An hour with Cynthia Carroll

she's been named the fifth most powerful woman in the world by forbes magazine fortune magazine ranked her number one on their international our fifth the anti mcentire and today on k pr present we'll hear from university of kansas graduate cynthia carol carol is the ceo of anglo american a british mining company that's the largest producer of platinum in the world to see the first one then and the first now and felt africa and to lead anglo american the mining giant founded in nineteen seventeen by ernest oppenheimer that as interest and platinum whole gold diamond is an industrial mineral is my training carroll is a petroleum geologist who earned a masters in geology from the university of kansas in nineteen eighty three thousand a professor museum of art finland for now fear if india can it really is a great pleasure to be with all of you today and i'm so pleased to revisit this campus and be

reminded again of how much i profited by the two three years here at graduate school where i spent at the outstanding department of geology increasingly an interesting way this is my first visit to the us in the end of the elections i have had a huge interest in and the outcome isn't sure all of you have and it's clearly an exciting time to be back in the country and i'm proud to be an american when the world is seeing us with new laws and with renewed hope i've been invited to speak you on the subject of corporate responsibility and to share with you some of the lessons we at anglo american and learned in dealing with this pressing issue but first of all what is this company of ours what is anglo american with a half american name that probably most of you have never heard of all the name first it was founded in nineteen seventeen in johannesburg as anglo american corporation of south

africa it start up capital was forced from britain the united states and south africa hence its name the company grew to be the biggest in africa and outside of the oil gas sector we are really investors today were one of the world's major mining companies and our position in the top twenty of the london stock exchange for two years one hundred index we do have a presence of the tents were mentioned in forty five countries stretching from alaska to australia from chideya to china and we are actively prospecting in about twenty five countries our group is by some measure the largest and platinum where we hold about a forty percent market share and you're so sick company de beers were also the largest shareholder and producer of diamonds were aligned and we have significant and growing

position and copper and iron ore and nickel and coal and we had one of the strongest pipelines in the world we employ about a hundred ninety thousand people worldwide and today women represent about one in five of our workforce a number that is increasing at all levels of the organization all of that makes us a truly multinational multi cultural and multi lane will company a company like ours working an extract of industries and operating other countries we do constantly face a situation which demand that we take a stand on difficult issues and it would be disingenuous of the decline that during the course of our ninety one year history we always made the right decisions we accept our mistakes and we also accept the burden of responsibility that weighs on us today to make a good corporate citizen indeed one of the things that has

struck me in my twenty months of their more months at the home of the company is the extent to which the people you work for an american demand that we make a difference to the societies of which we are a part where we can we use our size and we use our influence to leverage for positive change so let me give you some examples in the struggle of black south africans to transform their country politically socially and economically we funded the official opposition in parliament we led the first business delegation to meet with the anc with the african national congress in exile and we were the first major company to recognize black trade unions it is my ambition to leave the anglo american to be the world's leading global mining company and i am determined that we achieve this goal but i'm equally determined that we do so as a partner

as investor and as the employer of tours in the countries in which we operate and firmly supporting the growth and the development of our host societies is not corporate window dressing but a precondition to achieving our ambition our long history has taught us many last and in the area of corporate social responsibility and i would like to share a few with you now the founder of the anglo american sermons oppenheimer stated in nineteen fifty four years between before the term corporate social responsibility became fashionable the aim of this group is and will remain to make profits for shareholders but to do so in such a way as to make a real and lasting contribution to the communities in which we operate sir ernest oppenheimer clearly saw that without an underpinning of trust says saudis are dysfunctional without was we have little prospects of

success as those who work in the diamond industry will tell you big deals in the diamond industry are still sealed on a handshake and establishing a trusting relationship however is easier said than done there's no shortage of surveys showing the multinational companies ripe low in public regard somewhere just about politicians and well below college professors and international mining companies have also been seen as some of the worst offenders the image of mining as a dirty and a dangerous poses with mining companies going into host country's depleting their resources and then shipping out raw materials without adding any downstream guy who maybe something of a caricature nonetheless it is a widely held perception and one and that is being brought into sharp and focused by heightened expectations of what the

mining industry should be contributing to wider society the truth is the really the extract of sector is the antithesis a poet with capitalism despite what some people believed responsible mining companies do not work in places where governments are we a mine can take up to ten years at least to come into production and he remained in operation for fifty years or more and so we have a vested interest in the stability and the prosperity of our hosts of friday's long term investors like mining companies depend upon reaching an enduring accommodation across the spectrum of shareholders for their continuing license to operate and companies such as ours need to work with both governments at all levels as we're doing and are copper project secure veco and shaky i improve in order to come up with ways to use infrastructure for wider social development rather

than to serving the needs of one mind or one single plant but the question we as a global community was about answer is to pay for these improvements the mining industry is expected to create jobs to pay their taxes provided physical infrastructures such as road such as rare ways such as houses electricity water and sanitation and even downstream to so they said to smelters but the conundrum it's the most easily accessible the high grade surface and near surface deposits have already been discovered and depleted which is forcing mining companies out to seek resources and less developed areas of the world where there is an even greater need to contribute to the development of infrastructure all of which come at a considerable backstroke extra financial cost in return the industry expects transparency and consistency in its licensing regulatory

impermanent regimes we need sensible labor regulations and consistent standards and require an enabling environment that encourages investment for the long term and i believe that the only way to answer this question is through open dialogue and sustainable partnerships with governments with communities with suppliers with customers with resorts resource companies with ad agencies and ngos and all these aspects are being brought into sharp focus in our plant copper projects at pebble in alaska or we are co owners with our partner northern dynasty we're seeking to build a mine in the bristol bay and pebble beach area which is the center of the world's largest salmon population and i'd been there to see firsthand how the prospect of mining a pebble has aroused huge opposition among commercial salmon fisherman sports fisherman and environmentalists and at the same time income deprived from

salmon fishing is in steep decline and job opportunities in the area are extremely low i wasn't listed the aid of the well respected keystone center as an intermediary to help was all the problems with the understanding that if they cannot be resolved to the satisfaction of the community we will not develop them on we will not proceed if you're not welcome we will go high standards of corporate responsibility are essential to earning trust and in this respect and bo has joined with various organizations in supporting agreements which define good corporate responsibility practices around issues such as trust transparency and accountability always keeping him on human rights for example we're the first company to join a number of governments and international institutions and pledging financial support for the

investment climate facility of africa which promotes the establishment and growth of new and existing businesses were also leading supporters of the extract of industry transparency initiative which is making it much more difficult for revenues from the resources industry to be in bottles by elites it also creates a framework for a much better informed debate about the uses to which time limited resource revenues are port and this initiative is now being implemented in twenty five countries and gives hope that governance is moving in the right direction and the mining and oil and gas revenues benefit development and poverty alleviation and certainly one of the underpinnings of trust have to be safety and that was called into question early on in my tenure in anglo when the head of the platinum mining company reporting

toomey came to me to tell me about the twenty nine fatalities that occurred in the year in the past such that you always had been regarded as inevitable something which i found to be deeply troubling and the news of still another doubt i found to be totally unacceptable and that led to our immediate closing of the operations of the twenty eight thousand employees could undergo new safety training they were brought up from underground and ultimately the closing of the mine shaft of or purify weeks at a huge cost to anglo with the result but word spread throughout the company iraq our organization globally and safety and troughs work everywhere reinforced in addition to our own internal summit's in april the sheer we took the initiative to convene a tribe to part ain't safety summit with representatives of the south african government the labor movement and the

major mining companies to try to achieve a lasting breakthrough in improving safety performance across the mining sector which employs around a million people by way of father we've recently taken trade union representatives leaders to look at but the fifty best practices and several mining operations around the world in ireland in oman in brazil and chile and australia and in south africa turning to the subject of engagement communities coming back to the issue of pavel communities like those in pebble in alaska are rightly assertive about issues such as environment protection livelihoods in sustainability opposition campaign groups are often deeply engaged and they're well funded and they're highly motivated and media savvy and strengthened by the internet's ability to disseminate information instantaneously they represent a powerful combination we cannot undo not return

to ignore multinational companies therefore are constantly rethinking the nature of their relationships with the local communities the priority the day is very much on seeking to work with them in an open way to reduce any harmful impacts and maximize the developmental benefits of our operations the mining sector has made big strides in improving its environmental performance of the past twenty years and a similar step change is now occurring in the social sphere or a lot with skills or sensitivity the mining industry has in particular not always been good at managing the extensive indirect impact of its operations on some of the communities around us if we open a new mine in a poor area we know from experience that this may trigger trigger massive immigration by people looking for economic opportunity their arrival will hatch huge implications for those already living there in terms of competition for land for resources and

services and i cannot take so we cannot take so responsibly for such population movements but we have to be part of devising solutions and one of the ways our own group justices through an innovative structured procedure we designed to facilitate with stakeholders a better understanding of local priorities this unique community engagement and involvement to watch which is now taught is now taught in business schools throughout the country as both a sustainable development initiative and as an example of corporate innovation it allows our operations to target their social and economic contributions with precision to increase community self sufficiency it's been praised by the world bank the one world trust and by the us base and geo business for social responsibility and a case where trucks could have been truly imperative place in south africa where local community lived and

graze their livestock in the path of the mine expansion being planned by anglo platinum and certainly those people would be expected to vehemently oppose being upgraded in the face of those arts and after years of consultation with the community and world found an alternative area better suited much better suited to them build a new village for them including houses and education training and health care facilities and were able to successfully resettle them and there's still resistance from a small minority was addressed through negotiation peace with maintain and trust or certainly a spouse our group has also been in the forefront in the creation of emerging businesses and since the late nineteen eighties we've been working to ensure that economic opportunity underpin political change in south africa into thousand seven are black economic empowerment initiative formed to

find and develop business opportunity for black south africans support in excess of two billion dollars in transactions and indeed no other company has undertaken comparable transactions on such a wide front and in such a short period of time at the small business of all the end of the scale and was the melody which facilitates entree for emerging black businesses into the country's economic mainstream for two decades says union has pioneered small business development in south africa are creating real jobs to the creation of real opportunities in the real economy and during two thousand eight we have scaled up the work of an old somali through establishing a levin small business hubs in mining communities which is working to create about two hundred new enterprises a year i'm not

aware of any other mining company in the world during its and many aspects of the angles and the late model now have been extended to chile to brazil and we're now looking at a room and i briefly one imagine your work in the h iv aids field in the mid nineteen eighties and south africa anglo american was a pioneer in that fight against the disease and we now have the world's biggest workplace voluntary counseling and testing and enter of operative of treatment program in the industry well over fifty thousand of our employees have been tested with a pretty surprising rate of more than seventy percent and our program which is now being extended to dependence to families is making a real difference by prolonging the laws of affected employees were able to continue with normal jobs support their families and actively contribute to the country's economy

i should also like to touch on what we are doing in the area of education and skills development for example we haven't ours and training program in place to bring you zimbabweans down to south africa and five year contracts and today we have an agreement with the south african government where we have a two to one training program once i'm bob lande to two south africans with the intention of repatriating those the bubbly and win in the longer term we have a mining operation operating in zimbabwe in addition at any given time we have around two thousand apprenticeships in anglo that we support and we approach about six hundred people with scholarships annually educational scholarships in addition in south africa they're eleven national languages official line which is we have the issue of people being able to convey communicate from one to the other is

last year we invested twenty million dollars to develop a literacy training center to support the literacy training of about two thousand people annually in the wider society for many years our chairman's fine has been acknowledged the leader in the field of corporate social investment in south africa it is funded the building to more than a thousand classrooms last week the fine was voted best corporate grant maker for the eight year in a row this is an astonishing achievement but let me turn now to a commodity that is fundamental to our business water many of our facilities operate in extremely arid areas mainly in the southern hemisphere where there is inevitably competition with other users and industries anglo american is therefore committed to minimizing water use and to

reusing and recycling the water we do use our ultimate goal is zero discharge we've invested in it forty two million dollar water recycling plant in south africa's would pay back old field just last year this plant now is converting billions of gallons of water from underground coal mines into clean drinking water and serve around eighty thousand people on a daily basis insulate the expansion at our most process copper mine is being undertaken on the basis that we will reduce the use of freshwater by forty percent per ton of copper produced also intruding your arm wanted that that very day mind we provided ms traps in the attic and the desert to supply water for local farms and over the border in peru we provided to farmers there are key of veco copper projects with training and the use of drip irrigation systems allowing them to reduce their

use of water by twenty percent moving on to the subject of climate change today the demand for cleaner mining is being accompanied by a search of cleaner products we fully recognize that as a major coal producer and a major energy user we must look at how we can play our part in finding solutions to climate change so what we at anglo american doing to help the world go cleaner well the major platinum group metals platinum itself lillian and rhodium that we produce our essential components in on a catalyst for both diesel and gas powered vehicles we're also closely involved in research to study the role of platinum and a cleaner energy next especially in fuel cell technology and we're playing our part in making coal cleaner in our coal mines in australia we're capturing methane gas from underground seems that would have been released into the atmosphere and selling it to power

stations to generate electricity the greenhouse gas savings from this initiative or equivalent to taking three hundred and seventy five thousand cars off the road and another project underway in northern queensland will remove the equivalent of an additional three hundred thousand vehicles currently we're also engage in research with various partners including shell on projects related to integrated carbon capture and storage the feasibility of converting coal to liquids and in taking forward clean development mechanism and here in the us we are partners with the us department of energy to build the world's first year zero emissions coal fueled power plant at a site in illinois and we hope that this venture put on the back burner by the president ministration will be a revival was under the new one had to say it

yeah especially a president from illinois couldn't hear some people talk about the resource curse that prevented a number of resource rich countries from converting their natural wealth into lasting economic development and human progress the success stories of mineral rich countries like chile the world's leading copper producer and botswana the producers on the world's best diamonds demonstrate that the real problem is not the existence of the resources or rather the absence of good national governance and it's virtually impossible to achieve good development outcomes were there is poor governance as it is evidence in several mineral rich countries around the globe we take a reverse story as exemplified by the democratic republic of the congo drc this is a vast country a partially one third of the size of the entire united

states and it is in doubt was some of the richest mineral resources in the world yet it is mired in predatory incursions from outside its borders endless warring factions within different tribal loyalties and many different tribal languages of government duly elected but threaten of overthrow by the rebel opposition infrastructure crumbling education in some places non existent and people everywhere and abject poverty and we'll have a small office in the capital of kinshasa and in exploration presence in the country but no mind in operation and it would be a long time to come so in conclusion i hope by given you encouragement to take a fresh look at the mining industry and how it is contributing toward polling more prosperous and more enduring

societies in the places where it house operation the developing world needs minerals and medals in order to meet the aspirations of billions of mining and its related activities have to be carried out in a way that is responsible and sustainable always with a view to such issues as heightened government and community expectations climate change water availability and respect for human rights and our license to operate and are legit is legitimacy crucially the pan upon the degree to which we continue to come man trust and command confidence and in our own group we strive to do that by ensuring that our local impacts are strongly positive and that we are accountable for them and all these things are at the heart of corporate responsibility and i trust that what i've said today gives you confidence than anglo american is not only playing as part

of his up there with the very vast as a leader in the industry you're listening to simply eight year old ceo of the mining company anglo american have a fair amount of questions on the first question you've talked about the investment the anglo american maids in the regions where you did business what percentage of your annual profits do you set aside for development we we actually don't designate on any at our budgeting year or a specific amount on hand it changes from erie or i think that two years ago about fifty million on last year it grows even further as i mentioned we've supported the bead deals in south africa to the tune of two billion dollars on it i never put a cap on it but i also have never put a minimal amount om you know it is dependent upon what we can do

on and what makes sense and i'm so there there is not a women's arm nevada where were operating the second question from the audience commodities have really drop in prices even with anglo american how are you preparing yourself for a recession and how do you think it's going to last well i was asked this a little bit earlier and my answer was right now we're not doing any forecasting on the air is so unpredictable without a doubt the two major on and added these are countries that play such a big part in the upper left of the world economies are the united states and china and in the case of china china represents about two thirds of the demand growth for major commodities around the world whether it's iron ore whether it's coal whether it's nicole whether it's copper ah and it's on the back of urbanization and we have not seen any expectation is between now and the year twenty twenty five

are there will be about two hundred and fifty million people living in cities along in in china are they have just committed to call esau the five and eighty six billion to infrastructure development along the government is actually intent on continuing to generate that growth china obviously has come off gdp growth from you know twelve percent that we've seen over once they are ten years or look a polling nine percent this year poet and a ramp down to go down to about eight percent next year aren't band a lot depends upon the us and the ability of the us to come back quickly art in terms of commodity prices they've dropped almost half across the board i mean plotting hours is trading below the marginal cost of production is not a sustainable situation and what will happen is an investor investment will not be mays so longer term there will be more of a shortage

and i think you could even see the priest jumping further than what we've seen in the last couple years so are junior riders out there will be hard pressed to survive in many cases and as i said earlier the development our future minds is not going to be an easy places it is a matter of you know companies like herself to support that moment of work rail systems road system sports system and it's going to take the wherewithal to make that happen that's why getting back to the question how much do you put on that i can't give a figure it's more more every day the next question for cynthia carol what can companies like anglo american do to promote good governance in countries like zimbabwe ah that the zimbabwe attack on well i don't know that we that we aren't in the case of zimbabwe and was actually been in zimbabwe for more than fifty years on and we elected more recently with with the challenge

and the companies like herself to stay in zimbabwe are to stay in only because we employ a lot of people we've got sugar cane our farms operations on and we also have been looking at the development of a platinum mine and we don't produce we don't generate any revenue in zimbabwe were not paying any taxes in zimbabwe armed and we're only there because we want to be part of the post lagarde regime aren't so we're not against and that's an extreme case but we're ninety eight only on are on the government suddenly we had our communities are who actually pleaded with us to say and we knew that in terms of food distribution there would not be any if we did not start we distribute food to our employees and their families which which probably exceeds over a hundred thousand people at the end of the day i am now you note your question about government and governance good

governance and me we haven't said we've got on the extract of industries transparency initiative which is hugely beneficial in places like the continent of africa on but we also been the case in particular of south africa and we've had over the years of good times are not so good time to enter into relationship and i spent a lot of time personally with government around the world at the highest levels and with ministers to try to engage and try to understand where they're coming from and what they're looking for and how we can build a model that is win win for everybody and that's the only sustainable approach in my view you mentioned the anglo american is involved with developing a coal plant in illinois can you tell us one that's scheduled open and how can we find out more information about it well it won't open because it's only envy on in that in the feasibility or even pre feasibility stage on we've

put money and to find just the tactical development and research and that's as far as it's gone so far arms so if you look up future gen i think you'll find it on google or on the website and website the final question from the audience for cynthia carol what lessons are you taking from this financial crisis and what lessons can the market take from anglo americans experience especially in terms of the relationship between business and governments on a whole lot of questions about exactly sure about and for all that appeared on in terms of in terms of lessons learned i mean it gets back to the earlier question about commodity prices and where we are i i think i think it just reminds us aren't at day in day out that we have to be as low costs as we possibly can be and we have to be so rigorous in everything that we do

so on one of the one of the positions that i have taken since i arrived is first of all that we do benchmark and we know exactly where we sit on the cost curve on air we said those businesses that are never going to get on the low end of the cost curve and therefore will not be competitive or not be viable on any part of the cycle and you know today we are really driving our investment plans in terms of delivering on our project on time and which in budget and that's a major challenge art but as well looking at the prototype one that we have in place you know because this is as we mentioned earlier it's about law school in more than forty five three and inflation on top of that more like sixty billion it's big and we are reflecting on the timing of that now we are trying to talk and cross the delivery on the project that we already have in hand and were looking at those products out there that we had imagined that we would

spend on and maybe dewine also some the products in peru from the president today on but there's some that are already put trainers are you up the tracks and in terms of what the young the financial community can take you know it's very very hard on we have been the talent and i constantly face is on balancing the short term for the long term and i'm i am a long term thinker a long term plan or an aide to be in a business as we are you can't just be looking at tomorrow we really do need to be preparing and that comes back to your question is there a question about our government and you know the way we fight with one another i mean we work so hard at it and we have to keep working out because governments chance ministers changers you know you look at china they're constantly changing south africa now is in you know in the midst of major challenge man and possible change and

you know there's no absolute early and the insane it's been there for a long long time ago and it's been fantastic but now they're being challenged so you have to keep working with all the constituencies and all the stakeholders in all potential government officials but it's really really are given to make you've been listening to simply a carol ceo of anglo american one of the world's largest mining companies carroll spoke a dispenser museum of art at the university of kansas on november fourteenth two thousand eight and now for a look at the other side of the mining industry we travel back in time back to nineteen fifty one the playful west frankfort illinois just hours before west frankfort number to mind was too close for the christmas holiday an underground explosion killed one hundred and nineteen miners working the second set the explosion garnered national

attention and resulted in the passage of the federal coal mine safety act of nineteen fifty two the west frankfort disaster is the worst of its kind since nineteen forty leading a hundred and eleven widows and a hundred and seventy six fatherless children in its wake the west frankfort mine disaster comes to us from the public radio exchange produced by chris yours sen nina jerusha

i'm a rejection of marsh and i was in the minority number two new island of explosion are abortion should do hoosier heaven sure she of the usual i were to do that night my name is alice sweet and women died in an explosion in nineteen fifty one there was the last shift before christmas and that he and his buddy matt out there to get me to go down and he said make us go get you and come on my house unless do something and iced in oregon and they met rinks rather it was coming off a day shift and he said dad how you boys better go down and get this message goes they'll make a big christmas day we won in the line and they come in and they're a time you're going to manipulate one john herb and railroad tracks were wrong or i had any income like a big race

statements made gulf of noise in the world and all our options for a war a high name is ill global pet and i was was record city school superintendent at the time of the mine explosion and i have a basketball game and we were in a gymnasium and someone that came in and asked me as pseudo schools power go down the only central junior high school gymnasium an open mic forum org and the pa announcer call for doctors because i'm an accident that my newspaper like wildfire throughout the gymnasium and then of course everybody rushed home are up to the mine itself

my uncle my mom's brother was it had this well again and they come in and announced that there had been an explosion of number to orient them he came to our house and said there's been an explosion and my mom and media lee says georgia's did that with my father my name is share agreement and my father was a trick rider it's a little cold family shows happen so he wanted capone andy cole on the top and he said some tavern in here as a dental vision no it isn't and when come to iran now which smelled smoke and he said to me you guys started out in some kind of motion on inside my name is eric

copy i was working a w f r rex i just come home from work we read daytime the station had to sign off the air for fifteen i just gotten home been home for a little while the phone rang my boss of please come back as bennett an accident some kind at the mine and that because they think it's bad nine stroll and then they're gone and then i looked at the number two man i was about a half years old and we even bet you know nan and didn't come home mama ornery worthy they are really waiting he'd work day shift that day and worked or little bit now for tv show our gothic are nearing gone your so you weren't mark i've been here for

quite a while somebody called out my neighbor and it was her own as she came down she said have you heard that had exploded at them i said know and i never thought about it in that much of a catastrophe you know i decided if you him her baby are they didn't say how bad it was all the families their wives and their sweethearts and the sons and daughters of the men who were down below on the second shift they know by this time that something it was more than just an accent it had to be something very serious and it was then the terrible word explosion just a good all throughout the counter and on our way that innocent flannel at coal and gas wells fargo and somebody is lamb and the miners were killed in a dismal oh my

then they took me home later and then go anymore i could see were no point made going to think that they're and of course everyone rushed out to the mine and waited they waited and waited i'm so terrible insomnia brought out there already nineteen nineteen seventy three

day we did know he would kill in winter in our world war ii was our good news over the ocean over that for allies say that sutter but he was ok and then get your hopes urban then they'd say knowledge didn't think anybody was alive i better ideas when listened to then and just turned to not really easy is said a certain way the radio station was the essential point for all the no's it was dispensed we had the announcers a coming from all the networks from los angeles and chicago smaller radio stations and we had to make some horrific announcements we called for funeral directors please come and help us we need your help come to the central jim or would set up a temporary morgue help us identify the bodies as they are brought up we need their bags for the bodies

settlers are many many many many many come on down to the gymnasium where a british run the bodies and they would bring him out on the election and may he headed places they'd call him a junior wide jam and all morning broke there in head of that got in trouble because it didn't tell you that was one of them

as we've been on the list it on this same forest for the sheer anomaly him and that huge margin that you've written that was about the only place where they could have enough space because there were so many of the bodies and all that they were and they would bring a man and cover them and they'd let you have the time to identify anyone that they could identify him lined up and getting roles on the gym floor covered up and it was terrible presidium get him out for quite some time i think my helmet wasn't found for about two days anyway so legally jewelers leaving

summer mainly song round the oatmeal which terrific term memory that mr hersh to host so the bottlers but he he bled on the gym floor may never did get that out of florida's republican sen sherrod brown region every year low he would just talk about how terrible it was an ambush at the families were going through he was just almost in tears when he'd come home from an all but he'd be home and try to sleep alone an eagle that it tore him up pre match they got very little sleep there are small they come out and lay down for maybe an r and i get dear to gamble let down now if he stayed out there long time is did three day for you if i can come home that he was tortured by it could really getting talk about it you know

much nothing else for a long time and it was early really absurd and he was shipped in part you know he was like a zombie for about three months after you would need power last month away as a horrifying experience and in an american families in town are connected one way or another relative or a neighbor or for an unknown and it was a nightmare for worse record the only thing that identified my father's body was and he had on a range that my mother had bought him it was a black onyx rank with a diamond and his and michel dionne that we never went back to the house that we lived in our life was never the same my mother lived to be eighty two years old but it's never recover and indiana my name now imagine

that the battle natalie's man not uncommon among and i'd whistle blow your sister secular really one was five one last two summers christmas i hope i never see another one like it we buried him on christmas eve and had to get out and have said a child on christmas day koval kids

at age don't understand there's a gray pessimist are you forever my mother in the funeral the day after christmas she didn't want it to be you know on a christmas day we never had a christmas tree are we never celebrated christmas again everyone had ever sent what i don't think it i think it affected everyone and west frankfort o'leary oh towns around here david davies and radio disc christmas the national radio to local radio to full of little announcement could imagine individualistic who reportedly

sent out a letter this is probably where treasury is tolerated thank you i've been here is

your sister neither neither you've been listening to the west frankfort mine disaster of nineteen fifty one this piece was produced for public radio exchange by independent producer chris

yours i'm kate mcintyre kbr presents is a production of kansas public radio at the university of kansas on our way that innocent flannel and coal and gas are from somebody is lamb and the miners are children's moral identity and the name natalie's dear sisters and brothers last year mother of bangers are weak and i cannot write goodbye centralia goodbye he looks like him for me and i will not buy this as he arrived in letters didn't you really lovely scary island while

i was in we found a place in the air call to love ourselves we're in this law is bad and the fumes common in the gas is a barn and my dear sisters and brothers there's nothing we can do in it i can hear them just a mark of my privacy in this never happens again in your sisters and brothers and my lang

is what is it in a minute baby is this your mother and denying him on my eyes at the end