This spring has been a whirlwind of activity as the Settlement School slowly returns back to business after the pandemic. It seems though, Spring was late this year. The overwhelming green has just started, nearly a month later than normal. I am late as well, just now realizing I have missed last month’s blog.
It seems this year we are stuck in the in between, the transition time. As I look out my office window today, it certainly appears to be autumn, but as I walk down the lane towards the lower end of campus, I am reminded that summer’s hot and sweaty hands haven’t completely relinquished their grip.
Today, with the increased interest in farming and foodways, there is a renewed interest in Fairs, and many communities throughout Appalachia are gathering to celebrate their home-grown produce, share their talents as basket weavers, potters, weavers of “kivers,” jelly-makers, chow-chow champions, furniture makers, whittlers and gee-haw whimmy diddle diddlers. The memory of the Pine Mountain
In the early twentieth century the Settlement Movement was budding in the United States and sweeping across Appalachia. In 1902, May Stone and Katherine Pettit brought this concept to rural Appalachia and founded Hindman Settlement School and in 1911, Katherine Pettit, along with teacher Ethel De Long, set out to Harlan County to help William
We recently hosted our annual Farm Camp. And the children gleaned so much from community farmers and Pine Mountain staff. Bright and early before the children gathered in the Laurel house for a farm-to-table breakfast, our youth farmhands worked alongside experienced farm staff to hoe the gardens, shape the soil, remove the weeds, and prune
In 2016, after a decades-long hiatus, Grow Appalachia helped Pine Mountain Settlement School revive its historic apiary on the campus farm. Starting with two nucleus colonies (NUCS's) purchased in Western Kentucky, we set out to build our mountain beeyard. Our demonstration apiary grew slightly over the past five years; however, this year, the School's beeyard
Pine Mountain Settlement School is honored to be partnering with Grow Appalachia for the twelfth consecutive year, and we are so excited for yet another opportunity to engage our neighbors in such a meaningful way. The work of creating a more sustainable and secure food system here in our region is perhaps more important than
While the past few months have been challenging for us here at Pine Mountain Settlement School due to COVID 19, and our typical way of operating has been altered in so many ways, we have adapted in order to continue offering valuable services to our farm families. With the support of Grow Appalachia, we are
Here at Pine Mountain Settlement School, we are so thankful to be partnering with Grow Appalachia again in 2020! This amazing relationship has allowed us for 11 years now, to provide organic agriculture programming, access to much needed resources, and assistance with preserving and marketing agricultural products, all at no cost to more than 80
During the early years of the School and before, every piece of land was precious and was often cultivated to the top of the ridges. This extensive cultivation may be clearly seen in the following photograph taken in the first decade of the twentieth century. What appears as terracing is often the result of cattle and
