In 1869, mineworkers gathered in Hazleton, PA and put their grievances in writing - condemning company stores, withheld wages, and employer control over daily life. Their resolutions, printed by a labor newspaper in Philly, reveal how tightly coal companies gripped both work and survival. Read the full story.
On Election Night 1864, politics turned deadly in Tremont, PA. After Schuylkill County voters re-elected Congressman Myer Strouse, a band of Irish mineworkers—calling themselves the “Bloody 69th”—paraded through town. Hours later, 25-year-old George W. Thompson was beaten to death. No one was ever tried. This is the Coal Region’s volatile Civil War era—press bias, ethnic tension, and justice denied—told through one forgotten murder. Read the full story.
The infamous Battle of the Crater in 1864 began when a mine beneath Confederate earthworks detonated.
A lunch scene in the coal mines of Northeastern Pennsylvania was depicted in an 1873 edition of Harper's Weekly Magazine.