1930's Business and the Economy | Harlan County and Coal

"Bloody" Harlan County.

The battle between coal miners and operators in Harlan County, Kentucky, in the 1930s lasted the entire decade and became extremely bloody and violent. The struggle ripped through the nation's conscience, drawing more national attention than any other labor conflict in the period. Ultimately, after many long years of strife, the federal government intervened to successfully open the county to unionism. The story of the Harlan Country strike, however, is one of defiance: of the operators forcefully resisting the trend toward unionism sweeping the nation and of the workers no longer willing to accept a coal company controlling their destiny.

Background.

Harlan County sits just north of the Cumberland Gap near the intersection of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. Located in a narrow valley between the Black and Pine Mountains, the area remained uniquely isolated from the outside world. No...