Click here to subscribe today or Login.
A 31-year-old man died over the weekend from injuries he sustained in a Pennsylvania coal mining accident, a harsh reminder that this industry is by no means ancient history.
The buildings where anthracite was crushed and readied for shipment no longer cast their long shadows on Luzerne County, and whistles from collieries don’t signal the start of another shift below ground or scream out to the Wyoming Valley that something has gone horribly wrong. But today mining remains part of our region’s economic, political and social landscape. It colors our conversations and our streams. It continues to shape us and our views.
Only days ago, President Barack Obama halted all new coal mine leases on federal land as the government reviews its policies on energy sources. Meanwhile, on Sunday, area residents memorialized the dozen men who died 57 years ago in the Knox Mine Disaster.
As an outgrowth of this annual observance near Pittston, local historians and others first created a series of events collectively called Mining History Week. This year, they’ve expanded further into Mining History Month of Northeastern Pennsylvania. Activities include a discussion Thursday evening in Wilkes-Barre by artist Sue Hand, creator of the exhibit known as “The Anthracite Miners and Their Hollowed Ground.” (For details on this and related events, visit ahfdn.org/category/mining-events.)
It’s entirely fitting in our area, perhaps even cathartic and crucial, to routinely reflect on coal’s influence. Between the mid-1800s and 1960, mining largely dictated life in Northeastern Pennsylvania. It determined where towns took root, who populated them, how much people earned, who thrived and who suffered. It instilled a proud work ethic and extracted a terrible toll on youths stripped of childhoods and men left unable to breathe. It powered an Industrial Revolution yet deprived families of fathers and sons.
Its legacy continues to leave many of us astounded and grateful, if sometimes ashamed. Much as some residents of the anthracite fields might try to move on, even to bury the memory of mining, it pops to the surface, forcing us to recall.
Federal and state inspectors reportedly will visit the Greene County coal mine to investigate last weekend’s fatality, the second at the site in the past seven months. Operations there have been suspended.