CANDLELIT CHRONICLES: HISTORIC HAUNTS

Entry 12/29

DEC 29 PROMPT:





“Your take on saving money on staples/ rising prices (etc.)”








         I don't have any personal direct take on rising prices, since I am a family caregiver for room and board with no direct income and no direct expenditures. I hear from the household's adults much about “the economy,” “the poor economy,” “nobody has money, everybody's hurtin',” but directly-I have no exposure. So let's talk about what I do know, from personal experience, and lucky me, I can connect this right back to the topic of Dec. 27's entry: Mountaintop Removal.





         I sure don't wish to seem that I am in the midst of a week of Kentucky bashing-yes, I railed against certain historical facts about Pikeville, Kentucky on Dec. 27-and today I'm going to rail again, but specifically directed at COAL MINING. Now-back in the latter half of the 1990's, as I said earlier, I spent quite a bit of time travelling around Kentucky and West Virginia and Southwest Virginia, studying the mountain scenery and Southern Appalachian culture. I went everywhere I could possibly manage to drive my “lil white speedboat” in the time frame allowed, and I saw quite a few towns, villages, cities, nuclear power plants, coal mine operations, and economic distress. And that's what I want to rant on today:

economic distress.

         Two of the towns I spent a lot of time exploring in the late 1990's were Harlan, Kentucky, and Jenkins, Kentucky. Now, before I continue, let me specify that in no way am I berating any individual, community, municipal government, commercial business, family, or any other entity in either of these towns. This is based on my perceptions at the time, and on what I know of the socioeconomic and cultural history of the Region.





         The economy of Southeastern Kentucky has, for nearly a century now, been fully tied to coal-mining, an environmentally destructive, nonrenewable-resource, potentially fatal (to workers), economically depressing, culture-depriving, industry.


The downfall of the Coal industry left hundreds, thousands, of workers without employment and no way to feed their families. Additionally, many ex-miners and current miners die annually from Black Lung Disease, a fatal illness common to underground mines. This is not to mention those lost to mine fires, nor the underground coal mine fires that burn for decades unstopped!





         I just read that Jenkins now sports a fancy golf course, so maybe things are at last looking up. But I still remember what I saw every time I drove through the Coal regions of Southeastern Kentucky, Southwest Virginia, and Western West Virginia from 1995-1999:

hopelessness and despair,


economies downtrodden,


folks who had given up and had no hope of a better future for posterity


an aura so dense that even now it makes me nauseous to remember the perception of economic and social despair

You know, it wasn't like this once upon a time. Mountains were green and gorgeous, or glorious in a snowy display. Trees forested the slopes, wildflowers grew at will and in abundance. Cabins dotted the hillsides here and there, and neighbors helped each other out. Mountains stayed the way Nature had intended them, great humongous gashes had not been carved out of them,  valleys and farms and homes weren't covered by water because the Army Corp of Engineers or some outside corporation had decided to dam. If only we could return to that status now!











Helpful Links:


http://www.angelfire.com/tn/jro99/index.html


http://www.abelard.org/briefings/fossil_fuel_disasters.php


http://www.coaleducation.org/


http://rogerphilpot.homestead.com/


http://www.coal-miners-in-kentucky.com/


http://www.harlankyresearch.com/