Today at the West Virginia Sierra Club ExCom meeting, I told yesterday’s story about Armstrong’s axing to an individual. The reaction was happiness because in the past individuals who had approached him for archival information about MTR and Blair Mountain were met with a lack of support. Apparently, he was disinterested in being involved with their requests, and appeared to lack moral support for their cause. Perhaps his actions were influenced by fear of the Coal Industry. The joke is that the Culture and History Commissioner Randall Reid-Smith is a big patron of the Friends of Coal. While there is an appropriate moral to this story, it doesn’t justify the disgusting tactics employed to fire Fred Armstrong.

What comes around, goes around, and Randall who would rather replace archives with a Cafe is cosmically next in line for his own kind of medicine.

Wed Nov 7 23:08:09 EST 2007

I want to explain this blog entry further. I don’t know if some people know just how strongly many West Virginians feel about this issue. If you want to get a good overview about what Mountaintop removal issues are about in places like WV see this article: The Government Sanctioned Bombing of Appalachia . Anti-MTR activists like Regina Hendrix who have gotten a really close-up view of MTR and the land and people effected, have strong sentiments and feel this should be a major public issue, and I totally agree with this. One such contention is the site of the historic “Battle of Blair Mountain” in 1921 where tens of thousands of West Virginia coal miners rose up against armed federal troops in defense of their right to unionize and improve working conditions. This was the largest armed conflict on U.S soil since the Civil War, and now we find ourselves fighting this battle again, but this time against a coal company that wants to mountaintop Blair Mountain to remove the coal, thereby destroying the historical and archaeological significance of the site. MTR displaces huge numbers of well-paying underground mining jobs and relies instead on huge machines to rapidly bring down mountains to get to coal seams quickly and destructively. It would be far, far better if Blair Mountain were preserved and received nomination for the National Register of Historic Places, but there seems to be some in West Virgina government who appear to be working in the other direction, and they seem to be the same people who fired Fred. It would be so much better if Governor Manchin came out and chastised MTR and any efforts that would remove Blair Mountain from history, in the same way that it now appears the archives, themselves, are under attack. Regina gave me permission to quote her on a statement she made that clarifies her experience with Fred. It was the conversation I had with Regina at the ExCom that inspired me to make this blog entry in the first place. You can also read her letter to Governor Manchin concerning Fred Armstrong here:

Jonathan, I got miffed with Fred because he was short with me at the Commission hearing. I have no reason to believe that he did anything to hinder the Blair Nomination. For sure, the people at Cultural Center who are handling the nomination are getting lots of flack. I believe the Gov. is very concerned to help the coal interests who are opposing the nomination; however, he is hesitant to interfere openly because we’ve gotten so much publicity at the national level and because the Park Service has obviously been very interested in getting a good nomination. I feel sure Manchin is working behind the scenes. The head of State Historic Preservation Office, Susan Pierce, has taken much flack and I believe she is afraid of losing her job, since she’s also a will and pleasure employee.”