Coal mining has been the subject of many terrible films but the reality was a far cry from the likes of “Brass Man: The untapped story”, “Kes 2: Kestrel in the city” or “Jozza Jones’ big day out”. In fact it may shock you to learn that rather than going into alternative careers with hilarious results most miners just died of shame. (coal dust related lung disease.)
Even before the times of turmoil the life of a miner was not all honey and roses. Mining was a dangerous business especially before the invention of the wooden pit prop. In those days men called “bagsleys” were employed to hold up the pit on their backs. It was tiring work and an untied shoelace could lead to untold disasters. Many was the time the call came out “the bagsleys gone to sleep and so has the workers” meaning that they had gone to sleep underneath lots of rubble i.e. died. Thankfully bagsleying was finally outlawed by the Eu on account of it really not being possible to a man to hold up the earth unless that man was Atlas and he had enough problems. In some parts of the world bagsleying still goes on, mostly in exploitative diamond mines but people don’t care so much about that because having something that looks nice in a ring is more important that turning the cogs of industry with steam power.
The mining man also had to be wary of brushing up against his friend in the dark. It’s hard to see underground due to the lack of solar rays and you didn’t want to be accused of fondling for the other team when the coal face you started working on turned out to be the next mans prized leek. Especially as in those days that kind of behaviour was punishable by putting you in prison with lots of men. Eventually a young boy tired of the constant special miscalculations of his uncle invented night vision goggles as a way of seeing in the gloom. That boys name was “Nicholas Night Vision” and for the first time the men of the mine were able to tell what was coal and what was mere bottle caps. What they weren’t able to see was that his uncle continued to advance on the young boy, luckily child abuse hadn’t been invented so it wasn’t a problem.
Another essential piece of equipment for the proud men of the digging industry was the pick axe or “Paxus” used to dig into the earth. In those days men had to provide their own work tools, so often instead of the metal tools we use today they would bring picks that had been knitted by their wives or broken bottles from the local pub. Even worse if anyone forgot their pick or it broke on a particularly hard piece of coal they would have to dig with their hands like a mole man until they could afford to replace it. One miner renowned for his thriftiness became known as “Shovel hands” because he refused to buy any digging equipment. Eventually his hands went into the shape of shovels mainly because of all the clawing at the rock face but also because he lost his hands in a digging accident and had them replaced with shovels. (because shovels were cheaper than bionic arms)
Shovel hands eventually learned the error of his ways when he was visited by three ghosts and used his shovel hands to clear snow out of the road so that the Christmas presents could be delivered to the orphanage. As Shovel Hands himself says “Merry Shovel-fest everyone.”
Another famous (or should I say infamous!?) miner was “Hog Holston” who was famous for being the world’s largest tunnel dwelling mammal. More often than not Hog would get himself stuck in a shaft by eating too much coal and would have to be dragged out by pit ponies. Needles to say the mine bosses had to dock his pay for use of the ponies as well as for all the coal he had eaten. It might seem unusual for a man to eat coal but in those days people often had to top up their meagre diets with fossil fuels. A popular meal at the time was Gronk Cake – a baked bread type food made from flour, salt and petrol. People would also go swimming in the North Sea to try and inhale the North Sea gas. This became so popular that the government had to make a special warning poster “North Sea – Not Be!” as people kept dying from hyperthermia and the corpses were clogging up the propellers of fancy steam ships.
Despite these hardships the mine men still look back with fondness to the times when “Coal was king and mining was mega”. For one thing even the most slow witted of knaves could get themselves a well-paying job pushing around the coal carts and after work they had all the fun of communal showers. Former mine-mongers will often get together and share a shower for old time’s sake, two former colleagues from the Gragglesthwaite colliery even took to living together and sharing a shower every day. The mysterious thing is that they weren’t even miners!
The tunnel people also have fond memories of the constant brass bands that would play, even at the risk of caving in the tunnels with loud trombone vibrations. Each mine had a brass sections whose job it was to play contemporary tunes to make the miners dig faster. This tradition was started by an innovative mine boss who would wander around his mine with a brass claw dealing out punishments to those that weren’t working fast enough. This practice was eventually banned by the EU due to harsh conditions in the brass industry and that is where we get the term “brass banned” which was later shortened to brass band during the war because of ink rationing. (The allies were saving as much ink as possible to put into a giant robot squid that had been built to fight U-boats. Unfortunately it went wrong and most of Berwick was destroyed.)
Like all good things the work of the mine men had to end, eventually they were all dragged back to the surface to live with their ugly wives and children. Coal was made obsolete by the invention of tesla coils and the pits were closed down. Entire towns of men became unemployed with protestations of “Ah dunt know wat ta dae, I dinnae have de no oover skills.” This was dismissed as sheer laziness on the part of the miners there were lots of other digging related jobs available.
· Diamond Miner
· Grave Digger
· Man in the army that buries landmines
· Pirate
· Gold Miner
· Snow Shoveler
· Badger Baiter
· Salt Miner
· Hitting people over head with shovel for money
· Morlock
Thus the time of the coal-getter came to a close, but the work of those stout hard working fellows will live on through former mines becoming museums about mining. They will also live on through this short play I have written entitled “Coal: the Hardworking Lads”
Act 1/Scene 1 – Down the Pits
Three miners Henk, Loggins and Castor are working in the mine. (It is not actually a mine but a stage made to look like a mine through use of black crepe paper)
Henk: “Cor-eck ees t’ard work doon yon pit und nay mis-teek.”
Loggins: “Aye lad tis hard graft but honest. Meks this strong lark Ox, none ov this paper pushing fer us.”
Henk: “Aye und eets hall us northern men cin be deein, taint nay need fur aspirations rund these parts.”
Loggins: “Oor kid Belmont went on ‘avin aspirations to work ont’ gas boored ant look wier that git im.”
Henk: “Nar whier that’s wier!”
Loggins: “Like mi dad said…ee said ‘Son t’only graft rarnd ere is coal graft’”
Henk: “That dunt want ideas above tha’ steation!”
Loggins+Henk: “Cos that nowt a’bo station bit moore coil!”
Castor: “Hello chaps. It’s my first day down the mines and let me tell you it’s no picnic.”
Henk: “Wha dunt that belay that talk,”
Loggins: “Yeah, thas nowt better un digging ard graft fur a living. Mebbies tha does less martfin off and tha’ll get moor diggin’ dun!”
Castor: “But don’t you find all this digging a little…dreary. Don’t you men dream of anything other than coal?”
Loggins: “Whats that toorkin’ abart. Taint nowt better than coil and if there wa it wunt be fur larks of us.”
Henk: “Aye ooh does thee think thy is tarkin boot not geeing darn marns – Dickie Bird!?”
Castor: “But my friends. Don’t you want to see life beyond the coal hole? There’s a whole world out there just begging to be explored!”
Henk: “Thas’ livin in’t clard cuckoo land. All theer is in larf is graft ant gooin darn pub ‘t weerkend.”
Loggins: “Ees not wrong. Yung un. Ah once went ont ‘t self catering olliday ‘t magaluf and it wah no great shakes. Tha cudn’t get ah decent Sunday roast nae ware ant all prices wer in ‘t euro!”
Henk: “T’euro! Dunt meck me laugh. Arr can it be legal if it dunt ‘ave queen on it.”
Loggins: “Aye its cos of dat Euro that we can’t ‘ave dangerous working conditions no moor!”
Henk: “Aye, mi old man wor int Vietnam an’ tha dint ere nowt bout elf and safety back then!”
Castor: “Well you do make a convincing argument. I suppose I should resign myself to a pointless life of mine based drudgery.”
Henk: “Good lad, nar lets get some serious digging done”
Mine Owner Bill Tannen enters
Bill: “Sorry lads there nay moore work, mines av bin closed by Thatcher”
Henk, Loggins and Castor: “Grooo!”
-Fin-
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