coal camps
Miners' company towns
Coal camps were company-owned settlements built near mines to house workers and their families.
The mining company typically owned all structures—houses, stores, schools, churches—and often paid wages in scrip redeemable only at the company store.
Common in Appalachia and other American coalfields from the late 1800s through the mid-twentieth century, coal camps kept miners economically dependent on their employers.
My grandfather grew up in a coal camp in West Virginia.
- company townsEmployer-controlled worker settlements
- company housingEmployer-provided living space
- railroadsTrain transportation systems
- wage laborWork exchanged for payment
- company storeEmployer-operated retail outlet
industrialization · tipple · mine shaft · miners' unions · union hall · ethnic diversity · oral histories · mining towns · black lung · folk music · labor migration · rural poverty · scrip · pay day · holler · child labor · abandoned mines · family dynamics
coal campsfishing villages
Coastal communities centered on catch
resort towns · university towns · market towns · farming communities · financial districts