrill Martin papers (1937-1954, undated; .63 cubic feet, 2 boxes) primarily comprises Carrs Fork Coal Company newsletters (1940-1945) containing line-drawing illustrations by Martin that accompanied articles and letter-format lectures on mine safety by general superintent P.A. Grady. The newsletter was either attached to, or on the reverse of, a pay stub. Martin’s illustrations reminded the miners receiving the pay stub/newsletter that mine safety was their responsibility and also their patriotic duty as part of the World War II war effort. The articles, lectures, and illustrations in the newsletters warned miners that if safety was not a priority in their daily work, they were aiding and abetting the enemy.

The collection also includes a series of pay stubs issued to Martin’s uncle, C.A. Dupree, from the Carrs Fork Coal Company and the Stoker Coal Company, 1937-1953. Other items include union and mine safety booklets and manuals, including a Coal Miner’s Safety Manual (1942), By-Laws of Carrs Fork Coal Co. Employees Burial Fund (undated), and a contract agreement between Hazard, KY Coal Operator’s Association and the UMWA, District 30 (1937-1939).

In most cases, the newsletters are photocopies of the originals. In addition, photographs of some of the line drawings are included.

Note: Some of the financial records for this collection were not slated for digitization.

Tacony Oil Company collection, 1860-1896

These materials (0.5 cubic feet;  1 box) relate to the Tacony Oil Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and its exploration for oil in Lawrence County, Kentucky and Burning Springs, West Virginia. The materials were previously arranged together as a scrapbook, but have been disassembled with the papers left in their original order. The collection is mostly comprised of correspondence, much of which has been transcribed, but there are also some legal, financial, and business papers. 

The National Endowment for the Humanities awarded UK Libraries a Humanities Collections and Reference Resources grant to digitize 132 cubic feet (264,000 pages) of portions of the Bert T. Combs Appalachian Collection held in UK Special Collections, focusing on 189 years of economic development in the Eastern Kentucky coalfield from 1788 to 1976. The ten individual collections document the search for, extraction of, and distribution of coal, oil, and natural gas resources in Breathitt, Boyd, Clark, Floyd, Harlan, Lawrence, Letcher, Perry, and Powell counties; the creation of railroads to bring these raw materials to industrial manufacturers and electrical power generators across the United States; and the company towns, their services, and the individual lives that grew up to sustain and make possible this economic development. 

New Oral Histories on ExploreUK

We’re pleased to announce the following Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History interviews are now available on ExploreUK.

Alben W. Barkley Oral History Project | 14 interviews from 1953

A native of Graves County, Alben William Barkley (1877—1956) was a prosecuting attorney and judge in McCracken County, served in the United States House of Representatives (1913—1927) and the United States Senate (1927—1949, 1954—1956), and was Senate majority leader (1936—1947) and vice-president of the United States (1949—1953). These interviews focus on Barkley’s career.

Moonshiners and Revenuers Oral History Project | 7 interviews dating from 1969, 1986-1988

Part of the Appalachia Oral History Collection

These interviews with moonshiners and revenuers in Wayne County document their lives, the making of moonshine, its economic benefits, the tactics used by officers in pursuing the distillers, and the tactics used by the distillers to escape them.

Earle C. Clements Oral History Project | 14 interviews dating from 1974-1976

Earle C. Clements (1896—1985), born in Morganfield, was a United States congressman (1944—1947), governor of Kentucky (1947—1950), and a United States senator (1950—1956). He served as the Senate Democratic whip in 1953 and as acting majority leader in 1955. Clements was a close personal friend of Lyndon B. Johnson in the Senate. In This project, his associates and staff members discuss his life and career.