In the early 1980's, George Hayes was a school superintendent. At each of the graduations, he would tell of his dream of having a program to give scholarships to our Decatur County Community School graduates - in other words, North and South Decatur High Schools. Several people acknowledged that they thought this to be a worthwhile project, and in August 1983, he called seven people from our school district together to see if it was really feasible.

September 1983 - A retired university president was hired to be the fundraiser couach.

October 1983 - Plans and the application to become a 501(c)3 foundation were completed. The foundation applied to the state to have donations of $100 or more to have half of their donation taken from the bottom line of their state tax bill.

November 1983 - Each board member gave a donation to the foundation. A dinner was held for attorneys to explain what the foundation was doing.

January 1984 - A dinner was given for community workers. The goal was to have someone visit every home in the Decatur County Community Schools district to inform people of our mission and to raise funds.

February 1984 - The initial fund drive took place. The board met every week to bring in money and get an update. During that fund drive, more than $125,000 was collected.

Some of that money was used for the first four scholarships that were given that year. Everything else was put in investments to utilize only the interest for scholarships.