A Letter From Laurine
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The following is excerpted from a letter report from Laurine Williams who, with her husband Murray, owns a National Register of Historic Places property in Greene County. Charlene Vaughn is with the federal Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. June 3, 2001 Here is an update for you on the damage at the Thomas Kent, Jr. Farm. We have received so much extra attention to try to save our house that I don’t want to appear to complain. All that would do is take more away from our neighbors. Our neighbors deserve the same consideration. So I just sit here telling myself that this should not be allowed. What right should anyone have to cause such damage to our property or our neighbors?… Private citizens should not have to defend their property or suffer financial loss in order to do so. And there should be better protection for National Register for Historic Places properties. Our first loss was our spring. After many years of supplying excellent water for the house, our spring went dry when all of the wells down the valley went dry. Coal mining subsidence took the water. Our historic springhouse ceased to house a spring. The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP) is supposed to be protecting our water supplies, streams, and ponds but they really protect the coal companies’ profits. R.A.G. Emerald Coal Company (RAG) does have to supply us with water, and a big water tank truck pulls into our farm every Friday with city water. They will have to get a permanent supply to us in the next two years.… We have survived having our house lowered 4.9', tilted toward the pond about 7" and back again, creating extreme stress on the house infrastructure. Other than a few creaks and groans, we felt and heard very little. Other homes had mini earthquakes, cracking plaster and deep loud noises. We do know that the coal company stopped the longwall-mining machine about 200 feet in front of our house. They did maintenance on the machine so when they started up again they could go under the house and out the back without stopping. I understand the worst damage happens if they stop under a house. The longwall-mining machine did not stop until it reached to fence line in back of the shed. RAG put 100 more amps of electricity in our house so they could heat the house with electric and disconnect the gas and hot water baseboard heat. A propane tank was put outside of our kitchen and connected to our stove for cooking. After dinner one evening we nearly had a serious accident when our son-in-law was overcome with carbon monoxide fumes shortly after the propane gas was installed. The mining company’s contractor failed to install the required gas monitors in the kitchen and we were not aware of the danger. RAG put 16 nylon ropes around the brick on the house with 300 lbs. of tension on each rope, plus five cables on the foundation with 2,000 to 5,000 lbs. of tension. The other buildings were similarly roped. These ropes had to be checked three times a day to be sure that the tension remained the same. There were trenches from 3' to 12' deep around all of the buildings filled with gravel, straw and sump pumps. These were covered with plywood and had many, many yards of orange plastic fencing around them and yellow caution tape. We had only one way out of our house and that was through the kitchen door.… For days we had continuous noise and confusion and total strangers moving around our property within a twelve-hour period every day.… The rafters on the roof were reinforced. There were 6" × 6" beams in the basement on heavy-duty pipe jacks to prevent the floor joists from dropping if the foundation moved out too much. The panels and doors were removed from the entranceway in the center hall and the upper part of the front steps was removed from the front porch so they wouldn’t pull the front porch down. The front porch was tied into the house and there was cribbing underneath to prevent it from dropping. RAG provided a storage trailer to store all of the doors from the house, including the closet doors and the doors between rooms. They removed anything of historical significance to protect it against damage because it costs so much to replace them. They also put my library books, snail collection, dolls, china, photo albums, and pieces of furniture that were family heirlooms in the trailer. Our engineer told us that if our house moved more than 2" we could have irreparable damage. The front wall moved 11.2", and the largest crack in the house was 11.2". That is bad enough since those cracks did not close completely and will require special repair (a 2" crack was in the basement floor). Soon after the longwall-mining machine reached the fence line, several very large cracks opened in the pasture and had to be filled in immediately because there are calves on the fields that could have fallen into the cracks and been injured. There were also cracks up near the barn and in the hay field of similar proportion. Some of the cracks were 30" wide, 10' to 15' long, and we couldn’t tell how deep because they appeared to be bottomless. If anyone had told me that “now” would be the most difficult time I would not have believed them. But now I will tell you it is the most difficult. We cannot hurry the restoration work or the work might have to be done over at our expense so we just sit here. I have developed asthma, and Murray has shingles. Our doctors have told us our health problems are stress related. The stress is unbelievable. Murray suffers in silence. I do not.… The coal company has removed the ropes on the house and the cables on the foundation. Door frames and a few windows are still braced. The workers are filling in the trenches and we hoped to see grass seed in the lawn soon after. Unfortunately, so many errors have been made that they are digging up the trenches behind the house for the third time.… Since there are cracks in all of the rooms (where there were none) and some serious cracks that will take special work, and brick work inside and outside will need to be repaired or replaced, it will probably be a long time before we see the end of this, if ever. Our home is not suitable for daily living.… This summer we will not be able to look out the windows from the front entrance or go out on the porch, and we will miss the warm evenings out there watching the wild geese that have made their home in our valley.… Dirt and dust will be the words of the summer and plaster dust the words of the fall season.… Eventually, our house will be back to normal, according to RAG, but I will have some problems getting back to normal myself.… The coal company talks with the reporters and tells them that our home will be completely repaired and restored. They don’t explain that we must spend hours trying to keep repairs to our damaged home and buildings moving forward.… It is not the coal company that pays for the restoration of our property. We pay for it with doctor bills, total interruption of our lifestyle, legal fees, and a take-over and control of our lives.… I wish I knew of a way to reach the public to give them a real understanding of the extent of the damage caused by longwall mining, and to get them to understand the stress and anxiety to the people that live above the longwall panels. Unfortunately, you can drive through a neighborhood overlying a panel that has been mined and see nothing but houses that appear to be in fine shape. The people in those same houses may be peering out through serious cracks in the foundation and plaster may be falling off the walls and ceilings. The floors may slope and you would find it difficult to walk there. As you drive by, you would not know that the kitchen cupboard doors hang ajar or the outside doors do not open. One sure outward sign of longwall mining is the “water buffalo” wrapped in black plastic beside every house because they have lost their spring or well. We must find a way to persuade the legislators that the laws must be changed in favor of the landowners and the owners of National Register Homes of Historic Places. We must protect our heritage, our homes, our water, and our neighbors. Laurine Williams Click here
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