The genesis of this graphic novel came shortly after I began work as a labor organizer for the Chattanooga Area Central Labor Council. New to East Tennessee, I visited the public library, curious to learn all I could about the history of the labor movement in the Tennessee Valley. When I shared about my research, a friend sent me a chapter from a book entitled Dixie Be Damned: 300 Years of Insurrection in the American South. The chapter outlined a story of coal miners in East Tennessee who stood their own against the combined forces of the State and corporate interests in the post-Reconstruction South. It was also a story about the re-institution of slavery through racist "Convict Lease" laws.
This unholy alliance between wealthy coal barons and Tennessee politicians allowed private companies to lease prisoners from the state of Tennessee. This exchange gave the coal barons a cheap labor source and allowed our state government to make money off locking up (mostly) Black men on trumped-up charges. But more importantly, the Coal Creek War was a story about the unlikely alliance between predominantly white Appalachian coal miners and the predominantly Black convict laborers.
Given the contemporary narratives often spun about the South (typically by those who have no relation to the South), I believe we are in desperate need of remembering stories like this one. The South has such a rich history of working-class struggle (and victory) that seems to get glossed over, or omitted entirely, from the regional history. We need to remember the deep histories of solidarity found in our hometowns and hollers. We need to remember these stories about poor workers standing together, running the racist governor out of town, and setting prisoners free. We need to remember so that we can foster a more complex understanding of who we are as Southerners and reject the cynical, uncritical narratives that cast our communities as a politically homogeneous cultural stain on the country.
While most of the scarce documentation of the Coal Creek War is bound up in academic texts and images of 130-year-old newspapers, I believe this is a story that needs telling and retelling for a broader audience. While there is absolutely a need for granular academic histories and deep theoretical texts, it is also critical that we depict our stories and histories in forms that are digestible, accessible, and even entertaining. The stories that have impacted me most have been those told through film, comics, and other visual mediums. I've sketched most of my life, and took a handful of drawing and film courses in college, but this book is my first real attempt at sequential storytelling. My sincere hope is that this project will pique interest in this slice of Tennessee history and what it might tell us about Southern working-class struggle and solidarity today.
Trouble! At Coal Creek is a dramatic retelling of the 1891-92 Coal Creek War. Through the eyes of a coal miner's son, it tells the story of a mining community in East Tennessee that stood its own against the combined forces of the State and corporate interests in the post-Reconstruction South. I was fortunate to learn a great deal from folks like East Tennessee organizer and historian Charles "Boomer" Winfrey, whose great-grandfather was a miner who took part in the Coal Creek War. First-hand accounts passed down mouth to ear from generation to generation are indispensable, and must be remembered.
This excerpt begins on Halloween night, 1891, as the miners and townsfolk of Coal Creek, TN, prepare for their penultimate uprising against the occupying state militia who are guarding over a hundred convict laborers. In the dark of midnight, this band of rabble rousers is initiated into the sacred order of the Knights of Labor. The Knights, who were among the most radical labor organizations of the 19th century, performed a deeply mystical set of rituals rooted in egalitarianism, cooperativism, and a sharp rebuke of the corrupting power of unbridled wealth. While the historical record is unclear on the extent to which the Knights were involved in this particular uprising, we know that at least a handful of the Coal Creek leaders were dedicated members. Regardless, the powerful imagery in their rituals punctuates the drama of what unfolds.
