The Coal Town System
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- čas přidán 12. 01. 2016
- West Virginia coal operators built small, company-owned towns for their miners to live in. The coal towns were almost always unincorporated; there were no elected officials, no independent police forces. Owners hired private detective agencies to watch over their workforce. Company towns were also untethered from the free market competition owners usually championed.
"The Mine Wars" premieres January 26, 2016 on American Experience PBS. - Zábava
“16 tons and what do you get, another day older and deeper in debt....”
A few tech corporations are bringing this back in the form of corporate municipalities where you live, work and buy everything from the “company store”. The more things change the more they stay the same....only cleaner but the grind is still there.
Where is this taking place?????????
Digital Coin now.
@@METALMAN4Wii screw crypto.
It's all decentralized and really fluctuates, it doesn't have real world value, most of it simply comes from speculation all heavily influenced by billionaires and scammers.
The irony is some want crypto to be regulated now because of the bad image it has had recently, then of course who and want entities will regulate it?
Kind of defeats the purpose of crypto.
Crypto is just one step up above NFTs, which is a straight up Ponzi Scheme, and takes a lot of power and resources to keep running i.e. blockchain backend which is devastating to the environment.
God, I hate the Capitalist system and its never ending schemes
@@allenelswick6961 They are called "innovation zones"
There were proposals like Nevada to be literal corporate cities and towns.
Don't mistake them for small towns that have corporate offices "contributing to local communities" they are in control, govern and the authority of communities.
Fortunately, these attempts of "innovation zones" were quashed.
The other example is 'Meta verse' by FaceBook/Meta
basically these are virtual economies controlled by Facebook and/or other corporations.
They were going to lean a lot on NFTs and crypto as a backbone
@@allenelswick6961 North Bayshore, Mountain View, California to start with. Google committed 1 billion dollar to make it happen. But don't be fooled, these things start small as a prototype to see how it goes, but if they want they can scale this nationwide.
My mother was born and raised in a coal town. She said the coal company treated the people very well. (The Page Coal Company). They were generous with resources and treated the workers well. My grandparents had a nice home with three “drops” which was and electric cord dropped in certain rooms. Their home was $15 a month. They had a “drop” in the kitchen, bathroom, living room, and two bedrooms. Grandpa worked as a butcher in the company store. The town was segregated. A sweet black woman knocked on their door needing work. Her husband and son were killed in a coal mining accident, and she needed work. My grandmother and grandfather loved her and she worked with them for 17 years. My mother, who was 5 years old, was so in love with her, she stuck to her like gum. I remember mom visiting as an adult when I was 10 years old. They were both were crying in each other’s arms they were so happy to see one another. Her name was Edna Saunders. The family loved her so much…..then had to move. She was family to them.
Industrialized feudalism basically
Much worse than feudalism.
Vassals were given housing, a place to grow crops, and protection from war and raiders by the Lord of the manor for a reasonable share of their crops. Alternatively, the vassals could receive the same benefits by serving in the Lord's army, or some other duty. When they became too old to work or serve, they were usually allowed to stay in their cottages, and have enough to eat. There have been a lot of movies that depict evil Lords mistreating the vassals, but that was actually very unusual behavior, since vassals could just move on to another estate, and the evil Lord would just be screwed.
@@oldrogue4247 imagine having such a shitty economic system it makes feudalism look good
I grew up a ways outside of coal country in Kentucky, but my ancestors come from there. Lately I've been learning about the exploitation of my people in earnest, after hearing about the evil of the coal companies my whole life. Words can't accurately describe how evil they were, nor can they describe how strong the Appalachian people are.
Amazon wants to bring company towns back
Boycott them. People have no clue what kind of monster their buying power will create / are creating
This was true in some places in the early years of industry but not later. Miners unionized, towns became incorporated, schools were built. Not much different than living in a prosperous town today.
My Grandaddy worked for the coal company during the Battle of Blair Mountain. He got his children educated and OUT of WV - and the rest is fortunate history.
Wow. What did he say about it?
@@eleanorsvenson2958 Like many things in my family history (Civil War, etc.) they were not discussed. I have uncovered a huge amount of history on my own. In many ways that generation had shame about their "country" roots and did all they could to get their children educated and out of WV. That was frustrating but I understand it now.
@@jsmcguireIII That’s sad. A lot of older generations are like that. I think incidents like The Battle of Blair Mountain are so important to the history of this country. I think the fight for fair treatment from employers and how that changed the quality of life for all Americans- 5 day work week, 40 hour day, etc.. is so integral to how America and Americans came to enjoy the life we do. So those fights are as significant as any war imo.
It’s crazy how this is happening in 2021
Don't like It then leave
How?
@@tompatherookiecrusher885 You first.
@@tompatherookiecrusher885 shut up
Nothing happen in 2021 all the coal companies sold the houses to the miners in the late 40's to early 50's. There was no more company owned anything except for the mines they kept running.
Hello Nevada, funny seeing you all the way back here!
If you don't like it then leave
My daddy moved my mom and my brother and sister to Coalwood WV. My sister recmemberd often the days.
"Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go, I owe my soul to the company store."
“Another day older and deeper in debt”
I worked for a big Ivy league university hospital. They used this business model to setup their health insurance for employees.
Kinda reminds me how Facebook & Google though
I was brought up in a coal town in Yorkshire, England in the 1950s and was destined to follow generations down the pit. At 16 I left and went working casual labour in France picking grapes, veg etc, still hard work but at least I was in the fresh air and well fed. To this day I don't understand why anyone would choose to go underground just to earn money.
You had an alternative. People that live around coal camps work underground to keep from starving and to support their families. Don't ever throw shade on my People that's how I grew up.
I can't believe this country tolerated fellow citizens being treated so poorly for so long. The government should have stepped in and done something long before it go so bad.
And STILL they haven't. These people are FORCED to pipe their used water straight into the river from their homes. Yes, every toilet flush goes in.
@user-lt5bp3ww3n you don't know come here from sic'em .
Young people these days have no clue what could be.
Family History
How history repeats itself
These towns were virtually the same as collective farms in the u.s.s.r..
Not really
They thought coal would be King for ever.
Company Store has gone virtual and renamed itself Credit Cards
Mann vs machime
So sad😰😰😰😰
No you don’t understand it’s a cheaper prices
Its funny cause this is an Ancaps wet dream lol
We have the nerve to complain about working conditions of today!!!
With inflation the average worker today gets paid leas
The principle of it all still remains: workers are getting paid pennies on the dollar again for long hours with or without benefits of being an employee of theirs.
I feel their pain...my internet connection is slow. 😂
It is ridiculous how people like to make blanket statements about history whether it be coal mining or something else.
Peale, Pa Coal Mine - Owned by Clearfield Coal Company from 1883 to 1912. It is now a literal ghost town (very cool to explore) but here is a bit of real history from a primary source. "The houses are 2 story frame buildings painted brick red; wainscoted to 4 ft. and plastered throughout; three rooms on the first floor, 2 or 3 on the second. They rent for $4.25 - $6.75 per MONTH including water. Altogether they are the most comfortable miners' cabins seen throughout the county and the rent is not high for a man earning $9 - $12 per WEEK."
They also had a school, railroad station, swimming pool, a park, icehouse, butcher, store, town hall, cemetery, etc.
Were all coal towns great? No of course not but many were not like this "documentary" claims.
"As we came in sight of town we were in full view of the most magnificent gorge it has ever been our fortune to behold. On our left was the beautiful natural park, where the party was to spend the day; on our right a ravine, at the bottom of which fully one thousand feet below where the cars ran is the beautiful little stream of the Moshannon; on the other side of this ravine, on a gently sloping hillside, stands the town of Peale, elegantly located for health and comfort. With the best of drainage and abundance of pure water, which is carried into every house and barn in the town, by pipes running from the fountain, it is destined to become a place of some importance."
From: The Raftsman's Journal, August 20, 1885
What's ridiculous is how many mining towns were like this maybe 5 percent sure there were some decent mine owners who treated there people right ,but don't try to paint it like it was wonderful go look up the darr mine see how it treated its women an children study your anti trust laws, federal trade commission laws
"From: The Raftsman's Journal, August 20, 1885" - Paid advertisement?
Is there much difference now? Does anyone have any freedom from price gouging. your wages never keep up with the cost of living.
Coal camps were not built to hold the miners and their family hostage. The reason coal camps were built and much needed was they were built in very remote parts where the local population was to low in numbers to supply all the vast labor needed to mine the coal. Large coal camps housed these new miners by the thousands. Miners immigrant's came from Europe to work the mines. Blacks came from the South for the same reason. In the larger more modern coal towns every thing modern was added to improve people's daily lives to have found more in a city you would have had to went to the big cities in the North. Not all miners lived in the coal camps. The company store was the down fall of a lot of miners getting in debt and never could get back out of debt. It is true a lot of coal miners were treated bad at some of the mining company mines.
slave camp
None were slave camps you were free to move in and you were free to move out.
@@allenelswick6961 sure... and not get paid...
sounds like animal crossings
This is Republican heaven.
Democrats ran the state for 113 years. Which explains a lot actually ...
@@bobhabib7662 If you’re talking mostly pre 1960’s you should try looking up “democrat republicans party switch” or something like that. The two parties actually began switching platforms in the 1950’s and 1960’s. So for most of the 1800’s and first half of the 1900’s democrats were generally conservative and republicans were generally liberal
@@jaredjenkins99 Utter garbage. This is the true Big Lie. The democrat marketing machine goes into full swing anytime someone points out their love for socialism and elitism. There has never been a "party switch".
@@bobhabib7662 I mean, I don’t truly know cuz I wasn’t alive back then, but how do you know?
@@jaredjenkins99 Yet you suffer from the decades of their rule even today...
How do I know? I'm literate and know history. Why don't you?
That white privilege
A lot of people had it tough.
Sounds like the Communist Russia except on the other end of the spectrum.
This is like real world the outer worlds, without the sci-fi stuff.