Service honors miners lost in explosion
CARMICHAELS – On Dec. 6, 1962, 19 days before Christmas, 37 miners lost their lives as a result of two explosions at the Robena No. 3 Mine in Carmichaels. Forty-seven years later, a crowd of more than 100 braved the bitter cold Sunday to fulfill the United Mine Workers of America’s (UMWA) promise to never forget the men, and the families of the men, who never returned home. The crowd of the victims’ family members, UMWA members and local politicians, bowed their heads as the names echoed through the cold silence.
“Forty-seven years now, another union president will stand here and honor the men who lost their lives,” said Cecil Roberts, international president of the UMWA. “We will never let people forget how much we loved them and cared about them, and we will never forget.”
Roberts said 109 children grew up without a father as a result of the tragic event, and hundreds of grandchildren and great-grandchildren never knew their grandfathers.
“These men were all someone’s son, father or friend,” he said. “They were members of the community.”
Five wreaths were placed in front of the Robena Mine Memorial, and the Masontown Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 4584 gave the miners a rifle salute.
Even though the miners never returned home for Christmas, Roberts said that their sacrifice, along with the sacrifice of miners throughout the country, was what led to stricter mine safety and health laws. Those laws, Roberts added, are responsible for saving at least 9,000 lives.
Last week, Roberts attended a memorial in Farmington, W.Va., to pay his respects to the 78 miners who were killed in a mine explosion at the Consol No. 9 mine in November 1968. Roberts will visit Utah next week to honor 27 miners who were killed in the Wilberg Mine fire in December 1984.
Roberts said that unfortunately many memorials, like the Robena Memorial Service, are held across the country, but they serve as a reminder to the UMWA to continue to fight for mine safety and health laws, and the strict enforcement of those laws.
“We have to be forever vigilant + Enforcement of laws saves lives,” he said.
Gerald Abbott, a miner and president of the local union at Emerald 2258, remembers the 1962 explosion. Abbott was in school when the miners were killed, and he knew some of the miners and the families of the miners who died. He said the UMWA worked to pass state and federal laws to ensure mine safety.
“(Mining) is a way of life for us,” Abbott said. “It’s what we were trained to do.”
He added that he makes sure that his company follows mine safety laws.
“We are standing here in the cold on this December day, 47 years later, to remember these miners,” Roberts said. “We will never forget.”
Although Richard Trumka, president of the American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations, was scheduled to speak at the memorial service, Roberts said he was unable to attend, because his mother fell ill.
He asked that those in attendance pray for Trumka and his family.