Number nine coal?

18 Aug 99 - 11:16 PM (#106395)
Subject: Number nine coal?
From: Terry

Anyone know what the term "number 9 coal" means in the song "Coal Tattoo"? The singer sings about getting a "blue tattoo" on the side of his head from the "number 9 coal". Is that the name of a coal train, or is it a grade of coal? Is (was) it a common injury to get slammed on the head, leaving a permanent blue tattoo?

Thanks if you know.

Terry

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18 Aug 99 - 11:25 PM (#106401)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Max

I'm pretty sure it's a grade of coal. I think, a cheap grad of coal. 16 Tons of Number 9 Coal, sold my soul to the company store.

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18 Aug 99 - 11:55 PM (#106406)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Frank of Toledo

Another answer is from Merle Travis' interview after he wrote Dark As A Dungeon. It was the number of the mine where the coal was extracted from. Coal Tattoo is a great old Billy Edd Wheeler tune....

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19 Aug 99 - 09:22 AM (#106490)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GeorgeH

As far as I know, "blue tattoo" is simply a reference to the fact that any cut sustained underground would get coal dust in it and so would give a permanant blue scar.

G.

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19 Aug 99 - 09:26 AM (#106491)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: AndyG

In the UK the phrase is/was blue-back miner, my uncle Joe was one. The phrase denotes an old hand, like shellback at sea.

A six-foot man working a five foot seam scrapes his back against the coal above and gets blue "tattoos", especially along his spine. Not actually very pretty.

AndyG

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19 Aug 99 - 09:38 AM (#106496)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Roger the zimmer

I'm with Max on this, from the same source, I've always assumed it was a grade of coal. Presumably the hardest to work from the context in the song.
[Sorry, Max, If I agree with you it's probably wrong!]

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19 Aug 99 - 10:11 AM (#106505)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: joeler

I would imagine that a blue tatoo is a bruise. Coal dust in a wound would turn black. I also number 9 coal is a grade of coal.

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19 Aug 99 - 10:24 AM (#106512)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Allan C.

Throughout the coal mining areas in the USA there are seams of coal which run for miles and miles in various directions. A multitude of mines tap into a single seam by way of shafts or through strip-mining (depending upon the depth of the seam in a particular area). These various seams are numbered. For instance, in Illinois the #5 and #6 seams are the most productive. In western Kentucky the #9 is mined heavily.

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19 Aug 99 - 11:52 AM (#106544)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Chet W.

While driving through the coal country in eastern Kentucky a few years ago, I was either amused or concerned by the weight limits posted on bridges. The signs, posted as you crossed bridges over creeks, gorges, or whatever, would read (I've forgotten the exact numbers, but something like) "weight limit 30 tons - if coal,60 tons. I had to wonder was the bridge built for 30 or 60, and if not for 60, had the structure been degraded by privileged 60 ton trucks so that I was going to fall into the gorge? Sure is a beautiful place.

Chet

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19 Aug 99 - 01:12 PM (#106570)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Bert

Chet,

That reminds me of an incident that happened when I worked in Iran. We had a pressure vessel to deliver to our site which weighed over 60 tons.

The bridge en route was rated for 36 tons so the haulage contractor was instructed to take an alternative route that was much longer.

Well, wouldn't you know it, he took the shorter route across this bridge. And made it safely, more by luck than judgement, he said "it creaked a bit".
When challenged as to why he took the vessel across that bridge, he replied. "We did it at night"; to which I responded "Do you think the %$#*ing bridge gets stronger in the dark?"

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19 Aug 99 - 02:04 PM (#106584)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: joeler

I used to build bridges. They will always take much more weight then they are rated for.....unless they're old and rusty.

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19 Aug 99 - 03:00 PM (#106601)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: _gargoyle

For EVERYTHING you never wanted to know about coal CoalInfo

From Kentucky Minerals Kinds and types of coal: a summary (sort of reminds me of Mudcat people - all different types all lumped under the catagory of "folk" - some burn hotter - and some stink more)

The kinds of coal, in increasing order of alteration (or rank), are lignite (brown coal), sub-bituminous, bituminous, and anthracite.

These classes are further divided into subclasses based on their degree of alteration (measured by volatile-matter content, Btu's, or by petrographic means). Coals from the Eastern and Western Kentucky Coal Fields are all bituminous; small deposits of lignite have been found in the Jackson Purchase Region.

The bituminous coals are also subdivided into types of coal as well: banded and non-banded. Non-banded massive coals are cannel, boghead, and some types of "splint" coal.

Banded coals are divided into subtypes based on the nature of the bands and are either bright-banded or dull-banded. The bands are classified into four major lithotypes: vitrain (bright,black, glassy, brittle), clarain (bright, satiny texture, brittle), durain (dull, grainy texture, tough), and fusain (dull black, charcoal texture, gets hands dirty).

The bituminous coal in Kentucky occurs in two regions: the Eastern Kentucky Coal Field and the Western Kentucky Coal Field. Small deposits of lignite, a low Btu coal, have been found in the Jackson Purchase Region in extreme western Kentucky, but they are not economically important. Coal is mined in approximately 45 different seams in eastern Kentucky and in about 10 seams in western Kentucky.

Coal production:

More than 7.4 billion tons of coal has been produced in the two coal field for over 200 years; the Eastern Kentucky Coal Field has produced more than 5 billion tons and the Western Kentucky Coal Field has produced more than 2.4 billion tons. Forty-one counties produced coal in 1992. Pike County led eastern Kentucky production with 22.7 million tons of coal; in western Kentucky, Webster County led production with 12.6 million tons. In recent years, the largest production in eastern Kentucky has been in the Fire Clay coal bed (13 percent of total production in 1991). The Western Kentucky No. 9 (Springfield) coal bed was the leading producer in western Kentucky (16 percent of total production in 1991). Of the 1992 total production of 174.3 million tons in Kentucky, 63 percent was from underground mines and 37 percent was from surface mines. In 1992, Kentucky ranked third behind Wyoming and West Virginia in U.S. coal production. [Coal production figures are from the Kentucky Department of Mines and Minerals.]
University of Kentuck - Coal

VISUAL GRAPHIC

Stratgraphy of Coal Bearing Layers displaying No. 9 zone

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19 Aug 99 - 03:54 PM (#106608)
Subject: Civil War, Submarines and Coal
From: Sourdough

I think that definitely will qualify as Thread Creep but it does have to do with coal. Pull on any thread of knowledge and you'll find some interesting facts attached. I was reminded of this when I read the preceding messages about the different kinds of coal and their characteristics.

A number of years ago, I was working in Charleston (SC) Harbor with a group of archaeologists trying to locate a Confederate man-powered submarine that had been lost after becoming the first submarine to sink an enemy ship in combat. We'd found what we thought were pieces of the USS Housatonic, the ship that the submarine had "torpedoed" but as yet had had no luck with the submarine itself.

Although that was the best known of our activities, we had a couple of other projects in Charleston Harbor, too. One was locating a blockade runner that had run aground in the latter part of the War Between the States.

When we started excavating, we found buried in a sand dune, the blockafe runner which was a fast (for those days) coal fired ship. I picked up a chunk of coal and to my surprise it was anthracite rather than the cheaper coal I would have expected. I also learned that anthracite was a good indicator that we had actually found a blockade runner. It turned out that the Confederate ships carried, when possible, a small supply of the harder to get anthracite coal because it burned so much cleaner. They would fire their furnaces with it just as they tried to get through the Union blockade. Because the smoke plume was less dense than that given of by bituminous call, they were less visible on the horizon and stood a better chance of getting through the blockade.

Does this qualify as Bona Fide Thread Creep?

Sourdough - "We Do Our Part"

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19 Aug 99 - 06:55 PM (#106642)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: catspaw49

Hi Group.......Evidently this came up just after I left last night. If you'll notice ('cause some of y'all have done a ton of homework), you're all/both right. The seams and region numbers correspond. Seams also run at incredibly varying depths and have multiple branches or fingers. King Coal controls much of the economy of Eastern Kentucky and most of the southern mountains. It is estimated that only a little more that 2/5 of the coal has been mined from the Appalachians after all these many years........but certainly it was done at great cost to the land and the people. It's very dichotimous to know the only jobs you can have are destroying the land you love, and often your health.

Coal is a subject near, but not dear, to my heart. I grew up in the most heavily stripped county (Harrison/Ohio) in the nation (based on percentage). It was strange to watch people take a Sunday drive to see two of the largest draglines in the world, "Gem of Egypt" and "Big Muskie" and come home later and complain of the ugliness of the land while totally enthralled by the very machines that did the damage. In the end of course, it's not the machines, but men who do the damage. I was a member of the Appalachian Volunteers and we worked heavily with the locals on minerals rights issues, largely to no avail. One of the fascinating things another AV developed was a chart of "Interlocking Directorates" of coal, steel, rail, and power companies. The damn thing literally covered a wall. Unbelievable, made everything look so hopeless...............

There are ways to mine coal and use it that aren't detrimental to the land and the well being and health of the people, but it's unlikely I will see improvement in my time here on this sphere.

Bad subject....Makes me crazy and I want to go on and on about it.........Nuff said now.

Spaw

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19 Aug 99 - 06:57 PM (#106645)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: [e-mail]

The Confederate submarine "Hunley" was found and raised by Clive Cussler a few years ago, the same man that writes the wonderful adventure/escapist novels starring Dirk Pitt as a sort of underwater oo7.

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19 Aug 99 - 07:22 PM (#106655)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Kathleen

I always thought that number nine coal was a kind of coal. I don't know that much about mining, but I do live in a steel town that has many empty lots because there are mines underneath and you can't build on them.

Anyways, number nine coal is also mentioned in "Sixteen Tons" and that's what he's shoveling.

Later.

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19 Aug 99 - 08:15 PM (#106660)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Joe Offer

Speaking of coal, I watched the movie How Green Was My Valley the other night, and i'd like to put in a plug for it. It won the Academy Award for best picture in 1940 or 1941. It paints a vivid picture of the life of Welsh coal miners - and it has some wonderful Welsh singing. It was a good way to spent my time, since I've been Internet-starved these last two weeks.
-Joe Offer, home soon, but not for long-

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19 Aug 99 - 11:37 PM (#106708)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: _gargoyle

How Green Was My Valley

Released in 1941
(same year as Citizen Kane - winner of "Best Original Screenplay" - Herman J. Mankiewicz and Welles which "aced out" HGWMV)

How Green Was My Valley was an "Oscar Sweep" with:

Best Picture, Director - John Ford
Supporting Actor - Donal Crisp
Original Story - Harry Segall
Cinematography, Interior Decoration

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20 Aug 99 - 03:21 AM (#106753)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Sourdough

Erskine b.

Clive Cussler formed an organization, NUMA (National Underwater Marine Agency) to search for what he called "Ships of Sestiny" of which the Hunley was one. We, NUMA, found the Hunley several years after the little adventure I wrote about. The Hunley still is on the bottom while legal questions and questions about how to best safely raise her are answered.

I didn't see the made for television movie that was recently released but it should have been good because the real story is filled with incidents of courage coming from conviction.

Sourdough

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20 Aug 99 - 07:51 AM (#106794)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: catspaw49

Yeah 'Dough, it SHOULD'VE been, but alas, it was barely adequate, not one of the better docudramas........Once again, it's hard to beat books.

Spaw

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20 Aug 99 - 10:09 AM (#106823)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Barbara

None of you have said what I thought was the cause of the "Blue Tatoo". I thought it was caused by black lung disease, and "the blue tatoo on the side of my head" was actually the "blood veins blue as the coal" In other words, all the coal dust in the miner's lungs kept him from absorbing enough oxygen into his bloodstream, and that turned his veneous blood very blue. This would show up wherever the veins were close to the surface and/or prominent like the temples ("side of the head") and the backs of the hands.
Hence, the bluer the tatoo, the shorter length of time the person has to live.
I believe I have heard Faith Petric explain the song this way. I have certainly heard someone say this.
Blessings,
Barbara

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20 Aug 99 - 11:01 AM (#106857)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Allan C.

Barbara, I like and can certainly see the reasoning of your explanation. The fence rider in me wants to use both thoughts: the skin scrapes becoming scrimshawed by the coal dust as the "coal tattoo" and the black lung disease creating "blood veins blue as the coal". I wish Billy Ed would drop in and tell us what he was thinking.

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20 Aug 99 - 01:42 PM (#106929)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Lonesome EJ

In the mid-1800s when the railroads were being established in the US, they wielded tremendous economic and political power. Most land purchased at the time was deeded in a way that the railroads retained mineral rights.This was done in the event that, if the property lay in the path of a later line of track, the Railroads would have the right to purchase right-of-way at pennies on the dollar. This right was rarely invoked, but at the turn of the century the Railroads holding these mineral rights sold them to companies like American Coal. American Coal used these deeds to declare ownership of millions of acres of mineral rights to the earth underneath farms throughout the Appalachians, especially in West Virginia and Kentucky. In this way farmers who had farmed land in their families for a hundred years were often evicted from their own properties, paid pennies by the Coal Companies for their properties, and were left with no recourse but to emigrate to places like Detroit, Cincinnatti and Chicago, or to stay and mine coal for their existence.

LEJ

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20 Aug 99 - 02:46 PM (#106939)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: _gargoyle

I must humbly disagree with your suggestion Barbara.

Black Lung Disease and Emphysima from smoking are virtually the same. Each is a insideously progressive death. It has been my pleasure watch it in a couple of friends' parents. Their temples did not turn blue.

A "tatoo" is a pigmentation placed under the skin - a "foreign substance"

Progression of IPF

-- Slowly progressive, chronic disease that involves the lung in a non-uniform fashion

-- Appears in middle age and is insiduous in onset

-- Most people with IPF eventually die of the lung disease after several years

-- No known effective treatment exists

Coal is the prototype for inhalation of an industrial product which is relatively inert and does not usually cause parenchymal lung damage.

The disease is called coal worker's pneumoconiosis (pneumo=lung, conis=dust, osis=condition) in the setting of a known history of coal dust exposure. The separation of simple CWP and complicated CWP is generally based on CXR appearances.

There is a lot of controversy related to simple CWP as a clinical disease and over 1 billion dollars in workers compensation is being paid out each year because of this "disease". However, there is substantial doubt that coal by itself causes any clinically significant pathologic changes, and therefore no functional abnormalities for which coal workers should be compensated. ( Cornell University see reference below)

If you have a LOVED ONE that is a SMOKER show them this photograph (214K gif)

Diseased lung tissue

What is Black Lung Disease?

Anatomy of a Modern Coal Mine (307K graphic)

chart of deaths from Black Lung

Everything you never wanted to know about Lungs and Disease

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15 Dec 08 - 03:24 PM (#2516116)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,Rock'n Rick

I'm sorry. Barbara, you could not be more wrong. You simply have your veins and arteries mixed up. Those veins you speak of are already heading back to your heart as un-oxygenated blood, which means they are supposed to be very much the color of dark blue. Arteries on the other hand, can only be seen at a few places like your eye ball and nut sack. It's simple logistics. Number nine obviously means the size of the coal or the coal seam from which it was extracted as referenced in the song "sixteen ton." ;-)

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15 Dec 08 - 11:55 PM (#2516501)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Gurney

In my home town we had two types of lung disease found in miners. Then, we called them Pneumoconiosis and Silicosis. The first was similar to emphysema in that it reduced lung function, partly by 'setting'in the lungs, and the second was caused by the lungs being abraded by stonedust, which was spread liberally to reduce the risk of explosion.
'Bone and blood is the price of coal.'

Coaldust is pretty sterile, and when it gets into a wound, the wound will heal with the coaldust under the skin, leaving a blue tattoo-like mark. It is not so common nowadays, because fewer miners get the dust driven into their skin by an explosion, which was the most common cause in the past.
I was both a miner and an insurance agent in my youth.

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19 Feb 09 - 04:29 AM (#2570664)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,Bill

There is nothing complicated or ephemeral here folks. Gurney had it pretty close. Just a little knowledge is needed. Billy Edd Wheeler, the gifted songwriter of "Coal Tattoo" is from Boone County West Virginia. Every mineable coal seam in America has a name. For whatever reason there are nine "Pocahontas" seams. It was (is) commonly referred to as "Pokie". Pocahontas 9 was referred to as "number nine". It was, "number nine coal".

When Wheeler was a boy in West Virginia some coal was still being mined by "shooting on solid". That meant that explosives were used to blast the coal free from the seam. It was common for coal fragments of various sizes to embed themselves in the bodies of the miners. Unlike most men of today, they didn't run to the emergency room or file a claim against the company. The wound healed and the embedded coal could be seen through the skin, much like the ink of the current day tattoo "artist". "A little more and I'd been dead" meant that had the coal penetrated much more it would have entered their brain.

Nothing less...nothing more.

I've shoveled the number nine with a number four and loved every back breaking minute of it. Go chew on that.

Thank your lucky stars for the men and women who mine the coal to make your life easier.

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19 Feb 09 - 10:26 AM (#2570878)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Musket

Yeah, just to add my bit.

I am an ex miner and I have a few old cuts, all over 25 years old now, but still there, still visible, because they had coal dust in them

Fresh coal dust on the coal face is quite inert and sterile and many older colleagues felt that by rubbing coal dust in, it stopped other things from getting into it that could be a problem, such as hydraulic oil, (always swimming in it.)

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19 Feb 09 - 01:09 PM (#2571015)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Jayto

I am the son of a western Kentucky coal miner and my brother mines coal right now. I have tried to avoid it as much as I can. I will ask them about it and see what they say. My Dad worked at Graham Hill mines in Graham Kentucky (Muhlenberg County) and my Brother works at Elk Creek (Muhlenberg county KY). Elk Creek is out in the middle of nowhere that is why I didn't put a town I am not sure what town it is considered lol. My Grandfather worked in Fyes mine on the Hopkins/Muhlenberg county line. My girlfriends dad owns/owned several mines around this region so I am sure I can come up with an answer with all these resources to draw from lol. I decided when I was a kid unless I had no other choice I was not going down in the mine. I remember going with my Dad underground when I was a kid. They had a good roof at the time and no water (that is often not mentioned in songs but they flood bad) and little methane build up (another overlooked danger in songs) so Dad would take me with him some when I was a kid. It used to be really accepted because in this area if you didn't go in the military or work on a farm you mined. So I would get down in the mine with my Dad and there would be several guys I went to school with almost training for the future. I always hated it though. The air was so damp and heavy. You could sense the hardship in the air and the fear. You would hear a pop and freeze while your mind went wild. I was in the safest areas too but back down in the old works and the new works you could always hear the roof working (shifting around preparing to fall) or falling rocks. Rats,snakes, and even dogs and cats would just appear out of these old works (old works are places that had already been mined by the current mine or frequently old mines that didn't exist at the time.). I hated it then and now. My brother will be outside and still slump over like he is underground. Alot of miners show signs of PTSD without realizing that is what is going on. They will hear a pop or bang and instantly look up at the ceiling and sometimes jump. You spend 12 hrs a day thinking about the roof giving away and it is hard to turn off. Just because your above ground in a house or outside in the sunlight instincts still react. I remember my Dad being on vacation and not going in the mine for a month or better and still blowing his nose and it being black as the coal he was digging. Sorry I have strayed on my story. I have total and utmost respect for miners. I come from a long line of them and may have to take my turn underground someday. Like MErle Travis wrote
"I will look from the floor of my heavenly home and pity the miner that's digging my bones."
"You spend your time diggin coal from the bottom of your grave."-- Darrell Scott

cya
JT

Sorry for the bummer post this topic just hits me hard.

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19 Feb 09 - 01:10 PM (#2571016)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,Russ

Gurney and GUEST Bill,

Thanks for info.
I've been singing the song for decades without knowing what #9 referred to.

Grew in in Mingo County myself.

Russ (Permanent GUEST and expat West Virginian)

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19 Feb 09 - 01:12 PM (#2571018)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: bankley

right on... Jayto

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19 Feb 09 - 01:54 PM (#2571048)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: bankley

....and remember the kind of pick you want to be using is small, made of plastic and wraps around your thumb...

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19 Feb 09 - 02:21 PM (#2571081)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST

I can't forget that lol

"you fill your cup with whatever bitter brew your drinking and you spend your life just trying to get away"-- Darrell Scott You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive

"You live to work and you learn to pray in Appalachia it's the only way"-- ugh me lol
cya
JT

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19 Feb 09 - 02:30 PM (#2571086)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Jayto

The above guest was me Jayto. Forgot I hadn't signed in lol.

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17 Mar 09 - 01:12 PM (#2591146)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST

I ask an old miner here in TN about number nine coal. Here's what I remember about his answer. Down in the hole, you blast a face. The fine rubble goes farthest. Easier to scoop where you start and larger chunks and lower clearance overhead as you work in. May even work the last chunks kneeling or laying on your side. There's a big difference in loading fine chunks with a coal scoop, standing on your feet and the labor of laying on your side dragging big chunks of broken bituminous fuel.

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17 Mar 09 - 01:31 PM (#2591160)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: olddude

"I work the mine for number 9
decades come and decades go and still our people die"

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17 Mar 09 - 01:58 PM (#2591177)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: olddude

JT has said it best in his version
JT Dark as a Dungeon

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28 Aug 09 - 04:10 PM (#2710952)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,Old Timer

Number nine coal , from the seam number from top to bottom. Different veins in different areas due to the North-South slant of geological formations.

Blue tatoo-Coal dust under the skin from a premature explosion, such as a squid.

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28 Nov 09 - 08:20 PM (#2775838)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,guest

#9 coal is Athracite coal. A very hard, high carbon, subclassification of coal."Blue Coal" is the term for a once-popular, specific, trademarked brand of anthracite, mined by the Glen Alden Coal Company in Pennsylvania, and sprayed with a blue dye at the mine before shipping to its Northeastern U.S.A. markets to distinguish it from its competitors.

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06 Apr 10 - 09:41 PM (#2881085)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST

The Us geologic society established a numerical layering system starting from the mountin top for the layers of coal in a mountain. Mountains in coal country contain many layers of coal with various layer depth. Many are not economically viable to mine.
Number 9 coal means that this is the 9th coal seal from the top
of the mountain. Number 9 coal is very desireable as it is a very
hard coal but the it is hard to mine as the coal seam is not very high, often just 36" to 48" in height. This coal is most often
found in eastern Kentucky.

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06 Apr 10 - 10:03 PM (#2881087)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST

Thank You GUEST -

YOUR SOURCE PLEASE?????

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07 Apr 10 - 10:09 AM (#2881356)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,Jayto

I know my brother was telling me the other day they are in 11 seam right now. They are also in the hottest mine around in W.KY right now. Hottest meaning the most methane gas. We have alot of number 9 here is west Ky as well. The disaster in West Virgina has really shook up alot of men around here right now. It is the main subject of conversation it seems. It is always like that a brotherhood. When a disaster strikes at a mines it reverberates throughout the mining communities. My heart goes out to all the families and miners.

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07 Apr 10 - 02:44 PM (#2881552)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,oggie

One source here Number Nine as a seam number

THere is also Number Nine Mine

Steve

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07 Apr 10 - 05:13 PM (#2881643)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,Gary Edelman

Not that it is exactly relevant to this thread,
but all the mine disasters since 2000 (and possibly
before) all happened in non-union mines. Especially
after the previous 3 which happened pretty close
time wise, the UWMA could have easily won the hearts and
minds of Americans and unionized those mines. Interesting
that despite it's status as a non-union mine, the Union
sent out its expert rescue and safety team which is doing
most of the work.

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05 Sep 11 - 09:37 PM (#3218786)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: GUEST,George

No. 9 Coal refers to the depth underground where the coal was mined. In other words No. 13 coal is at a higher elevation than No. 9, and No. 5 is at a deeper elevation, and so forth and so on..It was also a predominate coal stream that fed Illinois, W. Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky....

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06 Sep 11 - 12:46 PM (#3219044)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: fox4zero

It is not only coal fragments propelled by explosives that cause
blue tattoos, ANY rock fragments from an explosion will cause
blue tattooing.I've seen it myself in my practice. Larry

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06 Sep 11 - 01:22 PM (#3219063)
Subject: RE: Number nine coal?
From: Stringsinger

Gary, you said,

" Especially
after the previous 3 which happened pretty close
time wise, the UWMA could have easily won the hearts and
minds of Americans and unionized those mines. "

Not true. Don Blankenship and other dictatorial company owners had a propaganda mechanism in place as well as buying out the West Virginia state politicians and still have the weight of the privatized/corporatized Republican Party behind them.

The coal miner, not the cowboy is the real American hero, but as time moves on, his role diminishes as we find the need for alternative energy and not number nine coal.

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