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In 1913 doctors Eustace and Mary Martin Sloop started a school in the poverty entrenched mountains of western North Carolina, because they believed...
| The Sloops trudged on foot and rode horseback on steep dirt trails in isolated mountain valleys to bring medicine to the people and convince farmers to let their children come to school. Because of poverty and distance, the Sloop school in Crossnore eventually took in boarders then built dormitories to accommodate them. It gained a national reputation for effectiveness in changing lives and in breaking the cycle of poverty, moonshine and child marriages of mountain families. Mary Martin Sloop spoke at Daughters of the American Revolution rallies and conferences across the nation, inspiring them with tales of her life changing mountain school. She eventually put these tales to paper in her autobiography Miracle in the Hills. |
Drs. Eustace and Mary
Martin Sloop |
Sculpture named "Rising Above Our Circumstances " purchased for The Crossnore School
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The Sloops built a school, hospital, dental clinic and eventually, a boarding school to give children the basis for an improved life. They brought to Avery County the first electricity, the first telephone, the first paved road and the first boarding school. Through the Sloops' advocacy, public schools flourished in Avery County. By then the Crossnore School facilities were filled with children who, through no fault of their own, could no longer live at home. Roads, growth and common community in schools opened the secrets once harbored by inaccessible hills. Children who were orphaned, neglected, abused and abandoned found shelter at Crossnore.
The Crossnore School became a full-fledged residential childcare facility. Residents attended Avery County public schools. Today, The Crossnore School residents come mostly from piedmont mountain counties of North Carolina, and their special needs are often beyond the ability of traditional public schools to meet. Therapeutic progress stalls, and even reverses.Dr. Crain, herself once an award winning teacher and superintendent of Avery County Schools, determined that if Crossnore children
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were to get on even footing in life, they needed an educational program structured for them. She brought the "school" back to The Crossnore School when she opened Crossnore Academy, a pace setting Charter School in the North Carolina initiative to establish 100 innovative schools in the state. With the dedication in May 2001 of the Wayne Densch Education Building, The Crossnore School reclaimed the educational foundation beneath its commitment to give hurting children a chance for a better life. The school's highly qualified teachers enable it to meet not only the special needs of Crossnore residents, but also the needs of area day students who live at home and whose educational needs are best met at Crossnore. |
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