How to Rob a Bank

                            The homeplace on Anglin Branch



Once, a couple years back, during an early fall visit to my parents, we were sitting in the den just relaxing. It was a beautiful day and the sun shone brightly but the heat and humidity of summer were gradually being banished by Lady Fall.

We sat there for a while and then Dad said that if we were on Anglin Branch in Kentucky back in about the forties on a day like today, we would probably be out digging coal from a coal bank for the coming winter. Well, that piqued my interest and I found myself giving him the third degree!

Dad says that there were several little seams of coal on their property on Anglin, as there were on many farms in that area of Kentucky. Grandpa and Grandma Smith’s neighbor Levi Allen had a pretty good size coal seam on his land.

Grandpa and Levi used to dig coal together before the boys grew up and were big enough to help. Dad says that he can’t remember it, but he imagines that Grandpa and his older brother Dale would probably dig coal together when Dale got old enough.

Later, when Wallace and Dad got old enough, they would go out together and dig the coal. At that time, Grandpa would let them dig the coal and he would concentrate on other chores.

            Dad and Uncle Wallace have been "partners in crime"

since they were young boys. They are still best buds.

Of course, I was interested in exactly how they mined their coal. Dad says that the seams they worked were up the holler behind the barn. Wallace and he would drill a proper sized hole in the seam. Then they would then take pages from a Sears and Roebuck catalog and roll them into tubes. Dad rolled up a piece of paper until it formed a tube about the size of a silver dollar to demonstrate what he meant. He said that they would crimp one end of their tube and fill it to close to the top with black powder from a keg of powder they kept and place a long fuse in it before crimping the top end closed. They would then use a stick to force the tube back into the hole they had drilled into the hillside, being careful that the fuse led to outside the hole. Next, they would make some dirt dummies from similar tubes filled with dirt and they would push enough of these dirt dummies into the hole to plug it up. Dad says that they would then light the fuse and run for their lives!

            The coal banks were up on the hillside behind the barns.


Now, the resulting blast would not result in a neat pile of coal chunks. It would only serve to loosen up the coal in the seam. The boys would then use picks to break out the coal. They would load these chunks into a small sled. When this small sled was full, they would pull it over and dump it out into a larger sled.

The boys would continue this process over and over. Gradually, they would work themselves back into the hillside about fifteen feet or so. They had carbide lanterns to use as they worked deeper into the seam and they would use wood beams to shore up the hillside overhead as they went deeper and deeper.

After they had blasted and dug enough coal, they would pull the small sled back into the hillside, load it, and then pull it out. They would then dump the small sled and continue working.

When the big sled was full, two mules would pull the larger sled down to the coal pile close to the house. It would be transferred to the pile and returned to the holler for another load of coal.

Dad says that he reckons that a ton of coal would last them the winter. He figures that it would take five or six of the larger sleds to make a ton.

Dad could not remember exactly how long it took him and Wallace to get enough coal for the winter. He said they would start after the crops were laid by and they would usually be done by the time the weather started getting cold, so at least a few months.

Right about the time Dad and Wallace left home, Grandpa started ordering his coal from a little “one-man” operation somewhere around Manchester. As best as Dad can recall, a ton of coal delivered would cost Grandpa about thirty-five dollars. I don’t believe that Grandpa and Grandma had much money, but it sounds to me like that was thirty-five dollars well spent!