WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.920 --> 00:00:03.520 Welcome back to part two of our double episode on 2 00:00:03.560 --> 00:00:06.480 the Bootleg cole Rebellion. If you haven't listened to part 3 00:00:06.480 --> 00:00:08.919 one yet, then I recommend you go back and listen 4 00:00:08.960 --> 00:00:09.599 to that first. 5 00:00:10.480 --> 00:00:25.199 Alamatina hap penalcha oh, bela child, bela child, bela child, 6 00:00:25.640 --> 00:00:29.879 Chow chow Alamatino. 7 00:00:31.600 --> 00:00:34.280 Before we get started, just a reminder that our podcast 8 00:00:34.320 --> 00:00:37.399 is brought to you by our Patreon supporters. Our supporters 9 00:00:37.399 --> 00:00:40.439 fund our work and in return get exclusive early access 10 00:00:40.439 --> 00:00:44.439 to podcast episodes without ads, bonus episodes, free and discounted 11 00:00:44.479 --> 00:00:47.359 merch and other content. Join us or find out more 12 00:00:47.439 --> 00:00:50.759 at patreon dot com slash working Class history link in 13 00:00:50.840 --> 00:00:54.039 the show notes at the end of part one. We 14 00:00:54.119 --> 00:00:56.560 left off during the Great Depression, when miners in the 15 00:00:56.600 --> 00:00:59.920 Anthracite coal region had already been engaging in increasingly mill 16 00:01:00.359 --> 00:01:03.640 labor action as they established a union across all mines 17 00:01:03.640 --> 00:01:06.400 in the area after a massive and bloody strike in 18 00:01:06.480 --> 00:01:09.519 nineteen oh two. It was around this time that bootleg 19 00:01:09.560 --> 00:01:12.519 mining started to become a common practice, which would eventually 20 00:01:12.599 --> 00:01:16.159 grow into its own industry, independent of the major mining companies. 21 00:01:17.000 --> 00:01:20.480 Mitch Troutman, author of The Bootleg Coal Rebellion, The Pennsylvania 22 00:01:20.519 --> 00:01:23.760 miners who sees an industry says that although bootleg mining 23 00:01:23.879 --> 00:01:26.879 was technically illegal, the authorities trying to stop it just 24 00:01:26.879 --> 00:01:29.840 couldn't keep up with how widespread it was. Not to 25 00:01:29.920 --> 00:01:32.879 mention that even when the mines were closed, everyone still 26 00:01:32.920 --> 00:01:34.079 needed coal to survive. 27 00:01:35.879 --> 00:01:38.439 As the mind starts shutting down and people begin to 28 00:01:38.480 --> 00:01:42.400 bootleg full time, not on a strike, but indefinitely. At first, 29 00:01:42.400 --> 00:01:45.239 they're hiding it, they're trying to camouflage their activity. They're 30 00:01:45.280 --> 00:01:48.400 only doing it at night, and they're getting arrested. The 31 00:01:48.439 --> 00:01:51.319 company police, the coal and iron police are coming around 32 00:01:51.319 --> 00:01:54.959 controlling the properties, finding these people and hauling them off 33 00:01:54.959 --> 00:01:58.239 to jail when they can. But the thing is as 34 00:01:58.439 --> 00:02:01.680 more bootleg coals being produced, it's being sold for one 35 00:02:01.719 --> 00:02:04.079 to three dollars less per ton than company coal. And 36 00:02:04.120 --> 00:02:07.239 it's literally the same stuff, literally the same coal, from 37 00:02:07.319 --> 00:02:11.159 the same places, and it's the depression. More and more 38 00:02:11.199 --> 00:02:15.120 people want that are buying it, and so there's cases 39 00:02:15.199 --> 00:02:18.360 where the bootleg miners get hold into jail and that 40 00:02:18.520 --> 00:02:21.800 very jail is burning bootleg coal to heat itself. But 41 00:02:22.080 --> 00:02:25.039 then as time goes on, the jails are filling up. 42 00:02:25.039 --> 00:02:28.080 They don't have any more places to put people. The 43 00:02:28.199 --> 00:02:31.319 judges are growing more sympathetic, and there's a great story 44 00:02:31.360 --> 00:02:34.680 in the book about a cop who takes a bootleg 45 00:02:34.759 --> 00:02:38.240 miner into jail, and then as the cop leaves, he 46 00:02:38.319 --> 00:02:40.840 sees that same miner he just arrested standing out back 47 00:02:40.840 --> 00:02:43.560 of the jail, laughing at him because they just let 48 00:02:43.599 --> 00:02:47.599 him write out the back. And increasingly the bootleg miners 49 00:02:47.639 --> 00:02:51.319 would we find maybe a dollar for trespassing and theft 50 00:02:51.400 --> 00:02:54.599 or whatever the charges were, and maybe even given a 51 00:02:54.680 --> 00:02:57.439 year to pay it off, with the judges knowing full 52 00:02:57.479 --> 00:02:59.319 well how they were going to make that money to 53 00:02:59.360 --> 00:03:01.479 do it. This is part of the coal and iron 54 00:03:01.520 --> 00:03:04.439 police like losing their power and losing their effectiveness. 55 00:03:04.879 --> 00:03:07.520 Overall, the Great Depression was a time of militant labor 56 00:03:07.560 --> 00:03:10.800 action even outside of coal country, as people came together 57 00:03:10.840 --> 00:03:13.240 as communities to take care of each other and push 58 00:03:13.280 --> 00:03:15.919 back against the people in power who tried to blame 59 00:03:15.919 --> 00:03:17.800 the working class for their own poverty. 60 00:03:18.280 --> 00:03:20.639 Bootleg coal isn't the only thing from the Depression that 61 00:03:20.719 --> 00:03:23.120 hasn't had enough written about it, though. There's all sorts 62 00:03:23.120 --> 00:03:25.479 of things that start to pop up, especially after nineteen 63 00:03:25.560 --> 00:03:29.159 thirty two or so. There's the farm Holiday movement, who 64 00:03:30.120 --> 00:03:33.479 are trying to declare a moratorium on foreclosures, especially in 65 00:03:33.520 --> 00:03:38.599 the Midwest Iowa specifically. They have this great little jingle. 66 00:03:38.639 --> 00:03:41.360 I guess it's more of a poem. They say, let's 67 00:03:41.360 --> 00:03:44.879 call a farmer's holiday a holiday will hold. We'll eat 68 00:03:44.919 --> 00:03:47.039 our wheat and ham and eggs and let them eat 69 00:03:47.080 --> 00:03:51.879 their gold. There's also milk strikes across the country, where 70 00:03:52.240 --> 00:03:54.639 the price of milk is dropping so low that it's 71 00:03:54.680 --> 00:03:57.599 not worth it for farmers to sell the milk anymore, 72 00:03:57.800 --> 00:04:01.080 and so farmers start blockading highways and railroad tracks and 73 00:04:01.159 --> 00:04:03.759 just dumping off all the milk they see in order 74 00:04:03.800 --> 00:04:07.599 to bring up the price. There's a general strike happens 75 00:04:07.599 --> 00:04:11.560 in Minneapolis, there's a general strike in San Francisco. And 76 00:04:11.639 --> 00:04:15.000 all these things deserve way more, way more written about them. 77 00:04:15.319 --> 00:04:18.360 Here's bootleg miner Mooch Kashner talking about a group of 78 00:04:18.399 --> 00:04:20.800 miners blowing up a shovel, which is a large piece 79 00:04:20.839 --> 00:04:23.040 of excavation equipment used in coal mining. 80 00:04:23.439 --> 00:04:25.800 There was a bunch of mines in there, and they 81 00:04:25.839 --> 00:04:27.639 moved to shovel in there to dig them out, and 82 00:04:29.680 --> 00:04:32.600 of course the people were hurting, like everybody else at 83 00:04:32.600 --> 00:04:35.720 the time. You know, they wanted to make a living 84 00:04:35.720 --> 00:04:40.040 and that's where they were making it. And then they 85 00:04:40.120 --> 00:04:42.959 moved to shovel in and they were supposed to start 86 00:04:42.959 --> 00:04:45.639 digging the next morning there with that shovel but they 87 00:04:45.680 --> 00:04:49.160 never did because they blowed it the night before. You know, 88 00:04:49.199 --> 00:04:51.639 the guys get together and talk it over. Yeah, a 89 00:04:51.680 --> 00:04:54.000 couple of guys and just a couple of guys, because 90 00:04:54.319 --> 00:04:58.959 it was better than everybody knowing about that. It was 91 00:04:59.040 --> 00:05:02.079 better than anybody. A couple of guys knew about that. 92 00:05:02.319 --> 00:05:04.879 I'm not to say I would say four people at 93 00:05:04.879 --> 00:05:07.279 the most. And I was one of them that knew 94 00:05:07.279 --> 00:05:10.279 about it, but I was didn't participate. 95 00:05:10.920 --> 00:05:15.360 So militant action is like again worldwide throughout time, part 96 00:05:15.480 --> 00:05:18.680 of part of coal mining struggles or just mining struggles 97 00:05:18.680 --> 00:05:22.879 in general. I'm really fascinated by down in Bolivia, the 98 00:05:22.920 --> 00:05:27.920 silver miners, who various times have been illegal, sort of 99 00:05:27.920 --> 00:05:31.360 bootleg style, but a thing they often do when they 100 00:05:31.360 --> 00:05:34.839 have marches, they just throw dynamite, you know, and you'd think, like, 101 00:05:35.160 --> 00:05:36.720 you think that would be planned out or something, but 102 00:05:36.759 --> 00:05:38.319 it's not. I have a friend who went down there 103 00:05:38.360 --> 00:05:40.519 say it's legit scary to be out of march where 104 00:05:40.519 --> 00:05:43.279 people are just throwing dynamite. But it does get like, 105 00:05:43.639 --> 00:05:47.759 it does get the level of seriousness across to what 106 00:05:47.839 --> 00:05:50.240 kind of risks people are willing to take, what type 107 00:05:50.240 --> 00:05:52.920 of stakes people feel like they're fighting on. And so 108 00:05:53.079 --> 00:05:55.399 that the bootleggers did any of this is honestly not 109 00:05:56.480 --> 00:05:59.360 shouldn't be surprising if you if you know coal. 110 00:05:59.120 --> 00:06:03.759 Mining history, bootleg miner Jack Champion talking with Michael Kazera. 111 00:06:03.839 --> 00:06:07.439 We were a very closed group, the gold miners. It 112 00:06:07.600 --> 00:06:16.160 was always help each other and keep your mouth let 113 00:06:16.199 --> 00:06:18.600 well and off alone. He's banking and hon us living 114 00:06:18.639 --> 00:06:21.519 as we always thought it was. We thought we'd a 115 00:06:21.600 --> 00:06:25.639 ride to this great resource tool as much as the 116 00:06:25.639 --> 00:06:26.560 big companies. 117 00:06:27.160 --> 00:06:29.839 You know, coal mines need to have multiple entrances for ventilation, 118 00:06:30.360 --> 00:06:31.879 and so there were a lot of ways in and 119 00:06:31.920 --> 00:06:35.360 out of a mine. But also it was happening on 120 00:06:35.399 --> 00:06:39.240 such a large scale that the companies couldn't always stop it. 121 00:06:39.759 --> 00:06:42.120 And because the companies couldn't stop the scale at which 122 00:06:42.160 --> 00:06:45.319 bootlegging was happening, the practice only continued to grow. 123 00:06:45.800 --> 00:06:48.560 And nineteen twenty five, you see all sorts of things happen. 124 00:06:48.639 --> 00:06:51.360 So and another important part of anthracite is he's used 125 00:06:51.360 --> 00:06:54.600 for home heat, and at this time the entire East 126 00:06:54.639 --> 00:06:58.639 Coast or Northeast Coast is using anthracite for their home heat. 127 00:06:58.720 --> 00:07:01.600 So when the strikes are on nineteen oh two, nineteen 128 00:07:01.600 --> 00:07:04.519 twenty five and others, it's a big deal. They try 129 00:07:04.560 --> 00:07:06.920 to strike through the winters when they have the most power, 130 00:07:07.240 --> 00:07:11.199 and that means that New York City, Baltimore, Boston, they're 131 00:07:11.240 --> 00:07:15.639 going without heat, and so these bootleggers are well, they're 132 00:07:15.680 --> 00:07:18.680 at this point, they're just strikers. These strikers are able 133 00:07:18.759 --> 00:07:22.160 to funnel coal out and get some money for that 134 00:07:22.319 --> 00:07:23.199 or get other things. 135 00:07:23.800 --> 00:07:26.560 Once people in the major cities started buying bootleg coal, 136 00:07:26.759 --> 00:07:29.160 the miners had essentially cut out the mentalman and could 137 00:07:29.199 --> 00:07:31.879 more or less round their own independent coal industry. 138 00:07:32.199 --> 00:07:35.319 I found some great stories, ones of a Philadelphia carpenter 139 00:07:35.600 --> 00:07:38.680 who reports to the newspaper that, yeah, I ran out 140 00:07:38.720 --> 00:07:40.680 of coal, and so I actually just went up to 141 00:07:40.720 --> 00:07:44.160 the coal region myself and some guys showed me how 142 00:07:44.199 --> 00:07:46.839 to start my own little mind, and I mind enough 143 00:07:46.839 --> 00:07:49.680 to keep my operations going down here in Philly. There's 144 00:07:49.720 --> 00:07:54.560 another story of someone who Boston businessman I believe, who 145 00:07:54.720 --> 00:07:58.959 arranges to buy a load of this stolen coal and 146 00:07:59.399 --> 00:08:02.240 even has a put on a train. He hasn't marked 147 00:08:02.240 --> 00:08:05.079 his potatoes until the Red and Coal and Iron Company 148 00:08:05.120 --> 00:08:07.759 find that their own train is being used to move 149 00:08:09.959 --> 00:08:13.439 bootleg coal during the strike. It doesn't end up getting shipped, 150 00:08:13.600 --> 00:08:15.759 but there's just tons of that going on. 151 00:08:16.439 --> 00:08:20.160 Bootleg minor William H. Adams told folklors George Corson in 152 00:08:20.199 --> 00:08:22.800 this oral History that his bootlegging became more of a 153 00:08:22.800 --> 00:08:26.480 commercial enterprise than a subsistence one. Miners used to also 154 00:08:26.519 --> 00:08:28.959 steal equipment from the mines to keep up with demand. 155 00:08:29.399 --> 00:08:32.759 The most tool used would be the pick and shovel 156 00:08:32.840 --> 00:08:36.879 and the bar. They would use the pick and shoveler. 157 00:08:36.879 --> 00:08:39.759 I will first use the bar to find out where 158 00:08:39.799 --> 00:08:42.159 the outcrop of the vein would be, drive it down 159 00:08:42.159 --> 00:08:44.200 to the ground until you could get the black stuff 160 00:08:44.240 --> 00:08:47.399 on the end of the bar, and just starts sinking 161 00:08:47.399 --> 00:08:51.360 a hole with the pick and shovel and using dynamite 162 00:08:51.399 --> 00:08:53.759 whenever you could get it, which was hard in the 163 00:08:53.799 --> 00:08:58.559 beginning to get The first bootlegger would either go and 164 00:08:58.600 --> 00:09:03.360 steal the dynamite or go and have someone who still 165 00:09:03.399 --> 00:09:05.799 worked at the callery to bring him some along from 166 00:09:05.799 --> 00:09:06.919 the calleries during the youth. 167 00:09:07.600 --> 00:09:10.480 Much Kashner says that bootleggers are the only reason a 168 00:09:10.519 --> 00:09:12.519 lot of the people in the Anthracite region made it 169 00:09:12.519 --> 00:09:13.840 through the Great Depression at all. 170 00:09:14.320 --> 00:09:17.360 They were the backbone of the whole cold thing, the 171 00:09:17.440 --> 00:09:22.960 whole thing during the depression. They were it. They saved 172 00:09:23.039 --> 00:09:26.559 the everything. They saved everything. They saved the business, they 173 00:09:26.559 --> 00:09:31.360 saved the market, they saved the towns, they did everything. 174 00:09:31.600 --> 00:09:34.679 Why did you turn to bootlegging in the first place. Well, 175 00:09:34.759 --> 00:09:37.080 I'll tell you a lot. When I during the depression, 176 00:09:37.759 --> 00:09:40.320 this is when I was old enough to go to work, 177 00:09:41.159 --> 00:09:45.080 I was fourteen years old, I was bootlegging color and 178 00:09:45.919 --> 00:09:49.000 we used to go in in two three o'clock in 179 00:09:49.039 --> 00:09:52.240 the morning with my brother in laws and we'd screened 180 00:09:52.320 --> 00:09:55.279 coal inside that mine and carry it out in bags. 181 00:09:55.399 --> 00:09:58.320 And they leave me there by myself, at that age 182 00:09:58.320 --> 00:10:02.240 at fourteen, kind of small bags of co out while 183 00:10:02.240 --> 00:10:04.480 they'd be taking a trip to sell it at that 184 00:10:04.519 --> 00:10:06.519 time in the morning, to have arrange with free arrangements 185 00:10:06.559 --> 00:10:10.159 made to stay away from the coal iron police, you know. 186 00:10:11.279 --> 00:10:12.919 And that's what we've done. We've done that for a 187 00:10:12.960 --> 00:10:18.679 much two years before I ever started work any other place. 188 00:10:18.759 --> 00:10:21.960 You know, we was doing that and it never got caught. 189 00:10:22.080 --> 00:10:25.879 Of course, we was doing it that long. And I 190 00:10:25.960 --> 00:10:28.279 they always leave me there and I all kinds of 191 00:10:28.320 --> 00:10:31.000 noises at two or three o'clock in the morning. It's scary. 192 00:10:31.360 --> 00:10:35.360 You know, you'd be scared. And that was an experience 193 00:10:35.440 --> 00:10:36.039 in itself. 194 00:10:36.639 --> 00:10:39.679 Even at fourteen, Kasher managed to somehow juggle going to 195 00:10:39.679 --> 00:10:42.360 school and bootlegging to help support his family. 196 00:10:43.080 --> 00:10:46.759 He went one year, just started, didn't even finish the 197 00:10:46.799 --> 00:10:50.960 first year of high school. And I started to work 198 00:10:51.000 --> 00:10:54.919 around the mines, which I was going to school. I 199 00:10:55.000 --> 00:10:57.159 was bootlegging. I cold too, and I you know, we're 200 00:10:57.440 --> 00:10:58.600 carrying those bags out. 201 00:10:58.519 --> 00:10:59.000 In the morning. 202 00:10:59.200 --> 00:11:01.279 Didn't get up in the morn to go to school 203 00:11:01.440 --> 00:11:04.679 after working an hour or two hours carrying a bag. 204 00:11:05.320 --> 00:11:07.120 You go home and go to wash and go to 205 00:11:07.159 --> 00:11:09.799 bed and get up, yeah, and go to school. And 206 00:11:09.840 --> 00:11:12.480 then we walk to school in that buses. Then we 207 00:11:12.519 --> 00:11:14.600 walked a mile and a half of school. 208 00:11:15.559 --> 00:11:19.200 So as bootleg begins to grow, women and children aren't 209 00:11:19.240 --> 00:11:22.399 just helping at home. They're going into the mines. There's 210 00:11:22.440 --> 00:11:25.679 some great stories of children who run mines after school 211 00:11:25.720 --> 00:11:28.919 on their own. There's women and children working on the 212 00:11:28.919 --> 00:11:32.120 surface level of the mine, hauling the coal up, processing 213 00:11:32.159 --> 00:11:36.000 it there. But then there's also women and children going underground. 214 00:11:36.000 --> 00:11:38.960 There's a few cases of women being miners in their 215 00:11:39.000 --> 00:11:43.360 own right. And there's also this breakdown as you go 216 00:11:43.480 --> 00:11:48.039 from having a job at the colliery to having this informal, 217 00:11:48.240 --> 00:11:52.480 illegal industry where the lines between what's home and what's 218 00:11:52.519 --> 00:11:55.960 work are breaking down, and so food is cooked at 219 00:11:56.000 --> 00:11:59.000 the mine and life is lived on the rhythm of 220 00:11:59.080 --> 00:11:59.960 the bootleg mining. 221 00:12:00.360 --> 00:12:02.559 Jack Champison, of course, and I was born. 222 00:12:02.600 --> 00:12:06.159 It was a great depression in America and. 223 00:12:07.120 --> 00:12:09.200 Coal was all over. 224 00:12:09.799 --> 00:12:12.679 We were surrounded by cold mines and coal. 225 00:12:14.000 --> 00:12:14.720 Even when we. 226 00:12:14.600 --> 00:12:19.879 Were children, we were learning how to recover this mineral coal. 227 00:12:20.360 --> 00:12:22.919 We used it in our furnaces and if we sold 228 00:12:22.919 --> 00:12:27.279 what excess we couldn't use, we more or less stole 229 00:12:27.399 --> 00:12:32.840 from the companies. It was their coal, but as poor citizens, 230 00:12:33.240 --> 00:12:34.720 they didn't stop us. 231 00:12:34.759 --> 00:12:36.799 Really, it was. 232 00:12:38.279 --> 00:12:41.600 Very abundant. It was everywhere coal. You know, there was 233 00:12:41.679 --> 00:12:45.399 big banks, but all around high piles. You know, that's 234 00:12:45.399 --> 00:12:48.960 why they called it goopling. We were stealing. Actually that 235 00:12:49.120 --> 00:12:51.840 all men turned their heads the other way because well, 236 00:12:51.879 --> 00:12:53.519 you know, we were helping ourselves. 237 00:12:53.559 --> 00:12:55.039 We were feeding our families. 238 00:12:55.639 --> 00:12:56.679 That's what they like, you know. 239 00:12:57.720 --> 00:12:59.720 But they got to be pretty. 240 00:12:59.519 --> 00:13:03.279 Numerous boot leggers, and then they started sort of for 241 00:13:03.559 --> 00:13:04.080 their own vie. 242 00:13:05.279 --> 00:13:07.759 But as impossible as it was for authorities to stop 243 00:13:07.799 --> 00:13:12.240 widespread bootlegging, they did occasionally try, which cashnary again. 244 00:13:12.519 --> 00:13:15.919 When they arrest us, you know, in any way, shape 245 00:13:16.000 --> 00:13:21.919 or form, we would try to reciprocate. Okay, we went 246 00:13:21.919 --> 00:13:25.320 around ready and shutting union jobs down, and they shut down, 247 00:13:25.600 --> 00:13:29.000 you know, And of course they didn't like the shut down, 248 00:13:30.360 --> 00:13:34.519 but they did in sympathy. And they know they probably 249 00:13:34.559 --> 00:13:37.600 had somebody in them, somebody in their family working on 250 00:13:37.720 --> 00:13:39.799 move leg. You know. You don't know. We had a 251 00:13:39.879 --> 00:13:41.679 mine where you'd set along the road waiting for a 252 00:13:41.720 --> 00:13:45.200 trucker and I almost kiss his rear to buy a 253 00:13:45.240 --> 00:13:47.879 load of coll off. Yeah, you know, so you get 254 00:13:47.960 --> 00:13:49.480 rid of it. It was hard to get rid of 255 00:13:49.519 --> 00:13:53.519 cold when this first started, until until these more breakers 256 00:13:53.519 --> 00:13:58.720 got put up and the people, the truckers start a 257 00:13:58.720 --> 00:14:02.519 haul to the city. People started by cold trucks. 258 00:14:03.080 --> 00:14:06.639 Here bootleg miner William H. Adams tells folklorus George Corson 259 00:14:06.759 --> 00:14:08.919 about some of the conflicts with the coal and Iron 260 00:14:08.919 --> 00:14:11.519 police in the early days of bootlegging, and how the 261 00:14:11.519 --> 00:14:14.200 miners had strength in numbers. 262 00:14:13.799 --> 00:14:17.440 In the first place. When it started, the coal and 263 00:14:17.480 --> 00:14:21.039 iron police would come and blow the hole shot and 264 00:14:21.120 --> 00:14:23.399 arrest the men if they caught him in the daytime, 265 00:14:24.360 --> 00:14:26.519 and would take them to the squire, and of course 266 00:14:26.559 --> 00:14:30.440 they'd take them haven't pleaded, gilly and take them to jail. 267 00:14:30.519 --> 00:14:32.840 And what they charge you with trespassing. 268 00:14:32.960 --> 00:14:36.720 Trespassing that's all they couldn't hold them for and stealing coal. 269 00:14:37.600 --> 00:14:40.320 They got that many in jail. And this thing continued 270 00:14:40.360 --> 00:14:45.120 that long that the men got together and started mobbing 271 00:14:45.200 --> 00:14:50.879 the coal and iron police. And later on why they 272 00:14:50.879 --> 00:14:53.600 couldn't get law and couldn't stick them in jail anymore, 273 00:14:53.639 --> 00:14:58.559 why they just stopped and they used to go night 274 00:14:58.720 --> 00:15:01.559 and make coal at night rather than daytime. But then 275 00:15:02.000 --> 00:15:07.799 in around nineteen thirty three, this thing went that far 276 00:15:07.919 --> 00:15:13.080 that they even mobbed and chased the group of coal 277 00:15:13.120 --> 00:15:17.240 and Iron police and coal and iron officials from good 278 00:15:17.279 --> 00:15:22.279 Spring right back into the sneak gup through the bush. 279 00:15:22.000 --> 00:15:25.600 The people knew their paths and sneak up through and 280 00:15:26.720 --> 00:15:30.240 make the coal and hide it and then turn around, 281 00:15:30.440 --> 00:15:33.320 hide their tools, closed the hole, cover the hole up 282 00:15:33.399 --> 00:15:36.679 and stand trees in the road where the road was 283 00:15:36.759 --> 00:15:39.600 and cut limbs and leaves and stuff and close it 284 00:15:39.799 --> 00:15:42.080 laid over the road so they couldn't see the tracks. 285 00:15:42.120 --> 00:15:44.960 And there's different ways that it was done. 286 00:15:45.039 --> 00:15:51.559 There replanning it. Were there women in this at night? 287 00:15:51.639 --> 00:15:53.799 Though, women were in it at night as well as 288 00:15:53.840 --> 00:15:54.639 in the daytime. 289 00:15:55.360 --> 00:15:58.000 And as we've mentioned before, now, part of life in 290 00:15:58.000 --> 00:16:01.320 the Anthracite region, especially during the day depression was anything 291 00:16:01.440 --> 00:16:04.879 less than a community effort. Women and children were heavily 292 00:16:04.879 --> 00:16:07.759 involved in the bootleg industry and then helping their families 293 00:16:07.799 --> 00:16:08.840 and communities survive. 294 00:16:09.440 --> 00:16:12.759 Some places why the wives and the daughters were on 295 00:16:12.879 --> 00:16:17.159 top and hoisted the buckets up with windless and even 296 00:16:17.240 --> 00:16:21.159 in some places the wives and daughters and sisters went 297 00:16:21.200 --> 00:16:23.480 inside and helped the load the coal up and send 298 00:16:23.480 --> 00:16:26.240 it out. That was the first time that the women 299 00:16:26.320 --> 00:16:26.960 ever worked in. 300 00:16:28.440 --> 00:16:29.159 A coal mine. 301 00:16:29.679 --> 00:16:33.639 That's the first time any female ever was around the 302 00:16:34.080 --> 00:16:37.600 collery or worked at a collery outside of maybe clerking 303 00:16:37.720 --> 00:16:41.720 in an office or a nurse at the hospital where 304 00:16:41.759 --> 00:16:43.879 they'd give first date if somebody was hurt. 305 00:16:44.120 --> 00:16:45.720 So when you get the coal out of the ground 306 00:16:45.759 --> 00:16:47.960 for the company. You send it to the breaker, where 307 00:16:48.159 --> 00:16:51.399 again it's sorted by size, it's maybe cleaned, and then 308 00:16:51.639 --> 00:16:55.080 it's marketed sold to where it needs to go. When 309 00:16:55.320 --> 00:16:58.519 you bootleg coal or take coal from the combanks or 310 00:16:59.240 --> 00:17:02.279 rob it from a the company already, mind, you still 311 00:17:02.279 --> 00:17:05.279 have to process it. And so much of this processing 312 00:17:05.359 --> 00:17:07.680 was done, especially in the early days of bootlegging, done 313 00:17:07.680 --> 00:17:10.440 at home in the backyard. The coal would be brought 314 00:17:10.440 --> 00:17:14.039 there and then it would be typically older people, women 315 00:17:14.079 --> 00:17:16.920 and children who would crack it with hammers, sorted by size, 316 00:17:17.400 --> 00:17:20.839 and then bag it up, sell it, use it whatever. 317 00:17:21.799 --> 00:17:26.160 And women and children play. They play a huge role 318 00:17:26.200 --> 00:17:27.720 in the bootleg coal industry. 319 00:17:28.119 --> 00:17:30.839 Women and children were also subjected to the dangers of 320 00:17:30.880 --> 00:17:31.680 bootleg mining. 321 00:17:32.119 --> 00:17:34.920 There were a lot of serious incidents, that's for sure, 322 00:17:35.400 --> 00:17:40.480 but fighting the shovels in the strip and end of it, 323 00:17:40.759 --> 00:17:44.720 and having the women getting the bucket and keeping the 324 00:17:44.720 --> 00:17:47.480 operator from strip, and not that there was. 325 00:17:47.519 --> 00:17:50.279 About how do they do it? 326 00:17:50.400 --> 00:17:53.359 When the shovel operator empty the bucket and dropped the 327 00:17:53.400 --> 00:17:56.359 bucket down, the women jumped in the bucket, and of 328 00:17:56.359 --> 00:17:58.880 course the operator was afraid to move the bucket with 329 00:17:58.920 --> 00:18:01.119 the women in, so course that would help them. 330 00:18:01.400 --> 00:18:04.640 You mean, this is the big bucket that takes a 331 00:18:04.680 --> 00:18:07.400 bite out of the side of the mountain, that's right. 332 00:18:07.440 --> 00:18:09.319 How many women would get in there. 333 00:18:09.240 --> 00:18:13.240 Oh four or five and the operator wouldn't wouldn't hist 334 00:18:13.319 --> 00:18:13.680 them up? 335 00:18:14.720 --> 00:18:18.880 Well, didn't anybody push them out or try to push 336 00:18:18.960 --> 00:18:19.200 them out? 337 00:18:19.400 --> 00:18:21.799 No, they didn't try to push them out with the 338 00:18:21.839 --> 00:18:27.240 women in, but they were arrested, but they got over 339 00:18:27.279 --> 00:18:29.880 it all right. Well, any women arrested at the coal 340 00:18:29.920 --> 00:18:35.119 holes individual coal holes, not an individual coal holes, but 341 00:18:35.119 --> 00:18:39.440 at these stripping incidents, there were women arrested as well 342 00:18:39.480 --> 00:18:39.880 as men. 343 00:18:40.400 --> 00:18:43.359 So these veins that the bootleg miners are working in, 344 00:18:43.839 --> 00:18:47.160 they you know, they run downward, but they also side 345 00:18:47.200 --> 00:18:49.759 to side stretch out. And so if I want to 346 00:18:49.799 --> 00:18:52.240 open a bootleg mine, the best place I know to 347 00:18:52.279 --> 00:18:55.119 find coal is where there's already bootleg mine. Go down 348 00:18:55.200 --> 00:18:57.640 maybe another one hundred feet and start mining right there 349 00:18:57.640 --> 00:19:01.160 in the same seam, and there's stretches where there started 350 00:19:01.160 --> 00:19:04.359 to be hundreds of minds in the same place. And 351 00:19:04.480 --> 00:19:10.039 these people start coordinating in Shimok and Pennsylvania. They even 352 00:19:10.440 --> 00:19:13.119 like they have their own security guards, they have their 353 00:19:13.160 --> 00:19:17.440 own mind inspector. Like the bootleggers do amongst themselves. They're 354 00:19:17.440 --> 00:19:20.519 interconnecting their minds underground to help create airflow to keep 355 00:19:20.519 --> 00:19:24.079 each other safe, and they're absolutely helping rescue each other 356 00:19:24.160 --> 00:19:25.359 when there's accidents. 357 00:19:25.880 --> 00:19:29.200 Russian help after an accident was also a community effort, 358 00:19:29.359 --> 00:19:31.880 with minus from all over stopping what they were doing 359 00:19:31.960 --> 00:19:35.880 and sacrificing their days pay to help out sometimes even 360 00:19:35.920 --> 00:19:37.559 when there was nothing that could be done. 361 00:19:37.839 --> 00:19:39.960 Every accident, every mine accident in this. 362 00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:44.759 Area, I was there worked for free too. I left 363 00:19:44.799 --> 00:19:47.319 my job where I was earning money. They go help 364 00:19:47.359 --> 00:19:51.559 that person out. It was trapped without. 365 00:19:51.240 --> 00:19:54.920 Pay that you get paid. So as there was an 366 00:19:54.920 --> 00:19:56.799 accio that they come to my mind and I went, 367 00:19:57.519 --> 00:20:00.640 I had away and then I dropped everything and left and 368 00:20:00.720 --> 00:20:03.519 stayed there. I was at the mine rescue operations already 369 00:20:04.000 --> 00:20:08.440 thirty five hours without coming home. Stayed right there. I 370 00:20:08.440 --> 00:20:11.440 don't think there was one escape, so that we didn't 371 00:20:11.440 --> 00:20:15.160 train the first aid. Then we started getting them in 372 00:20:15.200 --> 00:20:20.839 that mine rescue and from that time on the mine 373 00:20:20.880 --> 00:20:28.720 accents reduced terrific in this area. Before that, we had 374 00:20:28.839 --> 00:20:31.720 quite a few of mine accents that sometimes a couple 375 00:20:31.799 --> 00:20:34.960 every month, and then after we started training these guys 376 00:20:35.599 --> 00:20:38.359 and teach them while we were training, to teach how 377 00:20:38.359 --> 00:20:42.119 to mind safe and do things safe in lines, and 378 00:20:42.160 --> 00:20:45.880 that reduced the mine accents terrifically. 379 00:20:45.680 --> 00:20:47.960 And the women in town were often just as militant, 380 00:20:48.079 --> 00:20:50.400 if not more so than their male counterparts. 381 00:20:50.839 --> 00:20:54.240 The street in front of our house here was dirt, 382 00:20:54.759 --> 00:20:59.200 and of course the strivens started and called their cold 383 00:20:59.400 --> 00:21:03.319 past them to loaded in the railroad cars the ship 384 00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:08.079 to the breaker, and of course they raised not much 385 00:21:08.279 --> 00:21:11.359 does then this dust got on the tomatoes dogs. There 386 00:21:11.400 --> 00:21:14.400 are potatoes dogs that you didn't need a spray because 387 00:21:14.480 --> 00:21:18.680 the tomato or the potato bugs to get the sun 388 00:21:18.759 --> 00:21:21.440 on them out and they wouldn't hurt the stalk. The 389 00:21:21.480 --> 00:21:24.960 women couldn't wash. The house would be dusty from the 390 00:21:25.000 --> 00:21:29.160 front of the back. So they finally closed the road off, 391 00:21:30.240 --> 00:21:33.519 and of course the women. The women closed the road 392 00:21:33.559 --> 00:21:35.559 off put benches across the street. 393 00:21:35.960 --> 00:21:39.880 The community solidarity and bootleg mining communities also extended to 394 00:21:39.960 --> 00:21:42.079 the few people who still had company jobs. 395 00:21:42.799 --> 00:21:45.559 Also, as mines are shutting down, you have people in 396 00:21:45.599 --> 00:21:49.400 town who are working for the company mine UMW members, 397 00:21:49.640 --> 00:21:51.839 and then you have people living on the same block 398 00:21:51.880 --> 00:21:55.039 who are bootleg mining, and you you really can't hide it. 399 00:21:55.039 --> 00:21:58.799 It's a big operation. It involves a lot of moving 400 00:21:58.839 --> 00:22:02.799 heavy things around. But there was a lot of solidarity 401 00:22:02.880 --> 00:22:07.599