I have found the last three messages fascinating and Bernard's
epistle to be very thought provoking.  Although I am making the very
same points (in a slightly different way) in my own writing, Bernard, I
must disagree with your claim that the miner's statement was wrong.  My
father and another Welsh miner friend came from Anglesey, where their
families were tenant farmers.  They both hated mines and had the scars
to support their points of view.  My father loved farming, although he
had seen a young farm hand he was training fall beneath the blades of a
disc harrow drawn by a sixteen horse team on the Canadian prairies (he
had also an accident working on the railway in Wales).  My father was
quite happy to leave the mines, and defended miners' rights to higher
wages when speaking with "farmers" on the west coast.
        I, on the other hand, loved (and still love) mines.  Despite the
fact that, when I was very young,  my father had taken me to visit
miners in the hospital who were dying of silicosis.  Despite the fact
that my father and many friends and neighbours had been injured in mine
accidents.  Despite the fact that many close friends and neighbours were
killed in and around the mine (the Sullivan Mine averaged 2.5 deaths per
year).  Despite the fact that in two and half years, I had a number of
close calls myself (being saved only by a very fast reaction time).
Despite the fact that my brother, during the depression of the
"thirties" quit his job in the Trail smelter, because the lead was
effecting his health.  I don't know of any other industry that has the
same amount of death and disease. I am, of course, speaking of mining
and its offshoot industries generally (be it coal, mercury, lead, or
"hard rock" gold in quartz).
        Part of the reason that I quit mining was that I was beginning
to enjoy too much the adrenaline lift that came from facing danger.  I
also knew that my partner and cross-shift were too willing to accept
more dangerous conditions for higher contract pay (they used their
contract pay for booze money).
        Miners wages have generally been higher than other industries.
But that's only because they deserve the higher wages.  I get quite
incensed when some historians portray miners as being ignorant and
extremely poor, but I find your statement "Miners the world over - and I
mean the ones who actually do the digging - have been known for a higher
intelligence than their counter parts in other occupations - they have
to be" to be contradicting what appears to be the point of your letter.
        Yet, I am in sympathy with much that you say.  When I was a
teenager, my father had the opportunity to develope a dairy farm with
the backing of a family of successful breeders, who wanted another herd
for their breeding program; but I hated farming!!  Having been brought
up among miners, I had a completely different point of view than my
father.
        Having worked hard as a teenager and  as a young man, I learned
very early that any workman "is worthy of his hire".  When returning to
university, and meeting young communists who pleaded the case of the
poor working man, however, they irritated me. They didn't know what they
were talking about, and I told them to get out and do a good day's work
before orating from a soap box.
        While I won't be presenting a black view of the industry, I can
sympathize with those miners who hated the mines and bemoaned their
lot.  They were telling the truth as they saw it.




%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%