Transcript

6.19.25 · The Mountain Eagle

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Speaker 1: Now we turn to the Mountain Eagle to read news
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from Weisberg. Your reader today is Bill den Arsdale. We
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will begin with the addition dated June eighteenth, twenty twenty five,
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which the publishers have donated to RADIOI as a reminder
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Radio Eye as a reading service intended for people who
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are blind or have other disabilities that make it difficult
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to read printed material. And the first story is scene
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from new movie is filmed near making Rust Belt. Ruby
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stars Francis Fisher, best known for her roles in Titanic
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and clet Eastwood's Unforgiven by Magdeleine Flannery. On the morning
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of June eleventh, Evdene Branham was kneeling in her garden
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at the head of Pine Creek when a woman with
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piercing blue eyes and long gray pigtails ambled up the haller, shouting, Mama,
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where are you. Evideen has two daughters and she talks
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to them every day, but last Wednesday she didn't have
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time to check in with them until late that night. Instead,
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she spent the entire day surrounded by a film crew,
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greeting and talking to her new daughter, Ruby, played by
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actress Francis Fisher. She was playing the part of Ruby's
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mother Grace in a film called Russ Belt Ruby, being
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directed by filmmaker Talia Lugassi. Last fall, I got a
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message from Skyly Howard with Apple Shops Appalachian Media Institute AMI,
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asking if my cousin Evideen would allow a film crew
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to use her home to shoot part of a movie
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the following summer. How do they even know what my
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house looks like, Evideen asked when I called her about it.
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I reminded her that years earlier, her mother, Flora Wright,
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had been interviewed by an AMI film crew sitting on
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the front porch of the cabin. Apparently these young filmmakers
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had seen the film. It is a beautiful spot. The
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cabin was built in nineteen thirty six and the logs
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are clearly hand hewn, which you don't find much anymore.
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Skyy and the rest of the crew had been asked
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to take pictures of the house to send to the
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writer director. We settled on a time and Evdene made
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her famous zucchini and banana bread to give them. Wolfgang Miles,
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Madison Buchanan, and Skyly walked through the house, took pictures
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and told us what they knew about the film. The
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main character would be played by Francis Fisher, an actress
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perhaps best known for her role as the mother of
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Rose played by actress Kate Winslet in the film Titanic,
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or in Unforgiven, the Academy Award winning film she did
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with her former partner Clint Eastwood. Lugassi directed the well
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received film This Is Not a War Story in twenty
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twenty one. Evideen spread the word among friends and family,
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and we all looked up Francis's films and watched Talia's work.
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In March, Talia came in from New York and visited
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the house to check out the location herself. Once again,
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Evideen fed everyone her wonderful sweet bread. Before she left.
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Talia asked Evideen if she'd be willing to play Ruby's
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mother in the film. Ruby is in her seventies in
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the film, so a ninety year old would be perfect
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for the part. They would send the script for her
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to look over. Evideen said she'd look it over, but
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argued that she was old and wouldn't be able to
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memorize it all. She was assured there would be cue
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cards to help her and they'd do it over until
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she got it. When we got the script, I suggested
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some changes to it based on what Evideen would be
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comfortable saying, and Talia agreed with the changes. Evideen started
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going over her lines, running through them with her grandson
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Chase or anyone who had time to do it. Her daughter,
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Francis had very few lines compared to her in the scene.
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The two of them would be in When we celebrated
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Evideen's ninetieth birthday and her picture was on the front
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page of The Mountain Eagle. I sent the picture to Talia.
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What followed was an introduction by text to Francis Fisher,
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who said she'd love to talk to Evideen. That resulted
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in an hour long phone conversation between the actress and
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her on screen mother. They talked about their children and grandchildren,
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about gardening and weeds. Francis shared her fool proof non
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chemical recipe for killing weeds vinegar salt and dishwash detergent,
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and reassured Evideen that together they would make the scene work.
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They would do it until they got it right. It
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would be fine. By nine a m. Last Wednesday, vehicles
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were blocking the road up to the There was a
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short school bus, which is a vital part of the
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film story, and RV decked out for the crew, a
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large van and four SUVs. There were professionally made large
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que cards, a battery charging station, a sound crew, two monitors,
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and an amazing camera rig. They got the two women
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wired up with microphones and headed out to the garden.
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They ran the scene again and again, shooting from different angles,
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having Grace Evideen facing this way and that. They brought
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out black shades to adjust the lighting. They had her
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stand then kneel. By twelve thirty Ruby Francis had yelled Mama,
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where are you at least ten times. After lunch, the
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crew switched to the front porch, running the scene there
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where it was cooler. Francis put her feet up on
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the railing and Evideen was told not to worry about
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saying the script just as it was written. She was
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encouraged to talk naturally, and she did. It was almost
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seven o'clock that evening when the crew huddled briefly, then
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announced it's a wrap for Abdeen and began clapping. She
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was exhausted and relieved it was over, Francis hugged her
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and said, your film debut. Francis still had work to do,
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climbing out of the school bus, running up the porch steps,
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entering and exiting the cabin. As we sat at the
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kitchen table, drinking tea and talking, Francis would emerge through
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the front door, Hello, Mama. Wait a few minutes, then
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exit for yet another take. At eight thirty, the crew
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started loading up all their gear. Evideen's niece said she
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saw them pulling out of may King at nine that night.
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They're staying in Harlan County until the middle of July,
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shooting the rest of the film. Before I headed home
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that evening, I asked Avedeen what she thought about the experience.
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I'm glad I did it, she said, but I'm glad
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it's over. I don't see how anybody does that kind
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of acting, doing the same thing over and over. That
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was my first and last time. But I do like
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my new daughter, Francis. She was reeled down to earth.
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The makers of Russ Belt Ruby say it is a
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film that follows a woman on her last days of life,
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as she journeys to say goodbye to her family, her
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home and the Mountains. Madeleine Flannery is a retired communications professor,
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having taught at Hazard Community and Technical College for thirty
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four years. She lives in Weisberg. The next story is
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more about Francis Fisher, a native of Milford on the Sea, Hampshire, England.
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In nineteen fifty two, Francis Fisher began her acting career
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by apprenticing at the Barter Theater in Abington, Virginia. A
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successful career in theater, mostly in New York City, playing
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leads in over thirty productions of plays by such noted
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writers as Noel Coward, Emily Mann, Sam Sheppard, William Shakespeare
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and Tennessee Williams. She moved into television, where she played
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Detective Deborah Saxon on the ABC daytime soap opera The
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Edge of Night nineteen seventy six to nineteen eighty one.
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She later had a role in CBS's daytime soap opera
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Guiding Light, before guest starring on the network TV shows Roseanne,
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Matt Locke and In the Heat of the Night. Fisher
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moved into film in nineteen eighty three, and in nineteen
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eighty nine she appeared opposite Clint Eastwood in the movie
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Pink Cadillac. During filming for the movie, she and Eastwood
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began what would become a five year relationship, during which
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the couple had a daughter, Francesca, in nineteen ninety three.
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In nine twenty two, Fisher again starred with Eastwood in
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the movie Unforgiven, which Eastwood also directed. Her most famous
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role came in the nineteen ninety seven movie Titanic, when
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she played the role of society matron Ruth DeWitt Buckater,
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the mother of seventeen year old Rose played by Kate Winslet,
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who falls in love with Jack Dawson Leonardo DiCaprio. In
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nineteen ninety nine, Fisher again teamed up with Eastwood in
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the movie True Crime, in which she played the role
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of district attorney. Fisher has had major roles in a
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number of other film and TV projects, including the twenty
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nineteen HBO series Watchmen and the twenty twenty five movie Rust,
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a western, in which she stars with actor Alec Baldwin.
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The next headline is side by side measure is off
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for now after writers object ordinance that would allow side
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by sides and other special purpose vehicles to travel legally
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on two lane highways in Lectric County has had a blowout.
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The Electrifiscal Court this week tabled the proposed ordinance to
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opt into a state law passed during the last session
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of the General Assembly. The law, known by its legislative
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bill number Senate Bill sixty three, would allow owners of
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some off road vehicles to travel up to twenty miles
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on the two lane roads with a center line. But
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there is a catch, and that catch caught legislators and
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local officials off guard. A significant number of owners are
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angry about provisions that would require the vehicles to be
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made street legal, be insured, be inspected, and be licensed.
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But while many at the meeting agreed that insurance should
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be required, they said paying motor vehicle taxes, a twenty
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five dollars inspection fee and the nine dollar license fee
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was a bridge to is currently against the law to
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drive us side by side on the highway. Some owners, however,
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said there was no need for a law to change
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that we've done it for years and there's never been
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a problem. One man in the audience, said State Senator
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Scott Maiden, one of the sponsors of the bill, and
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state Representative Mitch Whittaker or at the Fiscal Court meeting
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this week to defend themselves, saying the legislature never intended
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to tax the vehicles. Maiden put it down to overreach
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by the executive branch. He said he has a meeting
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with the Revenue Cabinet about it next week, and if
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they continue to charge taxes, we'll fix it in January
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when the legislature goes back into session. Whittaker agreed, saying
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no one had mentioned taxing side by sides when the
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law was being discussed, but he said he is firm
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on insurance. I think anything on the road without insurance
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should be impounded, he said. A man questioned how they
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were supposed to change their vehicle's title to a special
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purpose title when there's a lean against it. If you
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owe forty thousand dollars on a side by side, paying
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it off is not an option, he said. County Attorney
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Jamie Hatton said he was sure the county clerk could
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take care of that without having to pay off the vehicle.
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I'm sure most people who have a forty thousand dollars
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side by side have a lean on it, he said,
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I don't. A man in the back said mine don't.
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A woman near by said. Another said the law will
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have a negative impact on tourism, especially with the twenty
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mile limit on traveling from one trail to another. There's
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no place in Letcher County where you can drive twenty
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miles and get on another trail, Roy Williams said well.
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Magistrate Benny mc call said he's not comfortable voting on
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the ordinance to opt in until they know for sure
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what they're voting on. Magistrate Jack Banks said he didn't
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want to wait too long. I've got people who want
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to be on the road, he said. Judge Executive Terry
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Adams said he is in favor of the law because
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it makes it legal for people to drive and protects
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them with insurance. Magistrate Kenny Anderson was against the law,
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and Magistrate deb Colliers said she is concerned about what
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effect it will have on people traveling to or from
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nearby counties to ride. The state law does not automatically
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make it legal for side by sides to be on
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the highway. It only allows counties to opt into the law,
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leaving a patchwork of laws across the state. Side By
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sides are designed for off road use and do not
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meet federal Highway safety regulations, meaning they cannot be driven
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on a federally funded highway. Inexpensive side by sides made
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with store brands or lowmower companies sell for as little
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as nine thousand dollars, but name brands such as Polaris
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and can M can cost as much as fifty thousand dollars.
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Now come with enclosed cabins and air conditioning. The state
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law requires side by sides driven on the highway to
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have a top speed of more than twenty five miles
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per hour, but most name brands easily exceed that, with
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one Cannam model reaching one hundred miles per hour. The
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state law also allows pneumatic tired military vehicles to be
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licensed and driven on the highway. Polaris Industries has a
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division called Polarist Government and Defense, which produces side by
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sides and full sized doom buggies for police and military use.
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Military models cost well over one hundred thousand dollars, while
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police and fire department models are comparable in price to
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a high end civilian model. Watchburg Police Department has a
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police model side by side that it uses during festivals
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and other outdoor events. The court voted unanimously to table
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the ordinance until they know more about what will be
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required of owners. The next story is cops sees gun
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phones after searching home of alleged killer. Kentucky State Police
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seized a high point three eighty pistol after serving a
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search warrant for the home of Mark Miles, accused in
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the twenty twenty four murder of Angela Roberts. Police searched
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the house and cars on June fourth, about a week
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after Electric County grand jury indicted Miles. Warrants were served
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the same day for two cell phones, storage devices and
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peripherals associated with the phones. Another warrant was executed two
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days later for phone records of another number. Miles, sixty five,
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was indicted May twenty second and charged with murdering Roberts,
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who was found lying over the seat of her car
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at a cemetery on Bald Mountain Road at Callan. The
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two were cousins, and Miles called nine to one one
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and told he had found Roberts's body and attempted to
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help her before he realized she was dead. When police arrived,
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Roberts was sprawled faced down across the car seat and
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floorboard covered with blood. Roberts had been shot in the head,
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apparently while seated in the car. Police found a spent
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shell casing and bullet inside the vehicle, along with hares
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that did not appear to come from Roberts. Police served
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another search form at last fall for DNA from Miles
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to compare it to the hares found in the car. Roberts,
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who was fifty eight at the time of her death,
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had been very public about her efforts to find out
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who murdered her daughter, Patricia May Roberts Deathridge. Trish Deathridge, forty,
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was murdered sometime between July twenty seventh and July thirty first,
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twenty twenty three, near her home on Bald Mountain Road.
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Death Ridge's decomposing body was found over a hillside and
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tangled in vines near her home on July thirty first,
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twenty twenty three, and she was pronounced dead on August first,
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shortly after midnight. Roberts had told others that she had
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made a list of suspects and was eliminating them one
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by one to find out who shot her daughter. She
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posted on Facebook on March sixth, twenty twenty four, Trish
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Deathridge's birthday, asking that if anyone knew anything about her
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daughter's death to call her. Roberts was killed the following day.
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Roberts spoke to The Mountain Eagle the previous fall and
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said she had been gone on a trip and returned
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home to find her daughter missing. She was open about
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her daughter's drug use and said Deathridge had picked up
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pain medicine for her while Roberts was gone, and the
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pill bottle was missing from the trailer where Deathridge lived.
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She wondered if some of her old friends had taken it,
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and if one of them had killed her. The next
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story is more than forty nine years later, members of
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a mine rescue team remember working first to rescue then
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recover victims of Scotia blasts. By Brian D. Mc knight.
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In nineteen seventy one, the Westmoreland Coal Companies Virginia Division
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in Big Stone Gap established a mine rescue team, handing
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the responsibility over to Lewis Hennigar. Westmoreland was giving it
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to the right man. Hennigar came from Lynch, Kentucky, where
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he worked in the U. S Steel Mines and was
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a member of its mine rescue team. After a few
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years as a Virginia Mine inspector hennegar landed at Westmoreland,
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where he used his experience at U S Steel and
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his response to the Robina disaster in nineteen sixty two
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to build and train the teams. For five years, the
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two teams trained and competed in industry competitions, but that
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all changed in nineteen seventy six. On March ninth, Blue
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Diamond Coal's Scotia mine in oven Fork in Letcher County
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blew up with more than one hundred men underground at
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the time. Mine rescue teams from all over the area
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were called in to possibly go underground. First on the
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scene was nearby International Harvester from Benham in Harlan County,
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but Westmoreland's teams arrived soon after. They arrived amid a
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scene of confusion, with very little information available about what
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they would be facing underground. They had no idea if
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there was an active fire, the source of the explosion,
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or if the mine had collapsed. The best information came
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from a Scotia miner who had been about two thousand
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feet from the blast, and instead of retreating out of
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the mine, he went forward to see if he could
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help any survivors. John Hackworth ran into bad air within
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about four hundred feet of the working face and was
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forced back, but he was there to tell authorities what
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he witnessed. He continued to work throughout the night, taking
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materials underground to reventilate the mine, earning the respect and
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admiration of the rescue teams. With Federal mind inspectors managing
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the crisis, mine rescue teams went inside and began re
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establishing ventilation so that fresh air could be brought up
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to a point from which they could explore for bodies.
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With fifteen men now known to be missing and several
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hours having passed since the explosion, they expected the worst.
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At around ten pm, the Westmoreland teams were sent into
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the section where the men had been working and found
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the first body. Alan Wolfe remembered we were stepping on
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him before we saw him. David Breedlove said that after
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nearly fifty years, I don't see dead bodies anymore, but
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I still remember the one I saw at the beltthead.
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After reporting they had found someone, the teams were ordered
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out of the mine and sent to the surface. Replacing
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them were other mine rescue teams searching throughout the working
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section and locating twelve more bodies, including six who had
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survived the initial blast but suffocated in the toxic environment
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behind a ventilation curtain they used to build a makeshift barricade.
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About eight hundred feet straight ahead were the last two
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bodies killed in the immediate vicinity of an old locomotive.
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The locomotive had an air compressor on it to operate
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the brakes that through a visible spark when it kicked on,
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but no rescuers knew about that yet. Nearly sixty hours later,
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the west Moreland rescuers were home in bed when calls
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began to come in. Pug Smith woke up after midnight
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on March eleventh, nineteen seventy six, irritated. Despite what the
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mine rescue teams had done at Scotia, some company officials
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had complained that their response could have been faster to
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drill in the future. Smith could not believe that only
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two days later Westmoreland was calling them in during the night,
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But once he got to the mine in Appalachia, Virginia,
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he knew something else was going on. There was just
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too much activity for that time of the night. When
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the rescuers gathered at the training center, at andover Lewis
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Hennegard told them the same mine had blown up again.
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Now they were terrified. If the same mine had blown
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up a second time, there had to be an undiscovered
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ignition source, and now they were going to be sent
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back inside. Team members piled into whatever vehicles were available
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and started back across Black Mountain. When they arrived back
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at the Scotia mine, they learned that a crew of
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thirteen were underground at the time of the blast, and
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eleven were feared dead. Among them were eight Scotia miners
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and three federal mine inspectors. Two men had escaped because
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they had just climbed over a pile of rock and
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debris when the blast went off and were shielded by it.
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When federal authorities, all employees of the Mine Enforcement and
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Safety Administration MESA, arrived on the scene after the first
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explosion on March ninth, they took control of the mine.
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When it blew up the second time, it became mesa's
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crisis to handle again. Several mine rescue teams arrived, and
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two teams were sent in through the drift mouth the
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same route taken after the first blast to explore the
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mine was three and a half miles deep, and it
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quickly became obvious that rebuilding the ventilation to a point
23:39
where rescue teams could reach the bodies would take weeks.
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There had to be another way. In the previous year,
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Scotia had drilled a thirteen and one half foot concrete
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lined borehole three hundred seventy four feet deep into the
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mine at one of its furthest points. The idea was
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to eventually install an elevator, which would permit men on
24:01
the clock to get from the outside to the working
24:04
face much faster than going through the drift mouth, but
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in March nineteen seventy six it was just a hollow
24:11
tube providing additional ventilation. The Westmoreland teams were loaded on
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a bus and taken to Eolia, where they first saw
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the borehole and an old rickety crane holding a metal basket.
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Three at a time, the Westmoreland men were lowered down
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into the hole. Gerald Tate and J. R. Kimberland remembered
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that the crane was missing a tooth, so about every
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fifteen feet it would drop them just enough to scare
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them nearly to death. By the time both teams were
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at the bottom, they found another mine rescue team there
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to back them up, and a small collection of Federal inspectors.
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There were at least twenty people there, all of whom
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would have to come back up three at a time
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if something went wrong. Understanding they were simply there to
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find the bodies, map their location, and returned to the
25:00
base at the bottom of the hole, the teams took off,
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ultimately running a few hundred feet, tapping into a telephone line,
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and then running more until they arrived in the area
25:10
where they started finding the bodies. After mapping the bodies,
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the teams ran back to the base of the borehole.
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Once back at the borehole, they began the slow process
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of being lifted out of the mine with the crane
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and basket. Among the last three out were Wendell Collinsworth,
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Gerald Tait, and Pug Smith, who were surprised when Bill Clemens,
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the federal inspector who was in charge at Scotia during
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both crises, climbed in with them for the ride up.
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Initially worried about the crane's thin steel cable that separated
25:44
them from life and death, they soon realized Clemens was crying.
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He cried like a baby all the way up, one
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rescuer said. Two days later, Mesa now known as MSHA
25:58
decided to seal them and the bodies within it. This
26:03
was an agonizing decision since the families wanted to give
26:06
their loved ones proper burials. With the Farmington disaster in
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West Virginia only eight years earlier and dozens of bodies
26:14
still underground at the time, they worried they may never
26:17
get their family members back. The mine remained sealed until
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mid November two hundred forty three days after the second blast,
26:27
before it was reopened and the bodies finally removed. After
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all the dust settled. Twenty six men died in the
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two explosions. They left behind twenty five widows who joined
26:38
together in a lawsuit against Scotia and its owner, Blue
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Diamond Coal Company. After several years, the suits were settled
26:46
and most of the families received handsome settlements in the
26:49
form of lump sum payments for the widows and annuities
26:53
for the children. Many of the women invested their money
26:56
in businesses or went to college, and a few of
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them are still around the area. A few of them
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were not so lucky for various reasons. For Westmoreland's mine
27:07
rescue teams after sitting the next five years without a
27:10
single emergency, they worked the P and P explosion in
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Saint Charles, Virginia in nineteen seventy seven, the feral explosion
27:18
in Unita, West Virginia in nineteen eighty, and the South
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Mountain blast in Norton in nineteen ninety two. By then,
27:25
the Westmoreland mine rescue program was probably the most experienced
27:29
in the world regarding actual emergencies. The team's performance at
27:34
Scotia was a major reason why the Federal Mind Safety
27:37
and Health Act of nineteen seventy seven required all large
27:41
coal mines to have mine rescue teams. This concludes the
27:47
reading of The Mountain Eagle. Your reader has been billed
27:50
in Arsenal. Now please stay tuned for continuing programming on
27:55
behalf of everyone here at Radio I. Thank you for listening,
27:59
and have a good day. Eight