Helen Hastie Dingman (1885-1978), a New York State native, came to Kentucky in 1917 to head the Presbyterian Church sponsored Community Life School at Smith in Harlan County. In 1922, she moved to New York City where she served two years as Assistant Superintendent of Field Work for the Women's Board of Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). In 1924, she joined the Berea College Sociology Department, where she pioneered courses in family welfare, social work, and marriage and the family, and was instrumental in the establishment of social work as a profession in Kentucky. She founded, and for 25 years directed, Berea's Opportunity Schools, an adaptation of the Danish Folk School concept. She was editor of Mountain Life and Work for a time beginning in 1925, and from 1929 to 1942, she served as Executive Secretary of the Berea based Council of the Southern Mountains.
From the description of Helen Dingman Papers 1917-1945. (Berea College). WorldCat record id: 52099310
