Council of the Southern Mountains
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| Founded | 1912 |
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| Focus | Community development |
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Area served
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Southern Appalachia |
| Method | research, education, technical assistance |
The Council of the Southern Mountains (CSM) was a non-profit organization, active from 1912 to 1989, concerned with education and community development in southern Appalachia.
Formally organized as the Conference of Southern Mountain Workers in 1913, for most of the years from 1925 until 1972 the CSM was headquartered in Berea, Kentucky, where it had a close relationship with Berea College. The membership of the CSM had traditionally been drawn from faculty and administrators of mountain colleges and settlement schools, agricultural extension workers, public school administrators, field staff of church home mission boards, and students of Appalachian folk arts. The CSM held an annual conference for its 300 members; published a quarterly magazine, Mountain Life & Work (ML&W), from 1925 to 1989; and organized commissions in which members could meet occasionally to discuss such subjects as health, education, and rural religion. The Conference changed its name in 1944 to Council of Southern Mountain Workers, and in 1954 to Council of the Southern Mountains.
Until the 1950s, the CSM's activities were conducted by a volunteer staff headed by an executive secretary who usually held at least a part-time position with Berea College. John C. Campbell was the first executive secretary until his death in 1919. His widow, Olive Campbell, occupied the position until 1928. Helen Dingman, of Berea College's sociology department, served as part-time executive secretary and editor of ML&W until 1942. She was followed by Alva Taylor and Glyn Morris in the 1940s. Financial support from the Russell Sage Foundation and Berea College was cut off in 1949, and the office was closed until 1951.
The CSM began a new phase in 1951 with the hiring of Perley Ayer as executive director. His energetic fund-raising increased the CSM budget from less than $5,000 a year to more than $25,000 by 1956. Two new staff, including Milton Ogle, were hired in 1958. The Ford Foundation transformed the CSM into a substantial organization with a $250,000 grant for community development and education in October 1962. Following President Lyndon Johnson's declaration of the War on Poverty in January 1964, Ogle organized college student volunteers into what would become the Appalachian Volunteers (AV). The new Office of Economic Opportunity gave substantial grants to support rapid expansion of the AV program. By 1966 tension between the CSM's cooperative community development strategy and the emerging conflict orientation of the AV led Ayer to fire Ogle and his top assistant; the rest of the AV staff resigned and incorporated as a separate nonprofit organization. OEO transferred its grants to the new AV organization, which moved its headquarters to Bristol, Tennessee. The CSM continued its community action technician programs, providing technical assistance to anti-poverty groups.
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