Accession Number: 20
Records, 1922-1987
29.2 Linear Feet
Online Catalog Record (BANC)

Overview & Series Description
History
Series I - Minutes of the Board of Trustees
Series II - Financial Records
      Subseries 1 - Trust Agreements
      Subseries 2 - Finacncial Summaries and Audits
      Subseries 3- Income and Disbursement Statements
      Subseries 4- Citizen's Fidelity Transaction Statements
      Subseries 5- Journal / Account Sheets
Series III - Chairmen and Trustees Files
      Subseries 1 - Edward O' Rear
      Subseries 2 - Ross Sloniker
      Subseries 3 - Francis S. Hutchins
      Subseries 4 - J. Farra Van Meter
      Subseries 5 - Henry H. Loomis
Series IV - West Correspondence
Series V - Lexington Subject Files
Series VI - Projects and Grants
Series VII - Homeplace General Correspondence
   1920s 1930s1940s 1950s1960s 1970s1980s undated
Series VIII - Homeplace Subject Files
Series IX - Photographs
Series X - Homeplace Rural Health Association
     Subseries 1 - Service Reports
     Subseries 2 - Personnel Records
     Subseries 3 - Miscellany
Series XI - Perry County Rural Telephone Company
     Subseries 1 - Record Book
     Subseries 2 - Correspondence
     Subseries 3 - Financial Records
Series XII - Oversize and Miscellany

Overview

These are the board meeting minutes, financial records, correspondence, and photographs documenting the founding of the E.O. Robinson Mountain Fund and its role in southeastern Kentucky agricultural, educational, health, and economic improvement efforts during the years 1922-1987.

Related Berea College Archives

Buckhorn Children's Center Records, SAA 45

Related References

Purcell, L. Edward, Good Neighbor to the Mountains: The Story of the E.O. Robinson Mountain Fund 1922-1987. E.O. Robinson Mountain Fund, 1988.

Series Description

The minutes, correspondence, reports, proxy vote records, and orders of the Board of Trustees are the most essential series for documenting the Board's activities and detailing the principal programs and services the Board directly administered or made grants to from 1922-1974.

These financial records were maintained initially in Cincinnati, Ohio, and later in Lexington, Kentucky by Mountain Fund secretaries Loretto Martin and Luise West. They document the establishment, growth, and administration of the principal trusts comprising the E.O. Robinson Fund, and include original trust agreements established by E.O. Robinson, investment and earning reports, and annual and monthly reports, audits, and secretary's general journal.

These are files maintained individually by Edward O'Rear, Ross Sloniker, and Francis Hutchins, each of whom served as chair of the Mountain Fund. There is no other correspondence for O'Rear and Sloniker elsewhere in Fund records. These two administrations are thus documented most completely in Board of Trustee minutes, in administrative records maintained by Fund secretaries Martin and West, and in the correspondence of trustee Francis Hutchins (from 1948-1988).

This series is comprised of correspondence maintained in Lexington, by Mountain Fund secretary, Luise West. West followed Loretto Martin in 1951 and was employed on a part-time basis by the Fund, while at the same time serving as secretary to Edward S. Dabney, president of Security Trust Bank.

These files were maintained by Luise West in Lexington. They consist of correspondence, reports, financial records, and newspaper clippings, relating to various Fund projects for the years 1932-1975.

This series consists of correspondence, grant proposals, and reports relating to grant applications made to the Fund. Included are lengthy formal proposals and shorter requests made by a wide variety of agencies and individuals in eastern Kentucky and elsewhere.

This series consists of general correspondence maintained at Homeplace by Lula Hale for the years 1927-1976. It forms a comprehensive record of day-to-day work conducted during her lifetime. Arrangement is chronological, although it appears her original filing system was subject based. Subject areas include her arrival at Ary in 1929, relations with Health Departments, University of Kentucky, county school systems, and various other individuals and organizations.

This series consists of miscellaneous subject files maintained by Lula Hale. Her subject order was significantly altered in the course of transfer and preliminary arrangement with the result that the present arrangement only partially represents her organizational scheme.

This series is comprised of photographs taken mostly by Lula Hale or Homeplace Hospital physician, Donald Martin. They were assembled by Willie Fay (Mrs.Victor) Spurlock and Ann Hoskins in 1983 as a means of providing photographic documentation of a wide variety of Homeplace programs and activities. Also included are three 16-mm motion picture films not presently in usable condition.

These are materials relating to the organization of a cooperative health association at Homeplace to provide medical care for local members, their families, and other needy persons. Included are drafts of a membership agreement form dating from 1946 which document the process where by the Mountain Fund agreed to provide for a physician and a nurse in residence. Also included is a logbook containing meeting minutes of the local committee, which directed the Association. The minutes detail early growth in the Association's membership and, in a brief fashion, the activities of Dr. A.G. Steele, the first physician hired. The log includes an alphabetical list of Association members and a record of their dues payments.

Also included are undated petitions of support from the communities of Ary, Fisty, Dwarf, and Rowdy; signed membership forms (1946); and miscellaneous receipt forms

This series consists of administrative and operational files, which provide documentation of the Perry County Rural Telephone Company (PCRTC) from its establishment in 1953 until its sale to L.D. Gorman in 1968.

This series includes awards, plaques, and oversize ledgers.

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