Appalachia: The Appalachian Coal Mining Wars

#places #hungergames #appalachia
In the fictional world of Panem, a girl from a gentrified coal-mining mountain town learned to survive through grit, self-sufficience, and more than a little rebelliousness. The girl on fire lit the spark that burned away the foundation of her dystopian civilization and inspired a generation in our world to challenge the structure of their own society. While Katniss Everdeen and her Mockingjay pin are now immortalized in pop culture and have even unironically become a symbol of resistance, few people know the real-life inspiration.

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[jacquelynsmith]

My great-great grandpa was killed trying to unionize Appalachian coal miners, and my family is still feeling the effects to this day. Generational trauma. His son became an alcoholic and took out his anger on my grandpa, who never drank but treated my dad similarly, who did NOT treat his kids the same. Luckily, you eventually get to a generation that breaks the cycle. My family also left the area in the 30s for Chicago.

[RHCole]

As someone who grew up there, thanks for this video 👍🏻 We fueled America's economic boom and have been left behind, so anything that sheds a light on that is a good thing in my book

[thetruextremeicon]

As a WV native hearing the way you pronounce it as oppa-lotcha is so jarring.

Where I'm from it's any of Appa-latcha or Appa-lay-sha

[sandybarnes]

Load 16 tons and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt. Saint Peter dontcha call 'cause I can't go. I owe my soul to the Company store.

[JaneMills]

I'm from the UK and lived in Wales for a number of years. I never knew any of this, and it's fascinating to see how miners' rights and strikes were handled in the US.

[Resileaf]

Great work on this video! Loved it!

*This* is the reason why unions are so important.

[Bubbaist]

My family were coal miners from eastern Kentucky and Tennessee (Fonde and Pruden). My great-great grandmother moved to Bell County from Harlan after her husband was killed in the violence there. I went back there in 2010 to visit relatives (mah kenfolk). As we were driving we reached an intersection with a sign to Harlan. The mere mention of Harlan caused a collective shiver among everyone in the car, even all those years later.

[murrayscott]

The most unfortunate is that each generation of working folks has to re-learn, sometimes from scratch that the war is on-going. The aristocracy keep alive those tried and true methods of control.

[blueteamepsilon]

I often hear people say the line "the government wouldn't do that, oh yes they would" as a way to say we should let big companies do whatever they want because it "boosts the economy" or "creates jobs". I feel like the history of American labor rights is good evidence of why the reverse is true. ( Yes, I know that's not what's saying it's about, but that's how I've heard it used)

[ignitionfrn]

2:45 - Chapter 1 - The appalachian roots of folk music
5:25 - Chapter 2 - Coal miner towns
8:40 - Chapter 3 - Union busters
9:35 - Chapter 4 - The start of the mine wars
11:25 - Chapter 5 - Mother jones
15:30 - Chapter 6 - The battle of blair mountain
19:35 - Chapter 7 - Bloody harlan
23:05 - Conclusion

[uncbball]

Appalachia is an intergral part of America and hope it can recover stronger than ever.

[danielsantiagourtado]

Love your content Eric! Thanks For this ❤❤❤❤

[wheelmannc]

Greed and abuse of power at the cost of the workers and their families. A very shameful part of this nations history...oh wait...that abuse of power and greed is still going on today. What's it going to take. We don't need additional laws... they are already on the law books. Thank you for sharing this information. Very hard working folks thorough out those coal fields and communities.

[bigbenalpha]

It's always good when this bit of history gets some attention. But man, every mispronunciation of the region gave me a full body twitch. I live minutes away from Paint Creek, and have traveled all throughout the Appalachian Mountains, and I've never heard it said like that. You still get a thumbs up, though.

[cassidyjenson]

"The real hunger games" was a wild titlecard choice lol

[BoyNamedSue]

Mother Jones deserves her own video but glad she got a spotlight here.

[evelyntodd]

Always glad to see Jade. Yes, I'm a childless cat lady. It's scary to see history being repeated.

[John-gxh]

Pretty much every day my mind is brought back to this hideous chapter of our history as I hear working people champion deregulation and rail against unions. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it, and those who try to erase history are trying to repeat it.

[kevinbarry]

And now so many direct descendants of that trauma stand around and defend coal mining as if it's the best thing that ever happened to them

[chrislittle]

By the way love your content maybe next time you could do san Quentin prison or folsom prison or Hampton court palace or glacier national Park