Blair Mountain Struggle For Justice Continues

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)

Hundreds of people from Appalachia and across the nation are marching in West Virginia to demand an end to mountaintop removal, the strengthening of labor rights, sustainable job creation in Appalachian communities, and the preservation of Blair Mountain. The June 4-11 Appalachia Rising: March on Blair Mountain is a commemoration of the 90th anniversary of the famous 1921 "Battle of Blair Mountain", one of the biggest civil uprisings in the United States history and the largest armed insurrection since the American Civil War. For five days in late August and early September 1921, in Logan County, West Virginia, as many as 15,000 coal miners confronted an army of police and strikebreakers backed by coal operators during a struggle by the miners to unionize the southwestern West Virginia coalfields. Their struggle ended only after approximately one million rounds were fired, and the United States Army intervened by presidential order. The event “builds on the energy of Appalachia Rising,” report organizers, “which brought thousands to the streets of Washington DC last September, and spread to Kentucky where dozens occupied their governor’s office for justice in their state and the region last February. Now we are bringing the movement to Blair Mountain.” – photo: at the June 6 kick-off for the March on Blair Mountain where hundreds of marchers rallied and held a press conference featuring Chuck Keeney, the descendant of famed UMWA organized Frank Keeney; photo courtesy March on Blair Mountain website