Since 1950 more than three million people have left their homes in Appalachia in search of better jobs and a better life in the cities of the Midwest and Southeast. Today they constitute one of the largest minorities in many of those cities. Yet they have been largely overlooked as a social group and ignored as a potential political force, partly because so little has been written about them.

This important book is the first to explore the Appalachian migration and its impact on the cities, on Appalachia, and on the migrants themselves, from the perspectives of sociology, economics, geography, and social planning. Eleven contributors offer new insights into the complex patterns of migration streams, the numbers of Appalachians in specific urban areas, their residential and occupational patterns in the cities, their adjustments to urban life and work, and the enormous social and economic impact of this mass movement.