Word: coaling
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...self-made man who started out shovelling coal himself, Reed has little patience for "failures." If a man works hard and spends his money wisely, Reed maintains, he will make something of himself. He suggested that about 90 per cent of the unemployed men in the county were "unemployable"--men who couldn't act responsibly or were too unskilled to work. "The poor," Reed feels, "would be poor anywhere...
When the UMW produced its 1950 wage contract, Reed decided he could not meet its terms. Closing his rail mines, he leased his land to truck operators, thinking this would be the best way to produce the maximum amount of coal and jobs. The truck mines, he explains, while not able to pay union wages, "do provide a living for men who otherwise would not have a job." In fact, he is certain that a man shovelling coal in a truck mine is earning better wages than unskilled or semi-skilled workers in other industries...
...Floyd country the welfare royalties are being paid and the method of mine ownership is clear. B.F. Reed may be rich, but his money now comes from banking and other investments rather than from coal exlusively. Perry Country is almost entirely non-union, and the operators have used a maze of dodging techniques to avoid signing a contract. In many cases a mine has been organized, only to have ownership transferred or a new "paper" company set up to run the mine without union restrictions. Because of greater injustices and higher unemployment, the picketing was more violent and tempers...
...mines are dramatically different from the truck operations. Safety measures which smaller mines cannot afford have taken much of the danger out of mining, and huge machines eliminate the physical exhaustion. In a typical truck mine a man crawls into a low tunnel supported by timbers, blasts his coal with dynamite, and shovels it out onto carts by hand. There is always the danger of heavy chunks of shale falling on a man from the mine ceiling. The work is tough, grimy, and hazardous. At Inland's mine the roof is supported by long bolts, and the coal is blasted...
...coal seams at Inland's mines are similar to those in the truck mines. They are more productive because Inland decided about eight years ago that the only way to compete was to mechanize. That decision has caused the work force to shrink by almost 90 per cent, but the company has let natural attrition rather than firing take care of the depletion. Operators of the truck mines note that Inland was able to mechanize because it was assured a market--Inland's steel plants--and because the company had large capital resources. Regardless of the reasons, though, Inland...