You Can't Go Back to Buxton

This was Buxton Iowa a bustling boom town in the early 19th and ribbons. And this is all that remains of Buxton. I dk where House and the old paymasters vault. The only remnants of Iowa's largest black coal mining town. And yet. Something else remains. The memories of Buxton's former residents. And their legacy. My memories are very. Close and. It gives me something I'm very grown up with. The surroundings. And just the. Atmosphere of. Them you know in a place like Buxton. Was very important. It was him not in the black and white trouble. But everybody was a person.

Bringing. To live met in that Miles where I don't find that. Anything This is what my heart but I think maybe someday something. Maybe that remembers. To more than 4000 blacks bussed in Iowa has been home. What began as just another coal camp in Monroe County became a small city that stood out from the other shanty towns of the area. Buxton boasted all the trappings of an established community churches. Three schools a YMCA a variety of shops even a baseball team. All this was an oddity for a place that was never incorporated but knew it and would come when the mines were worked out. And survival would mean moving on to a new camp. To dig in a new

mine. Dorothy Schrader is an instructor of history at Iowa State University completing her Ph.D. on the history of coal mining in Iowa. I see average length of time for a coal camp in Iowa was roughly eight years. And the reason for that was that the coal seams were simply limited. And when the coal seam had played out or when they had mined. Most of the cool then the coal can simply cease to exist. It existed because the families of the workers had to have a place to live close to the work itself. And again before the day of the automobile. The only solution seemed to be for the company to build very temporary homes. Really right next to the actual coal mine itself. Later when automobiles came in and then miners could live in incorporated communities and perhaps drive 10 to 20 miles to

work and then recall chaos really began to die out but the typical life of a coal camp would be around eight years. Everyone recognized it was temporary so there was very little incentive to really build good houses or to maintain those houses once they had been built. Moving from place to place was common for most miners who were used to company controlled towns and company ruled lives underpaid overworked and in debt to the company store was all that many a miner looked forward to. You live in a company how would you. But the company's Corney about the company's groceries and demolish closing everything you want in the cab you bought from the company. Only Ellen blushed and then it wasn't quite that day they had a company store company meat market but there was three other meat markets that it becomes a little known company. Knowing their drugstores they didn't own the restaurant

but Buxton's beginnings were different. The company that ran the town the Consolidation Coal Company was I was in greatest coal mining operation purchasing developing and abandoning mines to meet the tremendous energy demands of its owner. The Chicago Northwestern railroad. Coal supplied the power for the iron horse. To coal. Everywhere. Carbon life.

To my cat. And it shows you where to get in a deep dark mine Jack. I never see that even when I almost like got home I see the great big blue. Everywhere. Not an ounce of gold tooth big real room everywhere a. Bag ounce of gold too big. Things seem to be going well for consolidation. There was plenty of coal to mine and operations were running smoothly until eighteen eighty one that is when a strike was called that consolidations Mucha Cannick mining operation.

John Emery Buxton the mine superintendent decided to recruit black laborers from the South to keep the mines working. He sent home Armstrong a black businessman from a half the county to Virginia and Kentucky to secure men. My mother's people came to Buxton as a result of my mother having married a buck's dinner. But my father's people came the long way around. They came from Virginia and too much of crime not. Much a kind eye to Buxton. As miners. And then. My father. The coal as a miner until he became an engineer. But the route was very shortly after after slavery. Average miners. There was round 10 I was a. That was big money back in those days because. It

takes. Most of the budget come on and come up there was a fortune because they were working for so practically even a neighbor right back home and say I'm appearing in God's country you know. And I would you know. Your family ready to move your family know your family first eventually of all your family appear because you're making good wages. More and more blacks continue to come to Iowa the much the mines consisted of nine different shafts and slopes but by the late eighteen eighties the production of the mines began to decline. Superintendent Buxton decided to develop land in adjacent Monroe County running the railroad further south by 19:00 the Consolidation Coal Company controlled a large portion of Section 4 of Monroe County Bluff Creek township laden

with coal. The entire muchy camp abandoned its quarters and moved into the new consolidation tract in Bluff Creek to begin sinking mines and building houses in the town named after their respected superintendent. Buxton Mr Buxton decided to retire and his son Ben assumed the responsibilities of superintendent for the growing camp. More miners were recruited more wrote families in the South to come to Buxton where miners houses were on a quarter acre lot. Schools were being built and the miners well-being Wisconsin and. Buxton was ahead of the most. Sisters picture will show it to. Inspectors mine inspectors and things to give them a clean a building. Most mining communities and blushingly was pretty. Square with people living on the moon. They had a park and they had things for him to do.

An issue which you didn't get in most places in Munich. Also here. It was actually good minor maybe at the end of the year where you get a $200 bonus or some you know insanity for some minor to get a little extra Thanksgivings a Christmas theme a turkey and stuff like that which you didn't get at all my miserly native or just you get in and they couldn't come out of it but the best and they seemed to care. You know they had the miners at heart. It wouldn't so many accidents. 9:00 a.m. where we come from. And mind you there was somebody coming out every day just about bringing men out of there or even slated for gasoline and gas pockets. And. Right that. Actually was altogether

different. And the research that I have done on coal mining I have looked back through some of the National Coal Mining publications and the Consolidation Coal Company was held up as a prime example of an enlightened and a progressive core company. Buxton's liveliness enchanted the children of the miners with a variety of things to do and the opportunity to learn. But when you said Tell me about those miners wanting their children's children to be improved. That s the way why nobody stayed out of school to two as I've I've heard the people do to farm. There weren't any farms there was a father who worked in the coal mine. You got up and went to school. Now the only thing that you had to do chores. Everybody heated the house with the with calls

those so you brought in the coal. The water was outdoors so you pumped the water that sort of thing you did but you went to school. You kept your grade. You were supposed to graduate and go on. When I look read now that was just gonna like. Heaven to me in the way of speaking to us. The memories were so nice Such as. You know we go out Sunday to the ball games and. Monogrammed surgery alone with ride in Surrey out to Little Rock out Lille to the Surrey and then ride out to the ballgame. And they ride the roller skating and really. Really shells of different things up activities. The head there. Was a very. You know stays within you. Had such a pleasant. Memory about some of the schools

and how the people would get together. A. Man came to Buxton. Donnie would be heading. Down and we. Were conditioned to carry. Around the world will be. The. In the back man came the box didn't found opportunity. Down is on the run in the community. Bond showed the passion where men were beginning to Doris in practising. And eating feces cherries are an you within the sound. Of A. Bitch can't. Stand that agency's minds

has been a raisin in the mud. Daddy. Partly Nancy. GRACE. Casey and found communication in their lives in harmony. ESPN. It was a place that had no color. In fact it was a black. It was a place where white and black. We learned about each other working side by side in the mine. He had taught me to get the same for every you take for yourself if you do bad you will get along very well. But the people in motion were good people. They had seven characters in motion. Now can you. Ruth nor play. The rag. People who would come into the white

and white people are going to brag. I was a kid who lived about a block from the second bad and the balcony and maturity entered from the outside. And I do use you have to go up the strip in that door and go up and they're going to let paranoid in addition to saying they were harming you there and I really enjoyed it. One can read one of the British European women. I didn't know that there was any other way to live. I thought. I didn't think. I didn't know there was any other way to live. The black people had the ball team. The black people had the. Band. That's how my mother became acquainted with my father because the band went to Iowa for fair and she met this band man. And. The black people had the hotel. The black people

had a y m c a. My husband's father was secretary of the boy's Department of the YMCA in fact bucked and was the only place in the world that had the building YMCA set up one for the adults and one for the children. And. I thought this really everybody unworldly. Ruben Danes live perhaps one of the most colorful lives in Buxton. His father owned the hotel the dance hall. Some of the gambling houses and a number of other properties and what came to be called Gaines town one of Buxton suburbs. Today at 90 he hardly looks like the Gay Blade of the roaring 20s but there's still that twinkle in his eye. Our lives were exciting. I was young.

I. Had no more to move to other parts of the country world carnival music written soul food to praise him most and there was always excitement. From one week to another. Along with the excitement. Some of the Browns we mixed in with it so people know we've gone too far and there are jerks who are who and what was going on. The quality of life afforded Buxton's residents many luxury when we think of lifestyle I. I can truthfully tell you I never in my life lived in a house where there wasn't a musical instrument where there were not newspapers. Where there were not books. I never ate at a bare table because they hadn't polished tables hadn't come in style so it was tablecloth. Now the nearest I came to eating at a table that didn't have a tablecloth in the

morning the men had on their mining clothes so there were newspapers on the table. To keep the tablecloth from getting black. But those minor Globes I never lived in the house that was on carpeted. That was our lifestyle and I wasn't alone. All of the youngsters there that I played with real live the same one. Marjorie Brown was 12 years old when she left Buxton. Her parents had died and she was sent to live with her grandparents in Cedar Rapids. It was a hard adjustment to make. It was a place where I was one of the littles the ones fortunate enough to play the piano to sing a little bit. That. I've always. Known. I wrote a little bit plays a little programs that I wanted to share. And. I guess the shock of my life was to go to Cedar Rapids. And find out that I didn't

exist. Because I've been solely in the habit of hearing Marjorie will do this. Marjorie will have to argue that Marjorie. Will learn this. And that was a name I was used to and to go somewhere where Marjorie no longer existed. Was a bit of a shock. A little. But Marjorie had come into being in Buxton. Well I'm sure for people that moved from Buxton especially the ones that really spent their childhood in Buxton. And then. When they moved to another community. I I can only think that it must have been really a very shattering. Experience. I remember one woman telling me that in her home in Buxton she learned to play the piano. She had become accustomed to really a very gracious lifestyle. And her

feeling when she went into a school in another our community and as a child would probably do very openly very honestly went up to the teacher to tell the teacher that she could play the piano and that she would be happy to do something for her for the other students in her class and her feeling upon being rejected. I suppose this is something that one really has to experience to really understand what I think. Again it puts the thing into perspective. It must have been a very traumatic experience for these people. Well they were not very many people. Not very many black people in in Cedar Rapids honestly. I wonder if there were 300. There. And coming from a town of nine thousand and possibly Clouston fifteen hundred of them. Right. It was a brave new world. It was a brand new.

Thing for me. I had to learn. So much and then learned again. I had to learn. That Marjorie was an important part. Of. A community. And learn again that she was second third fourth or are known although Buxton had given rise to a population of nearly 6000 including a long list of black professionals doctors lawyers and teachers and came very quickly. By the end of World War One production began to decline. The railroads were turning to a new source of energy. To replace the cumbersome call consolidations mines were being sunk further away some. People began moving into now and closer to mines and 19 bucks in mind

when he was wheeled over and there are a number a number 19 was called Bucknall and number 20 at that time. Tractor number 20. And they built a town of Haydock from biking U.S. Open in cars. Out there in Baltimore and she meant foundation. Well then they had labored. Went on strike. Can try to mind in southern Illinois. So it is transferred through southern Illinois for the people who were there they had to have gathered

all over the country and probably moved to a different question and yet today Buxton's legacy goes on every month and a small Baptist church on the morning's east side the Buxton club meets its membership is largely black and many of its members never worked in the mines but they did grow up in Buxton. They still trace their beginnings back to that empty square mile in Monroe County and they wonder what can be done to restore the cattle trampled cemetery where their ancestors lived to commemorate an important chapter in Iowa's black history. The club's president Paul Wilson. We. In trying to determine what were here at the two years through our connections with Buxton and we are working. Desperately. To try to document all that we can

find. To legitimize this. We have various committees various members of the club. Working to make a contribution in this direction. My preface. Some remarks were saying I was thirsty talking with a gentleman. Did own the farm surrounding the cemetery where you sold it to him. They were right to do something about making the cemetery available to the Buxton I will incorporate. What should become of the Buxton cemetery located in Section 4 of Bluff Creek township. Actually there is a bit of controversy over it. The members of the Buxton club would like to see it maintained at present four acres of privately owned land are now taxed me in Section 4 because of the

blocks to the cemetery that bring acres of the cemetery appear to be a new farmed by those who border it. And even the sheriff of Monroe County has gotten into the act. With this letter written in 1977 complaining about the state of the cemetery asking for levying of taxes in Section 4 of the township. To cover Macon. Road. And yet by the fall of 1979 nothing had been done. Can it be and should it be declared an historical site. I think the first step is the box to be placed on the national register. I think this calls attention to the historic significance of the site. It doesn't really mean that any changes will come about on the site but I think it draws attention to the importance of the site and I think for the former residents of Buxton that this would go a long way toward helping them

realize one of their goals. They they feel such pride about boxed and I think the fact that it receives that recognition I think will be important to them. I think the next step and this is something that the state preservation officer has talked about. Buxton offers really a unique opportunity to involve. Scholars from all over the United States particularly from the black community to coming to Broxton to come to the Buxton site rather to maybe First of all carry out what are called archaeological digs to find out more about the life styles of people through that type of exploration. Buxton is I think quite exceptional in that you still have so many people who remember vividly what the community was like. There are many pictures that exist of Buxton the town in a sense at least in terms of a model to be almost physically recreated through the pictures through the people's memories and

through the archaeological explorations that could be done. And what of Buxton's former residents what the future holds for the square mile of land that was home for so many. A place with a miner's House stand for a name. I'm a. Big seemingly proud. To have been from Buxton. Your name or your store room. Well I've been in or out you know day mood and great rhythm rhythm. No problem. I have some mixed feelings I can't go back to books to. The back. Of the box to spam in there to.

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