The Depths of the Phillips Mine
The tour starts at the Beckley Exhibition Coal Mine where you get a real look at what life was like for miners underneath the mountains. Our guide, Gerald, spent forty five years working underground before taking this job to keep busy and share his experience with visitors from all over the world. You get to see historical artifacts like the old fireplaces used to create air drafts before modern fans existed. They even explain how miners had to nail their identification tags to pieces of wood and hide them inside the coal to stop others from stealing credit for their hard work. Seeing the transition from tiny kerosene teapot lights that only lasted three hours to the brighter carbide lights shows just how much technology changed over the years.
“Here is what it looks like when you are underground and your light goes out. That is pretty dark, isn’t it?”
The Highs and Lows of Coal Camp Life
After coming back to the surface, you can walk through an authentic coal camp filled with relocated historical buildings. There is a massive difference between the tiny one room bachelor shanty meant for single men and the two story superintendent house that originally had six bedrooms. The superintendent house is now full of unique curiosities like a barber shop, a doctor’s office, and a post office that some visitors say is definitely haunted. You can even see collections of coal scrip, which was the special currency miners were paid in that could only be spent at the company store. It was a tough system that often left mining families in debt for their own equipment.
“If you had two stories back in the day, you were telling people what to do. You were saying, Get to work, I am going to throw you some scrip and you are going to like it.”
Lessons at Helens Coal Camp School
One of the coolest stops in the camp is Helens Coal Camp School, which was the last one room schoolhouse to close in the state of West Virginia back in 1965. A teacher named Miss Debbie shows off the original floors and the horsehair plaster walls that have held the building together for over a century. Students back then used slates and abacuses instead of iPads, and the teacher had a dry wooden paddle known as the Board of Education to keep everyone in line. It is a sobering reminder that for many boys in these camps, formal education ended after the eighth grade when they headed straight into the mines to start working.
“After eighth grade, the boys went in the mines to work and the girls stayed home or got married. They could do either one.”
Ready to see the man trip in action and explore the haunted post office for yourself? You have to see the footage of this incredible place to believe it.
