Life in Company Towns

Items

• Women Searching For News, Walking Railroad Tracks Between Mines 6 and 8 After Explosion, Monongah, W. Va.

  In Monongah, West Virginia, December 6, 1907, an explosion destroyed Mines #6 and #8, killing most of the miners inside. The women in the foreground of the photograph, along with other families walked back and forth on the railroad tracks from one mine entrance to the other searching for news of loved ones. An eyewitness reports many women walked for more than 20 hours without food or sleep and some "were about to become mothers". The official death toll was 361 mine workers killed.
• Fetching Water from a Well

  One woman pumping water from a well and one holding a bucket.
• Women Working in Garden at Barrack Village Near Fairmont, W. Va.

  During Unionization of Coal Company workers, miners' families were evicted from Company owned houses. The Union supplied building material and land and the miners plus others constructed temporary barracks until the labor trouble was settled. Beside the barracks, there was room for small garden plots and here they are shown working in them. See New York Times Sunday Sept. 5th Picture Section.
• Miner's Wife and and a Group of Children with Strike Sign

  Children holding signs in the street.
• Striking Miner's Families Outside Barracks

  Portrait of children and some women and men gathered outside a barracks.
• Wives Waiting for Husbands at Mine No. 8 after Monongah Mine Disaster

  Wives and family members wait for men outside Monongah No. 8 mine. A. G. Martin and Company, Fairmont, W. Va.