| Summary: | In this interview, Earl Brown recalls his life as a coal miner, daily life in the mining camps and the challenges surrounding organized labor in Alabama. He also discusses FDR and the effect of the Wagner Acts on organizing labor. He was a member of the United Mine Workers of America of America (UMWA) and recounts organizing drives, strikes and the unique sense of solidarity among mine workers. Brown talks about his first job, loading coal. The employees had to buy their tools, powder, and lamp. He also defines "pillar work," "green work" and "top working." He briefly mentions black lung and says that it was originally called "mining asthma." Brown says that "segregation was everywhere else but there [inside the mine]. They respected one another, that's where the togetherness come at. You come out of the mine, you're separate... Even at the commissary they had the white line and the black line... the thing that pulled me the closest to the mine workers more than anything was because actually that's something that we didn't deal with... segregation in there." Brown believes that the UMWA influenced other unions in the steel and automobile industry, for example. People saw the effect of UMWA, Brown says. UMWA "paved the way...someone had to be a trailblazer and we were all trailblazers... coal, coke is the base for making steel. Once a coal miner go on strike, automatically set coke, steel everything else down. So it's a relationship you see."The digitization of this collection was funded by a gift from EBSCO Industries.
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