University of Virginia Library

Monday Notes

A Little Closer To Appalachia

By Jeffrey Ruggles
Cavalier Daily Staff Writer

As the crowd of about two hundred
waited in vain, the School of Athens
peered down painfully at the two
microphones and empty metal chairs.

It was billed as the 1970 Appalachian
Mountain Festival, featuring a group of
country singers currently on tour.
However, bad weather intervened and the
musicians never made it to Cabell Hall.

Instead, as most of the students in the
audience listened intently and several
ladies giggled uncontrollably behind copies of
the Virginia Weekly, a silver-headed coal miner
from Southwest Virginia spoke on life in
Appalachia.

The miner, John Tiller, talked about the
growing awareness among the inhabitants of
his region that they have been screwed — and
are being screwed — by both the mine operators
and the union leaders. Mr. Tiller spent the
evening presenting incidents which showed just
that.

In talks to the miners, various officials
warned them about getting rock dust in their
lungs, but said nothing about coal dust being
dangerous. They even said sometimes that it
might be good for you. It is only recently that
the full effects of black lung disease are being
discovered.

A couple, friends of Mr. Tiller's, missed by
one foot being killed by a bomb blast.
Eventually, they both went to jail in
connection with other incidents and the
bombing was never really investigated.

Every year the unions like to announce a
pay raise of a dollar or so. When the news of
the pay raise comes out in the papers, the stores
raise their prices once; when the pay raise
actually happens, they raise their prices again.

In Mr. Tiller's county, there is no hospital,
and only six doctors, all located in one town.
The roads are poor, and there is no other place
to dump garbage besides local streams. Efforts
to start some sort of disposal service have
failed, Up to 97 per cent of c land in counties
in this area is owned by coal companies.

Mr. Tiller spoke of the brand of law in
Appalachia, of officials who never went to
school: the only law they know is what their
superiors tell them. George Wallace thinks he
invented law and order, but there was a Law
and Order League of West Virginia which
flourished in the 1920's.

He reserved his sharpest comments for the
coal union's leadership, men like John L. Lewis
and Tony Boyle, the leaders "Jock" Yablonski
was trying to unseat. These leaders set up false
locals through which they divert union welfare
funds and retain control of the unions illegally.

These leaders also withhold benefit
payments from the widows of coal miners,
often giving these women none of the funds
they are entitled to Mr. Tiller called this
"profiteering off Death."

After Mr. Tillers's words and some
questions, it was revealed that the musicians
when they arrived would appear in the Prism
instead. Fleshy Greek pondering was replaced
by bits of mirror and cultured ceilings, and the
show went on.

Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain
Boys, also from Southwest Virginia, appeared
first, and it was fiddler Curley Ray Cline who
stole the show. After some standard and fine
country fare, featuring Ralph Stanley and his
banjo playing, a violin lead by smiling Curley
Ray drove the packed house wild.

The pounding applause inspired the band to
try an impromptu encore, which quickly turned
into a country jam. Curley Ray was swinging
and scraping his bow in a kind of country-Flock
style, and the banjo, bass, and two guitars were
moving in and out like they'd been improvising
all their lives. Afterwards, Ralph Stanley said
the group would have to change its name to
Curley Ray Cline and the Clinch Mountain
Boys.

After selling a few records the group had to
hurry off to Indiana, and the evening melted
into music by the Morris Brothers, first two and
then one, Hazel Dickens, and Anne Romain.
For a few for a while, anyway, there was
solidarity with Appalachia.