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News :: Children : Civil & Human Rights : Environment : Protest Activity
Ed Wiley could kick Chuck Norris' Ass (for the kids)
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Date Created
- 24 Aug 2006
Date Edited
- 24 Aug 2006 01:09:14 PM
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This work is in the public domain.
Grandfather Ed Wiley is currently walking from Charleston, WV to Washington DC to raise funds and awareness to build a new school for the kids of Marsh Fork Elementary in their community. The school sits right beside a coal processing plant and 2.8 billion gallon leaking sludge dam. Ed will arrive after in Washington DC at the end of his 40 day trek on September 12 and he invites all to walk with him. Visit www.PenniesOfPromise.org
 Grandfather Ed Wiley is no traditional environmentalist, child rights advocate, or political activist. His history and his heritage run deep into the coal encrusted veins of the Appalachian Mountains. Ed Wiley has never fought sludge impoundments. He has built them. He has never boycotted coal. He has extracted it. He worked in processing plants just like the one less than a football field from Marsh Fork Elementary School, in Sundial, WV - full of enormous clanging machinery, explosive gases, and chemically treated coal dust.  He helped build the 2.8 billion gallon sludge impoundment directly above Marsh Fork Elementary School where his 11-year old granddaughter goes to school and is poisoned everyday by those same chemicals. Now this man is spending his retirement walking 455 miles over 40 days and nights in the heat of summer! Why?… Ed attributes his "wake-up" to his 11-year-old granddaughter Kayla, who attends Marsh Fork Elementary. After having to pick up the perfectly healthy and enthused child from school three days in a row, color-drained from her skin, Ed asked Kayla (who he affectionately calls "Possum") what was going on. He puts it as follows.
WELCOME TO MARSH FORK ELEMENTARY (small building with lawn, lower left.) If that man-made dam broke (and its had NUMEROUS violations) those children would have 17 seconds to live.  Behind the dam there is 2.8 billion gallons of toxic sludge. Behind that theres a 1849 acre Mountaintop Removal site that's growing in size and waste output. These children deserve a new, safe, local place to learn! The runoff from the site flows into the sludge dam. The Mine Safety and Health Administration has cited the dam repeatedly for violations in its construction and maintenance. In 2000, a sludge dam in Kentucky, operated by the same company, released over 300 million gallons of sludge in what the EPA called the worst environmental disaster in the Southeast. The spill was nearly 30 times the volume of the Exxon Valdez oil tanker spill. These children deserve a new, safe, local place to learn!  There is a coal silo less than 300 feet from Marsh Fork Elementary School. That's illegal. The silo houses tons and tons of toxic chemically treated coal dust. Ever heard of black lung disease? Well, nowadays you don't have to go into the coal mines to breathe coal dust and get black lung disease. You just have to go to class.
According to Ed Wiley, "15-20 kids leave each day" because they are sick from the coal dust they are inhaling. These children deserve a new, safe, local place to learn! For over TWO YEARS the children of this community have been insulted, ignored, and brushed aside by big coal interests and the government of West Virginia! Now, Grandfather Ed Wiley is taking a radical step. He is taking the voice of the people of the West Virginia Coal Fields straight on out of the hollow, straight on out of the county, on passed the West Virginia border, and all the way to Washington, DC! The conventional wisdom in WV is that people CAN'T make a difference…and thats where we come in. Ed needs your support! Today, he passed 100 miles. There is no dobut that the man is in fit enough physical shape to finish the walk well ahead of his exhausted teenage support team. SCREW CHUCK NORRIS! Here's a real American hero. The trip has been an amazing success, Pennies of Promise has a short video of Ed talking about the trip, as well as coverage of Day 1 of the walk, and a newly created second videoof the trip.  So, how did it get to be this way? So that grandfathers were walking 100s of miles to raise awareness because the state was ignoring the fact that coal poisoning their kids and grandkids? I think of the modern American fixation on oil as a similar situation. Democratic Senators Byrd and Rockerfeller of West Virginia are good on almost everything, but remain deep in the pockets of the coal companies. Local and state officials are the same way. Coal Company "X" can poor millions and millions of dollars into a race for school board if they have to. West Virginia, because of its geographic makeup (mountains and "hollows") is also very difficult to organize. Some of the most amazing labor battles in American history - such as The Battle of Blair Mountain - took place in the coal fields of Southern West Virginia. The Battle of Blair Mountain remains the largest post civil war battle in American history. Needless to say, the unionizing miners lost at Blair Mountain to a federal militia, and the only bombs America has ever dropped on its own soil out of airplanes. Over 200 years of company towns, violence, union-busting, and exploitation by the coal companies, the people of West Virginia expect nothing else but the shit end of the stick time and time again. And that's what they get! 51-54% of America's electric energy comes from coal, and yet the coalfield counties are some of the poorest counties in the United States of America. Ed worked on these sites. He has cleaned up spills. He has pumped sludge around the impoundment to relieve pressure on the violation stricken dam. And now…he has to spend his retirement WALKING ACROSS AMERICA SO THAT HIS GRANDAUGHTER ISNT POISONED AT SCHOOL?!?! MY grandfather would be HUMILIATED if he had to do something like that!!! And yet - heres Ed, carrying an 8x4 ft flag and standind out like a flower in a desert… 
Support Ed and keep up with his progress at www.PenniesOfPromise.org (Thanks to the Daily Kos) |
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