Movie 'Matewan' captured early time of miners | GOOD MORNING COLUMN

Garret Mathews

I watched the movie "Matewan" the other day. As always, when I see the 1987 flick about the dangers of joining a labor union in 1920 deep in the southern West Virginia coalfields, I want to kick myself in the hind parts.

Much of the movie was shot in Thurmond, a ghost town about 75 minutes from the newspaper where I was working. Filming went on for several months, and a guy I know had a role as an extra.

But I never went to the set, totally missing the chance to watch movie types about as far away from Hollywood as you can get.

The reason was because my ignorant self thought it would be an insignificant "B" picture that would only be seen by drive-in devotees.

I looked at the list of leading characters. Chris Cooper. Will Oldham. David Strathairn. Mary McDonnell. Who are these people?

The director was a fellow named John Sayles. I had never heard of him, either.

Cooper has gone on to star in "American Beauty," "October Sky" and "The Patriot."

A year after "Matewan," Sayles directed "Eight Men Out," the story of the Chicago White Sox scandal in 1919. He's also worked on films such as "Passion Fish" and "Lone Star" that were well-received.

I heartily recommend "Matewan," especially to those who don't know much about the history of the labor movement in the Appalachian Mountains. Sayles and his mates did an excellent job of storytelling without allowing the characters to degenerate into caricatures.

In those days, miners lived in company-owned housing and were paid in scrip that could only be redeemed at the company store. If a man lost his job, his family's meager possessions would be thrown in a pile, and he'd be told to get on down the road.

In the mid-1970s, I interviewed an old-timer who helped organize the mines. He told me about employees of the infamous Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency who were hired by mine owners to squelch any efforts to vote in the United Mine Workers.

The man told me it wasn't uncommon for the agents to burn down buildings where secret organizing meetings were held. If a miner was even suspected of attending such a confab, he could be immediately axed from the payroll.

For the powerless rank-and-file, it was, as the narrator says in the beginning of the movie: "Times were rough."

— Garret Mathews

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