Blair Community Center and Museum Needs Your Support

By Madison Hinshaw, Communications Editorial Intern in Spring 2012.

If you’ve ever heard of Blair Mountain, you know the turmoil it has been through in the last several decades. Now this historic mountain and its battlegrounds are being threatened by surface strip mining. That’s why the Blair Community Center and Museum needs your support!

The Blair Community Center and Museum is a nonprofit organization working to promote and preserve the history of Blair Mountain. Established in the fall of 2011, the Community Center and Museum has been working to reach out to those unaware of environmental destruction caused by strip mining of Blair Mountain. Despite their tireless efforts, they simply do not have the funds to allow the organization to grow.

The Blair Community Center and Museum sits at the base of historic Blair Mountain in Logan County, WV

The Community Center and Museum is currently working in a large church, which they use as an office, community center and museum. It has a leaky roof, poor heating, and there is no drinkable water nearby. They also need to improve their museum by adding showcases, frames and important museum pieces.

The Blair Mountain Community Center and Museum has a goal of reaching $10,000 by the end of April. The projects, of course, will cost more than the goal they have set for themselves, but this money would aid in planting the seed to get them going.

Blair Mountain, located in Logan County, WV, was once the site of one of the nation’s largest labor conflict, the Battle of Blair Mountain. This battle was only five days long, but was heavily equipped with machine guns, explosives and an estimate of over one million rounds of ammunition.

More than 15,000 coal miners gathered in Charleston, WV, in an attempt to overthrow the control barons of the coal mining companies. Little did they know that a private army led by the Logan County Sheriff and coal operators were awaiting their arrival.

Though the battle was almost a century ago, it is not taught in schools and many people may not have even heard of it.

So please help our friends of Blair Community Center and Museum as they continue their fight to save this historical place they’ve called home for centuries.

To find out more information about this project or to donate, visit: www.indiegogo.com/The-Start-of-A-New-Beginning.

About AV's Intern Team

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