---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Public News Service wvns@newsservice.org Date: Mon, Oct 8, 2012 at 4:04 AM Subject: WVNS story: Preservationists: Second Battle of Blair Mountain Not Over To: PaulWilson pjgrunt@gmail.com

Preservationists: Second Battle of Blair Mountain Not Over Dan Heyman, Public News Service-WV http://www.publicnewsservice.org/index.php?/content/article/28772-1 Join the discussion: facebook.com/PublicNewsServicehttp://www.facebook.com/PublicNewsService Twitter: @pns_news http://twitter.com/#!/pns_news @pns_WVhttp://twitter.com/#!/pns_WV Google+: plus.to/publicnewsservice http://plus.google.com/106260479325451709866

(10/08/12) CHARLESTON, W.Va. - The fight over preserving the Blair Mountain battlefield is not over, according to the environmental and labor history groups trying to protect the site. Last week a federal judge ruled the groups don't have the right to sue to have Blair Mountain returned to the National Register of Historic Places. But labor historian Wess Harris says that's just one move in the long second battle of Blair Mountain.

"One good way to look at this whole thing of Blair Mountain is as a chess match. Certainly the judge's decision cost us a piece off the board, but we're a long way from checkmate."

In 1921 thousands of union coal miners fought with mine guards and company militias on a ridge line bordering Logan County. It was the largest armed uprising in the U.S. since the Civil War.

Aracoma Coal, a subsidiary of Alpha Energy, has a permit pending to remove the mountaintop and take out the coal seams underneath. U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton ruled that environmental and preservation groups could not sue to have Blair Mountain protected because Alpha's permit hasn't been granted yet. But Sierra Club spokeswoman Kim Teplitzky says the pending permit is enough of a threat.

"If this permit is granted, they could commence mining on the battlefield site, and potentially destroy this incredibly important historic place."

She says they would act if the state Department of Environmental Protection issues the permit to mine what's known as Piney Branch.

"We would definitely act. We are right now weighing our options, and we'll be watching closely to see what happens with this pending permit for Piney Branch."

Wess Harris says the state could lose a vital part of its past.

"The history's not going to go away, but the opportunity to teach from that mountain does go away. A huge loss. Just another case of our heritage being destroyed."

Preservationists say the process of having the site removed from historic protection three years ago was filled with irregularities. The companies that want to strip-mine the area say it's just wilderness, not worth protecting.

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