AbstractToday, in the eighteen counties of east Tennessee in Appalachia, more than thirteen hundred families belong to a unique grass–roots community organization called Save Our Cumberland Mountains (SOCM). For twenty years, SOCM has worked to improve the quality of life of its members and their communities by finding solutions to specific local problems. This chapter recounts how a membership–based group situated in the coalfields of Appalachia now raises $250,000 each year to support its w