After World War II, Berea College created a general studies course called "Man and the Humanities," in which students studied literature, music, and art. One of the first assignments asked students to draw their home community. Over the four-decade life of this course, some 7,000 drawings were saved.

      Because many of the students who came to Berea during these years were from Appalachia, these drawings are now primary sources that offer revealing glimpses of Appalachian life over the last half of the twentieth century. Mappalachia is an effort to make the drawings accessible to scholars, alumni, and the wider public. To begin, view the Getting Started page.