We started the day in the Beckley Exhibition Coal Mine. The mine was made with pick shovel and shot. The miner would undercut the coal then they would hand drll holes, fill the hole, yell fire in the hole, blow up the coal, and finally shovel the coal into the car. They would get 20 cents a ton and could get 2 dollars a day. Dads could bring their boys into the mine to help them. When the boys were 16 they could go in to work themselves. As time went on the mines machines like an undercutting machine and roof bolting will double the amount of coal able to be mined. Mining was very dangerous. Canaries could be used to tell miners when there was to much methane in the mine because the gas kills a canary in 5 minutes but it took 20 minutes to kill a man. If your canary died it is time to get out. They also used a lamp to check for gas. Black damp will flatten the flame and put you to sleep for good. Methane will put out your flame but you do not just relight your lamp. One way in the early time to get rid of the gas was to fan the room with coats. I don't think I would want to trust coat waving for my safety. As they started using machines they needed to dust the walls with limestone to keep the coal dust danger of explosion down. A major concern in the mines is from the roof. Not just that the roofs are low so you can't stand up straight and it drips on you but real dangers. Petrified stumps called kettle bottoms were known to fall out of the ceiling maiming or killing miners. When a kettle bottom was found it ha to be pulled out or shored up. The roof also could fall so they used roof bolts. Roof bolts were usually 4 feet long and had to go a foot into solid rock. Our guide has had to use a 20 foot roof bolt to hit a foot of solid rock. After touring the mine we went around to the company town. They had a one room bachelor shack and a 3 room family shack that the cost was deducted from their pay. We also saw the three story foremans house that was free of charge. There was also a 2 room school house. It was interesting to see that talking to a girl earned only one fewer lashes than fighting. Next we went to the place that makes the high wall mining machine. A highwall mining machine can mine 12000 feet into the coal seam. It only takes 3 people to run and nobody goes underground. The technology from this W.V. Company is sending its technology around the world. The high wall mining machine is an awesome machine. It brought to mind an oil derrick. It was huge and was able to cut its way into a mountain but sophisticated enough to follow a coal seam within 1/4 inch from outside. This is a modern type of mining used today. In fact when asked who made the best operators for these machines we were told young adults because of there video game skills. Ironically we ran into aparent whose kids in their 20's ran the high wall mining machine. Finally we went to Matewan and learned about what was known and what was conjecture in the Matewan shootout between Sid Hatfield and the miners versus the Baldwin Felts Agency. It made me want to rewatch the movie Matwan after discussing and seeing "what is known" and what is conjecture at the real Matewan.
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