This is just a snippet of articles on Google News showcasing the amount of AP dispatches being picked up focusing on my little region in the woods lately.. The last remaining coal breaker in Pennsylvania is set to be demolished.. a little bit of a debate has surged within the coal region as to the merits of trashing the historical structure still standing after all this time.
I linked up a good video of a flyover the other day of the St. Nicholas Coal Breaker..
A few noteworthy things about this last massive piece of history to know:
It is a symbol of when coal was king, when barons placed their bets on the dusty underground that would be unearthed for profit.
From this breaker, coal was broken into various sized pieces–often young children were forced to take out the sharpest pieces–and it was loaded onto trains for nearby large cities. Hence the name: Breaker boys. Those same breaker boys went to work clean but home filthy, and their lungs eventually become highly toxic filled with soot..
Regardless of the dangerous conditions met in the breaker, the coal region at one time employed over 180,000 people in the mining system.
And that was then>
This is now: A region vacant its spirit, a land that time often forgot.. spectacular and monster buildings, like this breaker, are vacant..
When this building comes down, with it comes hundreds of years of mining lure..
The AP says this:
The St. Nicholas Breaker once held the distinction as the largest in the world, the size of a city block and capable of processing more than 12,000 tons of anthracite each day. Shuttered for more than 50 years, it now blights an area whose economy never fully recovered after anthracite’s reign came to an end.
The reign truly did end.
And it was replaced by nothing.
Keep in mind at one time people traveled from NEW YORK CITY to shop at department stores in Mahanoy City, the home to this breaker. Mahanoy City is now falling into pieces, filled with hard core drugs, and an aging population whose homes go vacant after the inhabitant meets the mortal fate.
Coal was king.
Long live the coal region.
Falling soon: The breaker along with the souls of the boys were toiled and troubled their lives with the work of men..
