Background
Martha was born on October 7, 1866, the daughter the daughter of Captain Thomas Berry, a veteran of the Mexican-American War and American Civil War, and Frances Margaret Rhea, a daughter of an Alabama planter.
Martha was born on October 7, 1866, the daughter the daughter of Captain Thomas Berry, a veteran of the Mexican-American War and American Civil War, and Frances Margaret Rhea, a daughter of an Alabama planter.
She attended Madame Lefevre's School in Baltimore and a finishing school in Boston.
Miss Berry pioneered a new system of education to bring learning and knowledge within reach of all willing to work for it.
She taught Bible stories to the mountain people near her home. In 1902 she established her first school, a log cabin, on her father's plantation, with two teachers, and five boys forming the first enrollment. Since the students were too poor to pay tuition, no funds for the upkeep and maintenance of the school were available. The system of each student doing daily chores, putting the school on a self-sustaining basis, was thus begun. Enrollment rapidly increased, and at the time of her death the Mount Berry Schools had 1, 300 pupils and 125 buildings on 35, 000 acres (14, 165 hectares). The plant was built by the students themselves and maintained by student labor. Besides the two schools for boys and girls, the plant also includes an accredited college and a model practice school. Each student is required to do a certain amount of work in lieu of tuition, and receives practical training as well as academic schooling. A mill, workshops of all kinds, a granite quarry, pastures, and farmlands all form a part of the school plant. This system of providing education for the poor through self-help soon spread through the state of Georgia and neighboring states. When Georgia established agricultural and trade schools, they were patterned after the Berry system. Berry was appointed the only woman member of the board of regents of the state's university system in 1932 and in 1937 became the only woman member of Georgia's planning commission. She died in Atlanta, on February 27, 1942.
Martha Berry never married or had children.