Bluefield Coal Symposium 2014

摘要

A few moments before the start of the 2014 Bluefield Coal Symposium on August 12, 2014, Bill Raney, president of the West Virginia Coal Association, looked out into the audience gathered at the Brown-Gilbert Basic Science building on the Bluefield State College campus and asked, "Hey, Bill Archer. When we came through Bluefield today, I noticed there wasn't any coal in the Norfolk Southern Railway yard. What does that mean?" The conference started before Raney could get his answer. A century ago when the United States was helping its friends fighting World War I against the Germans, a Bluefield railroad yard filled with loaded coal hopper cars meant that the US Navy was loading its steam-powered ships and Merchant Marine fleet with genuine "smokeless" Pocahontas Coal as a stealth measure to avoid detection by German ships that were determined to sink America's answer to poppies already growing in Flanders Field.