Knox Mine Disaster

This tragedy took place on January 22, 1959. A rich vein of anthracite lay under the Susquehanna riverbed at the village of Port Griffith, near Pittston. As miners worked upon this vein, the Susquehanna River smashed through and flooded the mine. Twelve miners were killed immediately, their bodies washed away in the flood, never to be seen again. There were 74 workers in the mine at the time of the calamity, 62 of them were able to escape by various means, some involving the highest heroism on the part of their co-workers.

Causes

How could it have happened? Government investigations discovered the immediate cause in two illegal chambers dug under the river and extending 125 feet past the officially designated "Stop Lines." Moreover, the chambers were quarried without the benefit of boreboles to determine the thickness of the rock cover (35 feet was considered the minimum) and without proper surveying. Miners obeyed company orders and quarried the two tunnels, following their coal at a sharp upward angle toward the riverbed until the rock cover dwindled to a mere six feet. The thin "roof" could not withstand the weight of the Susquehanna.

Company greed and ineffectual mining inspectors provided other answers. Penalties proved to have little deterrence value. The sanction for this type of illegal mining only amounted to a $500 fine and a 90-day prison term. And then there was the criminal corruption at the Knox Coal Company involving both organized crime and the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA).

Not only was John Sciandra, one of the founders of the Knox Coal Company in 1943, named as the "top boss" of the region's organized crime family by the Pennsylvania Crime Commission, but prosecutors discovered that August J. Lippi, president of District 1 UMWA, had become a silent partner in the company in 1950 in flagrant violation of the Taft-Hartley labor law. Ten persons were indicted for criminal activities associated with the Knox case, including Superintendent Groves, but only Lippi and his partners, Louis Fabrizio and Robert L. Dougherty, served jail time (Sciandra had died in 1949, but his wife and heir, Josephine, was indicted). It became clear that the Knox Coal Company had developed one of the most corrupt mining operations in the region's history. In these endeavors, the company was joined not only by the District I UMWA but also by the firm that had leased the River Slope to Knox, the Erie Railroad-owned Pennsylvania Coal Company, two of whose officers were among the indicted.

Aftermath

Despite its decline, anthracite still commanded a large share of the local economy. The 1958 production of 7,669,440 tons had a market value of $76.9 million. With a predisaster unemployment rate over twice the state figure at 11 percent and a median income at about 80 percent of the state average, each of the area's 11,636 coal-related jobs was valuable.

One estimate of the disaster's impact put the direct and indirect job loss at 7,500, with a payroll deprivation of $32 million. Within months of the break-in, two of the area's largest coal companies-- the Pennsylvania and the Lehigh Valley-- announced a full withdrawal from the anthracite business. Their mines had been permanently damaged, company officials said. A potentially significant budgetary jolt also faced several local governments that relied heavily on coal tax assessments. Because of the Knox-related losses, the northern anthracite area would be forced to confront a multitude of grave new problems.

Other companies whose mines lay some distance from the Knox continued to operate on a much smaller scale into the early 1970s. However, water from shutdown operations continued to build up, and the steep cost of pumping, along with mismanagement, continuing corruption, and anthracite's declining competitive position relative to fuel oil and natural gas, eventually killed deep mining. Billions of tons of anthracite are still in the ground but remain inaccessible because of underground flooding.

The Knox mine disaster has remained an important part of the region's history and consciousness. The tragedy is remembered by a gravestone in front of St. Joseph's Church in Port Griffith, a marker engraved with 12 names. It is commemorated by a well-attended religious service every January 22. It is recalled by anniversary news stories and television interviews. How could citizens in this tightly knit community forget the tragic death of 12 mineworkers and the losses suffered by their families; the 60 massive railroad gondolas swallowed like bath toys by a raging whirlpool; the three-day sentry watch by multitudes gathered along the Slope mint Susquehanna' 5 banks; and the images of rescued men climbing out of the ground, one after the next, as family and friends welcomed each with tears of relief?

Just as importantly, how could they forget the corporate and criminal causes of the fiasco? The aggrieved populace of Northeastern Pennsylvania still remembers the Knox disaster as a breach not only of the Susquehanna River but also of public trust in the mining industry, in its largest union, in government inspectors, and in the broader political economy that permitted such abuse.