and two Grandfathers coalminers Grandson. How many of you had Parents, Grandparents or Great Grandparents work in these fields or a similar occupation. I really respect the unsung hardworking people in these occupations that made this Country great. Please President Trump, open all the coal mines across this country and give them a chance at these jobs again.

Grand dad left the farm in '45 to take a job working open hearth US Steel Fairfield Works. Only reason he hadn't been picked up in the draft for the war was three babies under three a, dying wife (TB) and elderly parents plus being in his late thirties.

Dad's first job after college was accounting in the front office at the mill.

Grew up between the mill and the mines and had uncles in the mines. All my parents circle of friends worked at the mill, in the mines or somewhere in between.

Heck, at one point I got certified underground and surface myself. Never seriously pursued getting hired on though.

I have hauled a lot of coal and fuel coke to mills and foundries. Molybdenum too. Never hauled steel except grinding balls out of the (gone now) ARMCO steel mill in KC. Hauled some grinding balls out of the old steel mill in Silver Bay MN to a concrete plant in AL one time. The mill had just closed. Was like a ghost town inside. Town near collapsed over it. we need to bring steel coal and lead all three back.

Warrior, as a GA man you might know about all the textile mills gone from Rabuns Gap. Another thing hard for me to take.

Actually I'm an Alabama guy but I do know the textile mills across the south. Grand dad left the farm with two cotton allotments. Basically being paid by the govt to not grow cotton. Dad sold those allotments the year I was born in 69. Cotton hadn't been grown since 45 and grandad and then dad got a check every year to not grow it. Far as I know the fellow up in Huntsville that bought them is still getting paid.

Had an uncle that worked at Russell Mills in Alexander City long before they hit it big with the contract to supply football jerseys and pants to the SEC. He was actually a mechanic and the last to keep the old prewar looms up and running.

Knew folks that worked Avondale Mills in both Birmingham and Anniston. Heck, even Dad tried his hand at owning and running a sewing room in the eighties. All of that including Dad's sewing room went under and are long gone.

My grandparents, both sides are from coal country, Shenandoah, PA. My parents said it was a great place to grow up, the town was very busy 80 years ago and slowly declined. Now scores of houses are empty and uninhabitable, trash piles, dead cars on the streets, Section 8 rentals owned by NYC slum lords are common.
Still lots of coal to be mined.

I have nothing but the utmost respect for coal miners. While I may seem anti union, the miners is one bunch that needed unions , for safety and health reasons if nothing else. The days of the company store and script are gone at last. The Obama years was rough around here but has picked up some, we have hard coal so there is a market for it. Parts of Southern Illinois would never have been developed if not for coal.
I have good friends in the mines. They are rough but God fearing guys. They crawl around in seams bent over and/or on their knees. A few years ago when we had an earth quake and 2 of my buddies that were mechanics were in a better supported area eating dinner and heard a roaring and they thought the top was caving in 7 or 8 mi away in the old parts but the noise started getting louder, they called some of the others into the supported area and said lets pray. Didn't take long to figure out an earth quake passed by, lol.

I retired after 40 years in the United Steel Workers Of America.My father put in 42 years.My Grandfather retired from the Boilmakers.

I was raised in what was one of the poorest counties in Kentucky pre- WW2....My grandfather left the farm and became a ironworker for TVA, helping build the KY Dam.

After the dam was built cheap hydro power supported many chemical industries, and the area economy was lifted up until this day.

My brother and cousin are currently iron workers, (pipefitter/boilermakers) and I made my living in one of the chemical plants as a boiler operator before retiring in '21.

We hauled it...until the mid 80's when there just wasn't any steel mills around.

Leased to Ohio fast freight and Aero.

Just saw on the news that the last still mill in Great Britain just closed down. Birthplace of the industrial revolution will be without a steel mill for the first time in 150 years. And that last mill was Chinese owned.

Makes you wonder if that's some sort of plan?

My one grandfather worked in the mine in that area I believe mining Anthracite coal. He also mined Bituminous coal in Western PA.

My grandfather, who I'm named after, lost an arm and an eye in a mine in eastern Ky. in 1926 if I remember right. My father was a maintenence man/electrician in different east Ky. coal mines. My brother and a both worked in the mines in east Ky. I didn't care for it but it was good money. I decided to die above ground so I joined the U.S. Army in 1983. I was medically retired in 1995. My son also worked in the mines in east Ky. and southwest Va.. He was a surveyor underground. Coal mining is not thriving right now so he is a partner in a construction business. I geuss you could say it ran in the family.

My grandpaw was one of the first to get hired at a reynolds reduction plant in gum springs arkansas in 1950.him,my uncles and later my father and several cousins worked there as potmen untill 1985 when reynolds shut the plant down because of high electricity costs.at that time they where spending over 1 million dollars a month converting ac electricity into DC through the giant rectifier building smelting to make aluminum.this was a united stillworkers union plant.in 1990 alcoa re opened the plant to dispose of the used potliner that was inevitable when smelter pots need rebuilt.whith new EPA regulations they saw the writing on the wall and realized ALL smelter plants would no longer be able to rebuild pots and just take the liner out to the back fields anymore.Alcoa still runs this plant and I am now 3rd generation still workers union hand along with brothers and cousins.

My Great Grandfathers ( all four of them ), and both Grandfathers worked in the mines in central Pa. In 1976, I started work underground when I turned 18. I retired from the coal business 37 years later, in 2013. I really enjoyed my time in the mines.

Here’s one of my Grandfather’s pay stubs from 1942



His Pa Miners Certificate from 1938

What does snow shoe mean?

Name of the town….Snow Shoe, Pa. About 30 miles north of Penn State University, Centre County.

Dad came out of WW2 with dynamite
cert and went to work shooting limestone
for Penn-Dixie. Known today as
Armstrong Cement.
Pap was a coal miner and later worked
for Moonlight Mushroom mine.
Only one steel mill worker,
an uncle from Bull Creek.

I'm still makin steel here in southern Ohio.

Steubenville?