Chapter 17 Exercises: Blood on the Coal — Labor Wars in the Mountains

Exercise 1: Primary Source Analysis — Mother Jones's Speeches

Read the following excerpt from Mother Jones's testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Education and Labor during hearings on conditions in the West Virginia coalfields (1913):

"I have been in the coal fields of West Virginia for thirty years. I have seen women thrown out of their homes in the dead of winter with babies in their arms. I have seen children without shoes, without clothes, without food. I have seen men shot down like dogs for the crime of wanting to earn a decent wage. And I have seen the courts of this state turned into instruments of the coal operators, so that a miner cannot get justice any more than a rabbit can get justice from a dog... The Constitution gives every man the right to assemble peaceably and to speak freely. In West Virginia, that Constitution does not exist. The coal operators are the government, and the Baldwin-Felts guards are the army, and the miners are the subjects."

a) Identify the specific grievances Mother Jones raises in this passage. For each grievance, indicate whether it relates to working conditions, living conditions, civil liberties, or the political/legal system.

b) Mother Jones describes the coal operators as "the government" and the Baldwin-Felts guards as "the army." Based on what you have read in Chapters 16 and 17, evaluate the accuracy of this characterization. Is she exaggerating for rhetorical effect, or is this a reasonably accurate description of the power structure in the West Virginia coalfields?

c) Mother Jones was speaking to a U.S. Senate committee — powerful men in Washington, D.C. How does her rhetorical strategy reflect an awareness of her audience? What is she asking the senators to do, implicitly or explicitly?

d) Compare the language and rhetorical strategies of Mother Jones's testimony to the primary source excerpts in Chapter 16 (company store ledgers, miner testimony). How does the shift from individual testimony to organized political advocacy reflect the evolution of the labor movement in the coalfields?

Exercise 2: Mapping the Mine Wars

Using the information in this chapter and freely available online mapping tools (Google Maps, USGS topographic maps at nationalmap.gov, or similar), create an annotated map of the West Virginia Mine Wars that includes:

a) The locations of Paint Creek and Cabin Creek, the Kanawha River, Matewan (Mingo County), Blair Mountain (Logan County), and the city of Charleston. Mark each with a brief description of the events that occurred there.

b) The route of the miners' march from Marmet to Blair Mountain. Trace the approximate path through Logan County. Note the terrain — ridges, hollows, rivers — that the miners would have crossed. Calculate the approximate distance.

c) The route of the railroad lines that served the coalfield region in the 1920s. Identify how the railroad connected (or failed to connect) the sites of the major conflicts.

d) Write a paragraph analyzing how geography shaped the military character of the mine wars. How did the terrain of narrow hollows and steep ridges affect both the coal operators' ability to control communities and the miners' ability to organize and fight?

Exercise 3: The Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency — Private Violence and the State

The Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency occupied a legally ambiguous position in the mine wars. Its agents were paid by private coal companies but were often deputized by county sheriffs, giving them the legal authority of law enforcement officers.

a) Research the concept of a private police force in American history. How does the Baldwin-Felts agency compare to other private security forces in American labor history, such as the Pinkerton National Detective Agency (used at Homestead in 1892) or the Ford Service Department (used at the River Rouge plant in 1937)?

b) What are the legal and ethical problems with allowing private companies to hire armed men who are then deputized as public law enforcement officers? Who are these men accountable to — the county that deputized them or the company that pays them?

c) Are there modern equivalents to the Baldwin-Felts agency? Research the role of private security contractors in contemporary labor disputes, pipeline protests (such as Standing Rock in 2016), or immigration enforcement. What parallels do you see, and what differences?

d) Write a short argument (300-500 words) either defending or opposing the practice of deputizing private security agents. Use historical evidence from the mine wars to support your position.

Exercise 4: Interracial Solidarity and Its Limits

This chapter describes the UMWA's interracial organizing as "remarkable for its era" but also notes its significant limitations — that solidarity existed in the union hall and on the picket line but not in the segregated camps and communities.

a) Compare the interracial solidarity described in the mine wars to another historical example of cross-racial organizing that you are familiar with (possibilities include the Populist movement of the 1890s, the CIO organizing drives of the 1930s-1940s, the civil rights movement's labor alliances, or the Memphis sanitation strike of 1968). What conditions made cross-racial solidarity possible in each case? What forces worked against it?

b) The coal operators deliberately recruited workers of different races and ethnicities in part to prevent solidarity. This strategy — using racial division to weaken labor organizing — is sometimes called "the wages of whiteness" (after the historian David Roediger's influential book). How does the mine wars experience complicate or support this thesis? Did the operators succeed in using racial division, or did their strategy backfire?

c) The chapter notes that when the union was defeated, "the interracial solidarity that had been its greatest strength largely dissolved." Why? What does this suggest about the durability of cross-racial solidarity when it is built primarily on shared economic interest rather than on a deeper commitment to racial justice?

d) Write a brief reflection (200-300 words) on what the mine wars experience teaches about the relationship between economic solidarity and racial solidarity. Are they the same thing? Can one exist without the other?

Exercise 5: The Suppression of Historical Memory

This chapter argues that the mine wars were suppressed from American historical memory — that events involving thousands of combatants, aerial bombardment, and the deployment of the U.S. Army were largely erased from the national narrative for decades.

a) Examine your own educational experience. Were you taught about the Appalachian mine wars in any previous history course? If not, what was taught in the time that might have been devoted to this topic? What does this absence tell you about how history curricula are designed?

b) The chapter identifies four factors that contributed to the suppression of mine wars history: the miners lost, the Cold War made militant labor history politically dangerous, Appalachian stereotypes allowed the events to be dismissed, and the mine wars challenged the myth of a classless America. Which of these factors do you think was most important, and why?

c) Research how the mine wars are presented in three different U.S. history textbooks (at the high school or introductory college level). How much space is devoted to them? How are they framed — as labor disputes, as regional conflicts, as class warfare, or as something else? What is included and what is omitted?

d) Select another historical event that you believe has been suppressed or underrepresented in mainstream American history education. Write a brief comparison (300-400 words) between the suppression of that event and the suppression of the mine wars. What common dynamics do you observe?

Exercise 6: "Which Side Are You On?" — Song as Historical Document

Listen to a recording of Florence Reece's "Which Side Are You On?" (multiple versions are available online, including Reece's own 1971 recording and various cover versions).

a) Write out the lyrics and identify the specific historical events and figures referenced in each verse. Which details are directly drawn from Reece's own experience in Harlan County?

b) The song is set to the tune of "Lay the Lily Low," a Baptist hymn. Why would Reece have chosen a hymn tune for a labor song? What does the choice of melody tell us about the relationship between religious culture and labor activism in Appalachia?

c) "Which Side Are You On?" has been adapted for numerous causes since its original composition — civil rights, anti-war activism, Occupy Wall Street, and others. Listen to at least two different versions (Reece's original and a later adaptation). How do the adaptations change the song's meaning? What is gained and what is lost when a song born from a specific struggle is generalized for broader use?

d) Write your own verse for "Which Side Are You On?" addressing a contemporary labor or economic justice issue. Follow the song's original meter and rhyme scheme.

Exercise 7: Then and Now — The Legacy of the Mine Wars

Then: In 1921, ten thousand miners marched on Blair Mountain, fought a five-day battle against private and state forces, and were eventually dispersed by the U.S. Army. The miners wanted the right to organize, to be paid in real money, and to live without the constant threat of violence.

Now: In the twenty-first century, Blair Mountain has been alternately listed on and removed from the National Register of Historic Places, as coal companies and preservation advocates fight over the site's future.

a) How does the contemporary fight over Blair Mountain's preservation echo the original conflict? Who are the opposing parties, and what interests do they represent?

b) Research the current status of Blair Mountain. Is it on the National Register? Is there active mining on or near the site? What organizations are working to preserve it?

c) Design a proposal for a Blair Mountain memorial or interpretive site. What should it include? Whose stories should it tell? How should it address the controversial aspects of the mine wars (armed insurrection, treason charges, interracial solidarity, suppression of memory)?

d) The chapter argues that the mine wars' structural dynamics — concentrated corporate power, captive workforces, geographic isolation, state violence on behalf of economic interests — are "not relics." Identify a contemporary situation in which you see similar dynamics at work. Write a brief analysis (300-400 words) comparing the structural conditions of the mine wars to your contemporary example.

Exercise 8: Community History Portfolio — Labor Conflict Research

This exercise is part of the ongoing Community History Portfolio project. For your selected Appalachian county:

a) Research whether there were coal mines in your county and, if so, what companies operated them. When was the peak of coal production? Use county historical society records, state geological survey reports, and the U.S. Bureau of Mines annual reports (many digitized and available through HathiTrust or the Internet Archive).

b) Search for evidence of labor organizing in your county. Was the UMWA active? Were there strikes? Were there incidents of violence? Sources to check include county newspaper archives (many available through Newspapers.com or state digital newspaper projects), state labor department records, and the UMWA's journal archives.

c) Interview a community member (if possible) who has knowledge of labor history in your county. This could be a retired miner, a union official, a local historian, or a family member of someone involved in the coal industry. Record the interview (with permission) and transcribe the relevant portions. Compare the oral testimony to the documentary evidence you have found.

d) Write a 500-word summary of your county's labor history, placing it in the context of the broader mine wars described in this chapter. If your county did not experience significant labor conflict, explain why — what was different about its economic structure, its geography, or its political conditions?