Posted: 3/21/2011 7:48:48 AM EDT
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Sitting here listening to some old music and a lot of the themes in yesteryear music was work or suffering, etc.
I recall my grandfather. He was strong, I mean strong like a bar of steel. He worked manual labor all of his life starting out cutting timber as a boy and in the Civilian Conservasion Corps when he was a teenager he helped build what is now Cowans Gap State Park, in PA. Served in the Army during the war and came home to spend over a decade working in the coal mines of western PA. He would tell me how he would swing a pick axe while laying on his belly and the mine roof was against his back. Getting paid by the ton and going to work in the dark and coming home the same barely making enough to pay the company store. He and my grandmother farmed most of their food, had no running water or electricity.. His hands were like leather covered 20# hammer heads. He could dig a fucking hole big enough to burry a small car in no time. He could swing an axe like a professional timber sport guy and his back was like an I-beam. All of his life he worked, until the day he died. He never sat idle. And through all of his hard work and aching bones he never lied, stole, cheated or took a handout. Was the most honest and morally guided man I have ever met. He read the bible regularly all of his life and never wavered that his hard work would be repaid someday. And I believe it was. When he died, our whole family stood next to his bed, at his home he bought and paid for with his hands. It was quiet and peaceful. While death cannot be anything I would consider good, he went as anyy man would want to go. |
| We have to be careful not to over-generalize, and I have several close friends who were born into wealth. BUT I will share a guiding principle to you guys out there in GD... a woman who has had to work in hospitality (waitressing, food service, hotel cleaning, etc.) will be much different from the women who have never had to do those types of manual, more blue collar jobs. You will notice this in how they interact with service personnel. It can be a plus or a minus depending on exactly what you want in your mate. |
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Try to find someone to do tough physical labor these days.  I've had a few somewhat tough jobs when I was young, but coal mining? Not me  Great picture  , you should have that framed.He told me he was burried twice and they had to dig him out both times. The first time he was in there for two days. He always took an extra sandwich in his lunch box for just such an occasion after that happened. Then he said he was using this new fangled cutting machine and he cut through a vein of coal and water came rushing in and he was kneeling on top of the machine and the water up to his chin. He said it took them three hours to get the pumps running and get him out. He said he and his brother were working with another fella that was using an electric machine to cut the coal and the guy started to get electrocuted and his brother grabbed an axe and cut the power cord that fed the tool. he said it flashed and made a big loud bang. The fella was okay though. Then he would say that you could tell a cave-in was coming when the roof screws would start breaking. he said they would go "ping" and the timbers would start cracking and splitting you'd have a few seconds to get out of the "room". terribly hard and dangerous work. |
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The picture was taken at the same gun range where hhe taught me to shoot when I was a little guy. Full circle and all that. It was the last time he went shooting. He was always too busy trimming hedges and mowing that summer and then I went TDY for a couple months and in the winter he turned south pretty quick.
He sure like to shoot stuff though. We always shot together, pellet guns to M1's and everything in between. We used to bait field mice with cheese crackers in the cellar and wait on them with a BB gun, lol. Sling shots too! Anything that slung a round, we toyed with it. he enjoyed anything like that and he made it his dying duty to make sure I was the same way, lol. |
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God bless him..
I had uncles that worked the mines in Pennsylvania and quarries in other parts of New England when they came here from Wales., My dad did it as a teen and was fortunate enough to become an electrician journeyman and didn't have to spend 10 hours a day in the hole. he went to war and used his education funds to get an engineering degree.. Going in that hole in the ground has been something I avoided like a plague, takes a special backbone to do that and not one I was born with. Chef |
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God bless him.. I had uncles that worked the mines in Pennsylvania and quarries in other parts of New England when they came here from Wales., My dad did it as a teen and was fortunate enough to become an electrician journeyman and didn't have to spend 10 hours a day in the hole. he went to war and used his education funds to get an engineering degree.. Going in that hole in the ground has been something I avoided like a plague, takes a special backbone to do that and not one I was born with. Chef He helped build this when he was barely a boy. 
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Sitting here listening to some old music and a lot of the themes in yesteryear music was work or suffering, etc. What are you listening to? A CD of old slave spirituals? It can't be country; thats all about women, drinking and pickup trucks and dogs. It can't be rock; thats all sex drugs and rock n' roll. Maybe you should enlighten us. |
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Sitting here listening to some old music and a lot of the themes in yesteryear music was work or suffering, etc. What are you listening to? A CD of old slave spirituals? It can't be country; thats all about women, drinking and pickup trucks and dogs. It can't be rock; thats all sex drugs and rock n' roll. Maybe you should enlighten us. Some Johnny Cash. Now Im rockin' to Breaking Benjamin |
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Quoted: Quoted: Try to find someone to do tough physical labor these days. I've had a few somewhat tough jobs when I was young, but coal mining? Not me Great picture , you should have that framed.He told me he was burried twice and they had to dig him out both times. The first time he was in there for two days. He always took an extra sandwich in his lunch box for just such an occasion after that happened. Then he said he was using this new fangled cutting machine and he cut through a vein of coal and water came rushing in and he was kneeling on top of the machine and the water up to his chin. He said it took them three hours to get the pumps running and get him out. He said he and his brother were working with another fella that was using an electric machine to cut the coal and the guy started to get electrocuted and his brother grabbed an axe and cut the power cord that fed the tool. he said it flashed and made a big loud bang. The fella was okay though. Then he would say that you could tell a cave-in was coming when the roof screws would start breaking. he said they would go "ping" and the timbers would start cracking and splitting you'd have a few seconds to get out of the "room". terribly hard and dangerous work. Damn, that's a tough guy. |
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Try to find someone to do tough physical labor these days. I've had a few somewhat tough jobs when I was young, but coal mining? Not me Great picture , you should have that framed.He told me he was burried twice and they had to dig him out both times. The first time he was in there for two days. He always took an extra sandwich in his lunch box for just such an occasion after that happened. Then he said he was using this new fangled cutting machine and he cut through a vein of coal and water came rushing in and he was kneeling on top of the machine and the water up to his chin. He said it took them three hours to get the pumps running and get him out. He said he and his brother were working with another fella that was using an electric machine to cut the coal and the guy started to get electrocuted and his brother grabbed an axe and cut the power cord that fed the tool. he said it flashed and made a big loud bang. The fella was okay though. Then he would say that you could tell a cave-in was coming when the roof screws would start breaking. he said they would go "ping" and the timbers would start cracking and splitting you'd have a few seconds to get out of the "room". terribly hard and dangerous work. Damn, that's a tough guy. He had no other choice I guess. The mines were the only steady work around. He eventually moved down here to SE PA in 1957. My mom was 14 and it was the first time she had electricity and running water. Ironically, she absolutely hated it. He worked in the steel mill for a bit then had a job building metal buildings, then as a maitenance foreman at a metal finishing plant. he retired from that and started his own business as a welder/fabricator and retired from that a couple years before he died. The guy taught himself college math so he could engineer things people contracted him to build. I remember he got a job through a civilian contractor at the US Navy ship yard in Philly to build a stainless steel deisel fuel tank for a ship that was in for rework. It had to fit in some awkward space and it had a specific amount of fuel it needed to hold. Instead of contracting the design out, he bought some books and figured it out on his own. He continued to do work here and there for the USN until they closed the yard. He was the most determined man you could ever meet and he was extremely intelligent. He was a medic in the Army and knew all kinds of medical stuff. He told me he could stitch a gun shot wound with his eyes closed. |
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Great thread OP.
Reminds me a lot of both my paternal grandfather and my maternal maternal great grandfather. Both men who worked from boyhood till the end. Both strong and serious men who loved their families and their God. Both wonderful role models, as was your grandfather it would seem. Here then, to great role models and awesome grandpas: 
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Great thread OP. Reminds me a lot of both my paternal grandfather and my maternal maternal great grandfather. Both men who worked from boyhood till the end. Both strong and serious men who loved their families and their God. Both wonderful role models, as was your grandfather it would seem. Here then, to great role models and awesome grandpas: Compared to him, I could never be half the man he was. |
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imo there's not enough sweat in most people's work day.
My grandfather was a similar type, and what I remember about him wasn't as much how tough he was(although he was a weathered dude by anyone's measure), but how much mechanical intelligence and simple horse sense he had despite his lack of formal education. It was mostly his influence that made me find a job where I could challenge myself every day while still being outdoors and learning about the world instead of in an office. |
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