About ASP/Appalachia - FRIENDS OF APPALACHIA

ABOUT ASP / APPALACHIA

HISTORY OF ASP

CENTRAL APPALACHIA

The 2026 Appalachia Trip (through Appalachia Service Project, Inc.) is a mission trip that FOA participates in. Friends of Appalachia Inc. Friends of Appalachia, Inc. (FOA) is a Trumbull, Connecticut based 501c3 Community Organization, open to all, which strives to educate and sensitize youth and adult volunteers to address the needs of the impoverished people in Central Appalachia.

Repairing Homes, Transforming Lives - ASP provides one of the most rewarding structured service opportunities in the nation — bringing thousands of volunteers from around the country to rural Central Appalachia to repair homes for low-income families.
Since 1969, we’ve made homes warmer, safer, and drier for families and provided transformational service experiences for volunteers. Each year, more than 15,000 volunteers serve with ASP, providing critical repairs for more than 350 families.
Our Mission - Appalachia Service Project is a Christian ministry, open to all people, that inspires hope and service through volunteer home repair and replacement in Central Appalachia.

Our Vision - Appalachia Service Project envisions the eradication of substandard housing in Central Appalachia and the transformation of everyone who comes in contact with this ministry.

Our Guiding Principles
- We believe that each person is a child of God imbued with dignity and worth.
We accept people right where they are and just the way they are.
We believe that all people should be able to live in affordable, safe, and sanitary housing.
We are committed to witness through the good quality of our work and careful stewardship of our resources.
We believe God calls people to serve others as volunteer partners in ministry and we will encourage their growth in faith as they answer this call.
Where ASP is involved in local communities we will encourage, affirm, and support the fair and just treatment of people.
We believe in ministering in the spirit of love, acceptance, and hopefulness.
We accept people right where they are, just the way they are.

We acknowledge that each person is on their own journey, and we seek to create a space where differences are welcomed and dialogue is encouraged. While we may hold diverse perspectives, we are united in our belief in the transformative power of love, grace, and service to our neighbors.

We believe that each person is a child of God, imbued with dignity and worth.

We are dedicated to fostering an environment of warmth and inclusivity for all of God’s children.

We believe in ministering in the spirit of love, acceptance, and hopefulness.

Our commitment to inclusivity stems from the teachings of Jesus Christ, who engaged all people with love and compassion. We strive to create a community where everyone feels valued, respected, and empowered to fully participate with ASP.

A Note On Accepting Others At ASP

When Rev. Tex Evans founded ASP in 1969, he emphasized “accepting people right where they are and just the way they are.” This commitment extends beyond the homeowners we serve — it includes the communities we work in, every volunteer, and our staff. As we welcome diverse individuals into a shared ministry of loving our neighbors, we strive to serve well together by embracing the following as we live in community together at ASP
Since 1976, ASP has been an independent, non-profit corporation. ASP continues a close relation with the United Methodist Church, however, continues to welcome participation from any denomination.

ASP Themes
2009 - "Putting Faith Forward"
2010 - "Eyes on the Prize: Racing to Serve"
2011 - "Follow the Word, Transform the World"
2012 - "All for One"
2013 - "Radical Reversal"
2014 - "Apostello, Life on Purpose"
2015 - "Becoming" Walking Like Christ"
2016 - "Handiwork - Created to Serve"
2017 - "Love in Action"
2018 - "Called to Action" 50th Anniversary Celebration
2019- "Be The Peace"
2022 - "Rooted in Love"
2023 - "Love Strong"
2024 - "Building Kindness"
2025 - "Be The Light"
2026 - "Love Thy Neighbor"
2027 - TBD

50% of the counties in Central Appalachia have only one hospital and about 1 in 5 do not have a hospital at all
Kentucky ranks 50th in the Nation for the number of adults who cannot read
In Hancock County, Tennessee the average income for a family of 4 is $14,000 a year
1/3 of all of West Virginia’s children are born into poverty
In Logan County, West Virginia 40% of residents do not have safe drinking water
Kentucky has more miles of running water than any other state in the US other than Alaska
The first observance of “Mother’s Day” was in Grafton, West Virginia in 1908
The first free rural mail delivery started in Charles Town, West Virginia on October 6, 1896
The first shipment of coal out of Central Appalachia was in 1892 from Dickenson County, in Southwest Virginia; today one coal company owns approximately 40% of the land and between 60%-80% of all of the mineral rights in the county

Extraction abuses by the coal industry, especially through mountain top removal, has destroyed more than 1,000,000 acres of forests, 500 mountains, and buried over 1,000 miles of streams in the Appalachian region
At the Battle of Blair Mountain West Virginia in 1921, between 10,000 and 15,000 coal miners confronted state and federal troops in an effort to unionize the Southwestern West Virginia mine counties; this was the largest organized armed uprising in American labor history and led almost directly to the labor laws currently in effect in the US
Sequoyah, of the Cherokee Nation, is the only known person in the world to single-handedly develop an alphabet; his work became the first written language for Native American people
Bristol, Tennessee is the “Birthplace of Country Music” which started with recordings made in the 1920s by the Carter Family (of Hiltons, Virginia), Jimmy Rogers, Ralph Perr-Victor and the Stonemans; Bristol is legally two cities – one in TN and one in VA – they share the same name and same main street, but have separate governments
Source: http://www.appalachiancommunityfund.org/ df

UNDERSTANDING APPALACHIA

   RADIO/PODCASTS WV Public Broadcasting
WV Public Broadcasting
   http://wvpublic.org/#stream/0
Inside Appalchia
http://www.npr.org/podcasts/381443598/inside-appalachia?fref=gc
The Front Porch
http://www.npr.org/podcasts/464292636/the-front-porch?fref=gc
Us & Them: 'You're Either a Hiller or a Creeker' By TREY KAY • AUG 23, 2017
http://wvpublic.org/post/us-them-youre-either-hiller-or-creeker?fref=g
VIDEOS
Appalachia-Bound: The Unheard Story of America's Coal Country
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZd3QRtSy5LM3rNSTnyRierHQeHrOsDyq
Because This is Where They Live Hear from ASP's founder himself, the Rev. Glenn "Tex" Evans, about the roots of ASP and the work that we do.
https://youtu.be/bbEvNlD66FU?list=PLqRA_56QdMy1fU5hAVcZPqdtJdJhQJmj2
Many Hands: Rebuilding Appalachia Published on 13 Jan 2015 A presentation of OpportunityLives.com Executive Producer: John Hart A Citygate Films Production
https://youtu.be/QOJdJKH8nmY?list=PLqRA_56QdMy1fU5hAVcZPqdtJdJhQJmj2
Hidden America: Children of the Mountains
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct_QT6tBOG0

MOVIES
Movie: The Breaks: Centuries of Struggle Trailer (2017)
https://www.facebook.com/breaksfilm/
Movie: Blood on the Mountain
http://bloodonthemountain.com/#home
October Sky (1999)
Stranger With a Camera (2000)
https://vimeo.com/channels/676200/54465749

ARTICLES / BLOGS
This Appalachia Life
https://www.thisappalachialife.com/?fref=gc
The Appalachian Project
   http://www.appalachianproject.org/
Last Breath When a coal miner's lungs finally gave out, his autopsy proved a top doctor was wrong — giving hope to thousands of other miners. The story of Steve Day and his final vindication. Posted on October 8, 2014, at 9:34 p.m.
https://www.buzzfeed.com/chrishamby/how-a-coal-miners-autopsy-proved-a-top-doctorwrong?utm_term=.fs7e40NvY#.slAQ8veo7
50 Years Into the War on Poverty, Hardship Hits Back By Trip Gabriel April 20, 2014
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/21/us/50-years-into-the-war-on-poverty-hardship-hitsback.html?hp&_r=3
Death Comes Sooner in Appalachia. It Comes Much Sooner in Eastern Kentucky. BY BILL ESTEP bestep@herald-leader.com AUGUST 24, 2017 5:33 AM
http://www.kentucky.com/news/state/article169037857.html What happened when Walmart left In West Virginia, the people of McDowell County can’t get jobs, and recently lost their biggest employer – the local Walmart store. They describe the devastating loss of jobs, community and access to fresh food by Ed Pilkington in McDowell County, West Virginia July 2017
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/09/what-happened-when-walmart-left
The Self-Serving Hustle of “Hillbilly Elegy” FEBRUARY 27, 2017
  https://tropicsofmeta.wordpress.com/2017/02/27/the-self-serving-hustle-of-hillbilly-elegy/
The visual story of what humans sacrifice in our relentless hunt for coal David Yanofsky & Akshat Rathi August 03, 2017
  https://qz.com/998890/the-visual-story-of-what-humans-sacrifice-in-our-relentless-hunt-for-coal/
Rural Appalachia lags the rest of the country in infant mortality and life expectancy By Carolyn Y. Johnson August 7
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/08/07/rural-appalachia-lags-the-rest-of-thecountry-in-infant-mortality-and-lifeexpectancy/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=nextdraft&utm_term=.5c672451f29f
BOOKS
Appalachian Lives
  https://www.amazon.com/Appalachian-Lives-Shelby-Lee-Adams/dp/1578065402?fref=gc
Life Is Like That by Tex Evans The Buffalo Creek Disaster: How Survivors of One of the worst Disasters in Coal-Mining History Brought Suit Against the Coal Company – and Won Gerald M. Stern 1976
Thunder in the Mountains: The West Virginia Mine War, 1920–21
   https://www.amazon.com/Thunder-Mountains-West-Virginia-Mine/dp/0822954265?fref=gc
An Appalachia Reading List https://www.thisappalachialife.com/single-post/2017/07/05/An-Appalachia-Reading-List?fref=gc
Grey Mountain by John Grisham
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
Prodigal Summer: A Novel by Barbara Kingsolver
My Name is Child of God…Not “Those People” Julia Dinsmore
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Name-Child-God-Not-ThosePeople/dp/0806656247/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1305625129&sr=1-3 Poem: “My Name Is Not ‘Those People’”
  https://doorwayproject.wordpress.com/2011/05/19/my-name-is-not-those-people-4/

REPORTS
Health Disparities in Appalachia August 2017 PDA, Inc., Cecil G. Sheps Center, Appalachian Regional Commission
  https://www.arc.gov/research/researchreportdetails.asp?REPORT_ID=138