MEET DR. HELEN LEWIS     

In 2005 The Craddock Center board began an annual lecture to honor Dr. Helen Lewis focusing on some aspect of Appalachian life with the goal of preserving or improving our life together.

Helen Lewis is a native of Georgia educated at Georgia State College for Women (BA), Duke University, University of Virginia (MA), and University of Kentucky (PhD). After teaching and working in the Central Appalachian coalfields from 1955 to 1990, she chose to come back home to Georgia to live near her family in Fannin County. She was one of the founding members of the Appalachian Studies Association and is a great asset to this area and to The Craddock Center.

As a sociologist, anthropologist, and educator she has lit many a fire for justice in both students and community organizations. Her entire life has been dedicated to helping folks help themselves. She has written many articles and books including Mountain Sisters (University of Kentucky Press, 2003). A collection of her writings is currently in process also to be published by the University of Kentucky Press. She continues to teach, write, consult, and is a huge blessing to those of us who are her neighbors!

2010 Helen Lewis Lecture - SILAS HOUSE    

Silas House is a nationally recognized author, musician, and environmental advocate from Eastern Kentucky.

He is a strong advocate for protecting the environment and believes in everybody being good to one another. He has been actively protesting a form of coal mining, known as mountaintop removal, which is devastating the mountains of Appalachia.

“If you happen to come upon a bird’s nest along
the way, in any tree or on the ground, with young
ones or eggs, and the mother sitting on the young
or on the eggs, you shall not take the mother with
the young.”—Deuteronomy 22:6

Speaking to the ravages of mountaintop removal, Silas House says,

“I think this verse is saying that we have to be kind to even the smallest creatures. I believe it means that we should be compassionate, and thoughtful, and responsible. And I believe that it means we should not be short-sighted or mean-hearted or greedy. To be good people, the verse says, we must all be protectors of bird’s nests.”