King Coal Show in Carmichaels honors coal miners’ history
CARMICHAELS – Many have said that history is not the past, but the stories we tell ourselves about the past. In telling ourselves these tales, we keep some semblance of the memory alive for as long as we are able to tell it.
One Carmichaels man hopes to continue to tell the story of the area’s coal mining history, one item at a time.
Presented by the King Coal Association, the 65th annual Pennsylvania Bituminous Coal Show, which runs through Aug. 25 in Carmichaels, is a celebration of the area’s industrial heritage. This year’s theme is “65 Years of Honoring Our Miners.”
Trista Thurston/Observer-Reporter
Brice Rush holds up the trolley pole of a set of coal mine carts made from old dynamite boxes, part of his expansive historical collection.
Association treasurer Brice Rush has been collecting coal mining memorabilia since the 1980s. He started with collectible hard hat stickers. Rush said that their protective headgear needed so much reflective material, and stickers became a big craze. He estimates that he has about 33,000 stickers housed in albums stored in his basement.
He recalls going to auctions since he was a small child, and he collects because he wants to keep the history alive, preserving things that are uniquely important to this region.
“Because it’s slowly going away,” he laments. “So we tell the story. Somebody’s got to do it. Somebody’s got to keep it alive.”
There are thousands of photos, books, almost 1,000 hats, posters and so much more. About 400 belt buckles, 70 from Consol alone, fill storage shelves. Bits and baubles of all sorts each have their own tale.
Trista Thurston/Observer-Reporter
Linda and Brice Rush on the porch of their reconstructed log cabin, moved to the property to house their coal mining memorabilia. The underside of the porch roof has mining signs.
“Everything here has a story,” he said, pointing to a wooden wagon built in the 1900s that now sits in his front yard. He begins to tell its tale, being buried for about 80 years.
“There’s more stories than that,” he begins a tour through his expansive collection.
Rush was a coal miner for over 20 years and said he married into a coal mining family. It’s been 25 years since Rush has worked in a mine, and he says how equipment has evolved in the intervening years, and even when he was underground, is astounding.
Trista Thurston/Observer-Reporter
Trista Thurston/Observer-Reporter
Some of the coal mining-related belt buckles in Brice Rush’s expansive historical collection are shown.
His wife, Linda, who serves as historian of the King Coal Association, interjects throughout the tour of the reconstructed cabin on their property that houses most of their wares. Each space is filled.
When he walks through the cabin, among the jackets, buckets, lanterns, ribbons and other pieces collected over the years, Brice said he can see all the stories. Everything has meaning and history. Some pieces he buys from auctions online. Some come from friends or relatives.
“I love local pieces because they’re familiar pieces,” Brice said.
His collection, though many items have ties to Southwestern Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio, has bits that come from as far away as Argentina.
Linda motions to some folk art pieces by local artist Alex Kanalis that are her favorite because of their one-of-a-kind nature that cannot be replicated.
Brice has difficulty selecting something specific. Asking him to choose is like asking a parent if they have a favorite child.
“They’re all my favorite pieces,” he said.
Brice is 73 and said he hopes to continue his historical efforts for 30 more years.
Trista Thurston/Observer-Reporter
Trista Thurston/Observer-Reporter
Linda and Brice Rush
“We have been given so many things, so much history to take care of,” Linda said, calling themselves the caretakers of history. “If we didn’t do it, a lot of this stuff would end up in dumpsters. We take care of it.”
They love it when people get excited about items, like when someone recognizes a predecessor in a photo.
“Then they tell us their story,” Linda said.
They hope to foster that excitement for years to come.
“I don’t sell hardly anything,” Brice said, thinking that if he can afford to buy an item, he can afford to keep it.
But despite that sentiment, he is a co-chair of the Eastern Mining Collectors Show, hosted by the King Coal Association. Collectors fill the Carmichaels Fire Hall to buy, sell and trade a myriad of coal mining memorabilia: lamps, hard hats, lunch pails, hard hat stickers, pins, ribbons, belt buckles and so much more. Admission to the collectors’ show is $1 and runs from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday.
Admission to the Coal Queen pageant, which will be held at 7 p.m. Sunday is $10.
Beginning Tuesday, there will be evening carnival rides, a mine rescue contest, pet parade, bicycle parade and educational exhibits. The week wraps up Saturday with the collector’s show, a car and motorcycle show at Wana B. Park, tractor show and parade at 4 p.m.
For the complete Pennsylvania Bituminous Coal Show schedule, visit kingcoalshow.com.