An oral history of the West Virginia Mine Wars published to coincide with the centennial of the Battle of Blair Mountain. In 1972 Anne Lawrence came to West Virginia at the invitation of the Miners for Democracy movement to conduct interviews with participants in, and observers of, the Battle of Blair Mountain and other Appalachian mine wars of the 1920s and '30s. The set of oral histories she collected-the only document of its kind-circulated for many years as an informal typescript volume, acquiring an almost legendary status among those intrigued by the subject. Key selections from it appear here for the first time as a published book, supplemented with introductory material, maps, and photographs. The volume's vivid, conversational mode invites readers into miners' lived experiences and helps us understand why they took up arms to fight anti-union forces in some of the nation's largest labor uprisings. Published to coincide with the celebration of the Blair Mountain centennial in 2021, On Dark and Bloody Ground includes a preface by public historian Catherine Venable Moore and an afterword by Cecil E. Roberts of the United Mine Workers of America.

In the early days of the Great Depression, the search for steady work drove hundreds of migrant laborers - many of whom were African American - from all over Appalachia to a rural area near Fayetteville, West Virginia. Union Carbide Corporation had begun construction on a three-mile tunnel to divert the New River, and many hands were needed. Toiling for five years in confined spaces with poor ventilation, no means of dust control, and limited use of personal breathing protection, the workers were repeatedly exposed to pure silica dust. Many developed silicosis, an incurable and debilitating lung disease that is estimated to have caused the deaths of nearly 800 workers, two-thirds of whom were Black. Soon after, the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Labor classified silicosis as an occupational hazard. Despite the disaster's impact, information about its severity was largely suppressed; a decision that ensured the event faded quickly from public memory. Aside from a small plaque at Hawks Nest State Park, which inaccurately admits to only 109 victims, there is little to mark the site of the worst industrial accident to date in the United States. In Appalachian Ghost: A Photographic Reimagining of the Hawks Nest Tunnel Disaster, author Raymond Thompson Jr. explores the possibilities of that tragedy by reviving the faces and spaces of Hawks Nest. Using primary source materials to re-create the workers' experiences in photographs, Thompson recontextualizes archival images to present a counter-archive that positions the Black experience at Hawks Nest within the larger story of the American labor landscape. His photographs and poetry give voice to the silenced, resisting revisionist narratives that often ignore the sacrifices of African Americans and erase their instrumental role in the development of America's infrastructure.

Written in response to the Hawk's Nest Tunnel disaster of 1931 in Gauley Bridge, West Virginia, The Book of the Dead is an important part of West Virginia's cultural heritage and a powerful account of one of the worst industrial catastrophes in American history. The poems collected here investigate the roots of a tragedy that killed hundreds of workers, most of them African American. They are a rare engagement with the overlap between race and environment in Appalachia. Published for the first time alongside photographs by Nancy Naumburg, who accompanied Rukeyser to Gauley Bridge in 1936, this edition of The Book of the Dead includes an introduction by Catherine Venable Moore, whose writing on the topic has been anthologized in Best American Essays.