For generations this was the stuff that fueled americas rise to become a world power. Cone much of it mined in central appalachia in the state of West Virginia. The southwestern part of the state has fallen largely off the map its a place that feel americans have visited for know much about. This is the haas of the Appalachian Mountains a place where tradition has deep roots. Along the economic bedrock of the region today coal is an impassioned industry the mine is here are threatened great. They are the heroes of West Virginia and miss the men who keep coal is black heart beating. Every morning they descend deep into the minds of several kilometers underground it is a duck and dangerous place to what. I. The tunnels in the sally mine are barely a metre high. C. H. B. Hell shoot. Up probably it will destroy the only thing leveled sure bring me back around more plainly said they found my. Colleagues gave herself if she if she should make a real shot. For three years now Scott Lockhart has won the black hot head of experienced minus like his father and grandfather before him. And the last will be out in house so thats how it. Looks more shell be the task of. Life it. Is to. Eat nothing new for me after. Crawling out on sixteen hours. On a. Really good score. When i first started in oh man. It was me and blue shoes for all time. Standing on have back pain the problems and pain problems in the future. Since it opened in one nine hundred eighty one descending on mine has been dug nearly two kilometers into the mountainsides it supplies valuable metallurgical coal West Virginias black gold to the steel industry. Accidents many of them fatal a frequent. Get scared who would. I fear. For the outcome im sure if you think about everybody here inside just kids that can see if. It is will be going to work and working for the. Place im trying to keep her going to. Have no trouble. Mainly told me off in spatial field selfconfidence not everybody can do the job that we did with which makes me feel proud. Scots older brother stephen has been in mine a full fifteen years. For you we watch each other but you try to help the children which is again nice coffee a lot to. Me and to me you know a fair buys often are right now where the one supports the other cant manage to do the outside and i kind of place one summer belisle there. Had a mom they took me thank you meaning how much you. Just. Feel shut out for somebody else. Up there to have it right for you not like it has much but now. You know more. Now on. The for thats. Absolute good kid stuff ill still see you know my. Friends you know. About from what i hear i hear they had like a computer out all the way it was just ok there are certain time throughout the day that very cold like it. Is that the nap it was like you know thats you know the scope is. Try to do away with it and. Put it all back us together the right ship for you know for all the what it takes to survive you know the end of the year it is the last hour and go out without work so im very worried about it its not like a i just want to work day. You know. How. To get free do you. Think we should all make it right nobodys muslim how come our. President donald trump promised to revive coal and has rolled back environmental regulations that the industry hates. In some parts of the country coal mines began hiring again. But the glory days of coal are passed not least because natural gas is both cleaner and cheaper. Aboveground much of West Virginia is still untamed nature forests cover the steep slopes of the central appalachians ones home to the cherokee and other native american tribes it was later settled by mainly scots and irish immigrants hundreds of narrow valleys crisscross the region the hundred School Holidays as they called in the appalachian dialect. The rural region is home to many small religious communities time often seems to be standing still here and tradition holds sway. You. Can be changed if you choose. To. It is also the world of bluegrass and mountain music. In his ballads and in cats head johnston tells of the hard life in the mountains like when a flood washed over the hollers and swept away what the locals had worked so hard for. With his dues his stacey crowd and former mine attorney Davis Johnston recorded his song muddy water which became a local hate. Me pulling the poll. Number are you kidding you wouldnt you. Have been buying. A manual recount told you. What. I mean i can still laugh about it making. A good part to say the big thing and i am. Amused means story a new phone those are usually my own news mode program so the big clue people are my own and i have so many people come back downtown and they just dont say why would you still leave here if god had let me pick or i were going to be born there are a good crowd here and if all were. And had to give your transfer belonging to that particular group you know all of the money you. Go to families and none affords you. Treasure or live with the young as an eleven year old kid their house burnt down and. You know thats weve also everything we did have a whole lot for theyve been tired it was gone in minutes you know and. That night just a few hours later you know we had one beds that we were sleeping our given over to ourselves and our inquiry for movie. Called my house people come together ill be walking down great triumph i come here ive been gone. You know when im shaking theyd stick your hand out for me shake cameras on them and one after a can do it or maybe put function in my hole and you know the name that may put me on back for a dog and just keep going on when i bumped off ive looked man of libby a hundred dollar bill. Because they no matter how smart. And if you count people live around. Here. Religion has long been a powerful force in these mountain communities. The Pentecostal Church called house of lords jesus still practices a form of worship that is officially banned by your outside West Virginia. At every sunday service pass to chris wolfe it risks his life. Over the years the ritual has claimed the lives of preaches and worship is. That weve got a team around him weve got a couple copper here and then we got to eastern im a back. East chapter man and if i give her the trip on schoolkids and so in a challenge its just a come i am theres this creature she is perfect. They all feel. We handled the math but the counting numbers are right thats why i feel my duty but its an honor to me that god can work if god would want me to lay my lap they know that away i would consider him armed he gave us not for us. To say if you drink you need daily that he shall not hurt you. The bible says show we your faith without any work. I dont understand why we are persecuted so by what happened to us they think i was ignorant and stupid because we were that. Wealthy believe me and we wont force them to go but. I dont do they because it saves me and i do they like ours are you saying. That our. Eyes are a bad way. I dont. Care what i say i have only to do it oh i do not. But as soon as i get a few dollars in my pocket i was by her oh my oh my god i dont want to miss the day off. To go with her i hear just go she just good ole boy our students will be able to hear i am rather one mapping. Out. The hotel which. Begin an hour. Oh. I dont harm her. Or not you know we have rights. Im. Not our. Our. Our. I. Compared to when the spirit of god lose a bone you and i was glad she didnt have that feel that power. To. Her need for good friends to get her thinking may leave you head man had come to go stroking him with a you was patient. She would mean killed issue most of those mean had fifteen twenty years experience. It was not a real pain it was all one ten. They knew they were those. People. You know came here first place six nights a week theres always that one. Can think about. The bereaved. Ok wrong. Caitlin and Scott Lockhart have been married for three years. Until the first child was born taken back to snow ice and well regarded jump in the struggling beach and after nearly forty years in the mines scotts father jimmy has just taken at every time and. Been married to a coal miner you know you get up every morning and again theres always that question in your mind is this going to be the last one on the scene. And then you know when the phone rings and youre like you say its a monster thing the first reaction is somethings happening and. I knew beforehand that as a choice that we may because my dad was a previous coal miner and he got crushed in the mines and he doesnt work anymore because he ends if i were the maersk i would probably still a van with a coal miner i mean i know it sounds crazy but you know thats all there is around here its either youre a doctor who are or am i mean theres a beer bar in between like mcdonalds and stuff but you know you tell me about bad. News. I pray that the months i open getting laid off with a month it can happen any time. Without the lines we have nothing in West Virginia but i cant really leave the mountains. I would never change my last you know my own money with chinese our boy will your right here. Only thing it would change we might get closer together the way i want to finish out right here i will destroy it is. There me work in the coal mines for thirty nine years and i honor him for that bit. Thats a hard job to work that long and here hes been diagnosed with black or placeholder said it was critical it was right stage one or stage two. And. Like his father scott rainey was the dust respirator in the mine. Hard work. Cut. Out. For. Him. That. Knowledge does not let. Me forget that. I think god it would be enough. For another person like. Michael bell shot. Shows it. Likely is just something mom or have to face with the mom our friends and all the guys i work with in the long room because your time. May not like it mike but i choose to take a nickle. Just a white guy really my brother in law he got it ill probably get a legal case of. The utility for. Free he thinks hes still different something so making me think she live. Anything inside. Believe me. I was laid out for about a year and i am with the company that worked for. Me. It was a stroke. Yeah they was a war on coke. This is me you know the year ill be more paper single like donald trump escapees were they. Were not going to call marcello out of work. Thats outlook for me. Hes down to earth person the people force me to. Istanbul is now you can even walk into a bar and just have a beer with him and sit down talk outlane nominations pine jane hes the mayor you have. A lot to think that hes laying out. The truth about somethings and he steps up to go live while these other people stay home he may keep the wily criticizing for hours and how much better. I work six days a week he nassers by asking more town under green with how they will smile me. I dont have time to watch social media. Theyve been thieving so i dont really know whats going on out in the world out of cairo. In the winter town. Has a cow manners not. Here your shift or its door you come out sad discover. Some nice allentown you get to enjoy sunshine in the sunshine. In the winter sun. Scotts mother lisa and his grandmother ruby and his mother and father in law have come for a visit. Family is very much at the center of life here. Mom tobar twenty three is going to be my brothers sixty second for her and he was killed in the cow mines and i can say when you see seventy six say would it be he was not doing yours i would have backed a tractor over into a man who. Have still not overused. And my father make up crippled in the mines and forty six then i had a knuckle that killed into my arms. So. Down the road you know. We know that the heroes have called they give this doll jobs but they take her husband and i would say you stay youve been in scott in their mom in clothes and koran just really hurt me you know so i wouldnt know mans actor really what p. Me and life relate movie im go in there on how mad you know i dont exempt from being minors but you know thats the way they go makes it really even so i have to accept you know everybodys cell family oriented here you know everybody likes to bring next im on the next day. And you know were always a phone call away. Counting the time he spends commuting scots works a seventy hour week alone he owns about five thousand dollars a month. If years later size to ever marry komarr a boy about have to tell her that as one of the one of the hardest decisions shell have to make. Him hear. You but nice phrase now again she hands out there you. Have. A family you know you could never reply should. Do you. Were the brain her. Power of your words are right there from oh man im so nervous. Her. Tribal sheikhs are usually people work in a big and then i come back here to fight leaving home you know. Im cold my neighbor travel the world. Got a plane you know that feeling you need to travel you know. Im. Being told youre off. Youre in your bins out on. The war now cross the world in your health and build bridges build build and stand strong for the want even for everybody. I would want to be in the facial rubber. But i have the i have a down i was nobody. Who leaked the threatening accident that happened with my friend i really dont not talking much about it so i just gotta keep that off my mind. Seemed about nobody you know followed mom while nodding was. Just live with myself i think about your own its hard not to you know when you need a friend seriously injured in only places was safe and you can bet they have it they dont hide from it dont you think that they. Want what could really have and can be as being merely is going to be in. You know just trying to get. Coal has claimed thousands of lives in West Virginia a single disaster nine thousand or seven killed three hundred and sixty one mine is until the one nine hundred fifty s. Many families lived in towns built and owned by the Coal Companies workers with paid in script that was good only in Company Stores strikes were ruthlessly put down today miners know that joining a union means risking their job. Since the one nine hundred ninety s. Hundreds of mountains have been ravaged by bluffs mining. Its cheap and requires fuel work has been drilling the rubble which often contains toxic waste piles up in the valleys and contaminate streams rivers and groundwater. As a place been locked. In order for them to continue the mining here theyll have to depopulate our communities and theyve done it before theyve done a lot. The real gun owner has lived in West Virginia all her life the cherokee native is fighting against the environmentally devastating mountaintop mining communities here are lawless and its sort of the end of nowhere. Man Company Peoples homes and. Eventually they tear down most homes vapors in the water the air is laden with coal dust and chemicals from the blasting they make life here impossible as so people are willing to stow out they want to get out for the people that refuse to sell their home all the stuff is in the middle of the Mining Operations and the coca news or chechens say you youll wish you were so. And ive been told you know they put me through but i still dont take their bio theres more than forty communities now across the southern part of the. That are no longer existing community the bomb coa industry they Gate Mountain people out of their mountains. If this is really about jobs what about we just turn the dozers around and fix what weve torah thats another hundred years worth of employment its not about job its about profit theyre called companies and the department of Environmental ProtectionWork Together and the politicians be in a fit from and through me anyway. Came pain contributions parks here and they are. Real gun owners home is protected by a chain link fence the activist has enemies. Years ago her home was nearly destroyed by flashlight and a growing problem as Coal Companies stripped the land bank to property was buried in toxic coal sludge the Environmental Coalition she founded fungal sued to stop mountaintop mining near by and one. Six years ive been threatening. People threaten to burn my house theyve been threatened people threatened to kill me. Theyve done things to my children my daughter was moved to buffalo ground me and when she was twelve years old theyve killed her dogs well i was angry because their bosses told them that it was my fault that they were going to lose their jobs and theres no truth to that i was testifying to stop an illegal permit water and air is absolutely more and important than a paycheck. Ive had a major pit right. Id have had to shoot above peoples heads yes to put them off my property and this was one i slept with right there on my swing. And yeah it was fully loaded their safety was on i had one in a chamber it was ready to fire. My daughters lost four friends to cancer. At twenty three. We have a lot of children here that have heart problems that have liver problems kidney problems youve watched people of all ages died of cancer so i have hand delivered. Thirty Peer Reviewed scientific studies to congress they know. They know whats happening here and they choose to do nothing they choose to lead our people. Its a very slow genocide a very quiet genocide and its not just any people to have i mean this is some of the poorest people in our country they have no Good Health Care they dont have healthy food they ate theyre completely defenseless they have no long line of lawyers waiting to prosecute these cases for them the coal industry says wall street owes us they owe all of appalachia the steel that built this country came from here why are we so poor we built all these big cities our men in these mines mom the kawi now why is it that we are so dirt poor why is it that we are so healthy its because everything that mattered left they leave us nothing not even a retirement not a pension. They took that they take it all and theres people here that will uphold them because theyre waiting on crumbs. Over eighty percent of the land in the south the state belongs to Mining Companies so its hard to diversify the local economy and leave coal behind. And always a long way worked his whole life like cindy said just to make sure we had to hear his shocking transformation cold thereby you know. Im proud to be a well the mountains we use amount of times a year where outside inside and out so rabbit rates night snakes a Little Chicken there you know its a good belt. And connects coral great coral but i mean if we can get a couple good schools we can link and get them back. And only the big we could make you can make dampened last year the actual three d. Yeah when they were about money from a store for yeah and then when if we see it it was more. And less at the bottom. Theres a lot of stuff that a lot that i cant. Cry bourses. Hurts me the worst my father. Gone. Now leaving the. Grill for gas wells and when i do read them they lowered. In my cracks the whole surface and that is what i am and so. I was very aware that if they did get that go with that i come out. In the mode that currys then i will fall in love im just tired of the story in all the whole around me going one you know but thats how life is were saying theyre just there coal miners or soccer. The southwestern corner of West Virginia is one of the poorest regions in the country the jobless rate is over fifty percent mens Life Expectancy is just sixty four years among the lowest in the nation. In welsh the country seat view thirty teams are powerless to stop the decline in Coal Companies take their profits out of state a long legacy of backroom deals between politicians and coal barons means they barely pay taxes. In the nineteen forties while it was dubbed little new york. It boasted the countrys first Municipal Parking building. Then mechanization led to the first mining crisis since the end of the cold boom the countys population has declined by some eighty percent and. Many of those who still live here seem to try to escape the dreary reality by other means Mcdowell County is. The epicenter of the countrys opioid epidemic. Began when pharmaceutical companies doctors and pharmacies pushed the pain medication oxycontin. This coming back so will. Sheriff mohsen west has joined county administrators to file a lawsuit against three major pharmaceutical companies. West again if i can is in a survival mode. Going into houses and situation more theres no food to eat nothing to play in the house kids sleep on chairs cigarette smoke possibly being very is the ball the young its just like animals living out in the wild children living with their parents because parents are in jail sometimes or over there. But every family in this county be affected by someone in their family has a drug problem and fix the middle the higher up in the lower class where you have companies thats making thirteen billion dollars in that period of time so they go have a big blow. This law also be going on for several years but doesnt stop the people from dying until we get a judgment against these functions. Are always begging for help the more system sure if more money and causes you to feel helpless. Weve been neglected for so long the last five deputies the last two to three years they were laid off because there was money there to pay him with Ten Police Officers right now we cannot cover this county anytime a Police Officer goes out they dont know if they dont come by. So you could still ahead of us in baghdad. We found people on sad right under the wheel over that is every day somebody affected in this campaign a very three people out of one family that overdosed on drugs these are not statistics these are people on know personally hes a lot of people have grown up with went to school with and theyre dying and nobodys taken note of it we dont have the first made here reason i wrote a letter to the gov and i said you dont know the situation and you give money out all around us and yet we leave the state and overdosed this. And i said shame on you blood is on your head blood is on your head and for someone to help us really really i mean for. Her. Every holiday is an occasion for the family to come together. Its already have a large family because drought weighs over the wall and then you turn around your help and yet it was i will love it its warm for helping and question for my grandkids on sunday and my kids that size are West Virginia. And im not only like my kids to my family of and stay at home if i really it was time to become president because he supported. Trump wants people to work hard and work for what they have and we believe in work and i think if we dont believe in handouts its a strong back and a hard thing and around here thats what we believe and try its a hard worker look for his daughter hes raised them well she was well to begin with but. If he won big four years if he sat on his butt you know bicycling is huge its. Triumph is really not a politician and kadian have no support so he has no body net then. I dont think hes in it for the money or to drop the case because he dont need the money. He is for the working class and i think if president from coming to my house that he would come in and shake our hands and not make us feel very little because hes i millionaire bill you and i are. Hillary clients that have a story she called paying for and quest for. A bank. You know that an educated and always smart people by reform. Bill pryor would actually think you would enjoy being around state very much i would give mr corn bread a prieto bones and grain and yes. Ok only a nice cantonese name hard to paint curtains to come in here and the nike hard on everybody it was want in a union and they literally would shoot a bullet will have fun i worked in union or day theres a ninety five days when im at work and. T. N. T. And how far she is you know sometimes labor youre really no bully the taco extravert underground types all that it looks good on a plate. Its not exactly following for my kids to be coal miners thats reverence for compilers you could ever work now in the water out of the mud however there should be it was a there at scotlands a scale very low. Just one on our rock in the mountains can kill you it can smash into the top you like lord i want my brother i used to im actually all stored that was i wish i would about that store that way i could ahead statement and sky could or it was michael had i got a life like it was right there it says only regret i ever have. It is just a big relief shelters but you really. Feel my life story good shit you have the world going to feel strong what im doing im just a radio wish rico my. Choice really. The be. The be. The bama. Despite social media and what some groups more and more people feel the. Cuddle therapy. Chats sex robots. Theres a growing need for entertainment to put intimacy. In our bros. Three thousand and thirty minutes on g. W. Whats coming up in the book is plenty to talk about here. In this league. Here comes the. Inmate team sixty eight and ill cry going to the wall of. The big games that come. Generation it was an obsolete and dusty full of stupidity and. They demanded nothing less than a home society of one maelstrom of conflict claims. To remember the. Star for the first time had a feeling of being pumped some. Seeds of civil rights. Peace movement one thousand. Nine hundred sixty eight. The global revolt starts september first g. W. U. S. President donald trump has cancelled his secretary of states trip to north korea which was planned for next week in a tweet trump said he asked mike pompei or not to go because north korea was not making sufficient progress denuclearizing the peninsula. Present us republican senator john mccain is to discontinue his treatment for cancer thats according to statement by his family the eighty one year old vietnam war veteran who once unsuccessful