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King Coal A Pictorial Heritage of West Virginia Coal Mining by Stan Cohen SC
King Coal A Pictorial Heritage of West Virginia Coal Mining Stan Cohen
Copyright 1984 FOURTH PRINTING 1986 Front page and title page are loose
Soft Cover
144 Pages
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction vi
Geology 1
The Beginning 5
Mining Methods and Operations 11
Coke 45
Company Stores and Towns55
Unions and Strife in the Coalfields 81
Transportation 101
Disasters 105
Living Conditions 119
Promotion 133
The Legacy of Coal 135
Bibliography 146
NO STATE in the Union has been more dominated by one product or natural resource than has West Virginia. Since the beginnings of coal mining in the early 1800s, the economy, welfare, and political life of West Virginia have been largely dependent upon its 'black gold," that underlies a great portion of the state.
Coal was not a very important resource in West Virginia until after the Civil War. It was then that the advent of the railroads made the coalfields accessible and brought thousands of miners into the state. Since then, West Virginia has been fertile ground for outside exploitation, massive labor confrontations, union organizing, and a multitude of political intrigues. The coalfields have provided great wealth to individuals and corporations, while many of the miners and their families have known equally great poverty. West Virginians have seen their state's landscape altered by underground mining and more recently by the impact of strip mining. The state's economy has been buffeted by the up-and-down cycles brought on by the price and use of "King Coal."
The story of coal mining in West Virginia is a fascinating one that has been well documented through the years in numerous books and articles. The story, however, has never been portrayed adequately in pictures. This book ill attempt to explore pictorially the history of underground coal mining in West Virginia, both the good and the bad, and show how this mineral has affected the history and development of the state. The reader who is interested in a more detailed history will find the more recent publications on the subject listed in the bibliography.
The photographs used were selected from a number of sources both within and outside of the state's boundaries. There are thousands of photos available; I have tried to choose a few hundred from these that arc most representative of coal mining's story. As more photographs come to light, additions and corrections can be made in future reprints.
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