Remembering Blair Mountain

Michael and Carrie Kline, Talking Across the Lines

In honor of the current Centennial of the March on Blair Mountain and Battle of Blair Mountain, we're reposting a favorite piece. Remembering Blair Mountain was written and produced by Miranda Brown while interning with Talking Across the Lines. Brown weaves oral history interviews recorded by Michael and Carrie Kline and music from the The Blair Pathways Project, produced by Sara Lynch Thomason. The Klines' interviewees were marching to Blair to commemorate the original march of 1921 and save the location of the original Battle of Blair Mountain was in danger from mountaintop removal mining. As of today it has been preserved. Known as the Redneck Army for their red neckerchiefs, ten thousand miners marched 50 miles in late August to early September of 1921, striving to end to the violence of the mine guard system of Baldwin Felts detectives and political complicity. They fought it out in the Battle of Blair Mountain. Let us know what you think of this production!