All The World's A Stage

My Grandfathers Had Black Lung, And We Counted Them Lucky

As I sit quietly on the beautiful grounds of the Louisville Presbeterian Seminary this morning, I read about the coal mine explosion in Harlan County, Kentucky.

The victims were identified as Amon Brock of Closplint; Jimmy D. Lee of Wallins Creek; George Petra of Kenvir; and Paris Thomas Jr. and Roy Middleton, both of Evarts, according to the Kentucky governor's office.

The blast occurred in Holmes Mill, on the Virginia border, at Darby Mine No. 1 about 1 a.m., McKinney said.

Both my grandfathers worked in Harlan County Coal Mines. They were both a Cawood mine for awhile, I think. We used to go to reunions there, and at Mary Helen, and learn about who'd died and who'd married and who had grandbabies now. And little ole me would hear the stories about when Jimmy died in the mine. And me, being me, asked my mom what it was like when the alarm went off.

She tried to explain, what it was like, this awful alarm, and how everyone stands outside looking toward the mine and just prays it's not their husband, not their father, this time. We're talking about the 1940's-1970's, when my pappaws were miners. But the alarm never went off if someone just lost a bodypart. The alarm only went off when something exploded or caved in and someone was likely dead.

Then the folks would come carry your loved ones body up to your little four room shack you shared with him and your six kids.

I'm sure it doesn't work that way anymore. Now, it seems like the families have to go down and wait and beg for information.

Both my grandfathers lost fingers in the mine. My mother's father had his lower leg completely shattered. He healed enough to go back to work but never walked quite right again. I have 3rd cousins in Wallins Creek. I swam in the lake the dam at Evarts every summer when I was a child.

My mother tried to explain, but I never understood until we went to see the play, the "The Kentucky Cycle" written by Robert Schenkkan. This 6 hour play has a scene, a simple scene, where when you don't expect it there's an explosion at a mine and the alarm goes off, and out come all the women. The alarm was perfect, it was the real alarm. My mother nearly came out of her skin next to me.

Sometimes, you really have to be able to put yourself there. My grandmothers were strong amazing women, and while having the steel to stand outside your door calmly and hope that isn't your dead husband they're bringing out of the mine isn't all of it, it was sure the foundation the made my granny the one who comforted us when all the grandchildren collasped sobbing in a giant group hug at my pappaw's funeral.

I'm angry at this administration for gutting OSHA. So angry, I can't even really talk about that. My ancestors, starting with the Cherokee, have been raped and stolen from, and some mornings there is no forgiveness in me that it's still going on today.

Posted by Liz at May 21, 2006 8:17 AM