Diana Baldwin | |
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Born | |
Died | May 28, 2016 67) South Carolina, US | (aged
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Children | 3 |
Diana Baldwin was an American hospital receptionist and miner. She and Anita Cherry, hired as miners in 1973, are believed to have been the first women to work in an underground coal mine in the United States. They were the first female members of United Mine Workers of America to work inside a mine. [1] [2] [3]
Baldwin was born on August 31, 1948, to Lelar Baldwin, in Letcher County, Kentucky. She first worked as a waitress, then as receptionist at a medical clinic. During that time, Diana had 3 children - Lori, born in 1966, Scott, who lived 1968 – 2022, and Mark, born in 1970. Later she married James Roger Gibbs (m. 1982 – 1991). Baldwin moved to South Carolina in 1992 where she received her Commercial driver's license and became an on-the-road truck driver. She met William Christian, a truck driver as well. They were married from 1994 to 2002. [4] [5]
In 1973, Baldwin (aged 29) decided that she needed a better-paying job to support her family. She applied for a job at a coal mine operated by the Beth-Elkhorn Coal Company in Jenkins, Kentucky and was hired. Soon after, she was brought to national attention as a woman coal miner. Walter Cronkite did a story on Baldwin in 1973. She also appeared on the show What's My Line? . She was interviewed by The New York Times in May 1974. Before retirement, Baldwin became a Mine Boss then Assistant Federal Mine Inspector. [6] [7] [8]
Baldwin died of lupus in South Carolina on May 28, 2016, at the age of 67. [4]
Jenkins is a home rule-class city in Letcher County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 2,203 as of the 2010 census.
The United Mine Workers of America is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the United States and Canada. Although its main focus has always been on workers and their rights, the UMW of today also advocates for better roads, schools, and universal health care. By 2014, coal mining had largely shifted to open pit mines in Wyoming, and there were only 60,000 active coal miners. The UMW was left with 35,000 members, of whom 20,000 were coal miners, chiefly in underground mines in Kentucky and West Virginia. However it was responsible for pensions and medical benefits for 40,000 retired miners, and for 50,000 spouses and dependents.
Harlan County, USA is a 1976 American documentary film covering the "Brookside Strike", a 1973 effort of 180 coal miners and their wives against the Duke Power Company-owned Eastover Coal Company's Brookside Mine and Prep Plant in Harlan County, southeast Kentucky. It won the Academy Award for Best Documentary at the 49th Academy Awards.
Mary Lee Settle was an American writer.
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Donald Henry "Pee Wee" Gaskins Jr. was an American serial killer and rapist from South Carolina who stabbed, shot, drowned, and poisoned more than a dozen people. Before his convictions for murder, Gaskins had a long history of criminal activities resulting in prison sentences for assault, burglary, and statutory rape. His last arrest was for contributing to the delinquency of a minor, 13-year-old Kim Gehlken, who had gone missing in September 1975. During their search for the missing girl, police discovered eight bodies buried in shallow graves near Gaskins' home in Prospect, South Carolina.
The Paint Creek–Cabin Creek Strike, or the Paint Creek Mine War, was a confrontation between striking coal miners and coal operators in Kanawha County, West Virginia, centered on the area enclosed by two streams, Paint Creek and Cabin Creek.
The West Virginia coal wars (1912–1921), also known as the mine wars, arose out of a dispute between coal companies and miners.
Florence Reece was an American social activist, poet, and folksong writer. She is best known for the song "Which Side Are You On?" which she originally wrote at the age of twelve while her father was out on strike with other coal miners, according to The Penguin Book of American Folk Song by Alan Lomax.
Judy Lee Klemesrud was a writer for The New York Times from 1966 until her death in 1985.
Julia "Judy" Belle Thompson Bonds was an organizer and activist from the Appalachian Mountains of West Virginia, United States. Raised in a family of coal miners, she worked from an early age at minimum wage jobs. Bonds was the director of Coal River Mountain Watch (CRMW). She has been called "the godmother of the anti-mountaintop removal movement."
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Lin Bolen was an American television executive and producer. She was most noted for her role at NBC daytime television programming as the first female vice president of a TV network, a position she held from 1972 until 1976. In this role, Bolen was responsible for commissioning the long-running game show Wheel of Fortune and is credited with bringing successful long form to network soap operas. Bolen was mentioned in Who's Who in America as a trailblazer for women in television.
The Pittston Coal strike was a United States strike action led by the United Mine Workers Union (UMWA) against the Pittston Coal Company, nationally headquartered in Pittston, Pennsylvania. The strike, which lasted from April 5, 1989 to February 20, 1990, resulted from Pittston's termination of health care benefits for approximately 1,500 retirees, widows, and disabled miners. The strikers also cited the refusal of the company to contribute to the benefit trust established in 1950 for miners who retired before 1974 and the refusal of the company to bargain in good faith as grounds for their action. The company cited declining coal prices, decreasing demand, and recession as its reason for limiting health care benefits.
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Julia Lester Dillon (1871–1959) was an American teacher from Georgia, who because of the death of her husband and her hearing loss, trained in landscape architecture. She was one of the first women to write extensively about gardening in the south and ran a regularly featured column which appeared in several newspapers and magazines. She designed spaces to enhance post offices for the U.S. Department of the Treasury and created the Memorial Park in Sumter, South Carolina. Based on her experience, she then served as Sumter Superintendent of Parks and Trees for twenty years. Dillon remained in Sumter after retiring. She continued writing until 1954, despite losing both her hearing and her sight. Julia Lester Dillon died in Sumter on March 24, 1959. She is buried in Magnolia Cemetery in Augusta, Georgia. She was inscribed upon the Georgia Women of Achievement roster in 2003.
The Coal Employment Project (CEP) was a non-profit women's organization in the United States from 1977–1996 with the goal of women gaining employment as miners. With local support groups in both the eastern and western coalfields, CEP also advocated for women on issues such as sexual harassment, mine safety, equal access to training and promotions, parental leave, and wages.
The 1959 United Mine Workers strike was a labor action by union miners in Eastern Kentucky. Originally over a pay increase, it grew into a conflict between union and non-union mines that resulted in three deaths. It was the first instance of labor violence in the area since the Harlan County War and was the prelude to the Roving Picket Movement.
Anita Cherry was an American practical nurse and coal miner. She and Diana Baldwin, hired as miners in 1973, are believed to have been the first women to work in an underground coal mine in the United States. They were the first female members of United Mine Workers of America to work inside a mine.
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