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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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072489
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07248900.011
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1990-09-17
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BUSINESS, Page 41Business NotesCOAL STRIKEFirst the Calm, Now the Storm
The 14-week-old strike by 1,900 mine workers against Pittston
Coal in Virginia, West Virginia and Kentucky began as a model of
genteel labor relations, with strikers staging peaceful sit-ins and
picketing politely. But last week the increasingly bitter standoff,
which has grown to include more than 37,000 wildcat strikers
throughout coal country, turned into an old-fashioned, ugly war.
A car bomb exploded at a Virginia coal company, and strikers hurled
rocks at coal-carrying trucks near the entrance to Sydney Coal in
Kentucky.
In West Virginia, where battles have been especially fierce,
nearly 300 strikers were arrested for blocking thre road to a
nonunion mine. Two employees at Hampden Coal were hit by shotgun
pellets. Said a spokesman for A.T. Massey Coal: "There is a total
state of chaos. The state (of West Virginia) is out of control."
Mining-company executives have urtged West Virginia Governor Gaston
Caperton to call out the National Guard, which he has so far
refused to do.
The battles erupted during a weeklong work stoppage that was
authorized by the United Mine Workers. Richard Trumka, president
of wthe U.M.W., said he ordered the shutdown in order to "calm the
volatile situation." When miners return to work this week, tensions
will be high. Trumka has accepted an invitation for the U.M.W. to
return to the negotiating table, but Pittston has not yet commented
on the proposal.